THESIS

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This is to certify that the

thesis entitled

Coms tock Park:

MILL TOWN TO BEDROOM SUBURB

presented by

David Wier

has been accepted towards fulfillment
of the requirements for

Mvo degree in HiStory

Major professor

 

Date August 5, 1981

0-7639

 

 

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(9 Copyright by
David War
1981

COMSTOCK PARK:
MILL TOWN TO BEDROOM SUBURB

By

David Nier

A THESIS

Submitted to
Michigan State University
in partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the degree of

MASTER OF ARTS

Department of History

1981

ABSTRACT

COMSTOCK PARK:
MILL TONN TO BEDROOM SUBURB

By

David Nier

This work is a local history. The devel0pment of a small Nest-
Michigan village, Comstock Park, is explored while the significance of
the events that fostered or hindered its growth are analyzed. The
major thrust of this thesis is to relate the familiar home environment
with the larger themes in state, national and world history. Comstock
Park is an unincorporated village that is in the process of being ra-
pidly assimilated into metropolitan Grand Rapids. Therefore, the re-
lationship between the fringe village and its parent city receives
special emphasis.

A wide range of materials are used for documentation including
books, magazines, journals, public documents, manuscripts, newspapers,
family records, letters and oral interviews. Considerable emphasis is
plaCed on oral interviews with senior citizens so many anecdotes are
included that may have purely local significance. They are included
because many incidents drawn from local history may be used to enrich

our lives in the future.

\h

PREFACE

My interest in local history began in the fall of 1969 when an
uncle, Clarence Nier, convinced me to respond to an article entitled
"History of Comstock Park" that was published in a community newspaper.
Homer L. Burch, the local historian who wrote the article, concluded
his brief history by stating "some local individual or group should
rise to the challenge of today--to research and develop the history of
Comstock Park to the last detail." Teaching social studies at Comstock
Park High School at that time, I decided to respond to the challenge of

the need for a "Village Historian."

After interviewing a number of the older residents in the community
and reading limited selections from original sources, I started to write

historical articles in the Comstock Park Observer. Interest in local his-

 

tory grew encouraging its introduction into the high school curriculum
where students joined in the research efforts and assisted in forming a
senior citizens' organization, whose members added to the store of in-
formation used in newspaper articles and a slide presentation developed

around a historical theme.

In the spring of 1979, feeling a need for an enriched historical
background and improved research and writing skills, I enrolled in the
Graduate School at Michigan State University as a history major. M.S.U.
provided encouragement through Dr. Emily 2. Tabuteau, Dr. Paul Duggan, Dr.
Frederick Williams and Dr. David LoRomer as they provided the confidence
I needed to improve long neglected academic skills. Furthermore, Dr.

Justin L. Kestenbaum, who served as my academic advisor, provided valuable

ii

assistance by broading my historical background and directing my research.

This project has been constantly encouraged by my own community
where senior citizens, students, colleagues, neighbors and family members
have provided support. However, among those who have given assistance
Clarence Wier has been a special source of inspiration, Therefore, it is

to Clarence that ”COMSTOCK PARK: MILL TOWN TO BEDROOM SUBURB“ is

dedicated.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION ............................ 1
CHAPTER
I. PIONEERS AT NORTH'S MILL, 1837 TO 1866 .......... 3
II. MILL CREEK VILLAGE, 1866 TO 1906 ............. 29
III. DEVELOPMENT OF COMSTOCK PARK, 1906 TO 1940 ........ 66
IV. UNINCORPORATED VILLAGE AND MASS SOCIETY, 1940 TO 1980 . . 111
APPENDIX .............................. 132
BIBLIOGRAPHY ............................ 133

iv

INTRODUCTION

The area north of Grand River has a history that is closely linked
to the growth and development of Grand Rapids. Early pioneers ventured
into the Grand Rapids hinterland for a variety of reasons. Some sought
the freedom of owning and living off the land, others anticipated wealth
from exploiting the few natural resources demanded by growing industries,
while a few went north when they could no longer endure the hard times
that frequently visited the infant city. Eventually these pioneers clus-
tered around small villages and created a rural culture that depended on
Grand Rapids as a market for their agricultural goods, as a supplier of
tools and manufactured products for the farm and home, and as their com-
munications link with the outside world. Grand Rapids was off the main
path of westward migration, because of the location of the Great Lakes,
and it was forced to forage closer to home for trade. Thus, Grand Rapids
became the warehouse and distribution center for the thinly populated
villages and farms in Kent County. Therefore, as Grand Rapids grew from
a small pioneer village to a modern city, it produced a spin-off effect
whereby larger enterprises accelerated the growth and development of some
of the surrounding villages and towns.

The small village of Comstock Park, located north of Grand Rapids on
the southern boundary of Alpine and Plainfield Townships, was one of these
off-shoot villages the history of which reveals a multitude of responses
to stimuli that originated in the parent city. The little settlement at

Comstock Park, formerly called Mill Creek, experienced an erratic growth

rising and falling with events that were produced outside its own rather
vague boundaries. Other communities experienced similar relationships,
especially with the economic development of Grand Rapids; some prospered
while others, like Plainfield Village, became ghost towns. Comstock Park
has experienced little prosperity in recent years, but it has maintained
its identity and refuses to pass away.

However, as the metropolitan area of Grand Rapids expands north-
ward, it poses a threat to the continued existence of Comstock Park. Hill
the people of Comstock Park again be forced to respond to outside forces
beyond their control or will they elect to shape their own destiny? In-
sight can be gained by looking to the past when similar forces altered
the lifestyle of the village. Because Comstock Park has remained unin-
corporated and has failed to develop the political machinery to plan its
future, it appears likely that it will again respond complacently to the
influence of the larger city. Therefore, the small village which has known
four names may someday add a fifth, Grand Rapids.

Comstock Park, and other towns and villages that are located on the
fringe of a city, cannot stop urban growth and, possibly, would not elect
to if they could. Still, these small villages and towns have often had a
rich heritage. If their past is not researched while their identity exists,
it probably never will be, and they will pass into oblivion. Local people
may make many uses of the past as they reach out into the future. This
work is written so the people in Comstock Park, and other communities like
it, may look back and reflect on their origins while looking ahead and

planning the type of environment and lifestyle they desire in the future.

CHAPTER I
PIONEERS AT NORTH'S MILL, 1837 TO 1866

Mill Creek is a small stream that flows from Cranberry Lake in sec-
tion six of Alpine Township in Kent County to Grand River in the south-
west corner of Plainfield Township. The Mill Creek valley was located
half way between the Indian settlements of Plainfield, where the Rogue
River empties into the Grand, and Chief Noonday's camp on the west side of
the Grand River rapids. Indian moccasins had worn a path between these
villages long before the white man arrived and named the route the West
River Trail. Charles E. Belknap, a Grand Rapids historian, recalled
"there was a trail that followed the river bank either way from the
Council pine more miles than I know--upstream to what Frenchmen termed
the River Rogue, since corrupted to the Rogue River."1 The trail followed
the ridge that paralleled the swamps along the river and provided the
traveler with an impressive view. Franklin Everett, an early Grand Rapids
annalist, provided a glimpse of the view the Indians enjoyed for he found
"from Grand Rapids to Plainfield, and about that village, there was com-
paratively little timber, so that the traveler on the old trail could see

quite a distance about him."2 This trail became a route familiar to the

 

 

1Charles E. Belkna , The Yesterdays of Grand Rapids (Grand Rapids:
Dean-Hicks Company, 1922?, p. 52.

2Franklin Everett, Memorials of the Grand River Valley (Chicago:
Chicago Legal News Company, 1878), p. 41.

3

4
pioneers of Alpine and Plainfield Townships, and its mid-point, Mill Creek,

is the focal point of this study.

When Rix Robinson arrived in 1821 and achieved the distinction of
being the first settler of Kent County and when Louis Campau, a fur trader,
followed him in 1826 and became the first white settler in Grand Rapids,
they found the Ottawa Indians living in this area to be a peaceful people.
Arthur S. White attributed their peaceful nature to "the terrible whipping
administered the Indians by Mad Anthony Wayne in 1794," and he claimed
that Wayne "had destroyed forever the spirit in them of open defiance and
obstruction to the coming of the strangers at least in this section."3
Albert Baxter records that the local Ottawa were “peacefully and amicably
inclined, often aiding and succoring the pioneers in time of need, pro-
viding game or fish, and exchanging courtesies with them of various kinds
in a neighborly and friendly spirit."4 Canote, a chief of the Plainfield
bands of Ottawa, was an example of the peaceful Indian who stood high in
the estimation of the early settlers. Those who knew him "all bear tes-
timony to his high character, to the savage majesty of his person, his
generosity, and desire to accomplish good everywhere at every time."5
However, Canote must have become dissatisfied with living so close to his

white neighbors for he left Plainfield in 1838 and was never heard from

 

3George N. Fuller, ed., Historic Michigan: Land of the Great Lakes,
Vol. III: Kent County by Arthur S. White, ed. (National Historical Associa-
tion, Inc.), p. 19.

 

4Albert Baxter, History of the City of Grand Rapids (Grand Rapids:
Munsell and Company, 1891), p. 43.

5The History of Kent County, Michigan (Chicago: Chas. C. Chapman
and Co.,T1881), p. 158.

 

again.

Canote was not the only Indian to vanish from the area; many left
because they were angry with their chiefs for signing the Treaty of Wash-
ington in 1836 in which the Indians ceded all their lands north of Grand
River to the United States. The Indians sold this huge tract of land far
an annual payment, designated reservation property, hunting privileges on
public lands and a package of short term fringe benefits. For the next
twenty years, Indians from all over Western Michigan journeyed to Grand
Rapids and gathered on the islands and river banks a week or two pre-
vious to Indian payment day. When the Indians reported for their money,
"they would identify themselves, receive their payment, sign their receipt,
and take their leave into the waiting arms of their unscrupulous white
brothers who met them with a whiskey jog in one hand and a credit card in
the other."6 The treaty ended Indian domination of the Grand River Valley,
for as soon as it was signed the federal government opened a land office
in Ionia, and the land was quickly taken up by the white settlers. In
October, 1857, the government made the last Indian payment in Grand Rapids,
and the Indians never returned to the islands and the river banks along

the rapids.

The Indian treaties and annual payments gave rise to an interesting
myth concerning the half-breed Potawatomi Wabasis and his buried treasure.
The legend was presented in verse in 1870 by Mrs. Minerva Jennie Kutz of

Oakfield Township when she composed the poem "Wab-ah-see, The White Swan;

 

6Donald Chrysler, The Story of Grand River (Grand Rapids: Grace
Publications, 1975), p. 72

 

6

A Legend of the Sleeping Dew."7 Mrs. Kutz erroneously cast Wabasis as a
treacherous character, and while describing the events of his death, she
made reference to a treasure that Wabasis had buried.

And here and there his vengeful soul

Led on the hunt for hidden gold;

‘Then in some lone and tangled fell

Would ring his wild, unearthly yell.8

Sometime between 1862 and 1870 Wabasis attended a green corn dance

on the Grand River flats near Indian Mill Creek and was warned that he
would be robbed on his journey back to his village at Nabasis Lake. The
old chief left the corn ceremony and followed the West River Trail to the
home of Michael Smith three miles north of Mill Creek. Homer Burch, a
prominent local historian, explained the visit:

Wabasis and Smith had long been friends and Wabasis had

always been a welcome visitor at Smith's home. But that

evening he declined Smith's invitation to stay for supper

with the family and, instead borrowed an old unused, iron

baking kettle laying by the house and, with it, vanished

off . . . into some nearby woods. After a rather lengthy

absence Wabasis reappeared at Smith's, this time without

the baking kettle, bid Smith a brief goodby, and again

resumed his journey.
Later in the evening, Wabasis was ambushed and murdered with a rock where
the old Plainfield-Sheridan trail crossed Rum Creek. James Roberts, a
pioneer farmer who lived in the area, found the body of the chief and

notified the Indians at Plainfield. The Indians buried Wabasis on top of

 

7Homer L. Burch, "The Chief Wabasis Story," Rockford Register,
November 12, 1970, p. 4.

 

8Chapman, op. cit., p. 154.

9Homer L. Burch, "The Chief Wabasis Story," Rockford Register,
December 10, 1970, p. 4.

 

the ground, surrounded by a low, log crib covered over with a roof of logs
and slabs."10 Wabasis went to the Happy Hunting Ground, but rumors of the
buried treasure continued to tantalize the white man. Many people believe
Wabasis buried a fabulous sum in gold which he received from the govern-
ment in payment for his tribe, but Burch has provided strong historical
evidence that the treasure was probably nothing more than Wabasis' "piti-
fully meager savings of silver coins."11 However, the legend has provided
some interest in Indian history, especially among those who would like to

find the treasure and possess Wabasis'wealth.

Immigrants from the eastern states, especially New York, began to
settle in the Grand Rapids area in the 1830's. The immigrants came by
way of the Erie Canal and ventured by wagon or river scow into the Michigan
wilderness to the Grand Valley village that Lucuis Lyon, a pioneer of
Grand Rapids, described as the "garden of Michigan.“12 In 1836, the popu-
lation of the town was somewhere between 500 and l,000 and the pioneers
were anticipating fabulous growth.13 Settlement produced wild speculation
in land and local banks were extending easy money. However, when Andrew
Jackson required gold for the purchase of federal land, the local banks
were destroyed and Grand Rapids began to suffer the effects of the Panic
of 1837. Dillenback and Leavitt, who published the first history of

Grand Rapids, reported that "for several years succeeding 1837, this was

 

10Ibid.
lllbid.
12Fuller, 92, 915,, p. 42.

13Ernest B. Fisher, Grand Rapids and Kent County, Michigan, (3 vols.,
Chicago: Robert 0. Law Co., 1918), p. 80.

8

a very 'blue' place. Folks were terribly poor, and real estate was hardly
worth the taxes."14 Hard times stapped immigration, and many of the pic-
neers returned to the East. Those who found conditions difficult in the
village of Grand Rapids sought land in the countryside, built cabins and
lived off the land. The hardship caused by wild speculation taught the
Grand Valley pioneers a valuable lesson as they later experienced "more

sober judgement and a healthier growth."15

The lands north of Grand River were surveyed prior to the signing
of the Treaty of Washington, and Robert Clark, an early surveyor, died
while working in the vicinity of Mill Creek. The surveyor was the fore-
runner of the pioneer, and the Old Residents Association has left a monu-
ment in memory of Clark on West River Road. However, the eager pioneers
did not wait for the completion of the survey or the land sale but settled
north of the river under conditions they called pre-emption, building
their log cabins and staking out their own claims. Chapman states "it was
no uncommon thing to see white men and the Indians tilling their corn in
the same fields, in amicable proximity to each other" at this time.15
When the pioneers secured their claims during the land sale of August, 1839,
"the red man vanished from the scene, leaving naught in memoriam but the
bones of his dead."17 When the settlers discovered that the soil of the

region was fertile and the village on the rapids needed lumber to grow,

 

14Dillenback and Leavitt, History and Directory of Kent County,
Michigan (Grand Rapids: Daily Eagle Steam Printing House, 1870), p. 38.

 

15Fuller, QB, cit,, p. 38.
“Chapman, 93. 911.. p. 1309.
17Ibid., p. 28.

they ventured to Ionia to stake their claims at the government land office.
John Ball, an early surveyor, described the great land sale as follows:

When the public sale of these lands came on . . . the

great question was, how to raise money to pay for their

lands, for they had expected to have made it by their

farming. Though told there was no danger, they were so

fearful that speculators would bid off their land, that

they went to Ionia with clubs to fight them off. But

the speculators did not come, as they had had enough of

land speculation in 1836.18

When Indian land was about to be placed on the market, there was con-

siderable local speculation over the pine lands north of the river. Lumber
from this area was to be used to supply the material for the early village
crafts. Wood products played a vital role in the evolution of early Grand
Rapids supplying such enterprises as making staves to be used in barrel
manufacturing, especially barrels for the plaster trades; the manufacture
of sleighs and buggies, which began in 1840; the building of pole boats
and steam vessels for the river traffic; cabinetmaking, which began with
William Haldane in 1836; and the manufacture of funiture, which began on
a large scale with the business of William T. Powers in 1847.19 Solomon
L. Withey, an early judge, realizing the importance of good pine land,
wrote a letter to his brother-in-law dated April 23, 1836, the same year
as the Treaty of Washington, in which he described land speculation north

of the river as follows:

I have applied for fine lots of pine land up Grand River,
but there is such a press of business at the land office,

 

18Everett, pp, 913,, p. 28.
19Fuller, QB, git,, pp. 77-90.

10

one cannot know under six or eight days whether he
can get it or not, and if two men ask for the same
land, the same day, they must agree which will have
it, as it is set up at auction. 0
The pine lands that were located along streams, like the valley of
Mill Creek, were especially prized because water power could be used to run
a sawmill. Sawmills were constructed as soon as land was available and

"most of the lumber used in building in the village was furnished by mills

located outside of the village limits, up and down the river."21

The first sawmill constructed in the Grand Rapids area was built in
1832 on the west side of the river on the grounds of the Indian Mission.
The mill was placed around sixty rods from the mouth of Indian Mill Creek
and was "just a cheap mill appropriate to the circumstances of the time."22
The mill was provided under the terms of the Treaty of Chicago 1821, and
Haynes Gordon was given the task of erecting and running the facility.
Using an undershot flutter wheel to drive a sash saw, the mill had a capa-
city of about 1,500 feet of lumber per day.23 After the Indian Treaty of
1836, lumbermen pushed north to tap the pine along Mill Creek. The stream
was surrounded by large stands of white pine, particularly in the north-
east corner of Alpine Township, and "for about five or six miles from its

mouth the water was sufficiently good for manufacturing purposes."24 The

 

201bid.. p. 71.

21Ibid., p. 84.

22Everett, 92, 515,, p. 3.

23Carl Addison Leach, "Paul Bunyan's Land and the First Sawmills of
Michigan," Michigan History, XX (Winter, 1936), p. 81.

 

24Dillenback and Leavitt, pp, gjjb, p. 31.

11

creek ran through a series of swamps and was bordered on either side by
clay bluffs. A few settlers had pre-empted land in the western part of
Alpine in 1836, but the Mill Creek pines were relatively untouched. Three
Frenchmen, Peter Labelle, Joseph Genie, and another whose name has been
forgotten, had built a mill on government land and operated it for two

or three years before they vanished.25 Little is known of this mill, but

a few trees were cut, and the Frenchmen became Alpine's first loggers.

The pioneer lumbermen from Grand Rapids staked their claims along
Mill Creek in 1837 and immediately hired contractors to erect their mills.
The tasks associated with building an infant industry in the primitive
surroundings of Mill Creek must have been considerable:
The story of these early sawmills, the difficulties
attendant upon getting in the machinery, the problems
of building the mills, and the lives and character of the
pioneers who built them, all is filled with interest.
The great forest of Michigan did not yield without im-
posing hardship and struggle upon those who sought to
conquer it and gain its wealth. Their tools were primi-
tive and the forest was vast, remote, and unrelenting.
But the sawmill was the indispensable adjunct of early
settlement. Lumber was used everywhere. 5
The first successful milling operation on Mill Creek was conducted
by George C. and James M. Nelson. The Nelson brothers moved to Grand
Rapids in 1836 from Milford, Massachusetts, and purchased the store of
James and Dwight Lyman on Waterloo Street across from the Eagle Hotel.27

To secure the lumber to erect a house on the lot he purchased in the Kent

 

ZSChapman, pp, 9159: p. 554.
25Leach, pp, pit,, p. 73.
27Baxter, pp, pit,, p. 109.

12

plot, the Nelsons supplied Barney Burton with the means to erect a saw-
mill on land they acquired on Mill Creek.28 Nelson's Mill was located
along the south line of section thirteen in Alpine Township where the
creek flows under the present Seven Mile Road.29 The Nelsons built a
series of sawmills in the Grand River valley and for twelve years con—
ducted a large and profitable business. In 1863 James and a third brother,
Ezra T., purchased a half interest in the Comstock Furniture Factory and
operated as manufacturers for the remainder of their lives. Eventually,
the Comstock interests would be bought out, and the Nelson Matter Company

would emerge as one of Grand Rapids's leading furniture plants.30

The Nelsons found competition amidst the Mill Creek pine in the per-
son of William Harmon Withey, the brother of Judge Solomon Withey, when
he built a mill south of the Nelsons and embarked upon a career in lum-
bering. Withey came to Grand Rapids from the State of Vermont where
pine had been rapidly falling to the stroke of the axe. In Grand Rapids
he found Harry Ives, a carpenter, constructing a house for his brother
Solomon; when Ives had completed his work, Withey contracted his services
and sent him up into the woods of Alpine.31 During the winter of 1838, .
Harry Ives built Withey's Mill on the northeast corner of section thirty

six of Alpine Township. Ives and his crew had to pack their provisions

 

23Charles Richard Tuttle, History of Grand Rapids (Grand Rapids:
Tuttle and Cooney, 1887), p. 119.

 

2gInnes and Tinkham, Map of Kent County, 1855 (Chicago: H. Acheson
Litho. .

30Baxter, pp. pit., p. 462.

31Elizabeth C. Withey, person interview, Grand Rapids, Michigan,
February 20, 1977.

13

through the woods and snow to their camp, where they spent the winter
erecting the mill. The loggers lived on meager provisions; "in the

spring their principle food was rice and sturgeon."32 However, "while

at work in the woods, Ives got out and framed the timber for a house erected
the following summer by E.B. Bostwick, on the Fulton Street hill. This
house for several years afterward was the mansion of Louis Campau."33
Throughout the eighteen forties and fifties Ives took his gang of men

and packed their tools and supplies from one mill site to another along

Mill Creek and Rogue River.

William Withey built a house next to his mill and with his wife
Sarah E. and their two children, William E. and Sarah C., conducted lum-
ber operations through‘ the area. The Withey homestead was undoubtedly
a busy place as the Census of 1850 shows six laborers, Mary and Israel
Smith, Sam Wilcox, James Sinclair, Ambrose Hall and C.H. Ives living with
the Withey family. Withey's Alpine estate was valued at $5,000 in 1850

making him the wealthiest land owner in the Mill Creek valley.34

Withey had civic interests that went beyond lumbering. Sometime
during the early 1840's he cut the logs to construct a small schoolhouse
in section 36 of Alpine in the vicinity of his home and mill. When

Alpine Township was formed in 1847, the organizational meeting was held

 

32Baxter, pp. _c_i_t_.. p. 663.
33Ibid.

34U.S., Seventh Census of the United States 1850: Population,
Kent County, Michigaanoom, Grand Rapids Public Library, Granleapids,
Michigan.

14

at the Withey School, and Withey was elected justice of the peace.35

"the students at the Withey School were the children of the early pio-
neers and Indians," claimed Hudson Lamoreaux, a local druggist from a
pioneer family, whose father, William S. Lamoreaux, told him about attend-
ing the school as a young boy.36 The Census of 1850 shows several of the
neighborhood children attending school. They included, from Section 1

of Walker Township, Simeon Berry 16, Alonzo Berry 9, N.R. Norman 6,
Warren Roberts 8, Henretta M. Tyron 12, and C.A. Lamoreaux 14; from sec-
tion 31 of Plainfield Township, Henry North 16, Cyrus North 14 and the
children of John Davenport; from section 25 of Alpine Township, William
E. Withey 11, Sarah C. Withey 6, Ruth A. Abel 17, Henry Abel 15, William
Abel 12, Sarah Abel 10 and Charles Abel 7.37 The list is undoubtedly
incomplete, but it does provide a sample of the students in Comstock
Park's first school. This school was still in use in 1871 when Dillen-
back and Leavitt published their history for they cite "District #9
fractional has a very old building known as the Withey school house."38
District #9 fractional included portions of Walker, Alpine and Plainfield
Townchips, and it is still in existence today. However, the name of the

school has been changed to Comstock Park.

In 1842 Withey acquired additional property in the northeast corner

of section 25 of Alpine from Henry C. Smith where he expanded his lumber

 

35Dillenback and Leavitt, pp, p13,, p. 32

36Hudson Lamoreaux, personal interview at the Hudson Lamoreaux home,
Comstock Park, Michigan, December 29, 1971.

37U.S., Seventh Census 1850.

 

38Dillenback and Leavitt, pp, cit., p. 32.

15

Operations by building another mill on Mill Creek just south of the pre-
sent bridge on Six Mile Road. This mill produced "large quantities of
shingles" along with lumber and lath, resulting in the name of Withey's
Shingle Mill.39 Stephen Wier, this writer's great-grandfather, cut off
several fingers while cutting shingles from the wood blocks fashioned at
the mill.40 Withey cut a road between his two mills, which the Alpine
Highway Commissioners called the Withey Mill Road. Shingles were trans-
ported by wagon down this road on their way to the Grand River where
steamboats would take them to market.41 In 1865 William Withey died, and
the shingle mill was sold by his heirs to Aaron Leland.42 Withey had
wisely invested his lumber dollars, resulting in his success in the field
of transportation. He was one of the directors of the Kalamazoo Plank
Road and for thirteen years ran stage lines between Grand Rapids and Kala-
mazoo.43 When the railroad entered Grand Rapids in 1868, Withey invested
in the Grand Rapids and Indiana Railroad and discontinued staging. Aaron
Leland and John Stonehouse continued to mill lumber and shingles at

Withey's old mill sites for many years.

The village of Comstock Park is located in section thirty-one of
Plainfield Township near the mouth of Mill Creek. The village was for-

merly known by two names associated with milling activity, North's Mill

 

390illenback and Leavitt, pp, pit,, p. 32.

40Clarence Wier, personal interview, Comstock Park, Michigan,
April 17, 1977.

41Alpine Township, Records of the Commissioners of Highways, Nov.
9, 1878.

42Dillenback and Leavitt, pp, p13,, p. 32.

43Dwight 8055, History of Grand Rapids and Its Industries (Chicago:
C.F. Cooper and Co., 1906), p. 195.

16

and Mill Creek. Daniel North, the pioneer settler in the village, arrived
in Grand Rapids in 1834 and two years later relocated in Plainfield Town-
ship. In 1838 North erected a sawmill at the site where the bicentennial
waterwheel has been erected as a monument in Mill Creek. North purchased
and logged section thirty-one of Plainfield and the land surrounding the
present village of North Park.44 North also owned timberland in sections
twenty-eight and thirty-three of Plainfield and"in the spring of 1843, as
late as April 9, . . . crossed the river on ice above the rapids with a

loaded team," undoubtedly headed for his mill on Mill Creek.45

Having built a home on the bank of the creek north of their mill at
the site now occupied by the United Church of Christ, the Norths are re-
garded as the first settlers in Comstock Park. The memorial stone in the
foundation of the church marks the location of the pioneer cemetery where
the Norths were buried. The North family gave the prOperty to the church
and buried underneath it are "Mr. and Mrs. Daniel North, Hugh, Daniel,
Claracy, Lavina, Nathaniel, Harriett and Henry North; a laborer who worked
for Daniel North and a traveler who stopped at the Norths', was taken ill
and died."46 The North home was a simple one-ream building constructed
from rough-cut lumber; it was razed about 1915 when the old Baptist Church
was moved to its present site. Billvarecious, the last village black-

smith in Comstock Park, was the final occupant in the humble North home.

 

44Chapman, pp, pit,, p. 1307.
45Baxter, pp, pit,, p. 544.

46Comstock Park Congregational Church, Golden Anniversary Booklet
September 16, 1960.

17
Many early pioneers in the Mill Creek valley, including Andrew Jackson
Lamoreaux, found winter employment with Daniel North at the mill and in

the woods.47

Daniel North sold his mill to William H. Withey in 1843. Withey
operated the mill until his death, when it was sold to Eli Plumb, who had
built a grist mill across the creek in 1366.48 Plumb's descendants con-
ducted milling operations from these sites until the turn of the century.
A few of the older residents in Comstock Park still remember the old saw-
mill. Silas Dutton was the last operator of the facility, and he piled

his lumber across the tracks from the Grand Rapids and Indiana railroad.49

"Rafting" lumber down the river, especially along the rapids, de-
manded skill. "Rafting" lumber through Grand Rapids began in 1838 when
lumber from the Alpine sawmills was sent to Grand Haven.50 Belknap
described the detailed process of building lumber rafts:

First came long, heavy stuff for a foundation, then
shorter lumber for cross piling. By a system of over-
lapping or shingling, the lumber was woven into many
thick layers. In times of good water the rafts were

two feet thick. Heavy pieces at the top were pinned

at the ends and to the bottom sills, with tough hard-
wood split from riverbank trees. All the tools needed
were an ax or an auger. When the raft was finished,
there was often added a deck load of shingles and lath.51

 

47F. Morris Lamoreaux, personal interview, Comstock Park, Michigan,
December 29, 1971.

48Lynn G. Mapes and Anthony Travis, Pictoral History of Grand Rapids
(Grand Rapids: Kregel Publications, 1976), p. 71.

49Clarence Wier, personal interview, Comstock Park, Michigan, April
14, 1977.

50Tuttle, pp, 913,. p. 119.
518elknap, pp, pit,, p. 133.

18

Once the rafts were out of Mill Creek they were sent to the quiet
waters above the rapids, now Riverside Park, to await shipment through
the rapids when the water was low.52 "For twenty years from the commence-
ment of the lumber trade," recalled Baxter, "the only profitable avenue
for shipment to other markets was by floatage to Grand Haven and shipment
from that port by lake vessel."53 After 1858 the railroad eliminated the
need to raft lumber. However, during their heyday, the lake schooners
shipped the rafted Alpine lumber from Grand Haven to Chicago, where "the
fertile but virtually treeless plains of Illinois and Iowa were being

rapidly settled with an insatiable demand for lumber."54

Other mill operators appeared after 1840. Between 1846 and 1850
Harry Ives built another mill on the creek in section thirty-six of Alpine
for H.S. Wartrus. Wartrus operated mills in Grand Rapids on Mill Street,
just below Bridge Street, and he was known to have taken considerable
Alpine timber.55 Another mill was built in 1845 by Colton and Phillips
near the facility operated by the Nelson Brothers. Colton's Mill cut
heavily from section twenty-four of Alpine Township, processing nearly a
million feet of lumber per year.55 In 1871 Gideon Colton was the sole
proprietor of the mill, but "the pine had become so scarce that the mill

was doing a comparatively small business."57 The circular saw was in

 

52Homer L. Burch, personal interview, Grand Rapids, Michigan,
February 23, 1977.

53Baxter, pp, pit,, p. 427.

54Homer L. Burch, From Sawmill to City--The Long Years Passing,
(Rockford: The Rockford Register, 1968), p. 18Tl

55Baxter, pp, pit,, p. 188
55Dillenback and Leavitt, pp, p13,, p. 30.
57Ibid., p. 31.

19

common use by this time, resulting in an increased volume which rapidly
depleted the timber reserves of Alpine. A circular saw was also operating
south of Colton in 1867 on section twenty-five. In 1863 John Stonehouse
had erected a water-powered mill on Mill Creek, but it was destroyed by
fire in 1867. Stonehouse built a steam sawmill on the site, and for many
years it turned out large quantities of shingles and also some lumber and
lath. In 1868 the Wolverine Pump Works, S.N. Edie, proprietor, was erected
on section thirty-six of Alpine, one-half mile north west of the Mill Creek
post office. This facility was "located on a small branch of Mill Creek,
whose waters“ gave it motive power, and was "furnished with facilities for
manufacturing five thousand pumps per annum."58 From 1860 to 1876 there
was a good market for wooden pumps; F.B. Day and S.N. Edie were the prin-
cipal pump manufacturers in the Grand Rapids area, sending pumps out in

peddling wagons to the surrounding counties.59

Many of the pioneer settlers in Michigan came from New York, and those
that settled in the Mill Creek valley were no exception. The Lamoreaux
family was one of the early pioneer families to settle in Mill Creek,
arriving in the early 1840's,and their family history provides a typical
pioneer experience. The Lamoreauxs were French Huguenots who left France
around 1685 when Louis XIV revoked the Edict of Nantes and destroyed their
religous liberty. The Lamoreauxs were forced to change their faith or
journey to a foreign land. After living in Holland and Belgium, they

moved to Canada and made their home in the New World. Arriving in Canada

 

531bid., p. 32.

593axter, pp, p13,, p. 502.

20

during the Colonial Wars, their sons were conscripted into the French
Army. Lamoreaux names are listed among the fatalities at the Plains of
Abraham in 1759. Life in Canada was difficult for the immigrant family,
as Huguenots were still a French minority; therefore, they moved to Yates
County, New York around 1800, where they lived until the late 1830's when

they moved westward to Michigan.60

The leader of the pioneer clan which came to Mill Creek was Andrew
Jackson LamOreaux. In Yates County, Andrew married Sally Francisco, and
she gave birth to six children: Samatha, Lester, Elisabeth, Florence,
Charity, and Andrew Junior. The family spent their time in New York work-
ing on the Erie Canal. The older children rode mules on the tow path
pulling the boats, and during the winter, they caulked hulls and prepared
the boats for the spring. While working on the canal, the family developed
a desire to join the immigrants and go west; therefore, when Sally died
in 1840, Lester, the oldest son and an accomplished blacksmith, built a
covered wagon and enlisted the family oxen to take the family westward.
The family journeyed to Toledo, Ohio by wagon and continued on to Jackson,

Michigan by rail and stage.61

While the Lamoreauxs wintered in Jackson, they prepared for the second
leg of their journey, the trip down the Grand River. Lester built a scow
on the ice of a Jackson mill pond, and in the spring it brought the

Lamoreauxs to Kent County. Lester's craft was a flat-bottomed boat with

 

60F. Morris Lamoreaux, personal interview, Comstock Park, Michigan,
December 29, 1971.

51Ellen L. Ericksen to David Wier, February 26, 1975.

21

a bow and a long sweep which was used for steering. The scow contained
one room, a cook stove, rocking chair, trunk and a few farm implements.62
While they were floating westward, the family apparently had trouble
keeping little Andrew aboard. To remedy this situation, somewhere around
Lansing where the river current increased, grape vines were tied to the
back of the scow so they would trail along behind in the water. Thus,

if Andrew fell off, all he had to do was grab hold of the vines and holler
until he was rescued.53 When the Lamoreauxs reached Egypt Valley in Ada
Township, they stayed with Ambrose and Teneyeh Lamoreaux who had settled
there earlier on an eight acre site.64 The family then settled briefly

in Paris Township where the present city of Kentwood is located. In

1842 Andrew Lamoreaux purchased 240 acres of land in section 1 of Walker
Township for $1.25 per acre from John Ball, an early engineer and surveyor
whose fees were often paid in land.65 Lamoreaux's three parcels of eighty
acres apiece were located on West River Road, and they included a good
portion of what is now Greenridge Country Club. Andrew and his sons
cleared the land and farmed during the summer while winters were spent
working in the sawmills on Mill Creek. His first wife having died in

New York, Andrew Lamoreaux married Emma Brown Weed, who served as step-

mother to the six children and assisted him in his farming enterprise.66

 

62Howard Silbar, “You couldn't keep the Lamoreaux's down on the
farm," Grand Rapids Press, June 19, 1977, p. 27.

 

53F. Morris Lamoreaux, personal interview, Comstock Park, Michigan,
December 29, 1971.

64Illustrated and Historical Atlas of Kent County) (Chicago: H.
Blendon and Co., 1876).

65Marian Ray, "Public Service a Lamoreaux Tradition," Advance,
March 6, 1979, p. 1.

66Ellen L. Ericksen to David Wier, February 26, 1975.

22

Morrison and Commager state that "comparatively few Huguenots came
to America; but those that did were of such high quality that they rose
to positions of prominence and acquired an influence out of proportion to
their numbers."67 The experience of the Lamoreauxs in Kent County seems
to have followed the general Huguenot pattern of success. The first
Lamoreaux family in Mill Creek built a home on the high bluff overlooking
the Grand River valley. The farm house was surrounded by barns and farm
machinery. Lamoreaux farmed his 240 acres until his death in 1876; he was
buried in the one-acre cemetery that was detached from the original
Lamoreaux estate and is now known as the Mill Creek Cemetery. Several
Lamoreauxs still reside in Comstock Park and Kent County, and they have
assumed roles of leadership and service. In 1841 Henry A. Johnson wrote
a poem for the Lamoreaux centennial that depicts the experiences of the
Lamoreaux pioneers:

A century has passed since Andrew and Sally
Envisioned a home in a far distant valley,
A valley of forests and of rich fertile land
That lay in its Splendor by the side of the Grand.
They came as a family and as pioneers bold
Oe'r trails that were new, by land we are told.
And by water from its source to its shores in the west
The goal of their dreams, the land of their quest.68
The Hackmuth family was another group of pioneers that had great im-

pact on the development of the Mill Creek area. The Hackmuths trace

their ancestry back to the Alsace-Lorraine district of Europe where

 

57Samuel Eliot Morrison and Henry Steele Commager, The Growth of
the Ameripan Republic Vol. 1 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1930), p. 93.

 

 

58Henry A. Johnson, “The Saga of the Lamoreaux Family," 1941,
Courtesy of Ellen Erickson, Comstock Park, Michigan, December 30, 1971.

23

Henry Hachmuth and his family watched Bismark, the Iron Chancellor, rise
in political stature. The Hachmuths anticipated the political turmoil
coming to their native land and emigrated to Canada where Henry estab-
lished a successful glass blowing factory. Family oral tradition boasts
that Henry Hachmuth was a world champion glass blower, defeating an
Englishman to capture the title. Champion or not, the glass enterprise
in Canada was short lived as the factory was destroyed by fire. Without
the tie of his business, Hachmuth and his family left Canada and jour-

neyed to their new home in the west.59

The Hachmuth family arrived in Kent County around 1849 and settled
in the Alpine Avenue area where they established an inn and operated the
toll station on the Newaygo State Road. To contribute further to the sup-
port of his family, Henry Hachmuth went into the wine business and raised
grapes on his Alpine farm. Hachmuths sold wine in the Grand Rapids area,
and when the inn was closed, it was converted into a farm home and the
wine business became just another source of revenue on the family farm.
Like most farms the income was seasonal, depending on the type of crops
to be harvested. Hachmuths sold raspberries, peaches, apples, grapes,
wine, cabbages, sauerkraut, butter, eggs and ice. By the turn of the
century, when Henry Carr Hachmuth was running the farm, the inventory re-
vealed assets totaling $4,500 dollars.70 Henry Carr was the grandson of
the elder Henry, and he built the farm into one of the more prosperous

enterprises in the Mill Creek area.

 

69B. Taylor Hachmuth, personal interview, Comstock Park High School,
June 2, 1972.

70Henry Carr Hackmuth, Farm Ledger 1908-1916, Mill Creek, Michigan
April 1, 1908, p. 2.

 

24

When the Civil War broke out, the economy of the Mill Creek valley
began to shift to agriculture. With the develOpment of agriculture, the
power of Mill Creek was again tapped, this time to grind grain. Without
a grist mill, the pioneer wheat harvest in rural Kent County was a dif-
ficult operation. White described the harvest by showing how grain "was
cut with a cradle, threshed with a flail, cleaned with a sieve and bagged
to be ground in Grand Rapids."71 The rural area around Mill Creek ap-
parently developed following the pattern of Grand Rapids as described by
White, "While man must have shelter, thereby creating a demand for lumber,
he must eat. To supply the imperative demand for flour the first grist
mill . . . was put up."72 The farmers in Alpine and Plainfield Townships
began tilling the soil as rapidly as the woodsmen could clear away the
big trees; therefore, by 1860 there was an imperative demand for a grist

mill on Mill Creek.

The need for a local grist mill was supplied by the Plumb family.
Eli Plumb, an early Walker Township settler, "bought North's Mill and
erected the flouring mill and the Plumb home during the war. The mill
started doing business after the war in 1866, with Henry and A.D. Plumb
as their father's partners."73 Plumb's Mill, called Mill Creek Mill,
stood on West River Road where the veteran's memorial is presently lo-
cated in Comstock Park. Plumb's Mill became the center of milling acti-

vity in the sparsely settled community, and although it was not large,

 

71FUIIer9 QB- EiE-s p° 68'
721bld., p. 84.

73Mrs. Henry Hachmuth, "History of Comstock Park," Comstock Park News,
December 21, 1917, p. 1.

25

it was sufficient to care for the needs of the local farmers.74 Milling
at Plumb's was a rather simple operation in which water power was used to
turn the grind stones that converted the grain into flour. The grinding
was done in the basement of the mill where water from the mill pond turned
a wooden turbine which, accompanied by wooden gears and machinery, turned
the stones. Grains of all kinds were brought to the mill where they were
ground and bagged. Most of the business was transacted on the main floor
of the mill, where customers would deal amidst grain waiting to be ground
and bags of flour. The Plumbs produced flour, buckwheat flour and gra-
ham flour, but they also handled oats, corn, hay and straw. In the Spring,
farmers would journey to the mill to purchase the seeds to sow in their

fields.75

With the advent of the roller process in milling, the old wooden
machinery and grind stones in Plumb's mill became obsolete. However, the
mill continued to operate until 1911 when a spring freshet on Mill Creek
washed out the dam and destroyed its power source. Charles and Arthur
Plumb, sons of Henry, were operating the mill at this time, and Andrew
Martin was their miller. After the flood, the mill stood idle, a land-
mark with pleasant historical associations for local residents, until the
spring of 1917 when it was torn down. Often various rumors or legends
develop among local residents in relation to old abandoned property. From
1911 to 1917 Plumb's Mill was not exempt from such talk. The following

tale was printed in the American Miller in 1916:

 

 

75Ida and Frank Lovell, personal interview, Lovell home, Comstock
Park, Michigan, December 2, l971.

26

Some residents of the village of Mill Creek and farmers
in the vicinity declare that the mill is haunted and
that on moonlight nights, two ghostly figures can be seen,
playing cribbage in the wheel room. A fantastic story of
the love of two men for one woman, the success of one, the
murder of the triumphant suitor and the suicide of the
loser, is breathlessly connected and whispered about of
evenings at the village store.75
The village stores were predominately saloons at this time, and the dis-
appearance of people needed some explanation. The story is fantastic and

contains little truth, but it became part of the heritage of Comstock Park.

The Plumb family developed a four or five acre estate around the
old mill. Beside their home, they also built a general store and two
large barns. The Plumb home was located across the street from the
Lamoreaux Drug Store where the Lydell Park sign now stands. In 1928 the
Conservation Department owned the house, and they gave it to the Congrega-
tional Church to make room to expand the fish hatchery. The church moved
the house up on Lamoreaux Drive for use as a parsonage. The house still
stands and is one of the oldest structures in the community.77 Eli Plumb
also built a small store across the road from the flour mill for Frank
Seymour, an Alpine resident who owned 80 acres just north of Plumb. Sey-
mour ran the fatility for two or three years; then the Plumbs took it over
and ran it themselves. Mrs. Henry Hachmuth briefly described the history
of the business:

Years later the small store was replaced by a two story

frame building and was still later enlarged by a one
story addition, where a general merchandise business was

 

75C.W. Shafer, "A Ghost-Haunted Mill," American Miller, November
1, 1915, p. 879.

 

77Ellen L. Ericksen to David Wier, March 27, 1969.

78Hachmuth, pp, pit,, p. I.

27

carried on by Henry Plumb and his sons, and later by
Charles alone, and Mrs. Plumb conducting a millinery
business in connection for one year. The Plumbs dis-
continued the business in 1915 after controlling it
continuously for about fifty years.78
The Plumbs sold the store to George Roup, a native of Sparta. The old
building still remains on main street having housed a plethora of busi-

nesses .

The Plumb family not only ran the first grist mill and general store
in old Mill Creek but also established the first post office. The post
office was established on October 28, 1868,with Eli Plumb appointed as the
first postmaster. Plumb ran the post office out of the mill, and it "was
just a small desk, as the mail was very light."79 The post office was
transferred to the general store when Eli Plumb became the second post-
master. The Plumbs ran the post office for thirty years before John H.

Baker took over on February 4, 1899.80

Plumb's two barns were located on the site now used by Lamoreaux
Drug store as a parking lot. These barns were originally built to shelter
the family horses and provide a warehouse for their horses and delivery
wagons. Since sleeping quarters in the barn lofts were also rented to
teamsters, the facility was referred to as "Plumb's Livery." The
livery burned in 1911 or 1912, and Lou Sherman, a teamster for Neil

Lamoreaux's Ice Company, died in the fire. Many rumors concerning the

 

78Hachmuth, pp, pit,, p. 1.
79Ibid.

80Comstock Park Rotary Club, "Dedication Ceremonies: United States
Post Office," Comstock Park, Michigan, May 19, 1962.

28

cause of the fire circulated among the village old timers, but the truth
will probably never be known.81

The Plumb influence on the community produced a conflict over a
name for the village. When Daniel North settled in the area in 1837, the
place was referred to as North's Mill. Homer Burch declares, "In 1866
when the G.R. and I. railroad was built north along Grand River to Cedar
Springs, its second station five miles north from its starting terminus
on West Bridge Street at Grand Rapids, was named North's Mill."82 When
the post office was established in 1868, it was named Mill Creek, after
the stream that passed throught the center of the village. Burch further
states, "Sometime following the 1870's the railroad station name was changed
to North's Station and then to Plumb's Station and later also became Mill
Creek."83 Thus, during the nineteenth century, the community was known
by three names. On June 8, 1906, it was given its fourth and present name

when the name of the post office was changed to Comstock Park.34

 

$1Clarence Wier, personal interview at Clarence Wier home, Comstock
Park, Michigan, December 2, 1971.

82Homer Burch, "Comstock Park History," The Preview, August 25,
1969, p. 10.

 

83Ibid.
84Rotary Club, "Dedication Ceremonies," May 19, 1962.

 

CHAPTER II
MILL CREEK VILLAGE, 1866 TO 1906

After the Civil War, two railroads constructed through the area
began Mill Creek's post-pioneer period. Railroads played a vital role
in the development of the community, as enterprises were attracted by
good transportation facilities. Historian Richard Lingeman agreed that
"railroads did indeed bring prosperity by easing access to such natural
resources as timber, by providing transportation to market of local agri-
cultural products, and by bringing raw materials to the local manufacturer
and goods to the local merchant more cheaply."1 The railroads were built
north of Grand Rapids to connect already existing towns and ship lumber,
and Mill Creek was fortunately selected as the junction for the Grand
Rapids and Indiana and the Grand Rapids, Newaygo and Lake Shore railroads.
If Mill Creek village had not already existed, a village undoubtedly
would have sprung up around the railroad junction similar to the way
towns developed in the American west. Rail transportation was a valuable
asset to a community in a culture based on horses, and since the commu-

nity had two rail lines, growth was expected.

The Civil War delayed railroad construction in Western Michigan; but

 

1Richard Lingeman, Small Town America (New York: G.P. Putnam's
Sons, 1980), p. 164.

29

30

when it was completed, there was a local construction boom.2 George J.
Leisgang, an ardent local railroad buff, has written the following account
of railroad construction through Mill Creek:

The G.R. and 1. dates back to its organization in 1854.

It was not until after the Civil War . . . that rails

were first lain. This section of track (through Mill

Creek) began in 1867 when a portion of the line was

completed from Grand Rapids and terminated at Cedar

Springs.3
The first section of the G.R. and I., which extended 21 miles north of
Grand Rapids, was completed in December, 1867. Since the state granted
twenty mile original land grants to the railroad, the rails were extended

twenty miles each year.

Lingeman analyzed the influence railroads had on many small villages
and towns, and his findings are applicable to Mill Creek. He states "a
railroad by itself was not always salvation; at times it would be only
a temporary boom, stimulating industries that later were to go under,
giving the town a few bracing breaths of prosperity before it returned to
somnolent stagnation.“4 However, the railroads did keep Mill Creek alive
while neighboring communities were perishing. When the railroad turned
and went through Rockford instead of following the river and going through
Plainfield village, which was located north of Mill Creek on the confluence
of Rogue River and was larger and more prosperous, Plainfield was doomed to

become a ghost town as it relied on riverboat transportation. Therefore,

 

2Willis F. Dunbar, All Aboard (Grand Rapids: William B. Erdmans
Publishing Company, 1969), p. 110.

 

3George J. Leisgang to David Wier, September 21, 1977, Letter in
author's local history file, Comstock Park, Michigan.

4Lingeman, pp, p15,, p. 165.

31

Comstock Park did not begin as a result of the railroads, but rail trans-

portation undoubtedly played a major role in its continued existence.

A second railroad--the Grand Rapids, Newaygo and Lake Shore-~was
constructed through Mill Creek in 1871, and on May 19, 1872, it "saw the
first section opened for operation, from Grand Rapids to Sparta, a dis-
tance of 14.7 miles."5 The line was extended to Newaygo in 1872; three
hundred passengers joined a September 11 excursion for the first run to
Newaygo.5 The G.R.N. and L.S. was a lumber railroad like the G.R. and I.
with eighty per cent of its tonnage consisting of lumber and forest pro-
ducts. From 1871 to 1881 the road operated at a loss of $36, 552.28; there-
fore it was consolidated with several other roads into the Chicago and West
Michigan Railway Company on September 30, 1891.7 The C. and M.W. ran the
troubled line until January, 1900, when the Pere Marquette Railroad took

possession of it.

A number of depots have serviced Mill Creek's two rail lines. The
first depot was built on land which "was given to the railroads many years
ago by the father of Dana Stowell for a station without any expense," and
it was apparently destroyed by fire.8 When the fairground was located in

Mill Creek in 1891, The Telegpam-Herald announced that passengers were

 

 

5Paul Wesley Ivey, The Pere Marquette Railroad Company (Grand Rapids:
Black Letter Press, 1919), p. 242.

 

5George J. Leisgang to Don Strange, an engineer C. and 0. Railway Co.,
April 6, 1978, Letter in author's local history file, Comstock Park,
Michigan.

7Ivey, op. cit., p. 243.
8Hachmuth, Comstock Park News, December 21, 1917, p. 1.

 

32
landed at the new depot built by the C. and W.M. and G.R. and I. on the
west side of the grounds.9 The main mode of transportation to the fair
was by train. Passengers received a round trip ticket from Grand Rapids
to Mill Creek for 15 cents with trains running at fifteen minute intervals.
However, in 1902 the Grand Rapids Street Railway Company extended their
electric lines across the river to the fairground resulting in a rapid
decline of passenger train traffic.10 Streetcars took over most of the
local transpdrtation market because they were more convenient as they de-
livered passengers much closer to their homes. Therefore, in 1905 the rail-
roads responded by abandoning service at Mill Creek. Huntley Russell, the
State Senator from the area, pressured the Railroad Commission and the legis-
lature to restore service at Mill Creek, and they responded with restored
service and a new depot. Mrs. Hachmuth noted the inconvenience during the
interim period when “the name of Mill Creek was removed from all time cards
of both roads, and no tickets sold to or from this point for about two
years, and all persons desiring to get to Mill Creek had to go to Fuller
Station, three miles away and drive back along the railroad track to Mill
Creek with their baggage.11 Passenger and freight service were restored,
but they did not bring the village prosperity. With the increased popularity
of trucks and automobiles and the devastating impact of the depression on
Comstock Park, rail service was stopped again, and to date it has not been

revived.

 

9"Up the Rolling Grand," The Telpgram-Herald, September 2, 1891, p. 1.

 

10West Michigan Fair, Premium List 1902, p. 19, Michigan Room, Grand
Rapids Public Library.

 

11Hachmuth, pp, pit,, p. 1.

CT

I")

33

One of the most spectacular wrecks on the G.R. and 1. occurred on the
morning of August 15, 1900, when a telegraph operator by the name of E.R.
Wells fell asleep in the Mill Creek depot. The Northland Express, a limited
that carried four sleepers to the Michigan resort country at the end of the
track, was one of the finest trains on the road, and Wells allowed it to
pass Mill Creek while he was sleeping.12 Was it possible for a telegraph
operator to sleep while a train passed a station fifteen feet from where
he was sitting? This apparently happened, for Wells was awakened by the
Howard City telegraph operator who told him to hold the northbound train
in Mill Creek as he was sending one south. Wells, unaware the Northland
Express had already come through, acknowledged the request. The two trains
collided just north of Pierson with five hundred passengers on board.

Eight pe0ple were killed, including all four engineers, and many people
were seriously injured. The locomotives were both destroyed.13 Operator
Wells' nap caused an intensive investigation from which the railroad con—
cluded, "the theory that all negligence which causes serious disaster will
always be found to have been more or less habitual is still worthy of

respect."14

Transportation was vital to village growth, and in 1883 Mill Creek
was given further impetus when a new road was constructed. On July 27,

1883, "the Canal Street Gravel Road Company was organized by Mr. Comstock

 

12Edward Masselink, "The Great Train Wreck," Grand River Times,
March,1981, p. 5.

 

13Harold B. Norman, "Had G.R. and I. No. 5 passed Mill Creek,"
Trains, January, 1974, p. 34.

14Ibid., p. 35.

an:

F
.ri'l
d w-

J

7,: 1’1

and

DI

34

and began construction of a gravel toll road for ten miles north from the
Grand Rapids city limits, along Monroe Avenue to North Park, across Grand
River on a wooden bridge, built in 1884, to Mill Creek and thence north
along the north side of Grand River over an old sand trail road to Plain-
field Village and Plainfield bridge."15 The officers of the company in-
cluded Henry Plumb, president; John E. More, secretary; John W. Champlin,
Treasurer; while Francis Letellier, Henry Plumb, John W. Champlin, Nathaniel
W. Stowell and C.C. Comstock served as directors.15 Stowell provided the
gravel for the road from the hill on his land in Mill Creek. The area to-
day is referred to as Stowell's Terrace. The new road, currently West
River Drive, was considered "the best gravel road north from Grand Rapids
and cost $25,000 including the first North Park bridge at $3,500.17 A
toll gate was erected on the road by the C.W. and M. crossing which was
managed by Frank Lamoreaux. Ida Lovell worked in the toll booth when a
young girl as an employee of her parents. The toll booth was still opera-
ting in 1899 with the tolls applied to the upkeep of the road. Travelers
were taxed according to the number of axles on their buggy or wagon with

riders on horseback paying the smallest fee.18

On August 22, 1885, the State of Michigan made a decision that had

 

15Burch, Preview, August 25, 1967, p. 10
158axter, pp, pit,, p. 543.
17Burch, pp, p13,, p. 10.

18Ida Lovell, personal interview at the Lovell home, Comstock Park,
Michigan, March 24, 1971.

35

tremendous impact on the development of Mill Creek. The state selected
Grand Rapids as the site for a Soldiers' Home to house the "disabled, de-
crepit, aged or indigent soldiers" who had served in the Civil War.19
Michigan had been overlooked by the federal government; the Board of Mana-
gers of the National Homes had decided "that it is inexpedient to establish
a soldiers' branch home in the State of Michigan, because of the proximity
of that state to branches already established at Milwaukee, Wisconsin and
Dayton, Ohio."20 Michigan, having provided 93,000 volunteers in response
to President Lincoln's call, responded to the federal government on June 5,
1885, by establishing its own soldiers' home. The Michigan Soldiers' Home
was built on the 132 acre Nelson Farm three miles north of Grand Rapids.
The citizens of Grand Rapids purchased the estate for $16,500 and deeded

it to the state. After the site was selected, the facility was quickly
constructed, and on December-30, 1886, Governor Russell A. Alger was on hand

to dedicate the building that was later to be known as "Old Main."21

The first noticeable influence of the Soldiers' Home being located
in the north end came in the form of improved transportation facilities.
The Soldiers' Home was placed in Grand Rapids “with the promise, direct or
implied, that some means of transportation to the site would be provided.
In fulfillment of the promise, and also for the development of north end

real estate interests, the North Park Street Railroad Company was organized

 

19Baxter, pp, p13,, p. 366.

20Gerald Elliot, "Making Good the Solemn Promise," Grand Rapids
Press, March 11, 1973, p. 24.

 

ZlBaxter, pp, p15,, pp.'367-368.

36

on August 21, 1889, and incorporated with a capitalization of $100,000."22
Charles Carter Comstock, a wealthy north end lumberman, provided $94,000
of the total cost of the line. The company built the North Park line as
as extension of the Taylor Street line, which was Operated by the Valley
City Street and Cable Railway Company, starting "from the north line of
the city at Taylor Street past the Soldiers' Home to the bank of Grand
River at what is known as the town-line or gravel road bridge."23 The
line was two and one-half miles long and operated by a steam dummy. A
single fare from Sweet Street was ten cents with fifteen cents charged for
a round trip.24 Passengers heading to Mill Creek from the street railroad
had to pay a toll to cross the bridge at North Park and finish their journey

on foot.

In Streetcar Suburbs Sam Warner states "many of the founders and in-

 

vestors in street railways were real estate speculators who wanted to attract
new customers for their land.25 Comstock's generous support of the street
railway may have had economic motives as he owned most of the real estate

in the north end of Grand Rapids. Furthermore, under C.C. Comstock's
prompting, the North Park Street Railway Company built a pavilion, called

the North Park Resort, at the end of the line. The pavilion was an attrac-
tive building which offered boating, swimming, picnicing, dining, dancing

and entertainment to those who traveled to the north end. In 1891 Comstock

 

22L.G. Stuart, "History of the Grand Rapids Street Railways,"
(unpublished typewritten paper, Michigan Room, Grand Rapids Public
Library), p. 9.

23Baxter, pp. cit., p. 541.
24Stuart, pp, cit., p. 9.

25Sam B. Warner, Jr., Streetcar Suburbs (New York: Antheneum, 1974),
p. 60.

37

donated ninety acres across the river from the pavilion for use as a fair-
ground. Such pleasant surroundings tempted pe0ple to abandon their homes
in the city and settle in the new neighborhood developed by Comstock. Yet,
they continued to be employed in the city so the street railroad was used
to commute back and forth to work. Furthermore, with the extension of the
streetcar lines small villages like North Park and Comstock Park were in-
tegrated into the dynamics of metropolitan society. Thus, C.C. Comstock's
$94,000 investment probably produced considerable profit when real estate

prices rose, and he started to sell off his land.

The North Park Street Railway COmpany was purchased by the Consoli-
dated Street Railway Company in 1894 and electrified. Overhead feeder lines
were installed, and a five cent fare was levied on a trip from Grand Rapids.26
In 1902 the Grand Rapids Street Railway Company was running the line and
"built a double track steel bridge across the river and laid a track into
the fairgrounds to the main entrance."27 Later in the year the line was
extended to the north end of the fairground and Mill Creek.28 The inhabi-
tants of Mill Creek were now within a few minutes ride to the center of
the city for eight cents, five cents for the fare and three cents for the
bridge toll. The streetcar had tremendous impact on the village. It
broadened the cultural and economic horizons of the community as men and
women could ride to the city to work, shop or seek entertainment. Young

peeple also profited for they could now obtain an education beyond the

 

ZPStuart, pp. pip, p. 9.

27West Michigan State Fair, Premium List 1902, p. 19, Michigan Room,
Grand Rapids Public Library.

 

28"For Right of Way," Grand Rapids Press, June 9, 1902, p. 1.

 

38

tenth grade by attending a city high school or enjoy city amusements like
Ramona Park or the theater. Thus, the streetcar broke down the traditional
barriers of rural isolation in Mill Creek and drew the community into the

metropolitan environment.

Placing the Soldiers' Home one mile from Mill Creek had a vital and
enduring effect on the life of the community. Since federal law prohibited
drinking establishments within one mile of a Soldiers' Home--and Mill Creek
was exactly one mile from the Home--bars sprouted like mushrooms. During
the late 1890's, Judge Burt's saloon, Mike Hayes' saloon, the North Star
Hotel, Fred Echternach's saloon and Nick Fink's Riversite Hotel began
operating in Mill Creek. A well worn path soon led across the bridge to
the Soldiers' Home. The race track and the fairgrounds also encouraged the
saloon trade, since they attracted pe0ple into an area that was supposed
to be dry. By crossing the street the patrons at the fairground could
visit the bars in the Mill Creek business district, which became a popular

adjunct of the fairground. The Grand Rapids Press revealed the relation-

 

ship between the fair and the Comstock Park bars in an article published
in 1909 which dealt with a new policy at the fair of not granting pass
out checks for patrons to visit Mill Creek.

But the rule not to grant pass out checks worked another
hardship on some of the fair visitors. "I love your State
Fair, but oh your Mill Creek," was the refrain which has

been howled by an ever increasing number all week. The
reason? Well, it was all because there was no beer sold on
the fairgrounds. And not even a pass out check for the con-
cessionaires to allow them to get over to the wet precincts.29

 

29Grand Rapids Press, September 17, 1909, p. 7.

 

39

Ticket takers at the fair were apparently the subject of abuse by men with
a terrible thirst, who "threatened, cajoled and offered to bribe, but the
only thing that went was the purchase of another admission ticket for every-
one of the thirsty party."30 Many excuses were given to leave the grounds
and visit Mill Creek including:

It is estimated that there was something like 20,000 or

more farmers' rigs which had been left over at Mill Creek

and their owners were desperate in their desire to get

over there to feed their horses without having to pay

23.33%; Simiiiliistiiifittiiika 222.~§2"i..”ii12‘11.38991“

The business connection between Mill Creek and the Soldiers' Home was
temporarily interrupted on March 8, 1903, when "a heavy flood and ice jam
carried away three spans of the old wooden bridge and the last of the wooden
trolley bridge. Thereafter, for awhile a temporary public skiff ferry re-
placed the old wooden bridge at 10¢ a trip across the river; and Mike Hayes,
a Mill Creek saloon keeper, put on a free ferry . . . for old soldiers from
the Soldiers' Home . . . who patronized his saloon."32 Hayes' ferry was
named the "Kent" and "was a strange combination made from joining two river
scows, the paddle wheel from the old steamer "Hiaeshutter," and an old
tractor. The tractor was run onto the scows, the wheels blocked, and a

belt strung between the power drive and the paddle wheel."33 The ferry was

constructed by Edward Dutton, who with his brother Silas was running the

 

301bid.

3lIbid.

32Burch, pp, pit,, p. 10.
33Chrysler, pp, pit,, p. 45.

4O

sawmill in Mill Creek. The maiden voyage of Dutton's "Kent" was described

in the Evening Press on September 12, 1903:

 

Captain Edward Dutton ordered fireman Edward Dutton to get

up steam for the maiden trip. The fire box doors slanmed
musically and the blower hissed in the tall stack. The

steam gauge needle crept around the dial. The safety valve
felt the added pressure and drummed. "Board the Walker side,"
quoth Captain Dutton. Engineer Dutton snapped the reverse
lever into the "back" notch of the quadrant. Deckhand

Dutton threw off the lines and Engineer Dutton gave the trac-
tion engine a bare inch of throttle. The cylinders groaned
and hissed and puffed. The cranks turned. The Hiaeshutter
paddle wheel groaned and moved, and the water of the Grand
was beaten into foam as the new Kent swung clear of the

bank. Engineer Dutton gave her a wide throttle and the

Grand sung a useless remonstrating song at the flat cutwater.34

The saloon business was saved! A new steel bridge was completed in 1904
at a cost of $30,000, and the economy was back to normal. The "Kent"
quickly passed the way of earlier river steamers; its role had been ful-

filled.

The railroads, the West River Toll Road and the streetcar brought
improved modes of transportation, but like other small towns in the Middle
West in the late nineteenth century, Mill Creek depended on horses. Most
houses had a barn where the family horse and buggy were kept, and the local
business district provided the establishments that supported this horse
culture. Richard Lingeman provides a description of village horse culture

in Small Town America:

 

 

34Chrysler, pp, cit., p. 47 and "North Park Ferry," Grand Rapids
Press, September 11, 1963, p. 9.

41

There were, of course, stores where the farmers stopped

off to pick up supplies before the trip home and the saloons

where he wetted down the dust in his throat. There were

livery stables, carriage makers, blacksmith shops, harness

makers, feed shops, the establishment that made horse

troughs, hitching racks and town pumps, and the assembly

place for the commerce to and from the farm--the depot,

stockyards, elevators, restaurants where farmers and

teamsters caught a meal in mid-journey.35
Lingeman's description was intended for a larger village than Mill Creek,
but the role the horse played in community development applied to all
areas in the midwest. Horse culture was manifest in Mill Creek through
its blacksmith shops and livery stables, while the harness races at the
fairground truly emphasized the horse's exalted role. The late nineteenth
century relied on horses as modern man does the automobile, and their pun-

gent aroma constantly reminded local folk of their presence in the village.

Mill Creek had two blacksmith shops located on main street. The
first shop was built by Lester Lamoreaux, the elder son of Andrew Jackson
Lamoreaux, an accomplished blacksmith when he arrived with his family in
the early 1840's. This shop was located on the north bank of Mill Creek,
across the road from the present fire station.36 In later years, George
Ellis and Billy Precious operated this blacksmith shop. In 1905 Ed Joyce
opened another blacksmith shop on West River Road in the south end of the
village. This building, a wooden frame structure with sliding doors and
few windows, was always surrounded by wheels, broken farm implements,
buggies and wagons, that were always in need of repair. Inside the shOp

facilities were provided along the north wall for two teams of horses,

 

35Lingeman, pp, pit,, p. 264.
35Chapman, pp, pit,, p. 1311.

42

with a work area to the south centered around the anvil and forge. The
rear of the shop was cluttered with pieces of metal and wood that were

used in the process of repairing wagons and machinery.37 The blacksmith
shop was a favorite place for children to visit for they would witness
"sparks flying, the clang of heavy hammer on the anvil, a kicking or biting
horse being shod, the labyrinth of old wheels, part of plows, pieces of
cultivators, Odd and ends of metal, tires being set, bobsleds shod or
mended, a hame repaired or the thousand other jobs" that were being per;
formed by the village blacksmith.38 Lingeman provides further insight on
the blacksmith's trade pointing out that "he made nails and horseshoes for
a starter, but he also fashioned chains, tires, reaphooks, bullet molds,
yoke rings, axles, animal traps, files, shears, locks, keys, adzes, plough-
shares, hackel teeth, bits, saws, and the metal parts for a variety of
implements for home and farming, such as spinning wheels, looms and flails."39

U.P. Hedrick, who wrote about his Michigan childhood in The Land of the

 

Crooked Tree, found "the most satisfying time to visit the blacksmith's

 

shop was in mid-winter, when sparks were flying in all directions and the
fire in the hearth heated the shop while snow was falling outside and an
Artic gale blowing."40 The Mill Creek blacksmiths were especially busy
during fair week and the harness racing season, when they were frequently

called to shoe the horses at the track. With the decline of the fair and

 

37Clarence Wier, personal interview in Clarence Wier home, Comstock
Park, Michigan, March 8, 1972.

33v. P. Hedrick, The Lapp_of the Crooked Tree (New York: Oxford
University Press, 1948), p. 263.

 

39Lingeman, pp, pit,, p. 145.
40Hedrick, pp, pit,, p. 267.

43

the advent of the automobile, the trade of the blacksmith began to slow
and eventually it came to a halt. The blacksmith shops were torn down and

service stations appeared on main street.

The livery stable was another business supported by horse culture.
The first livery in Mill Creek was owned by Eli Plumb and was built during
the 1860's . Plumb's livery burned in 1911 or 1912. Nick Fink was opera-
ting a livery stable next to his Riversite Hotel at this time. The Fink
livery was also destroyed by fire. Early residents recall running hose
from the tannery across the street to save the hotel; however, the livery
was completely destroyed. Fred Echternach entered the livery business
when Fink's establishment burned. A portion of the Old Echternach livery
still remains; it houses Ludge Tool and Die. Echternach's livery had a
a large hay loft, a room for wagons and carriages Off the Lamoreaux Drive
entrance and stalls for horses on the main floor. Echternach, who also
operated the saloon in front of the livery, raised race horses at the site

which he raced at the local track.41

The livery stable provided shelter and feed for the animals, but
like the blacksmith shOp, it served as a social center and loafing place
for the men of the town. Lingeman provides a description of the small
town livery stable that may have been characteristic of those that Opera-

ted in Mill Creek.

 

41Howard and Ida Lovell, personal interview in the Lovell home,
Comstock Park, Michigan, March 24, 1971.

44

Typically, they were two-story box like structures of
unpainted wood, the walls covered with tin signs adver-
tising various patent remedies for ailing horses. They
exuded the stable smells of horses, manure, feed, and hay.
There was a rude Office with wooden chairs, a desk, a cot
for the night man, and a potbellied stove, around which
loungers gathered in winter.42
The livery stables and blacksmith shops were the places where town gossip
was shared. "Horses . . .and appropriate rigs were hired for weddings
and funerals, so stable owners were likely to be the first to know about
marriages and deaths, or which of the town's young bucks had hired a rig
to go on a spree in a neighboring town--and in what condition he returned,"
claims Lingeman.43 Many of the world's problems were undoubtedly settled
in the community livery stables, and with the decline of horse culture,

the community lost another of its exclusively male preserves.

One of the most pleasant ventures undertaken in the small community
Of Mill Creek was the West Michigan Fair. The fairground was the fruit
Of the political and Philanthropic endeavors of Charles Carter Comstock,
and for over forty years, thousands of peOple from West Michigan were
provided with a wide range Of Spectacles and sporting events at the local
site. In the autumn after the peak of the harvest season, farmers would
journey to Mill Creek with their wagons loaded with the best fruits Of
their labor selected for competition and display at the fair. Residents
of Grand Rapids and the surrounding cities and towns would join the rural
crowd displaying manufactured products and retail merchandise that appealed

to the farmers' tastes and often reflected the latest in agricultural

 

42Lingeman, pp, p15,, p. 264.
43Ibid.

45

technology. When the fair was not in session, West Michiganders would
watch for advertisements in the local newspapers announcing harness races,
sporting events and in later years automobile races. Thus, in the late
nineteenth century when agricultural values dominated community life, the
fairground and the race track played a significant role in the social and
economic life of the people. However, with increased industrialization

in West Michigan, rural men left their farms and sought employment in
city factories, resulting in the decline of the fairground until it be-

came a casuality Of suburban living.

The origin of the West Michigan Fair can be traced back to November
17, 1890, when C.C. Comstock Offered to donate ninety acres of ground to
the West Michigan Agricultural and Industrial Society,provided $50,000
was raised for improvements.44 The Comstock property was located on the
west side of Grand River just north of the bridge where the U.S. 131
freeway and Woodland Paving Company now stand. During the summer months,
Comstock used the teamsters from his lumber camps to dike the river and
fill in the swamp, and by 1890 they had landscaped a fairly attractive
site.45 When Comstock donated the land, the deed specified that the pro-
perty could “be used for fairs and exposition grounds and for the holding
Of exhibitions, shows, religious and political meetings, for a race track
for the speeding of horses and for other purposes of like nature."45 A

special provision was included in the deed which required the fair

 

44"The Riverside Fair," The Evening Leader, December 9, 1890, p. 1.

 

451da Lovell, private interview in the home of Howard and Ida Lovell,
Comstock Park, Michigan, March 24, 1971.

456055, pp, pit,, p. 580.

46

association to subscribe $50,000 for development, which they raised by
selling four per cent bonds for a twenty year period. The West Michigan
Agricultural and Industrial Society made the Michigan Trust Company
trustee for $100,000 in bonds "to be paid in installments of 25 per cent
respectively in March, May, July, and September of 1891, the proceeds to
be used exclusively in improving the grounds."47 The bonds sold quickly,

$14,000 having been raised at the first subscription meeting.

Before the fair was located in Mill Creek there was great contro-
versy over the wisdom of placing it on the Comstock site. The Comstock
grant, which may also have been designed to promote development of north
end real estate, created a deep rift between two fair organizations, The
West Michigan Agricultural and Industrial Society and the Kent County
Agricultural Society. During the latter half of the 1800's, the Kent
County organization had sponsored fairs on land they owned south of the
city, near Jefferson Avenue and Hall Street. A sizeable fair complex had
been established on the Hall Street site, and the West Michigan Agricul-
tural and Industrial Society rented the land and facilities from the
Kent County organization each fall in order to hold its fair. With the
advent of the Comstock grant, the West Michigan organization had to solve
the dilemma of continuing to rent the Hall Street site or accepting and
developing the property in the north. Amidst some bitter political mani-

pulation, the decision was made tO-abandon the Kent County organization

 

456055, pp, pit,, p. 580.
47The Evening Leader, December 9, 1890, p. 1.

 

47
and promote the new fair.48

Between 1891 and 1897 the people of Western Michigan were provided
with two fairs involved in intense competition. The Kent County Agricul-
tural Society continued to Operate a fair on the Hall Street ground, and
the West Michigan Agricultural and Industrial Society developed its new
fairground in Mill Creek. Charles W. Garfield of the Grand Rapids Savings
Bank, a promoter of the Kent County association for forty years, told "of
how he went out to the new fairgrounds to the north and took a photograph
of the place when it was covered with water--the photograph to be used for
campaign purposes."49 Garfield owned land in the south end of Grand Rapids,
and he resented Comstock's attempt to "steal" the fair and place it on his
property. In 1891 both fairs were held during the same week, September
14 to 18, and both organizations competed through newspaper advertisements,
posters and major attractions to draw the larger crowd.50 After 1891
the fairs were Scheduled for different weeks, but competition among them
continued until 1897 when the Kent County organization, realizing that
it could not compete successfully with the newer fair, abandoned its opera-
tion and the Comstock fair emerged supreme. In 1902 the Mill Creek organi-
zation was reorganized as the West Michigan State Fair, with the word

"State" included in the title because those behind the name change believed

 

48"Offer Of Grounds Recalls Old Fair Rivalry," Grand Rapids Press,
October 15, 1915, p. 2.

 

49Ibid.

50"Kent's Popular Show," and "Ready for the Crowds," The Evenipg_
Leader, September 15, 1891.

 

48

"that 'Michigan's best fair' was to be too big for any sectionalism in

the name."51

The West Michigan State Fair was housed in a variety of impressive
structures. Upon entering the fairgrounds, patrons passed through one of
two entrances that were flanked by thirty-two fOOt towers that contained
offices and adjoining waiting rooms. The main entrance was located on
the west side of the grounds adjacent to the railroad depot, and the other
was placed south of the grounds to accommodate street railway patrons who
had to walk across the North Park bridge. After paying the admission fee,
the crowds followed wooden plank walks that led to the major buildings and

fair attractions.52

The most impressive building on the fairground was the Art Hall.

The Premium List of 1894 described the building:

 

Has a rotunda center 106 feet in diameter; height to
base of flag staff 110 feet. The building is in the
form Of an octagon cross, with eight wings, extending
from the center, of rotunda. Four Of the wings at
right angles to each other are 44 x 80 feet each, two
stories high 22 feet posts, with gallery extending all
around the dome or center. The other four wings are
each 32 x 80 feet, one story 12 feet posts. There
are eight entrances, each flanked by octagon towers;
the two-story towers are 50 feet high, the spans
through the building from end to end are 266 feet.53

The Art Hall was painted a light cream color relieved with white. When

 

51"Michigan's Best Fair; Its Races and Features," Grand Rapids
Press, September 27, 1902, p. 1.

 

52West Michigan Agricultural and Industrial Society Fair, Premium
List 1894, p. 25, Michigan Room, Grand Rapids Public Library.

53Ibid., p. 27.

49

the building was completed in 1891, the Honorable C.E. Belknap joined an
inspection excursion and remarked, "splendid accomodations for manufacturers
to exhibit. The Art Hall is the best lighted in the country."54 Belknap
was impressed with the amount Of glass used in the structure as all of

the lighting was natural.

A wide variety of exhibits were displayed in the Art Hall. When the
fair Opened in 1891, the following exhibitors were among those who had
rented space for their displays:

Spring and Company--dry goods

Julius A. J. Friedrich--musical instruments

Nelson, Matter and Company--furniture

Valley City Milling Company--flour and meals

G. Zwingeberg--furs

Groskopf Brothers--trunks and travel bags

Heyman and Company--household furnishings

Belknap, Baker and Company--carriages and harnesses
Fruits from Kent County; local art; baked goods; sewing and quilting; manu-
factured goods;and church, school and club displays rounded out the items
shown in the Art Hall. The most popular exhibits throughout the 1890's

always centered around furniture. The Telegram-Herald noted in 1891 "the

 

furniture show is complete as might be expected. Mahogany, antique oak

and birdseye maple are shown in elaborate fashions."55

The horse barn was another focal point on the fairground. The horses

were stabled in a facility "219 x 312 feet, 40 feet wide, enclosing a

 

54"Up the Rolling Grand," The Telegram-Herald, September 2, 1891, p. 1.

 

55"Ready for the Crowds," The Telegram-Herald, September 15, 1891, p. 1.

 

55"Plenty of Fine Sport," The Telegram-Herald, September 16, 1891, p. 1.

50

square or court in the center 139 x 234 feet with track inside for ex-
hibiting horses."57 The enclosed court provided an ideal quarters for
inspecting stock and awarding premiums. The court was considered an inno-
vation in 1891 because it protected the judges from being molested by
curious and intruding spectators. The main entrance of the horse barn

was flanked by two octagonal towers that were used as Offices by the su-

perintendent of the horse department.

Those who exhibited horses were charged an entrance fee, usually one
dollar per horse, and a stall fee. The fair association provided free
bedding for the stalls and sold hay and oats to exhibitors at regular mar-
ket prices. The horses were shown in their stalls, and during exhibition
hours, the doors to all stalls were Opened. Colorful banners were hung
over the doors announcing the breed of the horse and the name and resi-
dence of the owner. Competitions were Open to both pedigree and non-
standard breed horses with premiums awarded tO the winners in the follow-
ing classes: standard bred roadsters, roadsters not standard bred, car-
riage and buggy horses, saddle horses, horses of all work, coach horses,
Belgian draft, Percheron or French draft, Clydsdale or English shire,
grade draft horses, jacks and mules, and Shetland ponies. Each year
judging standards were posted in the horse barns, which included such
characteristics as form, general beauty, style, action, matching and
evenness Of gait. Cash premiums in each class ranged from around fifteen

dollars for first place, eleven dollars for second and seven dollars for

 

57West Michigan Fair, Premium List 1894, p. 27.

 

51
third.58

The cattle barn was located north of the horse barn and also
fronted the midway and grandstands. The cattle barn was built on the
same design as the horse barn with minor alterations. In 1897 three hun-
dred head of cattle were exhibited in the cattle barn, and they were
shipped to Mill Creek from all over the midwest.59 In 1903 fourteen
classes of cattle were exhibited, including shorthorns, Devons, herefords,
Jerseys, calloways, Aberdeen-Angus, Holstein—Friesians, red polled, Gurnseys,
Ayrshire, polled Durhams, grade cows, pure bred fat cattle, and grade fat
cattle. Premiums were awarded to various aged bulls and cows, heifers,
yearlings, heifer calves, herds and sweepstakes, like a bull and four get.
The champion in each class received a blue ribbon and $15 while a red rib-
bon and $12 was awarded to second and a yellow ribbon and $8 dollars went
to third.50 Dudley Waters of Grand Rapids, owner of Maryland Farms, and
Martin Buth, Sr. of Comstock Park, owner Of Creston Farm, were local fa-
vorites in the cattle department, competing in the Holstein-Friesian class.
While the judges inspected the cattle and awarded ribbons and premiums,
farmers who hung around the livestock barns would circle them anxiously
awaiting their decisions. While the men lingered around the livestock
barns "their wives and daughters made the rounds of the commercial ex-
hibits in the main building and inspected the needlework and other ex-

hibits in the women's building."61 The horses and cattle were all

 

58West Michigan State Fair, Premium List 1903, p. 45, Michigan
Room, Grand Rapids Public Library.

 

59"Its Gates are Open," EveningpPress, September 6, 1897, p. 1.

 

50West Michigan State Fair, Premium List 1903, p. 29.

 

51"Livestock Draws Farmers," Grand Rapids Press, August 31, 1926, p. 1.

 

52

paraded around the race track in front Of the grandstand on Wednesday of

fair week in the grand cavalcade of the animals.

The sheep and swine buildings were located north of the cattle barn
at the end of the midway. Two buildings housed the sheep exhibits, and
one was provided for the swine. The sheep and swine buildings were se-
parated by a service entrance where livestock and machinery were brought
into the fairgrounds from the railroad loading docks. Pens were located
in the center Of the buildings with a six foot covered walk around them.
The stock was separated according to breed so spectators could compare
their merits.62 Sheep and swine exhibits were popular during the early

days Of the fair. In 1897 the Evening Press reported "In the hog depart-

 

ment there are 425 snorting rooters grunting away merrily" and "of the
meek sheep and lambs there are 350 on the grounds and more to be placed."53
These exhibits were especially popular with the children. The Ppp§§_dis-
covered "children under 10 years of age found it extremely difficult to
peer into the pens and inspect the sheep and swine exhibits. Fathers'

and mothers' arms grew tired lifting their offspring to vantage points
where they could survey the bleating sheep and the grunting, squealing

hogs."64

The original purpose of the fair was to promote agriculture and

industry, and during its early years, an educational atmosphere prevailed.

 

52West Michigan Fair, Premium List 1894, p. 27.

 

53Evenipg Press, September 6, 1897, p. 1.

 

64"Children are Honored Guests as Fair Opens," Grand Rppids Press,
August 30, 1926, p. 1.

 

 

 

 

53

The midway had few rides, side shows and gaming tables. Farm machinery
exhibits took up most of the space between the buildings and was housed
in tents on property north of the grandstand. Manufacturers displayed

windmills, water systems, manure spreaders, silo fillers, thrashing ma-
chines, choppers, grinders, wagons and a multitude of other farm imple-

ments. The Premium List of 1913 stressed the educational and improvement

 

function of the fair claiming "as a distributing mart for livestock of

all kinds and for extending the intercourse among men engaged in the live-
stock industry, there is no agency yet known that can approach it in this
field of endeavor."65 Later, when country boys began to leave the farm to
work in a factory, they had less interest in agricultural exhibits and
were looking for more citified attractions.55 The fairs responded and
during the twentieth century presented their patrons with the glitter of
the midway. Lyman A. Lilly, secretary of the West Michigan Fair in

1917 reflected this change when he stated the purpose of the fair was for
"the education, amusement, and entertainment of everyone."57 As the twen-
tieth century progressed, the agricultural and educational functions of
the fair started to disappear because of the changes introduced by indus-

trialization and urbanization.

The climax of the fair was usually centered around hotly contested

harness races "which drew the best animals and drivers On the state

 

65West Michigan State Fair, Premium List 1913, p. 13, Michigan
Room, Grand Rapids Public Library.

 

66Lingeman, pp, 913,, p. 310.

67west Michigan State Fair, Premium List 1914, p. 13, Michigan
Room, Grand Rapids Public Library.

 

 

 

WE

ha

54

circuit."68 The West Michigan Agricultural and Industrial Society built
seven speed stables on the north end of the fairground that accommodated
up to 185 horses. The horses raced on a mile track in front of wooden
grandstands which seated 4,500 people. The rooms under the grandstand
were used for dining and refreshment.59 Lingeman describes the role of
harness racing at a county fairground as follows:
The center of many a town's fairgrounds was a wooden grand-
stand and race track, where races were held in spring,
summer and fall, with the county fair meet the world series
Of the season. On the final day, families brought picnic
baskets and arrived early to pack the grey, weathered-lumber
grandstand, with its splintering wooden seats, or else
crowded close by the track so that, when the horses came
pounding into the stretch, the marshalls had to yell at
them to get back and give them room. As the horses neared
the finish line, the entire grandstand stood and cheered;
plenty of bets were riding.7
The horses at the fair were the cream of the local horse population.
Many hours had been spent in training them, and they were specially bred.
The bet became an adjunct to the racing and indicated the confidence the

horseman had in his finished product.

From the very beginning, the track of the West Michigan Fair pro-
vided the people in the area with the opportunity to enjoy quality harness
racing, and one may legitimately question if racing was not the purpose
for having the fairground established. Horse flesh from all over the mid-
west was shipped to Mill Creek, making local residents as familiar with
big names on the track, like Doc Tanner and Pop Geers, as contemporaries

are with popular athletes and athletes and television personalities. The

 

63Lingeman, pp, p13,, p. 310.

69West Michigan Agricultural and Industrial Society, Premium List
1894, p. 27.

 

70Lingeman, pp, pit,, p. 310.

55

speed stables were the first facilities to be used on the fairgrounds.

In 1891 the Telpgram-Herald reported that "about fifty horses are now

 

in training on the course. The stalls are nearly all secured and some
fine strings are on exhibition."71 Each owner rented space at the speed
stable, and employees cared for the needs of the horses and equipment.
The local speed stables were probably very similar to the Ones Sherwood

Anderson described in Tar: A Midwest Childhood:

 

There was a board floor and a long row Of box stalls on

each side and in front of each stall there was an Open-

ing with iron bars so he could look through but the horse

inside could not get out. A good thing, too. Tar walked

along slow, looking in. "Fassig's Irish Main; Old Hundred;

Tipton Ten: Willing-to-Please; Saul, The First; Passenger

Boy; Holy Mackerel.“ The names were on little tickets

fastened on the front of the stalls.72
The speed stables were a favorite lounging place of race fans at the fair-
grounds. Anderson states, "On the bench in front of the stable, on summer
afternoons when there weren't any horses being worked at the track, the
men talked-~sometimes of women, sometimes of why God let certain things
happen, sometimes of why is a farmer always growling."73 Anderson had a
job as a stable boy at the track and went around "in horsey evil smelling
pants."74 His mother reluctantly consented to having her son working at
the stable because she thought the association would be bad for him. And-

erson admitted the stable life had its base nature:

 

71Telegram-Herald, August 19, 1891, p. 1.

 

72$herwood Anderson, Tar: A Midwest Childhood (New York: Boni
and Liveright, 1926), p. 174.

 

73Ibid.

74Sherwood Anderson, Return to Winesbupg, (Chapel Hill: The
University of North Carolina Press, 1967), p. 106.

 

56

I dare say the associations were bad, too. What
profanity the boy heard! There were men about the
stables who were artists at it.

Tough women hanging about, too--and con men, flash
men of all sorts.7

Anderson's experiences in Winesburg, Ohio were similar to those of many
young men growing up in Mill Creek who hung around the speed stables.

The speed stables were located next to the row of houses built by the

Mill Creek Tannery SO the race track became an integral part of the educa-

tion of inquisitive tannery youth.

The race track in Mill Creek was a mile oval extending from the
North Park bridge to Mill Creek, and it was constructed of heavily packed
dirt which was watered and rolled on race day. A half-mile track was
constructed inside the mile oval in 1903. The local track soon earned the
reputation Of being one of the fastest tracks in the midwest. In 1891 at
the first fair on the new fairground, Nelson covered the mile in two min-
utes and ten seconds to establish a track record.76 Nelson's record
created interest in holding another race in 1891, and it proved to be

local harness racing's finest hour.

On October 8, 1891, the Comstock Driving Park was the scene of the
most famous horse race ever staged on a Grand Rapids track. Two royal
stallions, Nelson, owned by C.H. Nelson of Maine, and Allerton, owned by

C.W. Williams of Iowa, met for a race billed by its promoter Don J.

 

75Ibid.
75"Down Goes His Record," Telegram-Herald, September 19, 1891, p. 1.

 

57

Leathers as the trotting world's championship. These horses were the
finest trotting horses alive, and they raced for a $10,000 purse, a fa-
bulous sum for that day. The race was to be decided on the best three of
five heats with the owners doing the driving.77 Both horses had trotted
the mile in record time, and the excitement generated by the match swept
the whole country. Grand Rapids was exuberant over the race as a week
prior to its running the hotels were filled with horsemen, who constantly
discussed the horses. Local newspapers were filled with goSsip concerning
the drivers, and the condition of the horses was reported daily. Bets were
placed; the Norton House established a betting ring in its pool room with
Allerton given a 25 to 20 edge. Local fans placed their money on Nelson,
as he had set the record at the fair in September, and they were eager to

challenge the western money.78

On October 8 race fans poured into Mill Creek from all over the coun-
try. Special excursion trains arrived from Maine, Chicago, Terra Haute,
Detroit and other cities of Michigan. By race time 20,000 spectators
crowded around the track, having paid one dollar admission to the grand-
stand and an extra dollar for a reserved seat. A temporary grandstand was
erected where unreserved seats were sold for fifty cents. The blanketed
horses and colorful drivers seated in their fragile sulkies were paraded
around in all of their splendor to the delight Of the enthusiastic crowd

who were eager for the race to begin.79

 

77"Throw Up Your Hats," Evening Leader, September 25, 1891.

 

78"All Is Now Settled," Evening Leader, September 30, 1891.

 

79"Most Famous Horse Race Ever Staged on a Grand Rapids Track,"
Grand Rapids Herald, August 22, 1915. p. 2.

 

58

Nelson took the first heat in an unimpressive two minutes and thir-
teen seconds. In the middle of the second heat, C.H. Nelson turned to
see how far he was ahead and pulled his horse to the pole. Valuable se-
conds were lost, and Allerton took advantage of the mistake and won the
heat and the next two races. Thus, the glory of the great race was denied
to Nelson as he was defeated three heats to one by Allerton. Local fans
rationalized that Nelson was still the best of the two horses, but his
driver was a fool. With a record of two minutes and seventeen seconds

Allerton left Mill Creek as the world's class trotting champion.80

The harness racing events stages at the fairground during the 1890's
were sponsored by the Grand Rapids Horsemen's Association with Don J.
Leathers serving as president. Leathers was responsible for the success-
ful Nelson-Allerton race, and the following year he led the Horsemen's
Association into another ambitious scheme. During the summer meetings of
1892, the association hung up purses aggregating $50,000. The Evening
pppppp_reported, "It was the first time in the history of horse trotting
that an American association had hung up . . .aistake or purse of this
magnitude without entrance charges."31 The results of the summer season
proved to be disastrous and "the association not only lost a pile of
money but to some extent lost its nerve."82 To pay Off its losses, mem-
bers of the Horsemen's Association had to dip into their own pockets.

Leathers contributed $1,000 to the effort, but "chagrined and discouraged,

 

80"Allerton," Evening_Leader, October 8, 1891, p. 1.

 

81"Horse Talk,“ Evening Leader, November 18, 1892, p. 2.

 

821bid.
33"In Good Old Days," Evening Press, August 13, 1904, p. 1.

 

 

 

59

no meeting on any scale half as pretentious has ever been undertaken,"83
the Ppp§§_reported in 1904. The Horsemen's Association provided conser-
vative purses until it was replaced in 1903 by the Furniture City Driving
Club. The Ppp§§_concluded, "there is little question if the bold and pro-
gressive spirits who controlled the destinies of the Grand Rapids Horse-
men's Association had been less ambitious the future of racing events in

this city would have~been more propitious."84

The small village Of Mill Creek received further impetus in 1896 when
the State selected it as the site for a fish hatchery for the propagation
of black bass. In 1894 F.B. Dickerson and Horace W. Davis of the State
Board of Fish Commissioners engaged Dwight Lydell "to conduct some experi-
ments, in the hope of perfecting a method by which black bass might be
prOpagated for distribution."85 Lydell set up an experimental station in
Cascade and soon discovered that the male bass was responsible for building
the nest and caring for the eggs. Lydell's discovery upset one of the pet
theories of the scientists as they supposed the role of mother to be in-
digenous to the female. Lydell continued to experiment with black bass,
resulting in developing methods for their artificial propagation.86 The
State Board of Fish Commissioners were impressed with Lydell's work, and
in 1896 they spent $500 to purchase a five acre patch of land in Mill Creek
for the establishment of a bass hatchery. In 1897 the Evening Press

 

 

83"In Good Old Days," Evening Press, August 13, 1904, p. 1.

 

84Ibid.
85"Best in the World," Evening Press, August 16, l902, p. 1.

 

85"TO Raise Black Bass," Evening Press, September 25, 1897, p. 7.

 

 

60

described the site as:

Just within about two stone throws north of the State

fairgrounds, the C. and W.M. Railway Company's tracks

cross Mill Creek and at this point is as pretty a little

bit of scenery as cultivated country affords. The

tracks are built upon an embankment about twenty feet

in height, and in a little valley at the base are the

hatcheries.37
During the winter of 1896 and 1897, the legislature appropriated $1,500 for
the construction of ponds, dams, mains and general site development, and
Horace Davis was assigned to Oversee the construction.88 Two storage
ponds and twelve breeding ponds were constructed, and on September 24 the
ponds were stocked with black bass that "were obtained from the Kalamazoo
River near Galesburg, and from the Grand River below the dam in Grand

Rapids."89

The outcome of the hatchery at Mill Creek village was a disappoint-
ment for the first two or three seasons. In 1897 the hatch was lost be-
cause of the incompleteness of the ponds and two spring freshets on Mill
Creek. The State reported:

The soil being light, the rain dissolved and washed
the sloping sides sufficient to roil the ponds; these
will have to be walled or cemented. In addition, two
remarkably heavy precipitations, practically cloud-
bursts, occurred very inopportunely, roiling the creek
to a disastrpps degree just as the height of the bed-
ding season.

A retaining wall was constructed out of stone along the south bank of

 

87Ipid.

88Ibid.

89State of Michigan, Thirteenth Biannual Report of the State Board
of Fish Commissioners for the Calendar Years 1897 and 1898 (Lansing:
Robert Smith Printing COmpany, 1899), p. 12.

901bid., p. 11.

 

over
are

ins:

aio

61

Mill Creek in the following year, and the ponds were put back in opera-
tion. Several ponds were added to the small hatchery, and by 1903 the State
had concluded, "through the resourcefulness and tireless energy and efforts
Of the overseer, Mr. Lydell . . . one obstacle after another has been
overcome, one problem after another has been solved, until today the
production of bass on a certain and stable basis, and Of a size and age to

insure good results when set free in wild waters, is an accomplished fact."91

Mill Creek was selected as a hatchery site because of its excellent

rail facilities and the abundance of water on the hatchery site. J.K.V.
Agnew of the C. and W.M. Railway made several trips to the hatchery pre-
mises to study the possibility of arranging a sidetrack to accomodate the
institution and undoubtedly applied pressure to have the hatchery built
along company lines.92 The creek was a resource essential to the develop-
ment of the hatchery, and a dam was built above the facility from which
water was piped to the ponds. A good spring located in the bluffs west
Of the hatchery was piped to the hatchery grounds and provided a good
supply of water for the hatchery building. The State emphasized the role
of water by reporting in 1904:

The volume of Mill Creek is abundantly ample to sup-

port not only the ponds already completed, but also

an extention of the pond system over the entire val-

ley between our dam and the mill pond at Mill Creek
village, which would more than double the capacity

 

91$tate Of Michigan, Sixteenth Biannual Rpport of the State Board
of Fish Commissioners for the Calendar Years 1903 and’1904 (Lansing:
RobertTSmith Publishing Company, 1904), p. 13:

92Evening_Press, September 25, 1897, p. 7.

 

62

and output of the plant. We look forward to the

acquirement and development of the remainder of this

valley at the earliest possible date.93
The fish biologists were Optimistic about the future of the hatchery in
Mill Creek in 1904. The facility had a small two story frame hatchery
building with a tank room, pump room and an office on the first floor and
a workshop and bedrooms on the second floor. The tank room was equipped
with a fifty-jar battery for the hatching Of walleyed pike.94 A residence
was erected in 1903 for the superintendent on the high bluffs to the east
so he could overlook the grounds, and a horse barn was constructed at the
base of the hill along the creek. The hatchery made an appeal for visitors
to inspect the site, except during the spawning season in the spring, and
the State started to develop their growing enterprise into a tourist at-
traction and a park. In the years ahead the Mill Creek Hatchery would be
declared "The finest equipped and most productive fish hatchery in the

United States."95

Mill Creek experienced further growth in 1897 when it was selected
as the site for the location of two tanneries. Rail transportation was
once again a significant factor in the development of the community, as
the tanneries were required to ship an abundance of tan bark, hides and
leather by rail. The tanneries had nine railroad sidings running through

their grounds in 1907, and chuffing locomotives switched cars from track

 

93State of Michigan, Sixteenth Report--State Fisheries, p. 13.

 

94Ibid.

95State of Michigan, Department of Conservation, Division of Fish
Culture Operations, Report for Fiscal Year 1921 and 1922 (Lansing: State
Printing Office, 1923), p. 86}

 

63

to track.96 The tanneries like the fish hatchery and the fair would never

have been located in Mill Creek had it not been for the railroad junction.

The first tannery was built in Mill Creek in the spring of 1897 by
George Metz; it was called the Mill Creek Tannery. Metz, who lived on
the corner of Four Mile Road and West River Road, constructed his tannery
between the Grand Rapids and Indiana railroad tracks and the Grand River,
just north of Mill Creek.97 Metz employed between twenty-five and thirty-
five men in his business, which he named the Grand Rapids Leather Company.
He also built the brick building on the corner of West River Road and Le-
land Street (formerly called Metz Street) in 1897 which is now occupied by
the State Bank Of Michigan. John Baker started a general store on the
main floor of the building, called the Mill Creek Mercantile Company, while
the second floor was used by the International Order of Odd Fellows.98
Metz became a successful local businessman, and the Metz building in Grand

Rapids was named after him.

A second tannery, the Michigan Tannery, was built just north of the
Mill Creek Tannery in the fall of 1897 by John Bertsch, of the Cappon and
Bertsch Leather Company of Holland. Cappon and Bertsch started in an old
log building in Holland in 1857 and "in 1880, competing at New York, they

took the gold medal for the best non-acid sole leather made in the United

 

96Standard Atlas of Kent County, Michigan (Chicago, George A.
Ogle and Co., 1907), p. 45.

 

97Clarence Wier, personal interview at the home of Clarence Wier,
Comstock Park, Michigan, November 15, 1971.

93Hachmuth, pp, pit,, p. 1.

64

States."99 Cappon and Bertsch opened a store in Grand Rapids in 1869, and
when Metz started his tannery in 1897 in Mill Creek, they built next door

to compete for the leather market.

In 1902 George Metz sold the Mill Creek Tannery to the Wallin Leather
Company, a Chicago based Operation that opened a tannery in Grand Rapids
on South Front Street in 1881, and they later also purchased the Michigan
Tannery. The Wallin Leather Company, as the two tanneries were then
called, did a prosperous business until they were sold to the Union Tanning

Company, a New York syndicate, during the first World War.100

The tanning industries played a major role in developing housing in
Comstock Park. At the peak of their operation they owned forty-seven
homes and two tenements. The houses were rented by the workers at the
plant fOr 50¢ to $1.25 a week; the rent was deducted from their pay checks.101
The tannery rows were made of two story frame houses that were identical
in design. Rolled roofing, wood siding, small porch, wood pile for the
stove, standard outhouse, possibly a pig pen or chicken coup, and a family
garden were the embellishments of the tanners' home environment. Humble
by today's standards, but the tanner was a proud independent man who was
happy to have a job whereby he could support his family. Many of the
older residents in Comstock Park today were raised on tannery row. The
row houses stood on Leland Street, West River Drive and between the G.R.

and 1. tracks and the Grand River. A few of these structures still

 

99Baxter, pp, pit,, p. 494.
100Mier, pp. pi_t_.
10116id.

 

65

remain, and from them one can catch a glimpse of humble tannery row

architecture.

The late nineteenth century brought great change to the village
developing around Mill Creek; the railroads, street cars and improved ‘
roads increased communication and broke down rural isolation. Economic
and cultural ties were being established with the larger mass society.
With the fairground, tanneries and the fish hatchery starting out in the
1890's the local residents approached the future with optimism expecting
rapid growth. People traveled to Mill Creek to visit the fair and the
hatchery or to attend the harness races run at the local track. Mill
Creek was establishing a reputation in Western Michigan as a progressive
community. It appeared eager to tackle the problems that would be intro-
duced by urbanization and industrialization. The inhabitants of Mill

Creek expected great things in the future.

CHAPTER III
DEVELOPMENT OF COMSTOCK PARK,1906 TO 1940

At the turn Of the century, Comstock Park was a tannery village and
in many ways resembled the typical mill town Of the late nineteenth cen-
tury. The tanneries expanded north along the river, a resource they
exploited by disposing of large amounts of industrial waste there. They
erected power plants, tan yards, beam houses, drying lofts, storage build-
ings, extract plants and bark sheds. Tan bark dominated the area as it was
piled in long rows along the railroad sidings. Busy locomotives brought
in hides from the Chicago and St. Louis stockyards and took out finished
harness and shoe leather, while towering smokestacks poured black smoke
into the air as warm summer breezes carried the repugnant Odor Of rotting
flesh and strong chemicals throughout the community. The tanneries owned
and operated their own general store, the Mill Creek Mercantile Company
on Metz Street, where workers could purchase food on credit, and they also
owned most of the village real estate, including forty seven houses and
two tenement buildings where their employees were housed. During the peak
of their operation, the tanneries employed around five hundred men, in-
cluding many street car commuters from Grand Rapids.1 The village had two
hotels, the Riversite and the North Star, which boarded tannery workers

and provided amusement during their leisure hours. Tanners worked a

 

1Clarence Wier, personal interview at the home of Clarence Wier,
Comstock Park, Michigan, November 15, 1971.

66

(a

p
1

2.1

67
fifty-four hour week for around twenty dollars, with their rent deducted
from their paychecks.2 Thus, the Industrial Revolution brought unbridled
capitalism to the banks of Mill Creek, with success now determined in the
village by rate of growth, weekly profits and net earnings on laborers'
paychecks. The tanneries lured workers from their subsistance farms and
introduced the wage earner to the agricultural and business oriented
class structure Of the village. Furthermore, the tanneries produced a

few boom years to the small village that had been known as Mill Creek.

One of the more significant events that occurred around the turn

of the century was a change in the village name. The reasons for the
name change is still a subject of dispute, but Homer Burch provides some
insight with the following:

Along in the last Of the l870's, C.C. Comstock,

a Grand Rapids industrialist and one time mayor

of the city, acquired vast real estate holdings in

the area and eventually the village name was changed

again--to Comstock Park in honor of Mr. Comstock.

Somehow the transition from Mill Creek to Comstock

Park in peoples minds was slow and gradual and it

was still thought of and called Mill Creek long

after it became Comstock Park. It was not until

l906 that the post office was also renamed Comstock

Park.3
Comstock had great impact on the area for he was responsible for con-
structing West River Road, erecting the first bridge across the river,
donating ninety acres fOr use as a fair ground, extending streetcar service
in the north end, diking the river and filling in the swamps, building the
North Park pavilion and marketing north end real estate. Comstock's life

was marked with success in lumbering along the Rogue River and Cadillac

 

 

68

areas, establishing a factory to manufacture pails and tubs and another
to produce furniture and serving Grand Rapids politically as mayor and
congressman.4 When it was time to abolish the name of Mill Creek, C.C.
Comstock was the ideal local role model of an industrial era when finan-
cial success was the mark of a great man. Thus, Daniel North's pioneer
home was renamed Comstock Park while the village across the river in
Comstock's backyard retained the name of North Park. The name change
was contested fOr a variety of reasons but among them was the fact that

Comstock never lived in the community that bears his name.

The fairground had an impact on renaming the village. In 1891
when the Nelson-Allerton race was run the race track was called the
Comstock Driving Park, as C.C. Comstock had donated the land and pro-
moted development of the site. Race programs continued to promote the
Comstock Driving Park while fans shortened the title by deleting the
word driving. Thus, the enthusiasts of harness racing simply headed for

Comstock Park on race day.

Another version of the name change centers around Mrs. Frank Burt.
Mrs. Burt, whose husband owned Judge Burt's Saloon, organized a Comstock
Park Beautification Association to clean up the mess around the fairground
and in front of the saloons. Mrs. Burt was concerned about the reputa-
tion that had been established in Mill Creek so she promoted Comstock
Park as the name of the village. Mrs. Burt hired children to plant
flowers and tend to the patches Of grass around the village to present

the image Of a neat and orderly community.

4Baxter, pp. pit, p. 478.

69
A more popular version of the name change centers around the bad

reputation acquired by Mill Creek. Mill Creek developed a profitable
saloon trade because of the location of the Soldiers' Home, the fair-
ground, the race track and the federal restriction against selling
alcoholic beverages within one mile limit Of the veterans. With five
saloons, whose patrons consisted Of lonely veterans, race fans and fair
entertainers, the village quickly develOped a bad reputation. The fair
and the race track attracted a motley assortment of questionable char-
acters who were eager to patronize and enrich the local saloons. Richard
Lingeman described the small town saloon in words that are very appro-
priate for the establishments that Operated in old Mill Creek:

The saloons established themselves right on Main

Street to catch the farmers walk in trade. Even

then, they often had a closed-off, forbidden

air to conceal the inner goings-on from the

eyes of respectable folk walking the streets.

Bars were long and solidly constructed of dark

wood, echoed in the paneling on the walls. The

decor included prints Of race horses, prize

fighters, and voluptuous nude women. Yet

for all its sometimes sleazy aura of sin, many

town saloons were orderly places.
The patrons at Judge Burt's Saloon, Mike Hayes's Saloon, the North Star
Hotel, Echternach's Saloon and the Riversite Hotel frequently sought the
types Of amusement that were frowned on by the village moralists. On
September 6, l903, the first church in the village was dedicated, the
Baptist Church, which stood where the high school library is presently
located, and the saloon trade began to receive a more determined Opposi-

tion.6 The church members took their crusade to the political arena

 

5Lingeman, pp. pip” p. 266.
6Hachmuth, pp, pit,, p. 1.

70
where a village name change was debated as a means of shedding the repu-
tation that Mill Creek had acquired in the eyes Of neighboring communities.
On June 8, l906, the name of the village post Office was changed to
Comstock Park, and Mrs. Burt and the moralists won their first victory.
However, the name of Mill Creek still lingered in the minds of many of

the older residents who developed fond attachments with the good old days.

Several older residents in the village claim the name change was
promoted by the Comstock Park Ladies Literary Club, whose members resented
being introduced at out of town gatherings as "the ladies from Mill
Creek." Mill Creek apparently attracted a few "ladies of the night"
whose professional reputations had traveled out into the surrounding
communities. Respectable club women undoubtedly experienced some degree
of embarrassment from the unsavory stigma attached to their village, but
this story has limited reliability for the Ladies Literary Club was
organized on February l8, l9l0, when the village was already generally
accepted as Comstock Park. However, the club members probably appreciated

the fact that the name on the post Office had already been changed.

The growth of the tanneries was reflected in the growth of the
community and through the development of the school system. With the
introduction of a wage earning class, the population rapidly increased,
putting pressure on the neighborhood school. The old Withey School had
been abandoned sometime during the l970's, and the Mill Creek School was
erected on West River Road.7 The first Mill Creek School was a one-room
wood frame structure, but during the l890's, it was either added to or

replaced for the school then had two rooms and a long roof covered porch

7Ibid.

w

71

where students posed for school pictures. Students at Mill Creek School
were taught in a simple atmosphere where they sat two to a desk and
worked independently on their assignments until they were called to the
recitation benches to recite their lessons. With only two classrooms,
teachers worked with multiple classes where students studied together by
age and class. Using the recitation system, younger students learned by

listening to the Older students recite.8

The Mill Creek School was simply furnished. It was heated during
the winter by two Garland wood stoves, one in the front of each room.
Farmers sold wood to the school board and brought it to the school by
wagon or sleigh. The wood was placed in the woodshed next to the school
and students were assigned to carry it in when it was needed. The
teacher's first job on a winter morning was to build the fire and heat
the room. Kerosene lamps were suspended from the ceiling to provide
light on dark days, as the building was seldom used at night. A small
anteroom was used to store lunches, coats, boots and the water bucket.
The school water system was composed of a pump, located between West
River Road and the G.R. and I tracks, a bucket and a dipper. All students
drank from the same dipper and somehow managed to maintain a good state
of health. Directly behind the school building stood two outhouses which
the students called "five holers." Winter trips to the outhouses were

kept as brief as possible.9

8Mrs. Leona Wheeler to David Wier, April 8, l972. Author's local
history file, Comstock Park, Michigan.

9Clarence Wier, personal interview at the home of Clarence Wier,
Comstock Park, Michigan, April 7, l972.

72

In 1895 the teachers at Mill Creek School were Miss Evelyn Calkins
and a Miss Noyce. Miss Calkins had taught at Mill Creek when the facility
was still a one room school. In 1907, when Mill Creek School was re-
placed, the teaching staff had been enlarged by one position. Miss
Jennie Noel taught and served as principal while Mrs. Hart taught the
Older children and Mrs. Roberson taught the younger ones. Eighty to
ninety students were crowded into the two room school at this time,
making it necessary to build a new facility. The tanneries had been

Operating for ten years, and now the school was beginning to grow.10

The most enjoyable time for students at the Mill Creek School was
the Christmas season. The two rooms were Opened up by removing wooden
panels; then the school was decorated in Christmas attire. A Christmas
tree was set up between the two rooms and lit by candles. Pails of water
were placed on both sides of the tree for use in case of fire. Each
student participated in a Christmas program by saying a piece or singing
a song. This festive mood was climaxed with the giving Of gifts. Van A.
Wallin, the owner of the tannery, would send his teamster and sleigh to
school with presents fOr the children. Boots were given to the boys and

dolls to the girls with everybody receiving oranges, nuts and candy.11

Formal education ended in Mill Creek School when students passed
the county exams at the end of the eighth grade. The Kent County School
Board administered the eighth grade exams, and when they were satisfact-
orily completed, they issued a diploma. The first graduating exercises

in Mill Creek were held in l904 when J. Neil Lamoreaux, William Hartman

 

73

and Jay Ramsdell were presented their diplomas in the Baptist Church.
Students who went on to school traveled to Grand Rapids where they

attended Union High School.12

As the tanneries grew, the school grew; therefore, in l908, with an
enrollment of l38, a new facility was erected on the Lamoreaux farm next
to the Baptist Church.13 Clarence Wier, a student at the Mill Creek
School at the time recalled the move as follows:

I was eight years Old in the fall of l908 when we
moved out of the Mill Creek School . . . to our new
four-room school on the hill. When school Opened
in September, the Mill Creek School had already
been sold, and construction was still in progress
at the new site. To solve our problem school
Officials housed us in the Baptist Church, which

was lpcated just a little east Of the new build-
ing.

The new four room school was a brick two story structure with a bell
tower. In keeping with the times, the name of the school was changed
from Mill Creek to Comstock Park. The Comstock Park School was
heated by a gravity furnace, but kerosene lamps still provided light
and there was no inside plumbing. Amelia M. Doyle, a teacher hired
in l908 who taught locally over thirty years, recalled that "when
she began teaching at the school, a new four-room building has just
been erected . . . this provided an extra room to take care of the

expansion expected from Comstock Park."15 Older residents claim the

 

12Ellen Ericksen, personal interview at the Ericksen home, Comstock
Park, Michigan, April 5, l972.

13Hachmuth, pp, pit, p. 1.

14Clarence Wier, "Reflections on an Old School," The Schoolhouse,
August, 1974, p. 1.

15"Honor Teacher for Service at Comstock Park," Grand Rapids Herald,
undated article in P.T.A. Scrapbook, May 4, l94l

 

74

tanneries provided over seventy-five percent Of the tax revenue for build-

ing and Operating this school as they owned most of the village real estate.

In l912 there was a need for another building program because l73
pupils were enrolled in the school. An addition was built on the back of
the building in l9l3 consisting of two upstairs rooms and a main floor
auditorium. The School Census of l9l5 reported 2l7 students, an increase
of 44 in two years as ninth and tenth grades were added with the comple-

tion of new facilities.16

Ten teachers were employed at the school in
l922, receiving an average annual salary of $l,OOO. The enrollment stabil—
ized around 225 in the early l920's; 300 volumes were recorded in the
school library and all school property was valued at $30,000.17 School
business centered around personnel problems, music and athletic programs
and maintenance. R. Jeffery was employed by the board to perform one Of
the most unpleasant tasks in the system, cleaning the vault under the
outhouses behind the building. Jeffery received $15 for his service, but
he had to bear the sobriquet "honey dipper" that was hung on him by the

students.18

Comstock Park students received their eleventh and twelfth grade
education in Grand Rapids until a local high school was completed in l927.

In 1922 the School Board paid $l,l8O in tuition to the Grand Rapids schools,

16Plainfield Township, Kent Co., Mich, School Census of District
No.9 Fractional 1915, Directors Book of Records and Accounts 1915-1922,
COmstock Park Public Schools, Comstock Park, Michigan.

17Ibid.

18Plainfield Township, Kent Co., Mich., Director Book of Records
and Accounts, July 12, 1914, p. 33.

 

75
and $626 was given to provide transportation for students on the street-
car.19 Anticipating the need for a new high school, the board purchased
six lots from the Lamoreaux Farm Plat behind the school fOr $l,500 in
1921.20 The School Board created a building committee on July l4, 1924,
"with power to act relative to erection of a new building" and Peter Buth,
H.C. Hachmuth and Edward 8. Joyce were appointed as members.21 At the
annual meeting in July l925 the building committee reported a $l05,000
bond sale for the construction of a new high school. F.P. Allen and Sons
were awarded the architectural contract; J.P. TOp was awarded the contract
for general construction; J. A. VanderWalls Co. was awarded the contract
for heating and plumbing; and Grand Rapids Electric was awarded the contract
for electrical work.22 The building was completed in the fall of 1926.
Comstock Park High school issued diplomas to its first graduating class in
l927. The new high school contained twelve rooms and a gymnasium and was
considered an excellent facility. The building was constructed at the
opportune time for the tannery was still prospering and the depression had
not yet arrived. The l927 high school building served the community with
little alteration until the l960's when housing developments increased the

population, and it is still used as part of the high school today.

The tanneries stimulated the development of Comstock Park producing

what Lingeman called a "metamorphosis from the pioneer Chrysalis.“23 One

 

19Plainfield Township, Kent Co., Mich., School Board Minutes
l922-l930: MichiganpDistrict Record, Comstock Park Public Schools,
COmstock Park, Michigan, p. 89.

201bid., p. 88.

2lipid, p. 96.
22Ibid, p. 98.
23Lingeman, pp, p13,, p. l69.

 

76

of the characteristics Lingeman cites in this post-pioneer phase of
village development is the formation of a new middle class--including
"grocers, merchants, tradesmen, artisans, shopkeepers, clerks, doctors,
lawyers, dentists, ministers, teachers, bookkeepers, petit Officials--re-
spectable, industrious, God-fearing, early-tO-bed-and-early-to-rise, heed-
ful of their neighbors' good Opinion, bent on making money and avoiding

24

alien ways." In the post-pioneer village described by Lingeman, popula-

tion began to increase, buildings were rapidly constructed and store-

bought goods replaced those that had been assembled in the home.

Comstock Park experienced development similar to Lingeman's model
from T900 to l920. Mrs. Henry Hachmuth traced the growth of the village
during this period in her "History of Comstock Park" where she cites the
fOllowing:

The Mill Creek Mercantile Company was built by George
Metz at the turn of the century; in l903 the Baptist
Church was constructed; in l904 T.A. Hice started his
meat market and Ed Joyce Opened his blacksmith shop;

in l908 the school was built and Dana Stowell started

a store; in l909 Michael Hayes started a coal business;
in l912 Neil Lamoreaux started an ice and coal business;
in l913 Dr. Frant A. Boet opened a medical practice and
Mr. Taylor opened a barber shop; in l9l4 Fred Dodge
opened his dry goods store and Jefferson Childs started
a hardware; and in l9l5 C.F. Porter Opened a feed mill.25

By 1917 Comstock Park had a well developed main street "where people met,
gossiped, bought, sold, bartered, exchanged, learned."26 However, the
village was still dominated by horse culture with hitching posts and rail

fences, dray wagons delivering stock to the stores and lighter delivery

 

24Ibid, p. 170.
25Hachmuth, pp, pit,, p. 1.
26Lingeman, pp, cit, p. 170.

a.“

77

wagons taking goods from the stores to the customers. Furthermore, the
aroma of horses was everywhere as they were left waiting in front of the

stores along the street.

Comstock Park grew rapidly from 1900 to 1920, and in l9l7 Mrs.
Hachmuth claimed the community could boast of the following enterprises

and institutions:

One of the largest fish hatcherys; two tanneries;

the West Michigan State Fairgrounds; Hachmuth Pure
Food Co.'s plant; Comstock Park State Bank; two
general stores; drug store; hardware store; two barber
shops; blacksmith shop; a resident physician; a neat
church building with resident pastor; several boarding
houses; livery barn; a feed and grain mill; four
fraternal lodges; Ladies Literary Club; an Improvement
Association; a Parents Council; modern eight room
school building; school orchestra; brass band; news-
paper well started and a population of about 500.27

Mrs. Hachmuth failed to mention those enterprises and institutions that
the community would not boast of, and they are noticeably absent from her
list. Saloons were still the dominant business on main street as the
community possessed at least five Of them. One wonders if Mrs. Hachmuth
elected to ignore any other enterprises that are now lost in the annals
of local history. However, Mrs. Hachmuth was writing her "Apotheosis of
the Small Town" where she ended her work claiming "With the natural
beautiful surroundings, streetcars, railways and good transportation
facilities, Comstock Park is destined to become a most beautiful and

28 Her sentiments

popular suburban village adjacent to Grand Rapids."
were echoed by the Comstock Park Improvement Association whose officers

were J.G. Johnson, president; Frank Burt, vice-president; Hugh S. Dodge,

 

27Hachmuth, pp, pit,
28Ibid.

78

secretary; and J. Neil Lamoreaux, treasurer.29 Town boosterism was in
vogue at this time so local residents overlooked those factors that were
considered negative to community growth. Village development produced
Optimism, so great vistas were anticipated until the arrival of the

sobering experiences of the "Great Depression."

Hotels played an important role in early Comstock Park as they
provided lodging for tannery workers and people visiting the fairgrounds.
The first hotel, the Riversite, was established by Nick Fink I in the
late l880's. Nick Fink IV, the present operator of the old hotel, has
provided the fOllowing account of how his grandfather obtained his land:

When my Grandad squatted this land it was all

cattails and swamp. He pitched a tent on it and

lived in that tent. He had to keep possession,

I think, for 90 days or something. And he'd sit

here, they tell me, with a shotgun. And if he

had to go to town or somewhere, why then his daugher

would sit here with a shotgun. He squattga just one

acre and a description is on the records.
Fink's colorful description contains a little apotheosis of family history
with some of the details having been filled in. In l855 the property
belonged to Daniel North and in l876 it belonged to J. R. Compton. Nick
Fink I probably obtained the land from Compton with the details of the
land transfer lost in family legend.31 However, when Fink acquired the
site he built a twelve room hotel, which faced Lamoreaux Drive and is
still standing, a stable, a carriage house and an ice house. In l89l,

one year after the fairground was built, Nick Fink II helped his father

29Ibid. , p. 3.

30Eleanor Andree, “In the Fink Tradition," Accent, November 1973,
p. 10.

31Innis and Tinkham, "Map of Kent County," (Chicago: H. Acheson
Litho., l855). and Illustrated Atlas of Kent County, H. Belden and Co.,l876.

 

79

build a twenty room addition on the hotel to cater to the needs of travel-

32 In l893 the new addition to the Riversite

ers and vistors to the fair.
Hotel was Opened with a second story ballroom suspended on bridge trusses.
Nick Fink IV claims, "You'd get 200 to 300 peOple waltzing and the floor
would swing and sway. It was designed that way."33 However, he main—
tained the ballroom proved to be a bad investment fOr "after about four
or five years they stopped having dances because they found out that

dancing and alcohol don't mix."34

Nick claimed people would start fight-
ing and a lot of them got knocked down the stairway. Therefore the
ballroom was converted into additional hotel rooms. The Riversite ad-
vertised 5 or lO cent lunches, billiards, pool, rooms $l,OO per week and
up, suites with bath $3.00 per week and up, single meals 50 cents, candies,

35 The old hotel has

cigars, tobacco, soft drinks and vita on draught.
had a colorful history which is reflected in the facility today with its

accent on antiques.

The North Star Hotel was also built in the l890's with the establish-
ment of the fairground. The North Star was built by Joseph Thiel, and it
Operated along the same lines as the Riversite containing a bar, dining
room, sleeping quarters and an ice house. The bar was located in the
front of the building where one of its memorable features was the mural

of Plumb's Mill that was painted on the wall. The mural cracked and was

 

32Doug Guthrie, "Nick Fink's": mellow with time, "rpe North Press,
July 29, I980, p. 1.

 

33Ibid. p. 17.
3416id.
35Comstock Park News, Dec. 21, 1917, p. 4.

80

destroyed in 1920 when Mary Cordes, Joseph Thiel's oldest daughter, lowered
the hotel building to its present level.36 The dining room was called

the North Star Buffet. Meals were served to boarders and the general
public during the week of the fair. The kitchen was located in the back of
the building and sleeping quarters were provided on the second floor. The
North Star had thirteen rooms which Mary Cordes rented fOr $20 a month,
including board.37 Taverns were one of the mainstays of the local economy

and the North Star joined the others in catering to the north end's thirst.

The village developed socially as well as economically from 1900 to
1920. As the population increased, churches and clubs became an active
part of community life, and they altered the unified social structure
that existed in the nineteenth century. Lingeman describes the trend
toward "joinerism" in small towns and shows how it replaced "the informal
sociability of an earlier time when peoples' relationships with one
another cut across age, class, occupational, and organizational lines and
one's knowledge of all other townspeople ranged over their entire lives.
In those days peOple socialized freely over the whole social spectrum,
and cliques were frowned upon as 'stuckuppity'."38 When Comstock Park
divided socially among the Congregational Church, Immanuel Church, the
Ladies Literary Club, the International Order of Odd Fellows, the Macabees,
the Masonic Country Club and the American Legion, community life became

fragmented. Page Smith Observed a similar process and remarked "such a

 

36Ellen Ericksen, personal interview at the Ericksen home,
Comstock Park, Mich., January 6, l972.

37Clarence Wier to David Wier, Author's local history file,
Comstock Park, Mich. January 5, l972.

38Lingeman, pp. pit, p. 4lO.

81
plethora of organizations is Obviously a disease of the body politic in
communities which have lost all sense of an integrated community life . . .
Even under the best of circumstances the organizations serve to perpetuate
the fragmentations of the community and encourage the formation of enclaves
and cliques."39 These organizations promoted many profitable community
services but they also provided tension among the people as they sponsored

alternate lifestyles.

The Congregational Church of Comstock Park was formed on July 7,
l9lO, when twenty-one charter members met in the I.0.0.F. hall over Sandy
Lamoreaux's general store. Reverend S.T. Morris, the minister of Second
Congregational Church in Grand Rapids, assisted in organizing the local
church and served as its first minister. In March of l9l4 the Congrega-
tionalists relocated in the old Baptist Church, which was experiencing a
declining membership, and in l9lS the Baptists gave the Congregational
Church title to the building. The Congregationalists moved the Old
church down to the North property on Lamoreaux Drive where it is still
standing. The Conservation Department gave the church the old Plumb
family house in l928, which stood on hatchery property across from the

drug store, and it was moved up by the church to serve as a parsonage.40

Another church was established in the community during the Depression.
Immanual Church held its first meeting February 20, l935, in Jefferson
Child's old tin shOp, which had been moved to the rear of the Lamoreaux

building. The church grew out of a Christian Reformed mission that held

_ 39Page Smith, Aspa City Uppppa Hill (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1966)
p. 175.

40Comstock Park Congregational Church, "Golden Anniversary Booklet
1910-1960," September l6, l980. p. 8.

 

82

services in the building fonmerly occupied by the drug store. George L.
Youngs was the pastor at Immanuel when it was organized.41 In 1937 the
church moved out of the tin shop into the basement of their new building,

which was completed and dedicated on October lO, l943.

The two churches were often in conflict. Immanuel, which was
organized as an independent, fundamental church, was viewed by the Con-
gregationalists as being stiff-necked, rigid, dogmatic and fanatical
while the Congregationalists were considered worldly, secularized and
social by the folk at Immanuel. COOperative efforts at spreading the
Christian faith never blossomed as the two churches isolated themselves
from one another. Thus, in a community that provided a splendid opportun-
ity for spreading the faith, the Christians became another fractionaliz-

ing influence on community life.

Social organizations were also established near the turn of the
century, and they contributed their share to the breakdown Of community
life. In l893 the Macabees established a lodge over Dana Stowell's
general store. The Odd Fellows were organized a little later and their
lodge was located over Sandy Lamoreaux's general store.42 The minutes of
the West Michigan Macabee hive furnish a glimpse of the social life that
was provided by the lodges. The local Macabee hive was organized on
March 30, l893 when seventeen charter members elected the following

Officers:

 

41"Immanuel Church Growing," Comstock Park News, December 19.
l935, p. 1.

42Hachmuth, pp, pip,

 

83

Louisa Lamoreaux
Lillian Adams
Lizzie Lamoreaux
Nellie Lamoreaux
Mary Dunham
Euphemia Heath
Nettie Walker
Eliza Hice

Ida Lovell
Martha Spooner

Lady Post Commander

Lady Commander

Lady Lieutenant Commander
Lady Record Keeper

Lady Finance Keeper

Lady Chaplin

Lady Mistress at Arms
Lady Sargent

Lady Sentinal

Lady Picket

43

The ladies raised money fOr their organization by making quilts, cushions,‘
rag carpets, slumber robes and floral arrangements for which they sold
tickets and held drawings. The money was spent on welfare for the poor,
care for the sick, memorials for the departed and improvement of the
lodge. The ladies Sponsored a variety of social activities including
picnics, balls, card parties, oyster suppers, Spider web and basket
socials, ice cream socials and services on Memorial Day. The New Year's
ball with the Sir Knights was the biggest event in the Macabee year as
they involved both supper and dancing. They were frequently held at the
North Park pavilion. However, the Ladies and Sir Knights did not always
agree on the choice of site for their activies. For example, in January
l894 the Macabees were scheduled to hold installation ceremonies at
Stowell's Hall with their families present. A question arose at a “hive"
meeting concerning adequate room to accommodate such an event where L.
Spooner pointed out that "Sir Knights need more room and she understood
that some Sir Knights were interested in Fink's Hall. That was strongly

voted down by every lady present."44

The ladies apparently kept their men
away from the town bars during their social activities. Thus, the Macabee

and the Odd Fellow lodges provided exclusive social activities and community

 

43West Michigan Hive K.O.T. Macabees, Record Keepers Book of West
Michigan Hive NO. 304 (Mill Creek, Mich., March 30, l893), p. 1.

44Ibid, p. 36.

84

services resulting in a withdrawal from the rest of the community. So,

the village experienced more fractionalization from the private lodges.

Lingeman writes that, "women's historical role in many towns was to

"45 The local

fOrm a 'society' that presupposed class distinctions.
Macabee "hive" assumed this role in Comstock Park, with their committee
of three who reviewed social qualifications of prospective members, and
so did the Comstock Park Literary Club. The Literary Club was organized
on February 18, l9lO in the home of Louise Childs. The fourteen ladies
who attended the meeting were drawn from the more prominent families in
the village, including the Hachmuth's, Lamoreaux's, Child's, Hice's and
the Joyce's.46 Noticeably absent from the membership were the homemakers
who were struggling to make a living with their husbands on tannery row.
The club met once a month to discuss topics of interest and listen to
speakers. American history and literature was emphasized and yearly
announcements were embellished with quotes from Henry Wadsworth Long-

fellow.47 The club still exists today and is supported by women from the

Older families in the community.

The Comstock Park Improvement Association was also active in l9l7,
promoting the progressive reforms that were popular around the country at
the turn of the century. The Improvement Association was motivated by
village boosterism for it advertised the advantages Comstock Park offered

to the prospective industrial developer, businessman or resident including

 

45Lingeman, pp, pip, p. 405.

46Beatrice Edge to David Wier, Author's local history file,
Comstock Park, Mich., Jan. 21, 1975.

47Laclies Literary Club, Fourth Annual Announcement 1914-1915,
Comstock Park, Mich. p. 2.

85
excellent rail facilities, low taxes, streetcar service, fine building
sites overlooking the fish hatchery, pure Spring water and fine auto
roads. The local reformers boasted of the community's "fine school,
church, bank, newspaper, canning factory, two tanneries, flour and feed
mills."48 The Improvement Association negleted to inform the people
about the negative aspects in the local environment. The fact that the
tanneries were polluting the air and water went as unnoticed as the
presence of many saloons. Association memberships sold fOr one dollar a
year, including the annual picnic, and the group advertised that "every
member of the community is urged to join and help the officers make

Comstock Park a better and bigger town."49

On May 26, 1921 Glenn R. Chamberlin presented a proposal to his
brother Masons for the development of a Masonic Country Club in Comstock
Park. The Masons responded to the plea and purchased 400 acres of rolling
countryside next to the Lamoreaux and Hachmuth farms. The club grounds
were quickly developed, and "on August 1, 1923, the cafeteria, dance hall,

50 The entire

and a temporary nine-hole golf course were formally opened.
complex, including an l8-hole and a 9-hole course, was completed the follow-
ing year, making Comstock Park one of the playgrounds Of the affluent in
Grand Rapids. Few local residents possessed the social qualifications

fOr membership in the Masons, but they were exposed to the upper class
entertainment tastes through the country club. The club did provide em-

ployment for a few residents who worked as grounds keepers, cooks and

 

48Comstock Park News, December 21, 1917, p. 3.

4916id.

50Masonic Country Club, The Masonic Country Club of Western
Michigan (Grand Rapids: Powers-Tyson Co., l924), p. 3.

 

86

waitresses during the summer season.

The Comstock Park chapter of the Ku Klux Klan did not leave a
written record, but oral tradition still carries vivid descriptions of
its activity during the Klan revival of the l920's. The Klan fOund a
small, loyal band of followers in Comstock Park, who donned their hooded
apparel and observed cross burning ceremonies behind the establishment
formerly owned by C. and M. Carpet Company. Frederick Lewis Allen
described Edward Y. Clarke's efforts at reorganizing the Klan in 1920
and his account is applicable to Comstock Park:

The time was ripe fOr the Klan and he knew it.

Not only could it be represented to potential

members as defenders of the white against the

black, of Gentile against Jew, and of Protestant

against Catholic, and thus trade on all the newly

inflamed fears of the credulous small-towner, but

its white robe and hood, its flaming cross, its

secrecy, and the preposterous vocabulary of its

ritual could be made the vehicle of all that in-

fantile love of hocuspocus and mummery, that lust

for secret adventure, which surviggs in the adult

whose lot is cast in drab places.
The community was very conscious of the Klan; indeed, many sat on the
hill and observed their cross burnings and ceremonies. However, the Klan
died in the late 1920's with the decline of the parent organization.
Comstock Park was not alone in the resurgence of the Klan for most com—
munities in the area experienced some type of Klan activity. Now, older

residents prefer not to discuss this episode in their local history.

In 1932 J.E. Morris called a group Of veterans together for the

purpose of establishing an American Legion Post in Comstock Park. Fifteen

 

51"A Review of Comstock Park Legion Post," Comstock Park
Review, November 29, l946, p. 1.

 

87
charter members held their first meeting in March at Stowell's Hall
where they named the new post in honor of Louis Tiestler, a Comstock Park
Navy man who died on October 28, 1917. In 1934 the Legion spent $50 to
purchase a building from the Comstock Park School Board and $200 to
Obtain a site next to the school on the James Lamoreaux property. The
legion grew rapidly with 76 members in 1939 and well over 300 after World
War II. During the 1930's and 1940's, the Legion sponsored dances,
parties, baseball teams and sent boys to Wolverine Boys State. The
Comstock Park Review reflected on the brief history of the Legion in 1946
and boasted, "the following years have been too full of activities to
name them all, but you may be sure any program that is fOr the good of
the community you will find the American Legion, Louis Teistler Post No.
47 behind it."52 The 3ppipp_did not express the view of all the people
in Comstock Park because the churches and temperance organizations, like
the Comstock Park Women's Christian Temperance Union, that met in the
school, were opposed to many Legion functions, especially an important
source of Legion revenue, their popular bar. Arthur J. Vidich and Joseph
Bensman discovered a similar situation in Springdale, a small town located
in upper New York. They claimed, "the Springdale Legion does not command
the respect of the respectable groups in the community. Though some of
its means and methods are acceptable, it symbolizes 'loose-living' and an
unwillingness to cooperate with the churches."53 The Legion's reputation
in Comstock Park closely parallels the Springdale Legion with the temper-

ance and religious community as its major critics, especially during the

 

52Ibid., Comstock Park Review

 

 

53Arthur J. Vidich and Joseph Bensman, Small Town In Mass Society
(New York: Doubleday and Company, Inc., l960):_p. 25.

 

88

early period Of its growth. However, the Legion endured well beyond the
Temperance organization and is regarded as a rather banal organization

by the religious community today. The Legion established a veterans'
memorial in Dwight Lydell Park, has held a number of Memorial Day parades
and annually places flags on the graves of the veterans in the Mill Creek

cemetery.

The Industrial Revolution had a profound impact on Comstock Park as
it produced the technology that integrated village life with the Norms of
national culture. New ideas were often introduced through the fairground
where the latest gadgets and inventions were brought for exhibition and
display. For example, one of the most popular forms of entertainment at
the fair involved experiments in flight, ranging all the way from balloon
and parachute drops to primitive flying machines. The fair may have
inspired Comstock Park's aviation inventor, who is regarded to have made
the first successful flight in Kent County. Nick Fink, Jr., the pro-
prietor of the Riversite Hotel, invented a pedal powered aeroplane from
bicycle parts and two large box kites. The "Fink Airship No. 1" was
constructed at a cost of $300 with the Knape Machine Company doing the
machine work, the Rempis and Gallmeyer plant preparing the brass and

54

aluminum castings and Charles A. Coye fitting the ducking. The Grand

Rapids Press described the principle of the plane:

In beginning the flight the operator mounts

the bicycle and starts off. The horizonal rudder
is tilted at a slight angle and when the speed of
the machine reaches a point where the air pressure
on rudder and planes is sufficient to overcome the
force Of gravity the machine goes up gradually.
Then the propeller, turning at from eight hundred

 

54”Travel in the Air," Grand Rapids Press, June 24, l905, p. 3.

 

89

to a thousand revolutions a minute is intended to
keep the aeroplane in motion.

On June 24, l905, two years after the first flight at Kitty Hawk, Fink
successfully tested his aircraft. He flew Off the roof of the Riversite
Hotel from a point Opposite his barn and headed east where he "rose in
the air at once and mounted higher and higher until it soared out of the
protection of the hotel building. There a treacherous south wind swept
it out of balance and out of its course. It struck a telegraph post and
fell a distance of about twenty feet to the ground a partial wreck."56
Fink broke his collar bone, but he was not discouraged with the results
of his experiments for he believed that he had proven that his principles

of flight were sound.

Comstock Park witnessed its next flight two years later when A. Roy
Knabenshue brought his "Air-ship" to the fair. Knabenshue had drawn
large crowds at the state fairs in Brockton, Massachusetts and Columbus,
Ohio before coming to Comstock Park. The local fair association Offered
him $l,OOO for each successful flight for five days.57 Knabenshu's gas-
filled craft was the hit of the fair as it flew "over the race track and
in circles over the grandstand until the theory of successful navigation
of the air, was demonstrated to those present."58 However, Knabenshue
may not have achieved the limits of his contract for his "Air-ship"

ended up in the middle of Grand River during one of his exhibitions. The

 

55Ibid.

5516id.

57West Michigan State Fair, Pppmium List 1907, p. l7.

58"Last Day Proves a Big Success." Grand Rapids Press,
September l3, l907, p. 2.

 

 

90

Press reported, "The Operator sat on the framework looking very unhappy

. . 9
until two boats pushed out from shore and towed hlm 1n."5

Western Michigan had to wait until l9lO for its next exhibition in
flight when Bud Mars brought his Curtis aeroplane to Comstock Park. Gusty
breezes kept Mars on the ground, but he did manage one partial flight
where he nearly circled the race track but could not gain altitude. Bud
Mars' l9lO failures increased the excitement when the news was released
in l9ll that J. Clifford Turpin had arrived in town with a Wright bi-

60 Turpin's plane was "a 40fOOt machine . . . equipped with a 30

plane.
horsepower engine."61 Turpin increased the excitement over his flight by
offering passenger space to a Grand Rapids resident, resulting in numer-
ous applications, to participate in the first flight over the city. On
September 12, 1911 the fpppp,declared, " Grand Rapids has seen its first
aeroplane in flight."62 Turpin flew south at an altitude of 600 feet for
six minutes circling Fuller Station and the Gunn Furniture factory. The
following day his passenger, J.E. Worthington, was given an aerial tour
of the northeast side of the city. While returning to land, a fouled
spark plug forced an emergency landing on a swamp on the east side of the
river next to the Huntley Russell home. Worthington got more than he
bargained for as the emergency landing produced a severe test fOr his

nerve. 63

 

59Ibid.
60"ln Spite of Wind," Grand Rapids Press, July l8, l9l0, p. 3.
61"Is In Full Blast," Grand Rapids Press. September 11. 1911: p.1.

 

62“Turpin Braves a Real Gust Wind," gpppdpRppipspfresp, September
12, 1911, p. 1.

 

63"Dropped 400 Feet," Grand Rapids Press, September 13, 1911: D- 5-

 

91
Aviation exhibits were popular at the fairgrounds until the early
l930's when the facility closed down. Stunt flyers, like Lillian Boyer,
Ruth Law, Ethel Dare, Al Key and a host of others performed parachute
drops, plane transfers, loops and death drops to the delight of the

suspense filled audience in the grandstand.

The invention and mass production of the automobile produced con-
flict between the values Of a culture developed around the horse and the
values introduced by the automobile. The social transition from one mode
of transportation to another occurred during the heyday Of the West
Michigan Fair, and it can be Observed by tracing the type of entertain-
ment provided in front Of the grandstand. During the l890's, everything
at the fairground centered around harness racing, and the horse was
declared king of entertainment. With the invention of the automobile and
the aeroplane the role of harness racing declined while aerial exhibits
and automobile races increased in popularity. Furthermore, as the fair
began to lose its agricultural base and adapt to urban and industrial

values, the evidence of horse culture continually diminished.

The first automobile races were held at the fairground on Saturday,
September 26, l903. They were sponsored by the newly formed Grand Rapids
Racing Club, and l,9OO paid to watch Carl Fisher defeat Earl Kaiser.64
The following year, 4,000 race fans attended to watch Barney Oldfield and
his Peerless Green Dragon race against Carl Fisher and his Premier Comet.
The drivers did not race in competition but against the clock. Barney
Oldfield set the best time while establishing himself as a local hero at

64"Fisher the Victor." Evening Press, September 28: 1903: P- 2-

 

92

65

the track. In the following year Oldfield returned and defeated Paul

Lefevere. Gambling became a problem with early automobile races, proba-
bly as a result of the betting activity associated with harness racing;

therefore, auto clubs constantly tried to avoid it. In l905 the Epp§§_

warned there would be "no gambling on the grounds and that special

officers will be on hand to prevent any repetition of the way pool sellers

got in last year and conducted their boards on the sly."66

Races were not held locally from 1906 to 1908, but in 1909 Louis
Chevrolet showed up and defeated Ralph DePalma. Louis Arms, a colorful
sports reporter for the Press, described Chevrolet's race stating, "mile

after mile that little cardinal streak thundered along beside the low,

white fences, leaving huge clouds of yellowish dust in its rear."67

From 1910 to 1920 Barney Oldfield dominated the local competition, and
Louis Arms described Oldfield in words that probably reflected the attitude
of the local race fan:

The magic of the name brought thousands to Comstock
Park who solidly banked the home stretch and the
first and fourth lanes. Barney is the protagonist

in the field of circular track racing. He is pro-
gressive. The man with the Bowery slant to his cigar,
in his ten years of experience has always been just
two ahead of his times. When it was recherche and
good form to bang through fences and climb trees at
sixty-miles the-hour clip Barney always insisted on
making the biggest hole in the fence and was hanging

 

65"New Track Record, "Evening Press, October 19, l904, p. 8.
66"To Be Here Early." Evening Pppss, October 3. 1905: P- 5-

67Louis Arms, "Sets New Record," Evening Press, September l8,
l909, p. 8.

93
from the uppermost bough. He did it with greater

eclat and more frequently than other drivers hence

the word autg racing and Barney Oldfield became one

in the same. 8
Auto polo, dubbed the "undertaker's delight," was introduced in l9l4,
and it was frequently sandwiched between heats in future races. No major
accidents were reported in auto polo, but on June l7, l923, Bernard
McCale of Detroit crashed through the fence and was killed in front of

3,500 specators.69

In l924 races were sponsored by a new organization, the Grand
Rapids Speedway Association, but they ran into a new problem. Local
churches presented petitions to Sheriff William Smith requesting him to
halt all Sunday races. In response to church pressure, the Sheriff stated,
"As a result of the protests voiced from many sources I have ordered
against any more Sunday racing."7O Friction between racing associations
and conservative groups continued as automobile racing declined in the
late l920's. In a last ditch effort to save the fairground during the
"Great Depression", Barney Oldfield and Ralph DePalma were brought back
to take part in a race program. The race drew a light crowd, forcing the
owners of the fairground to sell out after the fall fair.71 Automobile
races had to wait until the depression and World War II had run their
course before they were revived once again on the Comstock Park Speedrome

track.

 

68Louis Arms, "Benz Bumps Mark, "Evening Press, September l7,
l9lO, p. 6.

69"Motor Racer Killed While 3,500 Watch, " Grand Rapids Press,
July l8, l923, p. 1.

70"Sheriff Puts Ban On Sunday Races," Grand Rapids Press,
August 20, 1925, p. 26.

71"Famous Drivers to Race at the Fair," Grand Rapids Press,
August 9, l935, p. 2.

 

 

 

94

Bicycle and motorcycle races enjoyed brief popularity between 1890
and 1920. The annual Plainfield road race was run on Decoration Day,
with riders starting on the fairground track before making a circuit
around the river while crossing from West River Drive to Coit Avenue via

Plainfield bridge. The Evening_Press reported seventy or more cyclists

 

completed in l899 in front of 20,000 spectators. As cyclists entered the
village of Mill Creek and approached the finish, "a dash in the face from
a bucket of water as a rider swept past the mill pond made him finish

"72 Cyclists came

with a clip that was a testimonial of stored up energy.
from as far away as Chicago to compete in the Plainfield race. However,
like the horse races, the bicycle races eventually gave way to the auto-
mobile and died out. Later, around l9l5, motorcycles enjoyed some popu-

larity with auto events on the fairground track.

The automobile began to compete with the streetcar during the
l920's as the major means of transportation. The streetcars did a pros-
perous business during the first decade of the 20th century, and they
were the main link between Comstock Park and the city. Dr. Lynn G.
Mapes, a historian at Grand Valley State College, provides a glimpse of
the streetcar experience:

Trolley riders could drop their mail in a box
attached to the front of the streetcar, purchase
the Grand Rapids Herald from a box behind the
motorman, or peruse the weekly copy of Trolle
Topics that entertained with jokes, helpfuI hints,

sts of cultural activities and the ever present
promotions for the North Park Pavilion or Ramona
ar .

 

 

72"Ford the Winner," Evening Press, may 30, 1899: P- 1-

73Lynn G. Mapes, "The Street Car Era," Grand Rapids Magazine,
March l975, p. 49.

 

95

During the l920's, the popularity of the automobile increased rapidly
while the number of streetcar riders decreased. Mapes reported that 79%
of the Kent County families owned automobiles in l925. The streetcar
companies struggled in vain to defeat the increased use of the automobile,
but their days were numbered. Between 1932 and l935 the streetcar lines

were abandoned, and the company transferred to busses.74

Thousands of spectators traveled to the West Michigan State Fair-
ground on June 24, l926 to witness a fireworks extravaganza Sponsored by
Officers of the Street Railway Company. The event was designed "to mark
the passing of the Old streetcar and the introduction of rolling stock of

ultra-modern types."75

Twenty of the old streetcars were lined up in front of the grandstand,
soaked with kerosene and ignited by Mayor Elvin Swarthout and L.J. De-
Lamarter, vice-president and manager of the railway company. The big
event was preceded by a fireworks display which included a frame-work of
fireworks that presented the company's slogan, "Don't worry. Relax. Ride
the Streetcar. The safest place in town."76 That evening the crowd did
not realize how little time the new streetcars would have or how much
alteration the automobile would bring about in their society. Vidich and
Bensman studied the village of Springdale and remarked on the influence

of the automobile:

 

74 Ibid., p. 51.

192 75 "Thousands in Joyful Goodby", Grand Rapids Press, June 25,
6, p. 1.

75Ibid.

In“

96

The development of the mass-produced gasoline

engine formed the basis around which a social and

economic reconstitution of Springdale took place.

The automobile established an intimate connection

between Springdale and the outer world and pro-

vided new business and occupational opportunities

in the fOrm of gas stations, repair shops and road

construction and maintenance. It made possible

the R.F.D. and in conjunction with the radio, a

comprehensive daily contact with events a9?

happenings as reported in the mass media.
Comstock Park experienced a similar transtrmation with the introduction
of the cheap, mass produced automobile. The "burning extravaganza"
at the fairground in l926 and the chant "goodby streetcars!" was symbolic
of one of the major turning points in Comstock Park history. The auto-
mobile accelerated the process Of integrating village life with that Of
mass society. Commuting to work in the industrial center of Grand
Rapids became an established social pattern for the local resident.
Furthermore, the automobile took people away from their homes and broke
down neighborliness. Lingeman notes, "when ownership of automobiles
became widespread in the l920's, it was "de rigueur" for every family
that owned one to pile in on a Sunday and go for a drive in the country,
rather than have leisurely Sunday dinners attended by numerous friends or
relatives. Automobiles also altered courtship patterns among the young,
removing them from the porch swing under the parental eye and taking them
Off to the dimly lit roadhouses that were springing up along the highways

outside of town."78

The automobile increased the tempo of village life
and tended to blur the simple elements of the neighborhood environment

with those of the complex urban centers.

 

77Vidich and Bensman, pp, pip,, p. 10.

78Lingeman, pp, pip,, p. 412.

97

Electrification was another outside influence that altered community
life in Comstock Park. One of the side effects of extending streetcar
service to the comnunity in l902 was partial electrification. Several
business establishments purchased electric power from the Grand Rapids
Street Railway, but the quality of the service was poor as lights would
blink on and Off when the streetcars passed by. However, most businesses
and homes were still illuminated by kerosene and gas lamps or portable
power units until power lines were established. In 1911 the Grand
Rapids-Muskegon Power Company surveyed the area around the Soldiers'
Home, North Park and Comstock Park and decided to extend their lines to
provide service for the area. The lines reached the fairground in August
1812 and immediately altered the style of the fair. Eugene D. Conger,
Secretary of the West Michigan State Fair noted:

With power on the grounds for use in the build-

ings it will be possible to have machinery in

operation, as was done last year to a limited extent

only. Having lights on the ground will make it

possible to keep the Fair open evenings, and thus

affOrd an opportunity for residents of the City,

to attend the Fair yithout loss of time from their

regular employment.
The change in the fair was not nearly as great as that in the electrified
homes. During the l920's most families were receiving electrical service
and purchasing electric washing machines, refrigerators, stoves and a

multitude of other labor saving devices. Albert Blumenthal, the author

of Small-Town Stuff, interviewed the manager of an electrical company

 

during this period who claimed he did "not know of a woman with electric

lights in her home who has no curling iron. Next in order of frequency,

 

79west Michigan State Fair, Premium List 1912, p. 13.

 

98

he says, are the electric iron, toaster, vacuum cleaner, percolator, hot
plate, sewing machine, and, last of all, three electric stoves and two
mangles."80 The ladies in Comstock Park enjoyed the labor saving devices
just as much as those in Blumenthal's Mineville. The Lynds also reported

similar results in Middletown. They declared “No other changes in Middle-

 

Town's homes have been as marked as the adoption by the bulk of the
community of these various conveniences, used only by a few of the very

81 . . . .
Labor saVTng dev1ces prov1ded an lncrease

wealthly in the nineties."
in leisure time in the family resulting in more trips to Ramona Park for
amusement or Grand Rapids to visit the theater. The more domestic sort
began to settle down for the evening around the radio to listen to pro-
grams like "Amos 'n' Andy." Blumenthal declared, "If the automobile
actually is breaking down the family by increasing the mobility of its

members and causing them to spend little time at home, it would seen that

the radio is an effective antidote."82

World War I gave Comstock Park a fresh infusion of patriotism which
was especially apparent at the fair. In l9l7 Lyman A. Lilly, the Agricult-
ural Secretary of the fair, made a strong appeal for the farmers to

produce and bring large exhibits to the fair. He declared:

 

80Albert Blumenthal, Small-Town Stuff (Chicago: University of Chicago
Press, l932), p. 390-39l.

81Robert S. Lynd and Helen Merrell Lynd, Middletown (New York:
Harcourt, Brace and Company, l929), p. 98.

 

82Blumenthal, pp. _c_i_t, p. 387.

99

In this time of unusual conditions, when we are
facing a war of unknown length, when tons of
food are sent to the bottom of the ocean doing
no one any good. When it is up to the United
States to feed the armies of Europe, as well as
our own, we cannot help feeling that fOOd is
king.

With these facts before us, it behooves us all to
use every means at our command, not only to pro-
duce all the fOod possible but to encourage
others to do the same. 3

In l9lB the fair association provided premiums for the largest acre
production of wheat, oats and rye, which were paid in War Savings Stamps.

The Premium List of l9l8 declared, "The Government is looking to the

 

fair to help win the war and we have had that idea in mind when making

t."84 During the war, ffiags adorned the buildings;

up our premium lis
entertainment adopted a patriotic theme; war slogans were displayed with
exhibits; and the fireworks grand finales thundered out the glories of
freedom, liberty and democracy. The fairground became the center of a

crusade to rally the fOlk on the home front to greater war production.

There was also feverish activity at the tanneries across the creek
from the fairground where the blue collar workers were making their
contribution to the war effort. Trains were busy bringing supplies and
Shipping out processed leather that was essential for manufactured goods
demanded by the army. World War I was still fOught with the aid of the
horse. The tanneries used horse hide to produce the leather that was
used to make hame covers for the animals pulling the wagons and artillery

in Europe. During the war, the tanneries experienced rapid growth,

 

83West Michigan State Fair, Premium List 1917, p. 5.
84West Michigan State Fair, Premium List l9l8, p. 5.

 

100

employing 500 men, while filling the demand for war material through

government contracts.85

The emotional excitement of war produced an aftermath that had
even greater impact on Comstock Park.. The voters of Michigan responded
to public sentiment for prohibition and approved a statewide prohibition
law that was to go into effect on May 1,.1918, and on January l6, 1919,
the necessary thirty-six states ratified the Eighteenth Amendment.
Saloons were the most popular business in Comstock Park, and John Barley-
corn was now declared illegal. Lynn Mapes maintains Opposition to
prohibition in Grand Rapids was apparent from the start. He states,

"the billiard and soft drink parlors that replaced many saloons were
Often accused of serving hard cider and other illegal beverages."86 If
Grand Rapids was tempted to resort to the Speakeasy, Comstock Park was
even more inclined. Frederick Lewis Allen discovered the direct result
of the Eighteenth Amendment "were the bootleggers, the speakeasy, and
the spirit of deliberate revolt which in many communities made drinking
'the thing to do'."87 Allen's impression of prohibition is in line with
the Situation that existed in Comstock Park. With Alpine Township
producing an abundance of apples, hard cider.became the favorite drink
in the saloon community. The Grand Rapids Press reported, that Nick

Fink, the present proprietor of Fink's Bar, helped roll the barrels into

 

85Clarence Wier, Personal interview, Clarence Wier home, Comstock
Park, Michigan, November 26, l97l.

6
8 Lynn G. Mapes, "Saloons and Prohibition," Grand Rapids Magazine
June, l975, p. 21-22.

 

87Allen, pp, pip,, p. 82.

101

into the basement and let the cider run from the hose into pitchers upon

88

the bartop." Fred Olsen, a Press reporter, interviewed Fink and

furnished the fOllowing account:

They were arrested once and fined $400 because
the alcoholic content of.the cider tested fOur
percent.

"They pinched Echternach the same day, but they
charged him $200 because his only tested two
percent," Fink explains. "I know it to be a fact
that they never sold one drop of moonshine or one
drop of home brew in the building,“ Fink will say
with pride. "There's never a danger of poisoning
anyone or hurting them with hard cider."

They paid no sales tax, and.no liquor tax. They
did not have to purchase a liquor license. Book-
keeping was simple. They had established sales
in a commodity that nearly everyone wanted to help
ease the pain of unemployment, bankruptcy and
foreclosure.

A Sign on the Riversite Hotel advertised, "We sell near beer here because

"90 However, some moonshine was

there's no good beer sold near here.
Obtained locally, for older residents recall it being passed around in
fruit jars outside the dance hall. Small stills provided fOr home
consumption while the enterprising sort ventured out into the woods to
set up a small scale illegal trade. Curb dispensers of liquor sold some

home brew, especially on the fairground.

Prohibition was a major problem on the fairground. In 1921 the
Press reported, "A small army of detectives and plainclothes men will be

on the grounds at all times working among the crowds . . . making it

 

88Fred Olsen, "Look Me in the Eye, Abraham Lincoln, and Tell Me
That I Need a Drink", Wonderland Magazine, January 31, 1971, p. 5.

89Ibid.

 

 

90Maurice Wier, personal interview at the residence of Maurice
Wier, Comstock Park, Michigan, March 28, l98l.

102

next to impossible to loot pockets, sell liquor or disturb the peace."91

Lyman Lilly expressed the intent of the management when.he stated, "We
are.told that considerable liquor has changed hands at a number of fairs
in the state, but we believe we are prepared to prevent the illicit
traffic at this fair."92 However, Older residents who attended the fair
testify of carpetbaggers selling their illegal liquor regardless of the

efforts of police or the fair management.

Prohibition was undoubtedly difficult to enfOrce in Comstock Park.
Blumenthal discoverd in Mineville "The hectic and hounded lives of the
proprietors or bartenders of the 'joints' are made easier by their large
and energetic supporting body of the public."93 The experience of the
Eighteenth Amendment revealed that laws can not be enforced when the
people elect to disobey. The citizen who patronized the Comstock Park
bars had developed a habit that went beyond the reach of the law when
the larger society elected not to enfOrce it. The bars did sell alco-
holic beverages, and the people continued to drink them. Thus, in l933
under the leadership of Franklin D. Roosevelt the prohibition law was

repealed.

The Great Depression dealt Comstock Park a blow from which it
never completely recovered. By the late l920's the community was a
prosperous village with a substantial mainstreet trade, a tannery,

fairground and fish hatchery. In 1925 a new high school was constructed

 

91"Would Have Fair Safe for Crowds," Grand Rapids.Press,
September 9, 1921, p. 2.

 

92Ibid.

93Blumenthal, pp, pip, l92.

 

103

and the community had a very optimistic attitude toward the future. It
appeared that early goals of the Comstock Park Improvement Association
were about to be realized. Prohibition did create problems for a few
merchants on main street, but they were managing to survive. Some bar
owners were even beginning to be regarded as community leaders. Now,
the Depression ushered in an era of gloom while community growth and
expectations came to an abrupt halt. When the depression had run its
course, Comstock Park had lost its fairground, tannery and bank. The
people were spending more time at home where they worked subsistence
farms, but when they sought employment, they were compelled to commute
to Grand Rapids. The spirit of economic independence was plucked from
the village, leaving the people at the mercy of the fluctuating trends
in the larger mass society. Comstock Park was stripped of its industrial

base and destined to become a bedroom suburb of.Grand Rapids.

The fair was in a state of decline when the depression arrived and
probably would have eventually became a casualty of industrialization.
Several problems had dealt the fair a crippling blow, but fire was its
number one enemy. On July l9, 1911 the grandstand was totally destroyed
by fire, and it also burned the roof and cupola of the Art Hall. The
fair association carried $3,500 of insurance on the grandstand, but cost
estimates for replacing it ran from $40,000 to $50,000.94 A new concrete
grandstand was erected, but the costs ate up the fairs profits for

several years. Then on July l4, 1920, the Art Hall was destroyed by

fire. Mary Echternach, a Comstock Park resident who lived over her

 

94west Michigan State Fair, Premium List 1912, p. 15.

 

104

father's saloon, discovered the fire and notified the Grand Rapids Fire
Department. Even so, "Within 20 minutes the flames had reduced the
eight wing structure to a smoldering mass of ruins."95 When the fire
department arrived on the scene, they made no effort to save the build-
ing but concentrated on saving the blazing grandstand and other buildings.
Comstock Park men dammed York Creek to provide a water supply to fight
the fire, and their efforts combined with.the fire department prevented

96

greater loss. The fire was so intense it ignited the roof of the

Zindel North Park pavilion across the river, and spectators could not

endure the heat to stand on the bridge.97

The fire damage was estimated
at $25,000, but Lyman Lilly estimated the replacement value between
$40,000 and $50,000. The loss put the fair association in an economic
bind as the Art Hall was only insured for $5,000. Exhibits that were
scheduled to appear in the Art Hall were transferred to the carriage
building while the place that the Art Hall occupied was used for con-

cessions.98 The fair peaked with the passing of the Art Hall and never

again recovered its former grandeur.

Furthermore, the fair encountered problems of a moral nature
during the 1920's that contributed to its decline. As the fair departed
from its agricultural and educational base, it developed more citified

attractions, where gambling sharks and "hoochie koochie“ dancers fleeced

 

95"Fairgrounds Fire Razes Art Hall," Grand Rapids Press, JUIV 15:
1920, p. 1.

96Ibid.

97Ibid., Clarence Wier, private interview at senior citizens
meeting, Comstock Park, Mich., December 11, 1980.

 

98Grand Rapids Press, July l5, l920, p. 1.

 

105

country boys with rigged wheels and sleazy Sideshows. The Grand Rapids
Board of Education threatened to withdraw their support of the fair in
l9l7 when.it issued a statement declaring, "Unless the board of directors
of the West Michigan State Fair agrees in writing not to allow vulgar,
indecent and.immoral shows on the grounds the Grand Rapids Public schools
will make no exhibition at the exposition next fall."99 The fair associa-
tion attempted to appease the conservatives,.and in l922, under President
Frank G. Row, they got their way. Row maintained, "The West Michigan
State Fair never will become a great fair until it eliminates gambling

and becomes more purely an educational exhibit, spiced with the proper

t."100 Row did not realize that the fair had

amount of clean amusemen
already lost most of its educational value to the thrill of the midway
and its many vices. All gambling was eliminated at the fall fair, which
meant a loss of around $8,000 to the fair management, and side shows
were strictly regulated. Lyman Lilly reported, “After thorough investi-
gation, it was found that very few of sufficiently high grade shows are
procurable and the management is placing only those which there are no
objectional features. There will be so few of the pay attractions that
the free acts in front of the grandstand will be more liberal and of the

very highest standard."101 ,Thus, the big wheel, the man with three

thimbles and a.pea, the seller of soap with dollar bill attachments and

 

99"Cleaner Fair Shows or Schools are Out," Grand Rapids Press,
June 5, 1917, p. 9.

 

. 100"Fair's Officials at Variance over Games of Chance," Grand
Rapids Press, September l8, l922, p. 1.

101"Fair Bars Wheel Games This Year," Grand Rapids Press,
October 29, 1922, p. 2.

 

106

the girls in the burlesque shows were all sent to work elsewhere. With
the vices eliminated and police everywhere present to enforce prohibition,
many traditional fairgoers also began to seek their amusement elsewhere.
When attendance declined, the profits declined, and the West Michigan

State Fair was forced into receivership.

With the losses resulting from fires and poor attendance, the West
Michigan State Fair was placed in receivership by Circuit Judge William
B. Brown on July l6, l927. A petition for receivership was filed on
behalf of "Louis D. Moody, Addison Keller, as the Keller transfer line,
Harry E. Morris and John V. Morris as Morris Brothers, Earl T. Cotton as
the E.T. Cotton Electric Co. and the Comstock Park Lumber Co."102
Council for the petitioners showed the fair's liabilities fOr September
30, l926 as $ll0,000 against fixed assets of $l58,564. Judge Brown
granted their plea and appointed C. Sophus Johnson and Olive Jones as

103 The

joint receivers to carry on the business of the association.
receivers made considerable progress liquidating the debt in the l928
fair, but when the depression arrived, their efforts were futile. Fairs
were not held in l931, I932 and l933 but they were revived in l934 and
l935. In l934.the fair attempted to Obtain support as part of the New
Deal, and it was under private ownership, being obtained by a stock

company.104 The fOllowing year automobile races were promoted to draw

 

102"Value of Grounds Important Issue in Fair Squabble," Grand
Rapids Press, July l5, l927, p. 1.

103"West Michigan Fair," Michigan Tradesman, July 27, l927, p. 32.

 

104Grand Rapids Press. Aug. 20: 1934: P- 1-

 

107

the crowds, and the big names, including Oldfield and DePalma, were
brought back to the local track.105 However, these late efforts could

not overcome the influence Of the depression, and on November l6, l936,
Judge Brown ordered a $60,000 bid by the General Fiduciary Corporation

for the fairground property accepted.106 Thus, Comstock Park saw its

last fair in l935. Capital Lumber and Wrecking Company soon came in and
salavaged the materials that existed on the grounds. Local fOlk who

were frequent visitors at the fair remember it with nostalgia. Their
feelings are similar to those expressed by Sherwood Anderson in Winesburg,
ppip_where George Willard and Helen White took a night walk through the

old fairgrounds. Anderson states:

There is something memorable in the experience

to be had by going into a fairground that stands

at the edge of a Middle Western town on a night
after the annual fair has been held. The sensation
is one never to be forgotten. On all sides are
ghosts, not of the dead, but of living people. Here,
during the day just passed, have come the people
pouring in from the town and the country around.
Farmers with their wives and children and all the
people from the hundreds of little farm houses

have gathered within these board walls. Young
girls have laughed and men with beards have talked
of the affairs of their lives. The place has been
filled to overflowing with life. It has itched

and squirmed with life and now it is night and the
life has all gone away.107

The depression claimed the tanneries as another casualty in Comstock
Park. During World War 1, Van Wallin sold the tanneries to a New York

syndicate changing their name to the Union Tanning Company. In the

 

105Grand Rapids Press, August 8, 1935: P- 1-

106"Fair Grounds Bid Ordered Accepted," Grand Rapids Press,
November 17,.1936, p. 5.

107Sherwood Anderson. Winesburg, Ohio (New York: Random HOUSE:
1919), p. 295.

108

post-war period, tanning activity slowed down considerably because of

the loss Of government contracts. The Old Mill Creek tannery was closed
in l924 and was dismantled during the early l930's. With the advent of
the depression the Michigan Tannery soon followed. In.l934 the Michigan
Tannery was closed, and when the insurance expired on the buildings in
January, l936, Capital Lumber and Wrecking Company started demolishing
the buildings. Demolition was completed in l938 and all of the machinery
had been shipped to a Union Tanning Company plant in Ridgeway, Pennsyl-
vania. In the fall of 1938 demolition commenced on the houses on old
tannery row.108 Thus, the industry that produced rapid growth in Comstock
Park at the turn of the century pulled up its roots and fled. The
village that depended heavily on the tanneries for employment, a tax

base and a market for main street businesses was left to adjust to a new

set of economic relationships. With the closing of the tanneries,

Comstock Park ceased to be an industrial community.

Like most small communities during the depression, Comstock Park
also lost its bank. The Comstock Park State Bank was established in
l9l7 by 0.5. Power as one of a chain of banks he Operated in small towns
in northern Michigan. The directors of the bank, D.H. Power, Thomas A.
Hice, Dwight Lydell, George P. Lamoreaux, Van A. Wallin, N.B. Creveling,
Martin D. Buth, G.S. Whitmore and H.C. Hachmuth, included the community's
most prominent businessmen. The bank was located on the corner of West
River Road and Mill Creek Street in the most attractive building in the

village. The bank was supported by a large portion of the local com-

 

108Clarence Wier, personal interview at the Clarence Wier home,
Comstock Park,.Mich., November 26, 1971.

109

munity.109 However, when the depression arrived, the bank could not
collect on its loans or pay its debts. Therefore, it was forced to
declare bankruptcy. Local residents lost their savings as the building
was razed and the material salvaged in an effort to pay off as many

debts as possible. With the loss of the bank the business community was
forced to make its financial transactions outside the community, fOrfeit-

ing another institution that had contributed to an air of independence.

The depression fOrced the community to lOok to the State and
Federal government fOr assistance. Lingeman observed this dilemma in
many small communities and he concluded, "Public works . . . boomed, and
thanks to New Deal programs, many small towns acquired schools and
libraries and museums and roads they had long put off out of traditional
parsimony. These new acquisitions, beneficial to all, shored up sagging
community moral, but they were also an irrevocable admission of the
federal presence and linked the small towns in new ways to the faroff
urban power centers."110 Comstock Park also received its W.P.A. programs.
Local men were put to work with wheelborrows and shovels moving the hill
behind the high school to construct an athletic complex. Prior to the
depression, the school used the fairground as an athletic facility, but
W.P.A. workers built a fine football, baseball and track complex on
school property. W.P.A. workers also paved School Street and built an

athletic storage building south of the football field.111 The workers

 

109Comstock Park News, December 21, 1917, p. 1.

 

110Lingeman, pp, pip,, p. 434.

111Clarence Wier, personal interview at the Clarence Wier home,
Comstock Park, Michigan, November 26, 1971.

110

were issued checks that were quickly converted into sacks of groceries.
With the tanneries closed and out of town employment non-existent,

families supplemented W.P.A. incomes with subsistence farming.

Comstock Park received another set back on July 3, l935, when a
flash flood raised the level of York and Mill Creeks and sent their
waters through the business district. The flood did considerable damage
to the main street stores and washed out both railroads. Merchants used
sandbags to protect their merchandise, but few of them escaped damages.
The water receded on July 4, but the damage contributed to the economic
difficulties of the depression. The Comstock Park Fuel and Ice Company
bore the brunt of the flood as the current washed away $1,500 worth of

slab wood, coal and coke.112

When World War II broke, out Comstock Park was a village in rapid
decline. The blue collar workers went to Grand Rapids to find employment
in the war industries. Women began to leave the household and join
their husbands working in the factories. A new economic relationship
was established which linked Comstock Park to the metropolitan environ-
ment. The village was forced to compete with outside merchandising
forces at a great disadvantage. The school became increasingly dependent
on State assistance as the community lost its industrial tax base. With
the closing of the tanneries and the fairground Comstock Park lost most
of its independence as a village. It soon became salmost totally depen-
dent on Grand Rapids industries and the state and national governments

for financial support.

 

112"Tiny Creek Causes Flood," Grand Rapids Press, July 3.
l935. p.2.

 

CHAPTER IV
UNINCORPORATED VILLAGE AND MASS SOCIETY, 1940 TO 1980

After the depression, Comstock Park's institutional framework was
drastically altered through the pressure of outside forces, while local
citizens clung to their unincorporated political status and failed to
develop the machinery necessary to assist them in adapting to change and
solving their problems. The community was forced to deal with new
relationships, established during the process of greater urbanization
and industrialization, which produced new patterns for marketing goods,
greater variation in population, state and national political dependence
and bureaucratization, increased social and religious fractionalization,
heavy demand for educational opportunity and new orientations in the
family and home. During this period, the unincorportated village of
Comstock Park, stripped of its economic base during the depression, lost
control of its own destiny, as stimuli from the larger mass society
elicited responses from local institutions that forced them to adapt or
perish. Thus, Comstock Park evolved into a bedroom suburb of Grand
Rapids as it adjusted to forces beyond its control. Edgar Lee Masters
found his own town passing with the influence of industrialization and
urbanization, and he lamented:

Go into any community of the kind I am speaking
of and you'll find this process going on. The
town is being made into a ganglion of the city.
Telephone and telegraph wires make it part of
the metropolis, the radio, the automobile, the
airplane, the city newspaper, the magazines

carrying Paris fashions, the standard cigar

111

112

stores, the standard grocery stores, the

standard drug stores, machine gas stations,

everything that the city can boast of, the

small town of today can boast of. The

privately owned canning companies, lumber

mills, are taken over by large corporations

who run them more cheaply and more efficiently.

Industrialism is in the saddle; it is America.

This is a country of monopolies and small

towns, long preserved from the influence, are

being drawn into the net.1

The impact of industrialization and urbanization on Comstock Park

was apparent in the changes brought about in the economic community.
The small stores that operated on main street became early casualities
of modern merchandizing techniques, such as mail order sales, super
markets and Shopping malls. Comstock Park was flanked by commercial
corridors that developed along Alpine and Plainfield Avenues where local
folk purchased goods more conveniently, atla lower cost and in a more
attractive environment. The K-Mart, Meijers Thrifty Acres, Family Foods
and the North Kent Mall provided too much competition for village enter-
prises like Lamoreaux's general store, Hice's meat market, Campbell's
lumber company, Bielawski's bakery, VanderJagt's dime store and Dodge's
dry goods store. The commercial enterprises still operating, such as
the drug store, the hardware store and the fOod store, do so at a great
disadvantage. They delay plant improvements, employ family members,
oppose tax increases, or support any measure that will control costs and
enable them to compete with the enterprises of mass society. In 1974
the school made an analysis of the community that reflected the bind of
the local businessman. Morrissey Lawn and Garden Center responded, "No

expansion planned--too costly, find it hard to earn enough 'net'

 

lLingeman, 9p, pip,, p. 390.

113

profit to pay for continually rising labor and taxes," while Claude Host
of the hardware replied, "Any more taxes and we will have to shut the
doors."2 Vidich and Bensman found a similar situation in their study of
Springdale, New York. They discovered, "As these large centers Of
retail distribution become more elaborate and efficient, the local
merchant loses a greater share of the trade of the mobile segments of
the population. His trade becomes more limited to the aged, the loyal,
the infirm and those who must buy on credit."3 Thus, the automobile
made it convenient fOr the village inhabitant to visit the plethora of
merchandizing establishments in the greater.Grand Rapids area and the
small village store was abandoned or forced to struggle at a commercial

disadvantage.

Mainstreet Comstock Park still operates from buildings that were
constructed at the turn of the century, thus most buildings are wood
frame. The building that housed the North Star Hotel is now occupied by
Louie's Bar; the building George Metz built for a general store now
serves the State Bank of Michigan; Frank Thiel's meat market has been
taken over by Betty's Restaurant; an optometrist is set up in Plumb's
Old general store. DeVries Realty occupies the old drug store; Lawson
Studio is in VanderJagt's Old dime store; Comstock Park Foods Operates
from the building erected for Comstock Park Lumber Company; the structure
that housed Echternach's Saloon is undergoing a face lift by a home

improvement company; Fink's Bar still operates from the old Riversite

 

2Comstock Park Public Schools, School Facility Report (Lansing:
Manson, Jackson, Kane, Inc., l974), p. 22-23.

3Vidich and Bensman, pp. pi_t_. p. 54.

114

Hotel; Cook's Dance Hall is now a pizza parlor; and the two saloons on
Mill Creek Street are still doing business but with new owners. The Old
wooden buildings give the business district a well worn look as few new
enterprises have been erected among them. In l96l, Fern Miles, the

editor of a local newspaper called the Suburban Echo, wounded community

 

pride in an editorial entitled "Village of Neglect" in which she described

the business district as:

The Town's main street of business is housed

in rotten wooden buildings; shoddyheeled
outwardly, and decadent inwardly. Many of these
business places should be razed and re-raised.
Some of these houses of gloom beckon the derelict,
and after dark main street becomes not too unlike
Bridge Street's Skid row prior to the Grand Rapids
urban renewal program and the freeway constructions.
A local businessman recently jested, "My next
project will be for free beer and wider sidewalks."
After a walk along main street that statement be-
comes an overture of truth. The weary and the un-
kempt and the drunk reel along the streets gloomy4
paths. It is a come-on welcome to all riff-raff.

Miles may have been a little hard on the village, but conditions were
ripe to elicit these comments. She focused on the village Old timers
and placed the blame on them for resisting change. However, the editor's
frustrations were shared by the businessmen who were forced to compete

at a great disadvantage with the mass society.

The post-war years also witnessed the community resident looking to
the outside for employment. With the passing of the tannery, the decline
of the fish hatchery and the struggling local stores, very little employ-
ment opportunity was available in the community. Men traveled to the

industrial and commercial areas Of Grand Rapids to seek their livelihood.

 

4"Village of Neglect," Suburban Echo, November 12: 1951: Do 1.

 

115

In l969, a community survey revealed:

Comstock Park is a typical suburban type com-

munity. There is practically no farming and

very little industry. Residents are employed

in the metropolitan area of Grand Rapids

as factory workers, in the professions, and

in the various service industries.
A small industrial corridor along West River Road began to attract
several light industries, but their specialized skills have required
employees from outside the local community. The community still lacks
an industrial base that would provide a measure of autonomy. The
village economy struggles as pay checks are earned and spent beyond its
own boundaries. The inhabitants of Comstock Park are predominately
industrial workers "who consist mainly of individuals and their families
who have migrated to the community in an effort to escape the city life
and to seek cheaper housing as well as land for home gardens."6 But,
being located so close to the metropolitan community, these fOrmer city

residents seek the advantages of both worlds, the small village and the

large city.

Today the village of Comstock Park gets most of its identity from
the school system. The community schools are located within the vicinity
of the village, and most of the daily activity revolves around these
buildings. A l974 school facility report stated, "The community receives

its strength from a strong sense of unity and spirit from the educational

 

5Western Michigan University, Report of the School of Education,
A Survey of Comstock Park Public Schools (Kalamazoo, Western Michigan
University, 1969) p. 1.

6Vidich and Bensman, pp, pip,, p. 94.

116

experiences offered to its citizens."7 The school district provides the
community with boundaries and gives the local folk a geographic identity
that is loosely defined within the unincorporated village. Those who
live within the school district have consistently rallied around the en-
deavors of the school making it one of the few unifying forces in the
community. When the school band strikes up, "We'll Be Loyal to You Com-
stock Park," on a fall Friday night, factory workers, businessmen, Le-
gionnaires, churchmen, Rotarians, housewives and local youth proudly don
their green and gold caps and rout for a victory. It is through the
school that "Comstock Park clings dearly to its own identity as a com-

munity."8

The school system grew rapidly in the 1950's when open land was pur-
chased by residential developers. In 1950 an elementary school was con-
structed behind the high school, and in 1957 it received two additions.
The Westgate area began in the late 1950's convincing the citizens Of the
need to add a gymnasium, cafeteria, industrial arts section and band and
choral rooms to the Old high school. With rapid residential growth the
1960's became a busy time of school construction. Stoney Creek Elementary
School was built in 1962 with additions made in 1963 and 1968. Green-
ridge Elementary School was constructed in 1963 receiving an addition in
1967. In 1968 still another addition was made on the high school to pro-
vide rooms for science, home economics, business and language arts.9 Re-

sidential growth was restoring some of the Optimism that had been tempered

 

7Comstock Park Public Schools, pp, pip,, p. 94.
8Western Michigan University, pp, pip,, p. 1.

9Comstock Park Public Schools, pp, pip,, p. 6.

 

117

during the depression as residents consistently supported school millage
requests. However, the 1970's brought recession and another period of
gloom. In the spring of 1974 the voters rejected the construction of a
$6,419,400 high school by a margin of one vote.10 The issue was defeated
by a larger margin on the second vote as the economy seemed to take a
drastic turn for the worse. Thus, students at Comstock Park High School
are still using the facilities that were erected in 1925 as part of the
general high school site. The school board does hold title to an eighty

acre tract of pleasant woodland if future development appears desirable.

For the last twenty years moves for school consolidation have been
hotly discussed in Comstock Park. When Kenowa Hills formed their district
in the early 1960's, local residents rejected consolidation in favor of
maintaining their own schools. B.T. Hachmuth, a former superintendent
and acting school board president, was one of the more active in sup-
porting the local school concept. Hachmuth, and many Older residents like
him, were afraid Comstock Park would lose its identity if the local school
system was abolished. They responded by passing a series of bond issues
that provided for a somewhat piecemeal but adequate series Of additions.
In 1969 outside expertise was hired and consolidation was again recom-
mended in their report.

Any report of educational needs and conditions must be
of necessity include a serious look at the existing
political organization in terms of future demands. Even
a cursory reading of this report should indicate to the

reader that the Comstock Park School District has limit-
ed human and financial resources. It will be difficult

 

l01bid.

118

and expensive to provide the facilities and the

prOgrams suggested in this report.

It is recommended that the Board of Education con-

sider the possibility of reorganizing the district

with neighboring units.11
The Western Michigan University study made little impact on the board as
they responded four years later by asking the voters to approve a six and
one-half million dollar bond issue for a new high school. Manson, Jackson
and Kane Incorporated, the architects who planned the proposed school,
issued the following assumptions in their 1974 survey:

1. From previous studies it is apparent that merger

with another district is not desired by the people

Of Comstock Park Public School District.

2. The people of the Comstock Park Public School

District desire to maintain local control over their

schools.12
Local control has proven difficult to keep with spiraling educational
costs. Because of low valuations in the school district, by 1969 local
tax receipts only accounted for thirty-one per cent of the local Operating
costs of the schools. The district was forced to relinquish some auto-
nomy as it became dependent on state aid formulas and federal funding pro-
grams to satisfy its need for money. The Western Michigan University
study concluded "that residents from Comstock Park School District will
have to continue to levy high taxes for operation and at the same time
depend upon a state aid formula that allocates funds at an increasing rate
for low valuation districts. The future is not bright."13 In spite of

gloomy reports the community refuses to let go of nearly 150 years of

 

11Western Michigan University, pp, pip,, p. 64.
IZComstock Park Public Schools, pp. 93., p. 45.
13Western Michigan University, pp, pip,, p. 56.

119

tradition. They have controlled their own school since the Withey
School was established in the 1840's, and through their Schools Comstock

Park derives its meaning and right to exist today.

Vidich and Bensman found school board politics dominated the town
of Springdale, New York, and their conclusions are applicable to the
village of Comstock Park. They stated:

Due to the high visibility of the consequences of de-

cisions, to the necessity of making decisions in order

to keep a large institution going and to efforts to

conceal the locus of decisions from a highly inter-

ested public, the school board and school policies

become the focal point of public crisis. Almost every

major decision of the board carries within it the seed

of crisis.14
The school district provides Comstock Park with its only vehicle of local
control as township governments are located outside its boundaries and
deal with issues that are less related to village concerns. Thus, the
school board has evolved as the center for potential conflict. Local
residents have recently gathered at the school to voice their opinions on
a variety of issues including Mr. Goei's Bible studies in the school

building, the selection of books like The Godfather in the English de-

 

partment, the dismissal of Cleo Anders as elementary principal, the con-
tinued employment of John Fehsenfeld as superintendent, the 1973 recall of
school board members, the six and one-half million dollar high school
bonding program in 1974 and the 1980 teachers' strike. The community
becomes volatile over key issues, and frequently political factions like
the Parents Action League (PAL) or Concerned Adults for Responsible

Education (CARE) surface to carry out their educational crusades. During

 

14Vidich and Bensman, pp, pipp, p. 178.

120

periods of political intensity, school board seats may be hotly contested;
but when things cool down, candidates are hard to get and board politics
sink' to the level of benign neglect. The board used to be dominated by
village tradesmen who relied on the school as a market for their goods.
The board has more recently been dominated by wage earners and house-
wives who are less sensitive to the needs of the local business community
and make most of their expenditures with outside firms. Even so, local
loyalty does exist with the board especially in regard to hiring practices
as a large number of local graduates have been brought back into the in-
stitution to teach. The locally raised teachers contribute to community
tradition and become somewhat threatened by policies advocating major
change like school consolidation. SO we find community spirit, loyalty
and pride is transmitted through the classroom from teacher to student

making the school the vehicle of conservative political socialization.

The decline of the fish hatchery and the development of Lydell Park
produced more problems for the unincorporated village of Comstock Park.
The fish hatchery was a source of community pride as it was one of the

most attractive enterprises in the area. The Nineteenth Raport of State

 

Fisheries boasted "The Mill Creek bass station is the acknowledged leader
in domestic fisheries and resourceful methods that make for success in
its special experimental work, evinced by the fact that for a number of
years it has outdistanced all competitors in the country in the produc-
tion of both small and large mouth bass."15 During its zenith, the

hatchery covered seventy acres of land in Comstock Park and Belmont and

 

15State Of Michigan, Nineteenth Biannual Report of the State Board
of Fish Commissioners for the Calendar Years 1909 and 1910 (Lansing:
State PrintinglOffice, 1911), p. 10.

121

operated twenty-three holding ponds. An Official from the United States
Bureau of Fisheries claimed, "The Mill Creek Hatchery, under the able
direction of Dwight Lydell from its inception, is, without question, the
finest equipped and most productive fish hatchery in the United States."16
The hatchery consistently out produced other facilities raising warm water
fish, including perch, walleyed pike, small and large mouth bass and blue-
gills and transported them by rail to the lakes and streams of Michigan.
Gradually, with the development of fish management research at Michigan
State University and the death of Dwight Lydell in February, 1927, the

facility started to decline.

In 1946 the State decided to abandon the fish hatchery and pull its
operation out of Comstock Park. They cited new research as the first rea-
son for abandonment claiming "enough or more than enough breeders are
found even in heavily-fished lakes and streams and these fish spawn suc-
cessfully wherever conditions are favorable. In such waters these breeders
invariably produce more young than the streams and lakes can provide with
homes and food."17 The Fish Division of the Conservation Department de-
cided the production of warm water fish was not essential and orders fOr
Comstock Park ceased to arrive; the demand for the product of the local
facility was gone. The condition of the facility was cited as the second
reason for abandonment. The old wooden pipe lines had rotted away; the

dams were in urgent need of repair; and the retaining walls required

 

16State of Michigan, Department of Conservation, Division of Fish
Culture Operations, Report for Fiscal Years 1925 and 1926 (Lansing:
State Printing Office, 1927), p. 86.

 

17"Comstock Park Concerned Over Fate Of State Fish Hatchery,"
Grand Rapids Press, Undated article in author's local history files,
Comstock Park, Michigan.

 

122

renovation. Claude Lydell, nephew to Dwight and manager at the hatchery
after his uncle's death, estimated the repairs at $50,000.18 Now, the

State decided to dispose of its local property.

The hatchery was liquidated in 1948, and the State donated thiry-
nine acres of the property to Kent County to be used a park. The hatchery
equipment was sent to other facilities around the State, and employees
were transferred. At the request of the Conservation Department, the park
was to bear the name of Dwight Lydell in honor of the founder of the fish
hatchery. Several local residents were involved in the land transfer.
Neil Lamoreaux, president of the Comstock Park Community Council remarked,
"If the State could convey it to the county park system, which might main-
tain it, that would be a swell arrangement" and B. Taylor Hachmuth, super-
intendent of Comstock Park Schools replied, "the community needs a spot
for a playground, pool and picnic facilities. The hatchery would be fine.
The main building could be used as a shelter. We hate to see a beauty
spot for years disappear or give way entirely to commercial sites."19
William P. Joyce, chairman of the County Road Commission, accepted the
deed to the property at a brief ceremony at the park and stated, "This
is one of the finest and most unselfish things the conservation depart-
ment ever has done. This 39-acre tract of land makes a beautiful addition

to the county park system."20 Linus Palmer, county park superintendent,

 

18Ray Voss, "After 34 Years, He'll Shift to Trout," Grand Rapids
Herald, December 26, 1948, p. 12.

 

19"C.F. Concerned Over Fish Hatchery," Grand Rapids Press, Undated
article in author's local history files, Comstock Park, Michigan.

 

20"County Lauds State for Gift of 39-Acre Dwight Lydell Park,"
Grand Rapids Press, Undated article in author's local history file,
Comstock Park, Michigan.

 

123

suggested some of the twenty-two ponds be filled in while others be kept
"for possible use as swimming areas in the summer and skating rinks in
the winter."21 The county approached their acquistion with Optimism

expecting the facility to develop into a pleasant park.

However, the park develOpment was hampered because of the peculiar
political nature of Comstock Park. The county considered the park a
neighborhood facility and refused to finance significant development,

while the community remained unincorporated and was unable to finance

 

development on its own. Community groups like the Rotary, the Dwight
Lydell Park Committee, the Comstock Park Businessmen's Association and

the hard working Jaycees attempted to aid development of the facility,

but their efforts were unable to go beyond single project items, like
building tennis courts, contributing to building construction or funding

a master plan. Alpine and Plainfield Townships have offered token support
for the park as it reaches out into each of them, but township govern-
ments have been controlled by the rural element who have little interest
in developing a village park. 50, the community is stuck with a site

the State abandoned, the county refused to fund and the townships ignored
while the village and local organizations have proved powerless to de-
velop it. 'For the past thirty years the park has decayed; retaining walls
have crumbled; ponds have filled in with plant life and sludge; while the
buildings have deteriorated for want of supervision and maintenance. Little
of the beauty of the fish hatchery is present in the site today as it suf-

fers from political fragmentation and years of neglect.

 

21“Grand Rapids Press, Article in author's local history file,
Comstock Park, Michigan.

 

124

The Comstock Park Jaycees recently funded a study of the park which
calls for a $1,201,929 improvement package. This master plan calls for new
tennis courts, Shuffle board courts, a ball diamond, basketball courts,
racquetball courts, bridges, foot trails, benches and a multitude of other
improvements. The plan does not include a new community center, remodeling
of the hatchery building or a new hydraulic system and pond clean-up pro-
gram.22 On October 16, 1980, the Board of Park Trustees approved $46,000
of local matching funds for a federal grant to start park development under
the guidelines of the new master plan.23 The $92,000 provided by county
and federal money will make a modest start in park development with much
remaining to be done. There appears to be no other readily available
money to develop the site so change will probably come slowly with a tight
economy. However, the master plan and the $92,000 matching grant have

provided some hope for the future.

The peOple in Comstock Park have taken an ambivalent attitude toward
township government. The township Offices and the centers of political
power are located outside the boundaries of the village and school district
so that most local residents view them as being remote and insensitive to
local problems. Furthermore, township boundaries split the community in
half and complicate efforts for unified prOgrams. The Comstock Park area
depends on the townships for modern government services like police and

fire protection, water and sewage service, street lighting and road

 

22Kent County Park Commission, Dwight pydell Park--Master Plan,
(Grand Rapids: M.C. Smith & Associates, 1979), p. 24.

 

23Kent County Board of Park Trustees, Lydell Park Funding Resolution,
Grand Rapids, Michigan, October 16, 1980.

 

125

improvements, and library and recreational programs. Moreover, the
location of facilities like parks and tennis courts have elicited strong
resentment in the community as they have been placed near the township
offices and away from the local center of population. The local com-
munity has provided leadership in Plainfield Township; Don Lamoreaux has
been the Supervisor and Harold Helsel a Trustee, but Alpine Township has
been dominated by the rural element. Alpine farmers look to the township
for road improvement and fire protection and have been involved in local
politics. The peOple in the Comstock Park area have accepted the govern-
ment of the Alpine farmers and avoided political involvement. The con-
servative nature of the peOple of Comstock Park has prevented efforts
toward incorporation as a town, probably because of the fear of increased
taxes, so the village and school district remains politically frationalized.
Thus, the political machinery does not exist to deal with a specific
village or community problem. Dr. William Viall of Western Michigan
University made a study of the community in the summer of 1974 when he
concluded:
The Comstock Park School District is not reflective of
the growth rate of the rest of the area.
Is it because it is already over-populated?
Hardly!
Is it because no one is taking serious action to
making the district attractive to new development--
commercial, industrial, housing? Is it because
schools are not inviting new families?. These last
two questions must be answered by those who already
work and dwell here.
With no visable organized effort of the community to improve,
that is, an effort such as made by a Chamber of Corrmerce or

another civic or service group, it is still probable that the
district will grow.

 

24William P. Viall, Survey of Comstock Park Public Schools 1974, Report
to the Comstock Park Board of Education, Comstock Park, Michigan, August 6,
1974 (Kalamazoo, R.E.D.E. Center, Western Michigan University, 1974), p. 2.

126

Dr. Viall indicated that the community has some problems to solve, but it
is still waiting for an efficaciius individual or group to address these

problems.

During the last thirty years, Comstock Park has grown into a bed-
room suburb of Grand Rapids, and developers have purchased land and con-
structed homes. The older developments, Stowell's Terrace, Child's Addi-
tion and Clark's Addition have become centers of low income housing and are
inhabited predominantly by the young and the elderly. The largest develop-
ment, Westgate, dominates the community and houses the middle-aged and the
middle-classed. Westgate was started in the late 1950's and now contains
around 700 homes.25 A Westgate house is currently selling for around
$50,000. During the 1960's, there was conflict between the newcomers in
Westgate and the Older residents of the village that was Often expressed
in contests for seats on the school board. Then, during the 1970's the
development dwarfed the rest of the community and the issue now appears
to be at rest. Another housing development, Westhill Acres, a federally
subsidized low income development, has sprung up on Pine Island Drive
providing housing for the rising middle class. Multiple unit housing has
experienced growth in the community with the Westgate Townhouses and
Alpine Slopes developing during the 1970's. The community contains one
large mobile home park, Northern Estates, and a small one on West River
Road. The mobile home parks and apartments house single and older resi-
dents providing few students for the community schools. Recent studies

have indicated that "there is still available land north and west of the

 

25Westgate Association, Westgate Telephone Directory 1971,
Comstock Park, Michigan, pp. 14-15.

 

127

village suitable for housing development," but they suggest that "birth
control practices plus 'tight' money for home mortgages may further re-
duce the increase in pOpulation."26 However, E.L. Ladd Company has sub-
mitted plans for the development of 542 units of housing to be erected on
the site they acquired on Samrick Road, north of the village but within
the school district.27 If the Ladd development is completed, it will

have a marked impact on the community and its school system.

Housing developments produced change in the community beyond the
expansion of the school system and increased population. The influx of
new people produced an increase in the number of churches and social
organizations that serve their needs. The Comstock Park Christian Re-
formed Church was the first Of the post-war arrivals setting up as a
mission in the Old dime store building in 1946. During the 1950's,
12th Street Christian Reformed Church in Grand Rapids took over the mis-
sion, and it was dedicated as a church on June 10, 1957. The Christian
Reformed Church stood on West River Drive until 1966 when it was razed to
provide for the I-296 freeway. In June, 1967, construction was started
on the present church on Pine Island Drive, and it was dedicated in
December of the same year.28 The next church was started in 1963 as a

mission of Calvary Undenominational Church in Grand Rapids with its

 

26Western Michigan University, pp, pip,, p. 1 and Manson, Jackson
Kane, School Facilities Report 1974, p. 5.

 

27E.L. Ladd, "Proposed Residential P.U.D. Layout," Blueprint
prepared by Exxel Engineering Inc., Grand Rapids, Michigan, December 3, 1979.

28Comstock Park Christian Reformed Church, "Dedication Program,"
Comstock Park, Michigan, December 22, 1966.

128

services held in Stoney Creek School. The missiOn erected a church
building on Lamoreaux Drive, and in July, 1966, the local fellowship
organized as Maranatha Bible Church.29 Maranatha experienced steady growth
dedicating a new building on Stoney Creek Street on January 23, 1972.30

The largest church in the community today, Maranatha runs a successful
summer day camp from its present church site. Members of the church

have recently purchased the Boy Scout Camp on North Division hoping to use
the facility to enrich the camping ministry of the church. On April 30,
1963, the Michigan District of the Missouri synod of the Lutheran Church
decided to establish a mission in Comstock Park. On November 3, 1963, the
first worship services were held in Stoney Creek School, and on December
15, 1963, the group was chartered as Zion Lutheran Church. The Lutherans
built their beautiful church on Lamoreaux Drive dedicating it on March 14,
1965.31 Maranatha and Zion Lutheran were located on the Westgate fringe;
these churches grew by drawing people from the building development. The
Catholics in the community attend Holy Trinity Church in Alpine and Assump-
tion Church in Belmont, as the local community does not have a Catholic
Church. The Catholic influence in the community is strong, and many
families send their children to the Catholic schools. The increased
number of local churches has not increased the ecumenical spirit of the

community. The churches all operate independently and tend to produce

 

29Maranatha Bible Church, "Building Brochure," Comstock Park,
Michigan, 1970, p. 1.

30Maranatha Bible Church, "Dedication Service Bulletin,"
Comstock Park, Michigan, January 23, 1972, p. 1.

31Zion Lutheran Church, "10th Anniversary Booklet," Comstock
Park, Michigan, December 15, 1973, p. 1.

 

129

their own social life for their members. Churches are still somewhat of

a fractionalizing influence on community unity.

The increase in population produced a number of new organizations in
the community. The Rotary is the Oldest service organization and is composed
of local business and professional men holding weekly luncheons for its
members and supporting a variety of community enterprises. The Comstock
Park Jaycees are another recent arrival. They support civic programs like
the Dwight Lydell Park and run public forums where political issues are
discussed. The Lions Club is also active, raising money for aid to the t
blind. A number Of organizations, like the Northwest Little League, sup-
port youth programs and contribute to worthy community causes. Probably
the most active organization in the village is still the American Legion

where people gather for fish suppers and social activities.

The post-war years have seen great change in Comstock Park. The
freeway was built through the area in 1966 and greatly altered the land-
scape. The Speedrome, a local race track built on the site of the Old
fairgrounds and airport, was demolished in 1966 to make room for the free-
way, and people stopped coming to Comstock Park for entertainment. The
high bluffs behind the high School were razed allowing the extension of
Division Avenue to West River Drive. A series of tornados stripped the
area of many of its trees, especially the tornado Of 1956 that passed
through Lydell Park and left local residents with great respect for the
power of the elements. Surely, the greatest change was the rapid pro-
cess of urbanization where open land was bought up and put into housing.
The open land around the village is still being sought out and developed

into home sites. As long as land is available, it will remain one of

 

130

community's most valuable resources Offering the possibility of de-
velopment in the future. Comstock Park will probably continue to grow

as a bedroom suburb of Grand Rapids, and as it does, it will become en-
riched with its most valuable resource, its people. As future citizens
exploit the land and alter the environment, they will write the next chap-
ter in the history of Comstock Park. One hopes that in the future Comstock

Park will experience as rich a tradition as it has in the past.

On a high bluff to the south of the village of Comstock Park, the
pioneers are buried in the old Mill Creek Cemetery. The cemetery is
maintained by the Mill Creek Cemetery Association, most of whom are now
buried at the site, but moss now covers the tombstones, ivy runs wild
through the brushy ground and grass has intruded upon the concrete walks
and steps. The cemetery has been the site of vandalism, and broken tomb-
stones and years of neglect have given it an eerie look. The visitor
at the site wonders why the facility is not restored and maintained be-
yond the occasional tended grave. However, after a glimpse of the old
buildings on main street, the condition of Lydell Park and the well worn
1927 portion of the high school, that same visitor might conclude the
cemetery suffers from the same blight, community apathy. If Edgar Lee
Masters were to visit the site, he probably would pen something like the
following lines:

Where are Henry, Andrew, Daniel, Tom and Neil, the champion
glass-blower, the bold pioneer, the gallant soldier, the

butcher and the Senator?
All, all, are sleeping on the hill.32

 

32Edgar Lee Masters, Spoon River Anthology (New York: Collier
Macmillian Publishers, 1914), p. 23.

 

131

A good portion of the history of Comstock Park sleeps on that wood
covered hill, and the local citizen can learn much by drawing from their
heritage. Indeed, the history of North's Mill, Plumb's Station, Mill
Creek and Comstock Park is buried there awaiting all who wish to search

and discover.

 

APPENDIX

 

KENT COUNTY

APPENDIX

WITH TOWNSHIP ORGANIZATION DATES

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

TYROA/E So L 04/ NELsoM seen/cm
Isa’o 1857 1854 1861
5P4 R T34 ALGOMA COURTMA/o 04457540
7846 1845 783i '8‘“?
ALP/M5 PLAM/FIE/D CAM/Vow GRATTA/V
[8147 [838 (8 ‘75 [846

CID/1451t Park
0
/KL—’A/T'
WALKER '8” A A VER GEM/WES
[937'38 (Grand RariJS) I 8 [838
1841
“I
K
9" .
- _, M
lure/mm. PAR/s CAfiCADF 101/2:21.
‘9‘“? I837 18:18 7338
81,80” CAM/ES CALEDONIA BOW/VI."
1935 183‘! 1840 IQHB

 

 

 

 

 

132

 

BIBLIOGRAPHY

 

BIBLIOGRAPHY

BOOKS:

Allen, Frederick Lewis. Only Yesterday, New York: Harper and Row, 1931.

 

Anderson, Sherwood. Return to Winesburg. Chapel Hill: University of
North Carolina Press, 1967.

 

Anderson, Sherwood. Tar: A Midwest Childhood. New York: Boni and
Liveright, 1926.

 

Anderson, Sherwood. Winesburg, Ohio. New York: Random House, 1919.

 

Atlas of Kent County, Michigan. Grand Rapids: R.L. Polk and Co., 1893.

 

Baxter, Albert. History of Grand Rapids, Michigan. New York and Grand
Rapids: Munsell and Company, 1891.

 

Belknap, Charles E. The Yesterdays of Grand Rapids. Grand Rapids: Dean
Hicks Company, 1922.

 

Blumenthal, Albert. Small-Town Stuff. Chicago: University of Chicago
Press, 1932.

 

Bowen, A.W. and Co. Grand Rapids and Kent County, Michigan. Logansport,
Indiana: Wilson Hfimphreys and7CO., 1900.

 

Burch, Homer L. From Sawmill to City. Rockford, Michigan: Rockford
Register, 1967.

 

Cather, Willa. My Antonia. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1918.

 

Cather, Willa. O Pioneers! Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1913.

 

Chapman, Charles C. History of Kent County, Michigan. Chicago: Charles
Chapman and Co., 1881.

 

Chrysler, Don. The Story_of Grand River. Grand Rapids: Grace Publications,
1975.

 

Dillenback and Leavitt. History and Directory of Kent County, Michigan.
Grand Rapids: Daily Eagle Steam Printing House, 1870.

 

Dunbar, Willis F. All Aboard. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publish-
ing Co., 1969. 133

 

 

 

134

Etten, William J. A Citizen's History of Grand Rapids, Michigan.
Grand Rapids: A.P. Johnson Co., 1926.

Everett, Franklin A.M. Memorials of the Grand River Valley. Chicago:
Chicago Legal News, 1878.

Fisher, Ernest B. Grand Rapids and Kent County, Michigan. Chicago:
Robert 0. Law, 1918.

Goss, Dwight. History of Grand Rapids and Its Industries. Chicago:
C.F. Cooper and Co., 1906.

Hedrick, U.P. Land of the Crooked Tree. New York: Oxford University
Press, 1948.

Howe, E.W. Plain People. New York: Dodd, Mead and Co., 1929.

 

Illusppated Historical Atlas of Kent County, Chicago: H. Blendon and Co.,
1 6.

Ivey, Paul Wesley. The Pere Marquette Railroad Company. Grand Rapids:
Black Letter Press, 1970.

Lewis, Sinclair. Main Street. New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, 1920.

 

Lingeman, Richard. Small Town America. New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1980.

Lydens, Z.Z. Story of Grand Rapids. Grand Rapids: Kregel Publishers, 1966.

 

Lynd, Robert S. and Lynd, Helen Merrell. Middletown. New York: Harcourt:
Brace and Company, 1929.

McGee, John. Bend in the River. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans Publishing Co.,
1973.

 

Mapes, Lynn G. and Travis, Anthony. Pictorial Histppy of Grand Rapids.
Grand Rapids: Kregel Publication, 1976.

Masters, Edgar Lee. Spoon River Anthology, New York: Collier Macmillan
Publishers, 1914. -

Morison, Samuel Eliot and Commanger, Henry Steele. The Growth of the
American Republic. Vol. 1. New York: Oxford University Press, 1930.

Smith, Page. As a City Upon a Hill. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1966.

Standard Atlas of Kent County, Michigan. Chicago: George A. Ogle and Co.,
1907.

 

 

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135

Tarkington, Booth. The Magnificent Ambersons. New York: Grosset and
Dunlap, 1918.

 

Tuttle, Charles Richard. History of Grand Rapids. Grand Rapids: Tuttle
and Cooney, 1874.

 

Versluis, Warren, ed. Echos of the Past. Walker: Walker Historical
Committee, 1976.

 

Vidich, Arthur J. and Bensman, Joseph. Small Town in Mass Society.
New York: Doubleday and Company, Inc., 1960.

 

 

Warner, Sam 8. Jr. Streetcar Suburbs. New York: Antheneum, 1976.

 

White, Arthur S. ed. Kent County. Vol. III of Historic Michigan. Edited
by George N. Fuller. 3 vols. Dayton, Ohio: National HiStorical
Association, 1924.

 

 

GOVERNMENT DOCUMENTS:

Alpine Township. Records of the Conmissioners of Highways, November 9, 1878.

 

Comstock Park Public Schools. School Facility Report. Lansing: Manson,
Jackson, Kane, Inc., 1974.

 

Kent County Board of Park Trustees. Lydell Park Funding Resolutions.
Grand Rapids, Michigan, October 16, 1980.

 

Kent County Park Commission. Dwight Lydell Park--Master Plan. Grand
Rapids, Michigan: M.C. Smith and Associates, 1979.

 

Innes and Tinkham. Map of Kent County 1855. Chicago: N. Acheson, 1855.

 

Plainfield Township, Kent County, Michigan. School Board Minutes 1915-1922:
Directors Book of Records and Accounts. Comstock Park‘Public Schools.

 

 

Plainfield Township, Kent County, Michigan. School Board Minutes 1922-1930:
Michigan District Record. Comstock Park Public schools.

 

 

Plainfield Township, Kent County, Michigan. School Census of District No. 9
Fractional 1915 and 1922: Directors Book of Records and Accounts 1915-
1922. ComstoEk Park Public Schools.

 

State of Michigan. Department of Conservation. Division of Fish Culture
Operations. Report for Fiscal Years 1921 and 1922. Lansing: State
Printing Office, 1923.

 

State Of Michigan. Department of Conservation. Division of Fish Culture
Operations. Report for Fiscal Years 1925 and 1926. Lansing: State
Printing Office, 1927.

 

State of Michigan. Nineteenth Biannual Report of the State Board of Fish
Commissioners for the Calendar Years 1909 and 1910. Lansing: State
Printing Office, 19ll.

 

 

136

State of Michigan. Sixteenth Biannual Report of the State Board of Fish
Commissioners for the Calendar Years 1903 and 1904. Lansing: Robert
Smith Publishing Co., 1905.

 

State of Michigan. Thirteenth Biannual Report of the State Board of Fish
Commissioners for the Calendar Years 1897 and 1898} LanSing: Robert
Smith Printing Co., 1899.

United States. Seventh Census of the United States 1850: Population, Kent
County. Michigan Room, Grand Rapids Public Library.

Viall, William P. Survey of Comstock Park Public School 1974. Report to
the Comstock Park Board of EdUcation,lCOmstock Park, Michigan
Kalamazoo: Western Michigan University, 1974.

 

Western Michigan University. Report of the School of Education. A Survey
of Comstock Park Public Schools. Kalamazoo: Western Michigan University,
1969.

INTERVIEWS:

Burch, Homer L. Personal interview, Grand Rapids, Michigan, February 23,
1977.

Ericksen, Ellen. Personal interview, Comstock Park, Michigan, January 6,
1972 and April 5, 1972.

Hachmuth, B. Taylor. Personal interview, Comstock Park, Michigan, June
‘ 2: 1972.

Lamoreaux, F. Morris. Personal interview, Comstock Park, Michigan,
December 29, 1971.

Lamoreaux, Hudson. Personal interview, Comstock Park, Michigan,
December 29, 1971.

Lovell, Ida and Frank. Personal interview, Comstock Park, Michigan,
March 24, 1971 and December 2, 1971.

 

Wier, Clarence. Personal interview, Comstock Park, Michigan,
November 15, 1971; Novemer 26, 1971; December 2, 1971; March 8, 1972;
April 7, 1972; April 14, 1977 and December 11, 1980.

Wier, Maurice. Personal interview. Comstock Park, Michigan,
March 28, 1981.

Withey, Elizabeth C. Personal interview. Comstock Park, Michigan,
February 20, 1977.

 

137

NEWSPAPERS AND PERIODICALS:
Advance, 1979-81.
American Miller, 1915-18.

 

Comstock Park News, 1917-35.

 

Comstock Park Review, 1945-48.

 

Grand Rapids Herald, 1915-48.

 

Grand Rapids Press, 1897-1980.

 

Grand Rapids Magazine, 1975-80.

 

Michigan History, 1936-45.

 

 

Rockford Register, I970-72.
Suburban Echo, 1961-65.

 

Telegram-Herald, 1889-91.

 

The Evening Leader, 1885-92.

 

UNPUBLISHED MATERIALS:

Comstock Park Christian Reformed Church. "Dedication Program"
Comstock Park, Michigan, December 22, 1966.

Comstock Park Congregational Church. Golden Anniversary Booklet.
September 16, 1960.

 

Comstock Park Rotary Club. "Dedication Ceremonies: U.S. Post Office."
Comstock Park, Michigan, May 19, 1962.

Hachmuth, Henry Carr. Farm Ledger 1908-1916. Mill Creek, Michigan.

 

Johnson, Henry A. "The Saga of the Lamoreaux Family." Ellen Ericksen's
notebook, Comstock Park, Michigan, December 30, 1971.

Ladd, E.L. "Proposed Residential P.U.D. Layout." Blueprint prepared by
Exxel Engineering Inc., Grand Rapids, Michigan, December 3, 1979.

Ladies Literary Club. Fourth Annual Announcement 1914—1915. Comstock
Park, Michigan.

 

Maranatha Bible Church. "Building Brochure.“ Comstock Park, Michigan,
1970 and "Dedication Bulletin." Comstock Park, Michigan, January
23, 1972.

 

 

 

138

Masonic Country Club. The Masonic Country Club of Western Michigan.
Grand Rapids: Powers-Tyson Co., 1924.

Stuart, L.G. "History of Grand Rapids Street Railways." unpublished
paper, Michigan Room, Grand Rapids Public Library.

West Michigan Agricultural and Industrial Society. Fair Premium List 1894.
Michigan Room, Grand Rapids Public Library.

West Michigan Hive K.O.T. Macabees. Record Keepers Book of West Michigan
Hive NO. 304. Mill Creek, Michigan, March 30, 1893.

 

West Michigan State Fair. Premium List 1902-1904; 1906-1918; 1920-1921;
1923; 1928; 1930; 1934-35. Michigan Room, Grand RapidSTPublic Library.

 

Wier, Clarence. "Reflections on an Old School." The Schoolhouse, August,
1974.

Zion Lutheran Church. "10th Anniversary Booklet." Comstock Park, Michigan,
December 15, 1973.