From the June 4, 1913 issue of the Evening Record:
WALKERVILLE’S FIRST APARTMENT HOUSE
Realizing the need of an apartment house in Walkerville, Mr. Charles Chilver of Walkerville, has erected one of the most modern and up-to-date structures of its kind in this vicinity. The building is a two-story brick, with basement and will furnish accommodation for 11 families, besides an apartment for a janitor and room for a doctor’s office. It is being erected at a cost of about $18,000, at the corner of Sandwich Street (Riverside) and Victoria Road (Chilver). The interior finish is of Georgia Pine on the Victoria Road side apartments and oak in the apartments on the Sandwich Street side. The apartments will contain five and six large rooms. The new building will be known as the Grier apartments.
I looked high and low though my files, but couldn’t come up with a decent photo of the place. Looks like the best one I have is this shot taken from a boat on the river a few years ago… Humm…
Here’s an aerial view.
The building was designed by Smith & Walker Architects. This is the only building that I have credited to them in my files. There is a listing for an E. S. Walker (later directories show an Irwin S. Walker, Architect so E.S. Walker may be a typo), as having designed the Lincoln Road United Church in 1915. I wonder if it was the same guy…
The 1923 Directory lists the following tenants in the Riverside Dr. building:
39-41 Sandwich St. Wallkerville – Grier Apartments:
39: Chilver, C.H.
Charles H. Chilver – President, Chilver Land Company (and the namesake of Chilver Road)
39a: Wollring, F.E.
Fred E. Wollring – Works, Ford Motor Company
41: Bunnell, Mortimer
Mortimer Bunnell – Foreman, Pere Marquette Railway
41a: Beers, P.M.
Philip M. Beers – Assistant Purchasing Agent, Fisher Body Company
43: McGregor, D.M.
David M. McGregor – No occupation listed.
43a: Kerr, E.R.
Edward R. Kerr – Vice President, Kerr Engine Works (Kerr Engine Works was discussed briefly in this post)
At one time the building was pretty swanky. It’s still in great shape on the inside. Regular reader and poster “ME” spent several years living in the Grier.
I thought the Fisher Body Company was only in Detroit. Where was the Fisher Body Company in Windsor located?
David, I believe it was where the old Studebaker plant was. I think that building was originally built for Fisher Body…
David – Windsor’s Fisher Body was at Edna & St. Luke, where the giant vacant lot is today http://tinyurl.com/dhk79m It burned to the ground in the 1970’s or so…
A photo of the plant can be seen here:
http://www.windsorpubliclibrary.com/digi/sar/images/part1/fisher.jpg
The Fisher Body Building was in the fields between Walker and St. Luke. It actually survived until the late 1980s when a young arsonist brought it tumbling down in a ball of spectacular flames. At the time the building was housing very expensive antique cars and boats; all gone. During the fire a gas main actually blew and a huge flame shot straight into the night sky for hours. The noise it made was deadening. That property is now owned by Ashok Sood. Same guy who razed the Seagrave Building and who is presently storing junk on his properties.
I like this building. I think this is where the Purple Gang hung out during prohibition…not sure… Somehow I always imagined a couple of toughs in trench coats hanging out on the stoop with tommy guns…back in the day…
This building is in extremely good condition and should be on the heritage list if it isn’t already. The interior is pretty much original until the fire department made them remove the interior oak front doors to the apartments for fire resistant ones (they even have the original brass door handles and bells).
39 Sandwich is supposedly where Mr. Chilver passed away and hearing what sounded like paper crumpling and forks dropping on plates in the evenings he still might be around.
Big kudo’s to the owners, The Schincariol’s for keeping this gem in great running order.
Forgot to add. I amsure I have interior shots of the apartments. If I do I will send them to Andrew so that he may post them if he wishes to do so.
I drive by that building regularly and have always appreciated its interesting brickwork, but wondered about that top part along the roof line which looks like it was slapped on much later. The trim in the drawing adds much more grandeur to the building.
Would love to see what the interior looks like.
Yea Andrew lets see the interior !!! Pleeease !!!
Okay, story time with Brendan. David, I would have elaborated this morning but I was running late for work. A guy who I used to work with told me about the time he found a cornerstone at the old Studebaker plant that my company took over in the 1980s. He was cleaning up the garbage in the yard in front of the plant and as he cleared away some brush and he saw the name “Fisher Body” carved into this large stone.
When the plant burned down in 87 one of the only things that remained intact was this massive cornerstone and the owner of my company at the time, Bill Allen wanted that stone because he collected old cars and was a fan of GM built cars. So a few guys got a couple of forklifts together and drove across Wyandotte with the intention of retrieving that stone. It turned out to be too heavy even for a large forklift to manage so the stone was simply buried where it sat.
True story.
Is there any old building in Windsor and Detroit that doesn’t have rumour of the Purple Gang? 🙂
When the Peabody Bridge was around, the view from it looked in the the 2nd floor, quite close too — was a very big city moment, in a sort of NYC El kind of way (Elevated Subway).
Wow that was one hell of a cornerstone. Even a modest lift truck can handle 3500 lbs or so. Too bad it got buried. I’m sure you’ve given a few of us some ideas. 😉
Haha, wouldnt that be something? The vacant property was used for a while as a parking lot for all of the unsold Chrysler Pacificas, there were hundreds of them, and a private security force was standing guard, complete with watch dogs patrolling near the fences and razor wire. I walked by every morning on my way to work and eventually the dogs got to know me so well that they would wag their tails and run to the fence when they’d see me coming up Edna : ) Some big mean guard dogs they were : )
And they just dont make cornerstones like that anymore, John