Bygone Business: Crissman's Drug Store

An early view of Crissman's Drug Store. Owner and pharmacist Lewis Crissman is show at right. (Courtesy of John Crissman)

One of the best-remembered businesses on Rochester's Main Street during the twentieth century was Crissman's Drug Store.  Lewis C. Crissman, a 1910 graduate of Ferris Institute (now Ferris State University), established the drug store that carried his name in 1913, when he bought out Luel H. Smith's Central Drug Store.The Smith store was located at 329 S. Main, just south of where the Chase Bank stands in 2014.

Around 1915, Crissman moved his pharmacy across the street to 438 S. Main, in what was then known as the J. W. Smith block, owned by the proprietor of the St. James Hotel. Lewis's brother, Clayton, was his partner in the early years, and for a time the store carried the name of Crissman Brothers.  L. C. and Clayton Crissman dissolved their partnership in 1936 when Clayton decided to concentrate his efforts on his fruit farm business.  When Lewis Crissman decided to retire from the pharmacy he passed the baton to the next generation, son J. Kenneth Crissman, who like his father, had earned a pharmacy degree from Ferris.

The Crissman brothers remodeled their store in 1929 and installed a soda fountain that became a clearinghouse of sorts for community news.  What the parlor of the St. James Hotel across the street had been to the town during the nineteenth century, Crissman's soda fountain was during the mid-twentieth century. A social switchboard in Rochester's game of telephone, the counter allowed for the rapid dissemination of local news and gossip. During World War II, servicemen coming home on leave found that a stop at Crissman's soda fountain was the fastest way to catch up on the latest events on the homefront as well as word of comrades in arms serving in far-flung places.

Crissman's came to an end in October 1966 when the business was sold and became the Pinkerton Pharmacy, bringing a close to  a run of more than half a century on Rochester's Main Street.

The Historic Butts Surrey

The surrey on the Butts farm, ca.1930

When Della Casey Wilson and her mother, Elizabeth Butts Casey Case, decided to close up the farm on South Hill that had been in their family since Rochester's pioneer days, they sold an old surrey in their barn to Red Knapp. That surrey remained with the Knapp family until 2009, when Red's sons donated it to the Rochester Avon Historical Society.

Elizabeth Butts Casey Case was the granddaughter of Elias Butts, a farmer who had migrated from New Jersey to settle on South Hill in Avon Township before the Civil War.  Elizabeth, or "Lizzie," as she was locally known, was also the second wife of Rochester hardware merchant Charles W. Case.

The Butts surrey has ties not only to families prominent in Rochester's history, but also to the history of the automotive industry.  The surrey was manufactured by the Dunlap Vehicle Company of Pontiac, Michigan, which was launched in August 1898 as an offshoot of the Pontiac Buggy Company.  Dunlap was meant to produce lighter-duty carriages, while Pontiac Buggy concentrated on the heavy-duty vehicles. The Dunlap company lasted only ten years; in 1908 it was merged back into the Pontiac Buggy Company.  Pontiac Buggy, in turn, was one of several concerns that were merged to form the Oakland Motor Car Company. In 1909, Oakland Motor Car became part of General Motors, and was the ancestor of the Pontiac brand.

The surrey on its way to restoration in 2014

Rochester Avon Historical Society is working to return the Butts surrey to the streets of Rochester. The surrey has been transported to northern Indiana where an Amish carriage maker will undertake the repair and restoration of the vehicle.  When it returns home in a few months, it will look much as it did when the Butts family was using it on the streets of Rochester about 115 years ago.

RAHS is currently raising funds to complete this project. If you would like to contribute to the restoration of the Butts surrey, visit rochesteravonhistoricalsociety.org and click the "Save the Surrey" link to make an online donation, or send your check to Rochester-Avon Historical Society, P.O. Box 80783, Rochester, MI 48308-0783. Please note the word "surrey" on your check or online donation.

For the complete history of the Butts surrey from the RAHS web site, click here. For more pictures of the surrey before restoration, click here.

At Home in Rochester: The Axford Price House

(Photo by Susan Wilson)

This large home on the southeast corner of University Drive and Walnut Street was built in 1894 for Axford Price and his wife Laura Fosdick Price.  Axford Price was the son of local pioneer William Price, who came to the area in 1830 and settled on the Hersey property in Stoney Creek. William Price's wife was Sally Axford, the daughter of Macomb County probate judge Samuel Axford; their son, Axford Price, born in 1834, was named to honor his mother's family. In 1835, when Avon Township was officially organized, William Price was elected to serve as the first township supervisor. 

Axford Price spent most of his life on his farm in Stoney Creek, where he and his wife reared a family of four sons.  This home in Rochester was built as their retirement residence, and Axford lived in it for 15 years, until his death in 1909. A few months after her husband died, Laura Price had the house partitioned to make it a two-family home to accommodate her son, Oscar, and his family. Oscar's daughter, Elna, and her husband, John Plassey, were the next generation of the Price family to occupy the house.

Eventually the Axford Price home was converted for office use, and is currently the home of Potere-Modetz Funeral Planning, among other tenants.  The Axford Price home celebrates its 120th birthday this year.

Bygone Business: Lucille Shoppe

For 27 years, the place on Main Street for stylish women to buy clothing was the Lucille Shoppe at 400 S. Main. Robert and Lucille Warren opened the store on October 17, 1946 in the Rochester National Bank building at Fourth & Main (now Chase Bank). The retail clothing trade was not unknown to Lucille Warren; her father, Fred B. Carpenter, had succeeded Louis Finsterwald and Harry Bigger as Rochester's menswear merchants, and her brother, Hilburn, had followed her father into the family business.

In 1952, Lucille's moved to the Masonic Block, where the shop became the neighbor of the venerable Carpenter's Men's Wear. The Warrens added the Boys 'N' Girls Shop to the retail mix in 1964, thereby creating a block of stores that could cater to the clothing needs of the entire family.

For an entire generation of Rochester families, the Lucille Shoppe and its adjunct children's wear store were a popular place to find that special “outfit.” But in November 1973, Lucille's and the Boys 'N' Girls Shop bowed to the enormous economic pressure that nearby shopping malls and discount stores had brought to bear on the Main Street shops and closed their doors.

This Month in Rochester History

The talk of the town in April 1964 was a new apartment complex that was going up in the village of Rochester. Wake-Pratt Construction Company of Royal Oak broke ground for the 49-unit Village Apartments on Romeo Road on April 23.  The $700,000 project included three buildings, named Surrey House, Carriage House and Coach House, in keeping with the development's modified Early American architectural style.  Architects for the complex were Lorenz & Paski of Detroit.

Mystery Spot

This week's post is a mystery photo, which should be no problem at all for natives of Rochester or those who are well familiar with Main Street.  How well do you know your town?

This photo was taken a few days ago from the sidewalk on Main Street, somewhere in the blocks between Third Street and University Drive.  In front of which store is this little stool to be found?  Post a comment and tell us where it is!

At Home in Rochester: William Shulter Starring House

This house on the southwest corner of West University Drive and Wilcox Street has historical connections to two long-time Rochester businessmen. It was built in the summer of 1916 as the family home of Rochester druggist William Shulter Starring, who operated Starring's Drug Store at 321 S. Main St. from approximately 1887 until 1923. The Rochester Era newspaper reported in early June 1916 that Starring had broken ground for a new bungalow on West Fifth Street (now University Drive), and updated its readers a week later with the news that the basement of the new house had been completed. The Starrings moved into their new home in October 1916. After retiring from the pharmacy business, they sold the property in 1924 to another prominent Rochester businessman, Charles Louis Sterns, and his wife Rena.

Charles L. Sterns operated the Idle Hour Theatre on Main Street, and in 1936 remodeled it, installed a new Art Deco facade, and re-christened it the Avon Theatre. In 1942, with Rochester's demand for movie seats increasing, Sterns opened the  Hills Theatre on the opposite side of Main Street.  The Avon closed in the early 1950s and the Hills continued as Main Street's only movie venue until it went dark in 1984.

Rochester Avon Historical Society is currently working on a project to bring back the Hills Theatre. Read about the Society's progress in this story from this week's Rochester Post.

Bygone Business: Four-O-Six Bar

As Rochester was emerging from the Great Depression in 1936, local resident Carl H. Hartwig bought out the Village Tavern - formerly known as the Merchant's Restaurant - which had been operating at 406 S. Main Street since 1927. Hartwig, who was the brother of Rochester real estate agent Max A. Hartwig, announced that he would open a new cocktail lounge and restaurant in the space after investing about $4,000 in new equipment and furnishings.

Hartwig announced his grand opening in the Rochester Clarion on September 18, 1936, informing local residents that the new establishment would be named the the Four-O-Six, presumably after its street address. The advertisement offered lunches for 45 cents and special “roadhouse dinners” for one dollar.

In 1952, restaurant owner Leonard Bebout needed to vacate his location south of the Opera House block and decided to move Bebout's Restaurant into the building he owned at 406 S. Main. As a result of that shuffle, the Four-O-Six moved up the block to 434 S. Main (thereby creating a local joke: “What's the address of the 406 Bar?”).

The Four-O-Six was known as a comfortable watering-hole where working men could enjoy a beer after the whistle blew at Twist Drill or Avon Tube. That image was tarnished by a tragic incident at the bar on September 26, 1971, when local resident William H. Spencer was shot and killed by another bar patron. As capital crimes were few and far between in Rochester, the murder at the Four-O-Six was the talk of the town and the story became permanently linked with the bar's name. The Four-O-Six closed its doors about two years later.

A Main Street Timeline

Rochester is approaching its 200th birthday in 2017, and with two centuries of development in our rear view mirror, there is a lot of history to ponder along Main Street.  This handy timeline illustrates some of the milestones that Main Street has marked along the way. Click on any of the balloon markers to expand it and read more about the event. Some events may be collapsed to the bottom of the frame - just click on the plus sign to expand and view them.  There is even an historic video clip featured in one of the event balloons for your viewing pleasure, but you'll have to find it on your own!

Main Street, Rochester Through the Years on Dipity.

This Month in Rochester History

Clarence Bigger meeting his last passenger train in 1964

Half a century ago, in March 1964, the Rochester Clarion reported that 80-year-old mail messenger Clarence M. Bigger was out of a job.  Bigger was newly unemployed because the New York Central railroad had just discontinued passenger train service in Rochester.  The last passenger train pulled out of the depot on East University Drive on March 19, 1964, leaving Bigger without a job after 57 years of meeting every passenger train to send out or receive mail.  He had won the mail messenger contract in 1912 and had met every train - except for a handful of days of illness - ever since.  The Clarion related his story:

Except on Sundays when there is no mail delivery, and a few times when he was ill, Clarence has met every passenger train coming into Rochester. "Never once have I been late meeting one," he says with pride.

Abiding by postal regulations, he has been required to carry a gun, but has never once had to use it. Once, when accepting a large shipment of money here aboard a Detroit United Railway (DUR) car, he was surprised to learn that seven armed guards had put it aboard the car at Detroit. "I used to handle all the money shipped into the Rochester National Bank," Clarence recalled. "Some days there would be as much as 32 bags of silver."

The New York Central/Penn Central continued to run freight trains on the line through Rochester until 1976; at that time the line was abandoned and the old railroad bed became the Paint Creek Trail.

Bygone Business: Bebout's Restaurant

For nearly four decades, Rochester residents who wanted to "dine out" likely bought their meals from one of the Bebout brothers, Harold, Clare and Leonard.  Harold Bebout started his career cooking in the town's pool hall, while in 1927 Clare took over the Merchant's Restaurant located in a newly-constructed building at 406 S. Main.  Those were heady days in Rochester - the South Hill bridge had just opened, bringing more automobile traffic into town, and business was booming. Not long after came the stock market crash and the Great Depression, and the restaurant closed, a casualty of hard times.

Harold Bebout rebounded in 1933 and opened a new restaurant, this time located in what was then the Nichols building (known today as O'Connor's Public House). During World War II, he also operated the employee cafeteria at McAleer Manufacturing on Water Street (now Rochester Mills Beer Company) and offered catering services.  Harold Bebout retired in 1947 and sold Bebout's Restaurant to his younger brother, Leonard, who had been cooking in the establishment since he was in high school. In 1952, Leonard moved the restaurant once again, back to 406 S. Main, where his brother had started out back in 1927.

One local resident recalled that a menu wasn't really necessary at Bebout's. A guest simply ate whatever Mr. Bebout, in his signature chef's hat and apron, happened to have on the grill that day, and paid whatever the waitress said was owed.  In May 1967, Leonard Bebout decided to hang up his hat and apron and go fishing, and that was the end of Bebout's Restaurant in Rochester. He's miss his friends, Bebout told the Rochester Clarion, but he was "just tired of cooking."

This 1961 photo of Bebout's Restaurant at 406 S. Main is from the Walter and Marjorie Dernier collection.

At Home in Rochester: the Harry Bigger House

This house on the corner of West University Drive (formerly West Fifth Street) and Wesley Street was built in 1921 as the residence of Rochester clothing merchant Harry Bigger and his wife, Hazel. It was built in what was considered to be a prime location, situated along a stretch of West Fifth Street upon which many of Rochester's leading businessmen built their residences in the 1910s and 1920s.

Harry Bigger grew up in Rochester and joined clothier Louis Finsterwald as a partner in his store, located in the Masonic block at Fourth & Main streets.  Eventually, Finsterwald decided to return to Detroit and in 1921 Harry Bigger bought him out of the Rochester store, becoming sole proprietor of the business then named Harry Bigger Men's and Boys' Wear.

The new house on the corner of West Fifth & Wesley was built in the autumn of 1921, and the Biggers occupied it for a little over a decade. In 1933, they decided to move to Detroit and they rented the Rochester house for a few years, until finally selling it in 1941.

Bygone Business: Case's Hardware

C. W. Case (right) in front of his store about 1905 (Rochester Hills Public Library)

A Main Street fixture for well over three quarters of a century, Case's Hardware stood at 335 S. Main from 1890-1968, but the company's roots in Rochester go back even further.  The business that most twentieth century residents of Rochester knew as Case's began in 1872 when a Civil War veteran named Joseph Reimer opened a hardware store on the east side of Main. In 1885, Reimer built a brand-new brick building to house his store at 418 S. Main (the location of today's Sumo Sushi restaurant), and shortly thereafter retired and sold the hardware to his son, Cyrus. Cyrus ran the store with the help of his partner and brother-in-law for a while, but was busy working out of town as a traveling representative for an implement manufacturer, so he sold his Rochester hardware to Harvey J. Taylor in 1888.

Taylor, who quickly decided that he did not want to continue paying rent in the Reimer building, began to scout around for a new location and settled upon a lot across the street and down a block, at 335 S. Main. Here he built a two-story brick structure in 1890, with a salesroom on the first floor and warehouse space and a tin shop on the second floor.  For the next half-century, the second-floor metal shop would be the domain of tinsmith Alexander Rose.

In 1889, just before the construction of his new building, Taylor had hired his sister Charlotte's young son, Charles Wallace Case, to work in the hardware store. Fresh off the farm and nineteen years old,  C. W. Case learned his uncle's business and ten years later, in 1899, formed a partnership with H. Frank Stone to purchase the Taylor store.  At that time, the business became known as Stone and Case, but after only a few months Stone sold his interest in the store to William Tienken, and the firm changed its name to Tienken and Case.  When William Tienken decided to go into the plumbing and heating business on his own in 1915, Case bought him out and the store became known as the C. W. Case Hardware. Meanwhile, William Tienken built a new store right next door at 333 S. Main to house his plumbing and heating business.

C. W. Case was a civic-minded merchant who served as Rochester village president and held a number of other political offices.  He was also well known for one of his best-loved hobbies, that of raising purebred poultry.  In 1912, he received international attention when his pair of purebred Buff Cochins won a championship for pairs held at Madison Square Garden in New York.  He proudly displayed a picture of this winning pair of chickens on the wall of the hardware store for many years.

Case operated the store until his death in 1944, but by that time his son, Mason, had taken over as manager because of the elder Case's declining health.  Mason Case succeeded his father as owner of the hardware store and the business remained in family hands until the building was destroyed by fire on December 12, 1968.

In its day, Case's filled important needs for the citizens of the Rochester area. The service provided was personal; my father recalls that if he needed three nails, he could go to Case's and they would happily sell him three nails, not a box of 100. Case's Hardware belonged to an era when merchants concentrated on serving customers more than on moving merchandise, and for that it is ever fondly remembered.

This Month in Rochester History

Fifty years ago this month, Rochester was mourning the death of Rochester native Sgt. William Eugene Jackson, who died from wounds suffered while serving in Vietnam on February 5, 1964.  The first Rochester resident to lose his life in the Vietnam War, Sgt. Jackson was the son of John W. and Elizabeth A. Jackson. He had deep roots in Rochester; his great-grandfather was William H. Jackson, who had established the Jackson Foundry at the south end of town in 1877.  William Eugene Jackson was a 1946 graduate of Rochester High School and had been a member of the United States Army since shortly after completing high school. He had also served as a radio instructor at the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York.

Sgt. Jackson was in Vietnam as a Special Forces senior military advisor to Vietnamese soldiers at a mountain camp north of Saigon. When the camp was attacked by an enemy patrol, Jackson ran out to investigate and someone threw a flare to illuminate the area. The Vietnamese soldiers in Jackson's camp,  apparently confused by the attack and the sudden light from the flare, shot him in a tragic friendly fire accident. Jackson was evacuated to Clark Air Force Base in the Philippines, where he died after a series of surgeries and blood transfusions failed to stabilize his condition.

Sgt. William E. Jackson of Rochester, first local fatality in the Vietnam War, was laid to rest with honor in Arlington National Cemetery.  May he rest in peace.

Thanks to Rod and Susan Wilson for providing the copy of William Jackson's RHS high school graduation photo that accompanies this post.

Subdivision Stories: Hamlin Place Farms

The Hamlin Place Farms subdivision was laid out on the north side of Hamlin Road, straddling Rochester Road, in late 1916.  It was located on a portion of what was historically the John Fairchild Hamlin farm, a pioneer farmstead in Avon Township since the 1830s. The Hamlin farm at its peak encompassed more than 500 acres; after the death of John Fairchild Hamlin and his wife, Laura Andrus Hamlin, ownership of the property passed to his daughter Belle, who was the wife of Judge Marsden C. Burch.

The Burches did not live in Avon Township on a full-time basis. Marsden Burch was a judge in Osceola County, Michigan, and later located in Grand Rapids, where he was U.S. District Attorney for the western district of Michigan. In 1897, President William McKinley appointed him an assistant Attorney General of the United States, and he and his wife moved to Washington, D.C.  They visited Rochester regularly to look after their farm interests, which were managed by tenants, and to vacation during the summers in the old Hamlin homestead, which they affectionately called "Oldhome."

The Oldhome property was reserved for the Burches' use when they sold off portions of the old farm for development, and the Hamlin house in which they lived until their respective deaths still stands at 1812 S. Rochester Road. The one and only side street in Hamlin Place Farms ran north from Hamlin Road, west of Rochester Road, and was called Burch Street for the property owners; it was renamed Crestline in 1950.

This 1917 advertisement for the lots in the Hamlin Place Farms subdivision refers to this portion of Avon Township as "Rochester Heights." It also makes reference to deed restrictions which were fairly common during this era, usually prohibiting sale of lots to people of color or to people of certain religious beliefs. Deed restrictions based on race or religion were widely used to enforce segregation in the days before federal law prohibited such discriminatory practices.

Thanks to Rod and Susan Wilson for providing the Hamlin Place Farms advertisement shown here.

Rochester Relics: The Elbe E. Robson Story

According to its label, this palm-sized antique bottle was once given out as a party favor during the 1901-1902 holiday season by E. E. Robson of Rochester, Michigan. The bottle is empty now, and not a trace of its former contents remains after 113 years, but we can be fairly certain that it once held holiday cheer in the form of liquor. Robson's back story as a player in a local controversy suggests no other possibility.

Elbe E. Robson was born in Michigan in 1865. He came to Rochester around 1899 to take over as proprietor of the Detroit Hotel, which stood on the southwest corner of Third & Main streets (where the Hermitage Gallery is today). The hotel was a handsome two-story brick building that boasted 30 guest rooms, a dining room, a bar and billiard lounge.

As one who made his living in the hospitality trade, Elbe Robson was an ardent advocate for the rights of saloonkeepers to sell liquor unfettered by government regulation. He apparently challenged such regulation early and often; Robson wasn't long in Rochester before he got himself into trouble with the law. According to a Detroit Free Press account from August 1900, he was one of four Rochester men fined for selling liquor without a license. In December of the same year, the Free Press reported in a dispatch from Pontiac that there had been more trouble:

The December term of the Circuit Court opened here yesterday afternoon and a lively session is promised. The criminals were arraigned at 1:30 p.m. Elbe E. Robson, of Rochester, proprietor of the Detroit Hotel, paid a fine of $200 upon pleading guilty to a charge of selling liquor on Sunday. He was also assessed $10 costs. On two other charges he was released on his personal recognizance in the sum of $300, in each case, until the February and April terms of court.

His hefty fines aside, E. E. Robson was in for a rocky ride in the first decade of the twentieth century. Back in 1889, Michigan had passed a liquor control law in Public Act 207, commonly referred to as the "local option" law. Under this act, individual counties were permitted to outlaw the manufacture and sale of intoxicating spirits within their borders upon a vote of the people, which could be petitioned for not more often than every two years. In Oakland County, agitation by temperance organizations was beginning to bubble to the surface right around the time that E. E. Robson was handing out these little bottles of cheer, but it was successfully beaten back by the "saloonists" until 1908.  In that year (the same one in which Carry Nation made her famous romp through downtown Holly), the temperance forces petitioned for a ballot question on the issue, and Elbe Robson stood in the gap to defend the saloonkeepers.

Elected as chairman of an executive committee of the county's saloonkeepers' organization, Robson traveled around advocating against the exercise of local option in Oakland County.  Just before the election, he gave an interview to the Bay City Times, which the newspaper summarized thusly:

E. E. Robson, proprietor of the Detroit Hotel at Rochester, and the most salient factor in the concerted movement instigated by the liquor element of Oakland County to oppose local option, was a guest of the Crawford today. This noon in a brief interview he outlined the situation as it now lies in his county, closing with the declaration that it would be a battle to the last ditch between the advocates of the licensed liquor traffic and the supporters of the local option cause.

As it turned out, Robson was right to be less than optimistic about the outcome of the election. His faction lost, and Oakland County went "dry" in the spring of 1908. The Detroit Free Press reported in late May of that year that Robson, weary of the fight, had closed the Detroit Hotel and moved to Richmond, Michigan.  Richmond was in Macomb County, which was still "wet," so Robson operated the Commercial Hotel there for two years, until 1910, when the temperance advocates were reversed at the polls and Oakland County went "wet" again.

This time, Robson went by the book and applied to the Rochester Village Council for a proper liquor license. The application was not without controversy, as opponents pointed out the proximity of the Universalist Church (at 226 Walnut) to the hotel. The hotel and the church did, indeed, share a property line, but measurements were taken and it was determined that the two buildings were precisely 400 feet apart, the minimum requisite distance under the law at that time, so the village fathers granted the liquor license.

The seesaw battle on the issue continued over the next several years, and Oakland went dry again in 1915. In 1918, statewide prohibition was voted in Michigan, and by 1920, the entire nation was (technically) dry. E. E. Robson threw in the towel and moved to Detroit, where he and his wife went into a completely different business and operated a millinery store.  He died in November 1933, exactly one month before national prohibition was repealed and liquor again became legal in the United States.

My thanks to Rod and Susan Wilson for the photo of the bottle that accompanies this post.

At Home in Rochester: The William Henry Ducharme House

This Dutch colonial on Crooks Road, just north of Hamlin, has ties to the history of the American automotive industry. According to WPA rural property inventory records, the house may have been built about 1899, but the exact date is currently unknown. The house stands on the remnant of what was once a large farm parcel straddling Crooks Road and consisting, at times, of more than 200 acres.

The most interesting part of the property's history began in 1916, when it was purchased by William Henry Ducharme of Detroit. Ducharme was the son of Detroit hardware merchant Charles A. Ducharme, who was a partner in the Buhl & Ducharme hardware business and was also president of the Michigan Stove Company. William Ducharme was a talented amateur athlete and active member of the Detroit Athletic Club; he played first base for the D.A.C.'s baseball club, known as the Deltas. He was a member of that team when they won the national amateur championships in 1890 and 1892.

In business, William Ducharme had started out in the hardware trade, like his father, but in 1909 he became one of the three organizers of the Kelsey Wheel Company and was elected treasurer of the new firm. Kelsey Wheel got its start from Henry Ford, who purchased more than three-quarters of the company's wheel production in the first year. The company later expanded sales to other automakers and to the federal government during World War I, and by 1919 was producing two million wheels a year.  In 1927, Kelsey merged with the Hayes Wheel Company and formed what became the Kelsey-Hayes Corporation, a major supplier of wheels and brakes to the Big Three automakers.

With Kelsey Wheel making great strides in the industry, William Ducharme decided to invest in real estate. He purchased the Crooks Road property in 1916 from William McKinstrey and apparently used the house as a country escape.  The 1922 Detroit Social Secretary lists Ducharme and his wife, Frances, as residents of Jefferson Avenue in Detroit but notes that they maintained a "country home" in what they referred to as "Avon Hills."

Ducharme owned the Crooks Road property until 1943, a year before his death, but by 1939 he was apparently leasing the house for use as a convalescent home.  The Rochester Clarion reported on May 19, 1939, that the house was damaged by fire while so occupied:

The River View Rest Home, operated by Jerry Cummins and Robert W. Brennan at 1921 Crooks road, about 3 miles west and two miles south of Rochester, was badly damaged by fire, Monday afternoon, about 2:45 p.m., when a fire started in the attic of the house and before Rochester firemen could get it under control had burned the top floor of the sanitorium.
It is believed the fire was caused by sparks from a hole in the chimney. Firemen were handicapped in fighting the blaze for lack of water. The well on the property had gone dry and was being repaired by John Boldt, who gave assistance in getting the patients from the Home before help arrived. Firemen exhausted the chemicals in attempting to extinguish the blaze and a hose line was run 800 feet to the Clinton River and pumped to supply water.
At the time of the fire, nine patients were registered at the Rest Home. One of the women patients had suffered a stroke two days previous and had to be carried from the home. She was transferred in the A.C. Hobart ambulance to the Woodruff-Geiger Hospital. The other patients were taken to The Haven, another private sanitorium west of the village, and to the home of Mrs. Leila Mitchell on East Fifth street. Mrs. Mitchell is a nurse at the River View Rest Home.
The property is owned by William DuCharme, of Detroit. He will repair the home immediately for its continued use as a convalescent home.

 Another newspaper article a few months later reported that the house had been repaired and the rest home was back in operation, but after Ducharme sold it in 1943 it returned to service as a private residence.  Most of  the surrounding farm land was sold for development following World War II.

The Story of Tyrrell H. Duncombe

This collectible old bottle has a connection to Rochester, Michigan and an intriguing back story. The product known as "Germex" was manufactured in Highland Park and Rochester, Michigan by Tyrrell Hubert Duncombe, who ran the Duncombe Research Laboratory in both locations from the late 1920s until his death in 1945.

Duncombe was born in Ontario in 1867, the son of a prominent physician and Canadian member of parliament. From 1889 until 1910 he was a pharmacist in St. Thomas, Ontario, where he also ran a real estate business.  Duncombe built the New Duncombe Opera House in St. Thomas and there exhibited the first motion pictures ever shown in Canada.

In 1910 he moved to Detroit, and by the late 1920s was a resident of Avon Township (now Rochester Hills), living on Washington Road.

Tyrrell Duncombe was a prolific inventor and was issued many U.S. and Canadian patents. Among them were patents for an acetylene gas generator in 1902, a coin-operated vending apparatus in 1910, a rotary internal combustion engine in 1921, and a traditional fuselage airplane with helicopter capabilities in 1930.

In addition to his mechanical inventions, Duncombe also styled himself  a cancer researcher, and he ran afoul of the U.S. Federal Trade Commission in 1935 when his claims that his Germex product was an effective treatment for cancer and other diseases fell under the agency's scrutiny. In a 1937 finding and summary of the investigation into Duncombe's case, the FTC cataloged the following claims that had been made by him in advertising for Germex:

Represented that cancer cures attained by said preparation were "beyond  all comprehension," and that it was a cure for syphilis, arthritis, pernicious anemia, and gangrene, and a remedy for tuberculosis, and that notable results were being obtained by use thereof in such diseases as cancer, sinus, catarrh, etc., and that it was used most successfully for various other diseases and was recommended for or effective in various other ailments, including kidney and liver trouble, pyorrhea, etc., and variously recommended same as a competent cure and remedy for everything that local doctors are called upon to treat and for any diseases caused by parasites or bacteria, and made use of circulars and other literature containing purported testimonials by various people to the effect that they had been suffering from cancer, ulcers and other diseases and had been relieved or cured thereof or completely restored to health by use of said preparation. . .

In his biographical entry in the National Cyclopedia of American Biography, Duncombe claimed that he had been graduated from "Ontario College of Pharmacy in 1889, M.D. at Rush Medical College, Chicago, in 1893 and D.C. at Chiropractic College, Detroit, Mich., in 1912."  The FTC investigation, however, took issue with his educational claims and described his credentials thus:

Although respondent is, or at one time was, a pharmacist, he is not registered as such in Detroit or Wayne County, Mich. Respondent never took a course in medicine and holds no degree in medicine. Respondent, however, in written communications prescribing and selling "Germex" has signed himself "Dr. T. H. Duncombe." Respondent explains that he uses the word or title "Dr." because he is a chiropractor. When questioned in regard to chiropractic, respondent was unable to state accurately the number of vertebrae in the spinal column.

The FTC further asserted in its findings that Duncombe had no substantive knowledge of the conditions that he claimed Germex could treat:

Respondent never read, nor could he give the name or title of any book on the subject of arthritis, anemia, syphilis, trench mouth, or scarlet fever. Respondent could name no book or article he had ever read on septicemia, gangrene, ulcers, diabetes, tuberculosis, or other diseases enumerated in his advertising material.
Notwithstanding the fact that respondent is not a doctor and is without medical education, he has not hesitated to consult with patients, to undertake to diagnose their troubles and to prescribe his product, "Germex" for them.

So what, exactly was Germex? The chemical analysis conducted by the FTC investigators found that:

Bacteriological examinations of "Germex" disclose that it is not an antiseptic, is not sterile and contains pathogenic or disease-causing bacteria.
. . .
Chemical analyses of a sample of ''Germex" as made by the Laboratories of the Detroit Department of Health disclosed the product to be a brown liquid, cloudy in appearance, with a yellowish residue on the bottom and a scum on the surface of the liquid standing in the bottom. The sample contained 8.18% of ethyl alcohol by volume, a deficiency of .82ff. had a musty odor, a slightly acid reaction, small amounts of resin and glucocides, total solids of .97'i of this .147, representing a composition of ash, largely sodium carbonate, and a trace of potassium carbonate.

Unimpressed, the FTC in 1937 issued a "cease and desist" order against Duncombe and the Duncombe Research Laboratory with respect to the sale and distribution of the product known as Germex. Tyrrell H. Duncombe died eight years later. He is buried in Mount Avon Cemetery.

Thanks to Rod and Susan Wilson for the photo of the Germex bottle.

This Month in Rochester History

As we turn the calendar page to 2014 today, we also look back at what was happening in Rochester half a century ago, in January 1964. The headline news in the Rochester Clarion at that time was the dedication of the new chapel at University Presbyterian Church on Adams Road, which took place on January 20, 1964. The congregation had been organized in 1958 and met in Lawnridge Hall, the former home of Donald C. Wilson, brother of Alfred G. Wilson of Meadow Brook Hall. Once their new chapel was dedicated, the congregation used Lawnridge Hall for administrative and educational functions. It is still a part of their campus today.

In its coverage of the dedication plans, the Clarion described the new building this way:

The chapel seats 180 people around three sides of a raised chancel supporting the pulpit and gleaming white marble communion table. From the skylit peak of the 40 foot ceiling, a celtic cross hangs suspended above the chancel. Behind the chancel, the choir is grouped around the Alfred G. Wilson Memorial Organ.

A few months after the building was dedicated, it was selected from among 275 entries as one of the top ten church building designs in the United States by the National Conference on Church Architecture.

Bygone Business: Pierson's Floor Covering

The storefront at 410 S. Main Street received a new tenant in the spring of 1964, after having served more than three decades as the home of a shoe store (first Hale's, then Leinenger's). The new store was Pierson's Floor Covering, and it held a grand opening on April 3 and 4, 1964. Operated by Arthur C. Pierson, who had been in the floor covering business in Detroit, the shop sold duPont paint, Armstrong linoleum and carpeting.  To introduce his store to Rochester residents, Pierson offered a child's fishing pole and reel to the first one hundred customers to visit the shop on opening weekend. Pierson's closed around 1971, and the Rochester Eccentric newspaper offices replaced it at 410 S. Main in 1972.

The ad shown here ran in the Rochester Clarion in April 1964 to announce Pierson's grand opening. Do any of you have one of those kiddie rod and reel outfits stuffed in a closet somewhere?