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The Club: 1916

Circa 1916. "Detroit Athletic Club from the Plaza Hotel." Evidently something of a motorcar magnet. 8x10 glass negative, Detroit Publishing Co. View full size.

Circa 1916. "Detroit Athletic Club from the Plaza Hotel." Evidently something of a motorcar magnet. 8x10 glass negative, Detroit Publishing Co. View full size.

 

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Not a hydrant

FWIW, I think that the concrete slab behind the two people is a manhole cover for access to the street storm drain. Similar manhole covers can be found at two of the three other corners of the intersection. The Detroit Athletic Club is the most prominent building when looking out over the left field wall at Comerica Park where the Detroit Tigers play. Thanks to archfan for the link to "Detroit Is My Home Town". I delivered the Detroit Free Press in the late 1960's but never knew the history behind Iffy the Dopester.

It's a storm drain

@Zoreo, I disagree. I think that "behind the couple just stepping off the curve" is a storm sewer catchbasin. Note the square cement panel is similar to one directly across the street without a hydrant. Also visible is the sewer inlet drain in the gutter.

DAC magazine

Contributors to the DAC monthly magazine in days of yore included Robert Benchley and James Thurber. I miss my days as a DAC member - great work-out facilities and superb cuisine in the dining areas. Also, not only does membership include parking for Lions and Tigers games, but you get a fairly decent view of Comerica Park from the upper floors of the parking garage.

Still fit as a fiddle!

In fine shape after all these years:


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Never too many Hydrants!

If you are a dog or an insurance underwriter!

Seriously, many intersections in high-value areas had a hydrant on each corner. The "stubby" hydrant looks to me like a high-pressure hydrant, part of a separate system that supplied high-pressure water capable of supplying a heavy stream as high as 15-20 stories without a pumper.

Detroit Automobile Club

The early auto pioneers made their deals in the bar in the Pontchartrain Hotel, where the tables in the "barroom were occupied with men so intent on studying blueprints spread out before them that they paid little heed to the drinks at their elbows."

As they prospered, they decided to "organize a club to get them out of the saloons of Woodward Avenue." They took over the sleepy Detroit Athletic Club (founded in 1887), built the building shown in 1915, and invited in anyone important to the auto industry. There were so many that the publisher of it's club magazine made $50K a year in the 1920's, all from advertising revenue.

There are many stories of the club's founding in the first chapter of Malcolm Bingay's book Detroit Is My Own Hometown.

Five fire hydrants?

Actually, Jimmy, I think there are five fire hydrants- I think there is one behind the couple just stepping off the curve at the top corner and the corner on the right has two. What were they expecting?

Change

Nobody locks their car.

No hydrant standardization

When were hose connections on hydrants standardized as a result of a major Baltimore fire? Fire departments from outside Baltimore discovered that they couldn't connect their hoses to city hydrants. That could explain why there were multiple hydrants so close together in the Detroit picture.

It is Motown.

One benefit of DAC membership is secure free parking, including parking for Lions and Tigers games.

Where's the fire?

Four hydrants at one intersection.

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