:: As always, there are a smattering of haunted houses/trails/apple orchards/still-empty Service Merchandise stores/whathaveyous around the region, most of which close up shop as Wednesday night. The Central Corridor Jaycees, however, would like everyone to know that their “Thirteenth Floor…
Tag: briefs
Oh, You Never Knew It! – April 2
The City Border Bike and Walking Trail is actually the paved-over remnants of a moat that briefly surrounded the southern half of the city in the early 1940s, connecting to the East Patterson River. During the debate over whether to…
Oh, You Never Knew It! – Jan. 17
:: In 1918, an accident at the Jackson Independent Pharmaceutical Company caused a tank to burst, releasing 1.7 million gallons of the company’s patented Menth-O-Lux mentholated topical creme (a similar but different-enough-so-as-to-avoid-legal-action competitor to Vicks VapoRub) down Pikers Hill, in…
Oh, You Never Knew It! – Jan. 10
:: Most people naturally assume that the city’s first public vending machines were the chicken leg contraptions installed along Soldier Boulevard by the Vendmate Company in 1925. Not so! Predating even those beloved tin hulks were the Vend-O salt dispensers…
Briefs
Oh, You Never Knew It! Wimple and Bing, the City’s fifth-most-famous intersection, was almost known as Wimple and Porkpie! In 1903, due to inattentive aldermen, street-naming honors had devolved to the rascals of the Bottling District. A Mr. Elliott Lamb…
More Christmastime in the City
:: Friday night saw the lighting of the annual Energonistics (formerly Municipal Gas Works) “Eternaflame” menorah, a ten-foot tall structure which consists of a stainless steel set of nine candles, each topped with what will be a constantly burning gas…
Briefs: Fordlandia, Letters
:: Henry Ford built a city in the Brazilian jungle. Fenced in by jungle, Fordlandia was transformed into a modern suburb with rows of snug bungalows fed by power lines running to a diesel generator. The main street was paved…
Briefs: Election Day!
:: Some of the odder places where people will be casting their votes around the city today- Hanson’s Barber Shop, Warnum Avenue…Barkay Bros. Funeral Home, East Folkim Street… The back room of Genardi’s Pizza, Halpern Street… The garage of Mr.…
Briefs- Views, Novotny, Ex-Lax
:: Best views in town… the top of the World War One Memorial tower in Baxter Park… the WKVD-AM hot air balloon at the zoo… the West Side Highway… from U-City park across the river into the Downtown… 22nd floor…