A view from 1920 of the busy corner of Sandwich and Ouellette.
The building on the south east corner of Riverside and Ouellette was a branch of the Bank of Commerce. It was designed by Detroit architect Albert Kahn, who also designed the Bank of Commerce in Walkerville which is still standing.
Another view of the bank from the Virtual Motor City collection at Wayne State. This building was replaced by the CIBC Building currently on the corner in 1973. The building above was demolished in the spring of 1972.
I can’t help but notice just how many people are milling about the streets in these photos! Windsor appeared to be quite the bustling metropolis back then…
It sure was Chris. If you were to superimpose Windsor’s downtown of the past with todays you will see the downtown was much larger years ago.
I always thought it was odd that a nice buiding like that was replaced by such a brown turd of a building. Why are so many buildings downtown either grey or brown? Heck, even our signs downtown (Casino’s) are brown and the “heart of the city” ones; you know the grey coloured sign that looks like a broken heart (who are these marketers and are they really that clueless?).
Where is the style, where is the colour? Downtown is just bland, bland, bland.
I think most of those people are waiting for a streetcar! 🙂
And look how everyone in these photos are wearing suits ! instead of wearing pants that sag down past the ass. amazing times they must have been. if i could snap my finger and live in those times instead i would !
People don’t seem to realize that the reason the downtown is bustling in the photos is because behind the photographer is the Detroit River. And the ferry docks. And to the left of the photographer is a massive rail yard. There is no pretty park in sight, but lots of dirt and lots of smoke from the ships and the trains. Large quantities of supplies came by ship, too. And what do you do when you are waiting for boat? Walk around, do some banking, eat, shop. Stores and restaurants flourished because there was a lot of traffic.
It is important to understand the interdependence of Windsor and Detroit at this time (which continues even today). People were going back and forth all the time simply because many families had a presence on both sides of the border. Ford and Hiram Walker were just two examples of Americans setting up businesses here. And there was no way to get across except by boat. People *had* to come downtown. It was not art, or independent retailers that kept downtown going.
This is also why downtown would eventually fail. When the tunnel and the bridge were built people slowly stopped coming downtown. They did not have to stop and wait for a boat — they stayed in their car and drove across without delay. The bridge, being situated so far away from downtown diverted traffic away.
It would take about 15 years (about 1942, was it?) after the bridge and tunnel for the ferries to stop moving people and cars across (correct me if I am wrong). It would take less time than that for the streetcars to disappear (1939?). Once the rail tunnel opened there was no need to ferry rail cars across and the downtown yard would go away, too.
For the record the Rail Tunnel opened in 1910.
The rail tunnel served the Michigan Central/New York Central, but the yards and rail barges ‘next to the photographer’ were owned and operated by the Great Western Railway, and the Wabash Railway. Later on this became CN, and the Norfolk & Western respectively. Further west was the Canadian Pacific’s rail barges.
Anyway these rail barges operated LONG after the tunnel opened up, it wasn’t until well into the 1980s when CN and CP acquired the CASO (Canada Southern), including the tunnel that these operations started to be phased out. In fact CP was still running their rail barge service as recently as 1994, as the tunnel was too small to accommodate modern multilevel rail cars. This of course changed when the tunnel bore was enlarged in the 1990s.
What a beautiful building. I didn’t know about this one. Thanks Andrew.
Thank you for the clarification on the rail tunnel. I did not know that one existed that long ago.
I have an old postcard with a street scene of Ouellette Ave. that was mailed by a young student to Cleaveland, Ohio in Feb. 1910. He was taking classes in Detroit and had made a day trip to Windsor on the Ferry. On a lark, I pulled up Google Earth and typed in the address on the card. As luck would have it, street view was available and I found myself looking at a 19th Century School. I assume that the adressee was one of his old teachers.
What struck me about this (and the point of this story) is that, whereas the old school and nearby buildings would have been completely familiar to that young man if he were still alive to-day, it is more than probable that every Windsor building that came into his view on that day 100 years ago is now gone.
It would seem that the apathy of succeeding generations of Windsor citizens towards our heritage and the utter contempt for it by our “movers and shakers” over time, have done a thorough job of removing most of it.
Speaking of Albert Kahn, I was reading in the DFP that the old Detroit Free Press Buidling in Detroit which has been vacant for a while now is going to be movie studio operated under Motor City Film Works. http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090224/BIZ/902240365 At least, that Albert Khan classic will be saved.
David, and imagine that they are spending money on the arts! Wow, if Detroit is looking to diversify why isn’t Windsor? Sure, $35,000 goes to the arts but it isn’t a free ride is it? Thanks counc. Gignac for your brilliant insight.