September 2025 site update

Oct. 18, 2025

Here is your recap of site updates from September.

We did a lengthy history on the Alger Theatre, once among more than 100 neighborhood movie houses across Detroit in the 1940s. Today, it is one of only a handful of survivors, albeit a closed one that has been a “renovation work in progress” for nearly 40 years. We also added pages on the NSO Bell Building, a longtime landmark on Oakman Boulevard overlooking the Lodge Freeway, as well as the Simmons & Clark Building, home to a jewelry business celebrating its 100th anniversary.

We also added 193 photos, including 32 inside and out of the Alger (pictured above). In August, we added the Palms Apartments, and last month, we added 21 images of this Albert Kahn-designed building. We also continued to chronicle the demolition of the Mammoth Building, formerly the Federal Department Store at Greenfield and Grand River.

August 2025 site update

Sep. 3, 2025

Here is your monthly update for what we accomplished in August.

We added two full histories, as well as six "briefs" or "shorts" that we hope to expand upon later. The most exhaustive write-up dives into the history of Little Harry's, a beloved Detroit restaurant that was housed inside the Alexander Chene House, one of the oldest surviving houses in Detroit. Despite an outcry from the community, singer Anita Baker demolished it in 1991 to make way for an IHOP restaurant. We also told the story of the Chateau Frontenac, a glorious 1925 apartment building on the east riverfront overlooking Water Works Park that was flattened in 1999. The site has remained vacant land ever since.

The shorts added were the Mammoth Department Store, which is being demolished as we speak; the Albert Kahn-designed Griswold Building (today known as The Albert); the former Harper Hospital Nurses Home, designed by Kahn; the Kahn-designed Kahn Garage (built for The Detroit News); the stately Kahn-designed MSU Detroit Center; and the Bernard Ginsburg House in Brush Park, which was designed by, you guessed it, Kahn.

There were 417 photos added to the site in August, with 388 of them taken by HD’s own Helmut Ziewers. In addition to images of the new locations added to the site, Helmut added 162 images of the Detroit Opera House, pictured above, including some behind-the-scenes shots of areas many have never seen. He also continued to document the restoration efforts under way by The Roxbury Group on the Bonstelle Theatre and Lee Plaza, offering you an inside look and sneak peek at the work going on to bring these jewels back to life. He also continued to document the demolition of the Mammoth Building (aka Federal Department Store).

There are now more than 15,000 images on the website; just shy of 9,000 of them are by Helmut. Among the most photogenic buildings on the site are the Masonic Temple with 648 images; Michigan Central Station with 541; the Packard Plant, 370; Guardian Building, 259; the Detroit Opera House, 244; the Bonstelle Theatre, 241; Sacred Heart Seminary, 203; Lee Plaza, 171; Fisher Building, 161; and main branch of the Detroit Public Library, 146.

Thank you, as always, for helping to keep HistoricDetroit.org up and running.

July 2025 site update

Aug. 10, 2025

Here is your monthly update for what we accomplished in July.

We added four locations to the site. Getting exhaustive histories were the legendary Flame Show Bar, which hosted everyone from Billie Holiday to Sam Cooke to Jackie Wilson - and was where a young Berry Gordy caught the music industry bug; the Clay School, the oldest surviving school in the city; and the Earle Hotel, a long-forgotten hotel in Midtown that was one of the few hotels designed by Albert Kahn. We also added a fairly lengthy write-up on the Clara Ford Pavilion, part of Henry Ford Hospital campus that was once where generations of Detroit women lived and studied to become nurses.

There were 287 photos added to the site in July, with 232 of them taken by HD’s own Helmut Ziewers. In addition to images of the new locations added to the site, we added more photos from Helmut’s behind-the-scenes access at the Guardian Building, dozens of photos of Redeemer Presbyterian Church (formerly St. Leo's Catholic Church), 27 shots of the inside of the historic and often-overlooked Senate Theatre in Southwest Detroit (pictured above), the Leland Hotel, the endangered Herman Kiefer Hospital and more.

We also continued to devote a lot of our time to setting up our nonprofit to ensure the site continues after I’m gone. As we told you last month, it also will help Detroit youth with scholarships. We received our nonprofit status from the IRS and EIN from the State of Michigan, and are now working on setting up its bank account, electing board members, etc. We should have more on that news for you in next month’s update.

Thank you, as always, to our Patreon patrons for helping to keep HistoricDetroit.org up and running, and I hope I can continue to count on you for support - especially after my passing, whenever that may be. Get your cancer screenings. If I had only done it at age 40 instead of 44 …

-d.a.

June 2025 site update

Jul. 9, 2025

June saw us add five locations to the site. The most interesting and in-depth of these was the Arena Gardens, a forgotten Albert Kahn-design that helped make rollerskating a nationwide fad and tried to make hockey a thing in the Motor City in the era before the Red Wings came to town. Another sizable entry was The Hamilton, a historic apartment building in Detroit’s Midtown that underwent an impressive makeover a few years ago. Other new arrivals were the Spanish-American War Memorial on Belle Isle, the Historic Motor City Missionary Baptist Church and the Clinton Street Greater Bethlehem Temple.

We made a major update to the Cambria Hotel page, going in depth on the history of WWJ-AM - the world’s first commercial radio station. This one was so sizable, it really ought to count as a new entry, but the building has had a page on the site for a while. We also made updates to the Children’s Hospital and St. Agnes Catholic Church pages, the latter because of a fire on June 3.

There were 283 photos added to the site in June, with 209 of them taken by our own Helmut Ziewers. These included more than 70 new images of the Masonic Temple (above), making HistoricDetroit.org the home of the most in-depth photo documentation of this incredible landmark. He also shot interior photos to accompany last month’s site addition of the Moross House, believed to be the oldest brick home in the city.

We also continued to share stories on our free Substack, including dusting off older stories that might get buried among all the new content on the site. Our favorite is the story of the Aquarama, a cruise ship that had an appetite for destroying docks and seawalls - and almost took out people, too. You can read those at historicdetroit.substack.com.

We’ve already added hefty additions in July, which our Patreon patrons have already gotten in their inboxes.

We also spent a lot of time getting our nonprofit set up to keep the site alive after the cancer takes me out. It also will help Detroit youth with scholarships. We will give you a full rundown once Uncle Sam signs off on our nonprofit status. It also will mean your donations will become tax-deductible. Stay tuned for that.

Another huge thank you to our Patreon patrons for making all of this possible. We cannot thank you enough!

May 2025 site update

Jun. 8, 2025

May was an incredibly productive month at HDHQ. We added seven buildings, one monument and three passenger steamers.

Getting new pages were the legendary United Sound Systems recording studio, the iconic Baker's Keyboard Lounge, the Parker-Webb Building, the Wisner Confectionary Building, and Koenig Coal & Supply on Gratiot. We did exhaustive histories on the Town Residences, which took 25 years to complete, and the Moross House - believed to be the oldest brick home in the city.

Our fleet of maritime histories were joined by the City of Alpena II, the City of Mackinac II and the City of the Straits, which launched as the first City of Detroit. We also added the Wish Tree, which was dedicated by Yoko Ono 25 years ago, and dove into the history of a park that once stood there.

We also updated a number of pages with, well, updates: The Lee Plaza renovation is finally, truly under way, and we were there to cover the ground-breaking with The Roxbury Group and Mayor Duggan; the deadline for The Parade Co.’s plan to turn the Brodhead Armory into its new headquarters is nearing; the Packard Plant is mostly demolished now; the Hilberry Theatre got a new name; and the Book-Cadillac Hotel got a new owner.

On top of that, we made an embarrassing discovery: Hundreds of our vintage Detroit postcards somehow lost their tags, meaning you weren’t able to see them. We went through all 3,000-plus postcards and made sure they were tagged - a painstakingly mind-numbing and time-consuming process, but they weren’t doing anyone any good if you couldn’t find them! While we were at it, we uploaded (and ensured they were tagged) another 291 postcard images.

Helmut did what Helmut does best: Took hundreds of incredible images of our city’s historic architecture. There were 341 contemporary images added to the site in May, including 56 of the Greater Penobscot Building (one that has been criminally under-photo-documented on the site for too long); 68 of the Guardian Building, including areas the public doesn’t get to see; and 33 new sneak peek shots of the Bonstelle Theatre restoration. We also added 52 historic images to the site.

As of June 8, 2025, there are now 14,512 photos on HistoricDetroit.org.

And our Patreon patrons helped make all of this possible. We cannot thank them enough!

April 2025 site update

May. 12, 2025

April brought some really, really bad news in my ongoing cancer battle. Between meeting with doctors and telling family and friends the news, I didn’t have as much time as I would have liked to work on the site. That said, we still added four buildings to the site - one of which represents more than six months of work and is far and away the longest and most in-depth history we’ve ever added to the site. And, of course, Helmut was shooting photos left and right, as always.

This behemoth building bio is the story of the Detroit Journal, a long-gone daily newspaper that was bought out by The Detroit News. We trace the paper from its founding to its sale, including a series of disasters - one of which remains the deadliest in the city’s 324-year history. We also added the former home of First Congregational Church, Greenfield Park Elementary School and another lengthy write-up on the McGraw Hotel, one of the legendary Green Book sites that served African Americans when discrimination kept them from most other hotels in the city. Our next major building update will be the history of WWJ, the first commercial broadcasting radio station in the world, and its former home that is now the Cambria Hotel. As always, we’ll send it to our Patreon patrons' inbox first.

Photography-wise, Helmut added 290 new photos to the site in April. These include a comprehensive photo documentation of the “Detroit Industry” murals at the Detroit Institute of Arts; interior and detail shots of The Shepherd, a repurposed Catholic church on the east side into an artist community; new shots of the Guardian Building and One Woodward Avenue; and more.

Historic photos added include construction shots of the Detroit Yacht Club, Our Lady of Sorrows Catholic Church, and the Detroit Journal and old First Congregational Church. We also plan to upload more historic Belle Isle photos from Vance Patrick. They’re scanned; we just need to find time to upload and caption them.

Thank you for being there and being patient, and thank you to our Patreon patrons for keeping HistoricDetroit.org a free resource for all!

March 2025 site update

Apr. 5, 2025

March saw us add six new locations to the site: the Civic and Senate theaters, Edwin Denby High School, The Shepherd (a former Catholic church that has been turned into an art community), Detroit Unity Temple and Temple Israel.

Over on our Substack, which your contributions also make free for everyone to read, we spent March chronicling the lives of five incredible, trailblazing Detroit women for Women’s History Month. The stories of these pioneers wouldn’t have a good fit on the building-centric confines of HistoricDetroit.org, but they’re right at home on Substack. We dove into the lives of Mary V. Beck, Detroit’s first councilwoman; Erma Henderson, Detroit’s first Black councilwoman; Mary Chase Perry Stratton, co-founder of Pewabic Pottery; Ruth Ellis, an icon of Black, women’s and LGBTQ+ rights; and Johnnie Mae Matthews, believed to be the first Black woman to own her own record label and the person who discovered The Temptations and tutored Berry Gordy on the ins and outs of the record industry. Check them out at historicdetroit.substack.com.

Last month saw Helmut take a much-deserved vacation to his native Germany, but he still added nearly 100 images to the site. This includes historical and current images of the new sites we added, but also updated shots of the progress inside the Bonstelle Theatre restoration (pictured above). He also got inside the Civic Theatre, which has been subject of a lot of ink lately as the City cracked down on land speculator Dennis Kefallinos. Meanwhile, our friend Vance Patrick lent us ANOTHER batch of old Belle Isle photos that we got scanned and will be uploading in the next few weeks.

On a personal note, several folks have written inquiring about my battle with stage 4 cancer. Though I am not out of the woods yet, I have completed chemo and radiation and am awaiting new scans to determine my odds and next steps. I appreciate your continued support, both in this battle and of the site, during some truly challenging times.

Thank you to our Patreon patrons and Substack subscribers for helping to keep HistoricDetroit.org a free resource for all!

Honoring Women's History Month

Mar. 23, 2025

Over on our Substack page, we're celebrating a few of the legendary Detroit women who have left their marks on our city. It's the sort of content that doesn't have a home on HistoricDetroit.org, the site, but history that is very much worth telling.

So far, we've shared the stories of Ruth Ellis (pictured above), a pioneer in Black, women's and LGBTQ+ rights; Mary Beck, Detroit's first female City Councilmember and council president; and Mary Chase Perry Stratton, the co-founder of Pewabic Pottery. We also have two more we've got for you before Women's History Month comes to an end.

Best of all, our Substack is free to all - though donations via subscriptions are welcome. Sign up at HistoricDetroit.Substack.com.

February 2025 site update

Mar. 9, 2025

February might be a short month, but it saw a slew of updates on the site. Despite a brief hospitalization, we still added FOUR lengthy histories of Detroit buildings to the site:

The mighty manufacturing juggernaut that was the Burroughs Adding Machine Co. (the surviving pieces of which are now known as One Ford Place in New Center), the Detroit Light Infantry Armory (the only building in the Motor City designed by renowned architectural master H.H. Richardson), the Princess Theatre (slogan: “nothing nicer anywhere”), and the COGIC Brooks Cathedral Center, which was originally St. Mark’s Methodist Episcopal Church. This represents the largest output of complete histories we’ve added to the site in one month in some time.

And we have more to come, including one we’re working on now that involves one of the deadliest disasters in Detroit history. Stay tuned.

February also saw Helmut shooting his heart out, as always, with him adding 444 images. Including historic images, we added 639 photos to the site last month. This includes an incredible photo tour of inside the Sacred Heart Seminary in Detroit, a place that not many get to see (pictured above). We highly recommend you check it out!

Lastly, you may have seen the article that Outlier Media wrote about me and my battle with stage 4 cancer. I want to let you know that I sung my appreciation for our Patreon patrons and their support, but it didn’t make the cut.

So, I’ll sing it again here: Thank you for your continued support! Especially in mentally, financially and health-challenging times, it is so incredibly appreciated!

The forgotten manufacturing might behind this Detroit building

Feb. 17, 2025

Up in New Center, just south of the Fisher Building, sits One Ford Place. Today, it is home to Henry Ford Health's administration, labs and more, but its history involves one of Detroit's forgotten titans of industry, the Burroughs Adding Machine Co.

We've added a full, in-depth history of this company, a powerhouse that once sold about 90 percent of the world’s calculating machines. Its story also includes a Beatnik author, one of the craziest corporate relocation plans ever (more on this in a future post), the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima, an attempt to dethrone IBM as king of computers, and the formation of a company many still know today, Unisys.

If you haven't checked out our new Substack, we're telling more stories about Detroit and highlighting some of the quirky, fascinating and forgotten tales that might not quite fit on HistoricDetroit.org. Check out this unlikely bit about what the iconic Grande Ballroom has in common with a downtown sports bar, or the unsolved mob hit that stunned 1930s Detroit. We're also revisiting gems that might get lost in all the stories on the website, such as the building that made Detroiters 'seasick.'

If you'd like to help support our work here at HistoricDetroit.org, we have a Patreon, where you can get some nifty donation incentives for your generosity! Members get early access to new material, as well. Thank you!