The Telway ( which is still in business ) is on the corner of John R. street and 11 mile road. Down the street about a quarter of a mile is the high school where I attended and graduated. This hamburger shop was a great place to get an hamburger when you were in the area and hungry.
This is Bray's hamburger place that used to be on the corner of John R. and 10 mile road. The Chrysler Freeway and the huge clover-leaf that connected it to I-75 replaced a few streets and this place.
This is the largest real tire in the world and it is still standing. Its stand is as large as many houses in the area.
This is Hege's Wigwam department store. It was the largest Tee Pee ( Wigwam ) built. The building was torn down and replaced. Notice the real carved wooden Indian posts supporting the building canopy. I remember another carved Indian statue standing at the entrance of the store as well.
This is the largest replica of a stove in the world. It used to reside at the Fair Grounds on Woodward Ave. near 8 mile in Detroit, Michigan. It was in need of TLC when I left Detroit in 1981 and was purchased and moved by a private buyer. This very place was where the Martin Bus Line ended when going south and the Detroit Metro Bus service started heading south. The Martin Lines covered the cities of Hazel Park, Madison Heights, went west and covered Royal Oak. I recall it being a nickel to ride that line and a dime to ride the one going into Detroit. Of course, I'm dating myself and the prices slowly rose, but the last time I rode a Detroit bus, it was twenty-five cents and a nickel for the transfer. I wish I could have found some other pictures of "The Loop." This was a drive-in and those teenagers who had cars would cruise from this place up John R. going north to the McDonald's Drive through and back south to the Loop again, looking for friends and just hanging out. Hope you enjoyed my wee trip back in time.
The Telway ( which is still in business ) is on the corner of John R. street and 11 mile road. Down the street about a quarter of a mile is the high school where I attended and graduated. This hamburger shop was a great place to get an hamburger when you were in the area and hungry.
This is Bray's hamburger place that used to be on the corner of John R. and 10 mile road. The Chrysler Freeway and the huge clover-leaf that connected it to I-75 replaced a few streets and this place.
This is the largest real tire in the world and it is still standing. Its stand is as large as many houses in the area.
This is Hege's Wigwam department store. It was the largest Tee Pee ( Wigwam ) built. The building was torn down and replaced. Notice the real carved wooden Indian posts supporting the building canopy. I remember another carved Indian statue standing at the entrance of the store as well.
This is the largest replica of a stove in the world. It used to reside at the Fair Grounds on Woodward Ave. near 8 mile in Detroit, Michigan. It was in need of TLC when I left Detroit in 1981 and was purchased and moved by a private buyer. This very place was where the Martin Bus Line ended when going south and the Detroit Metro Bus service started heading south. The Martin Lines covered the cities of Hazel Park, Madison Heights, went west and covered Royal Oak. I recall it being a nickel to ride that line and a dime to ride the one going into Detroit. Of course, I'm dating myself and the prices slowly rose, but the last time I rode a Detroit bus, it was twenty-five cents and a nickel for the transfer. I wish I could have found some other pictures of "The Loop." This was a drive-in and those teenagers who had cars would cruise from this place up John R. going north to the McDonald's Drive through and back south to the Loop again, looking for friends and just hanging out. Hope you enjoyed my wee trip back in time.
13 comments:
I love those buildings in the shape of objects, there a couple of coffee-table photo books dedicated to the subject. There was a Wigwam hamburger joint (yep, a big cement cone decorated like the one in your photo)at Lake Erie that was a popular landmark in my youth.
Jeaux: I do as well. I hated when they city planners would decide to level an old land mark.
I played a small part at "Save Orchestra Hall" in Detroit when then, Mayor Colman Young wanted it leveled only to make a parking lot in its place. This building was considered one of the most perfect acoustical buildings in the Western hemisphere. Built by the masters of yesteryear. It had fallen on bad times and disinterest when the Ford family had the Ford Auditorium and Cobo Hall built.Their new buildings took away venues that would happen at Orchestra Hall. The Detroit City Orchestra was moved to the newly built Ford Auditorium. The Ford's spent millions to try and fix the acoustics in that building to no real success.
Many of us musicians performed concerts at Orchestra Hall to make money to repair the building and eventually bring it back to its former glory. It is humbling to stand and sing on the same stage where Enrico Caruso, and Jussi Boerling used to stand and sing and other great opera stars of the past.
The first concerts were funny since one could look out over the audience and see opened umbrellas. There was an hole in the roof and the pigeons would come in and roost in the rafters. Of course, those sitting underneath would be showered by bird droppings. ;-) That was fixed finally and the "people" won out over the mayor's objections. Money was put into this building and presently, it is back on top and the Detroit City Orchestra moved back to it much to the chagrin of the Ford Family.
Moral of the story: Many times it's the right thing to do fighting those with no sense of history and preserve those landmarks for those who see the beauty of it rather than the dollar signs of a successful parking lot.
I also love the shapes...and i bet the burger joint was a fun to see everyone
Wonder Man: Back in my teens, this is how one met up with their friends. The burgers were very good, and nothing like the fast food mega-chains of today. Everyone knew everyone and the person behind the counter knew the kids as well. Those were different times. It's not unlike the TV show "Happy Days" except not so ropey-sweet.
There were the drag races on Woodward Ave. and other landmark places where the kids could cruise and meet kids from other areas and schools. One can Google Woodward Ave. Drag Races and if will fill you in on a wee bit more.
Suddenly I want a burger! As a teen we also had a place where we could go and meet and get a burger, that was so exciting to us back then. Now there is a place on every corner but the food is awful! My home town is changing too much, I feel lonely when I go back.
Steve: I know what you mean. What a surprise it was to find out that one of those places is still in business. I wonder if the burgers taste like they did back when I was a teen. Today,the burger palaces can not hold a light up to those places of my past. I also, used to love the White Castle cheese-burgers, little tiny burgers cooked with onion chips. One would have to order four or five of them at a time. Also, Michigan has the Big Boy restaurants and MacDonald tried to copy the Big Boy with their Big Mac.
Butch do you remember Top Hat burgers? I think my brother told me that the last one has closed :o(
There was a Daly's drive-in a couple blocks from the Big Boy where I lived. They had distinctly different crowds, lol, pretty much along the same dividing lines that prevailed at school - as if there were much difference between the two (which seemed way more significant back then).
Jeaux: Unfortunately, I do not. There was a Big Boy on Woodward we used to frequent when I was a teen but, I do not remember the Top Hat.
There was the Totem Pole drive thru, which was an hot spot for cruising teens of my generation.
I remember when the MacDonald's sign used to say " 3 million burgers sold"
In Madison Heights, where I grew up as a teen, there was the Madison Drive In, I think it was called. ( part of the cruising strip in Madison Heights. ) It seems every city and town had their own cruising strip and then there was the big one on Woodward Ave. where the drag races took place. Before I-75 was attached, there was a strip from 11 mile rode for about 3/4ths of a mile that was straight and this was a drag strip area until the expressway was connected with the construction north of it. The decade of the muscle car.
Great images, Butch...and a nice inspired tour down memory lane. Having a burger joint to hang out with friend sounds like great fun.
Love the school of architecture that makes buildings out of other objects/shapes. So American, it seems.
Greg: Thanks. I agree with you regarding the architecture. It makes those areas of the country unique with these objects.
Butch, they say you can find anything on the Internet, but you can't find a picture of a Martin Bus Lines bus!
Remember those blue and red buses?
"Lamphere Matt"
Smoky Pond: I remember them well. I remember them being only a nickel for a ride on John R. street through Madison Heights and into Royal Oak. Their most southern run ended at the Fair Grounds near that huge stove. One could then transfer to the Detroit Woodward Bus to continue going south. If I'm correct, many of those Martin Line Buses had manual transmissions. ;-)
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