Attention conservation notice: An unfinished look into the history of a retail building in Ann Arbor. There are no citations or links, though I make free use of Google books and the Ann Arbor District Library/UM “Making of Ann Arbor” website.

Short story: old building has always housed some sort of retail establishment.

Most recently the home of Arcadian Too Antiques, soon to be home of Ann Arbor coworking.

Being on Main street (a half block south of Huron) means the lot where the building stands has been platted from the beginning, and has been pretty much in continual use.

From the mid-1800’s to about 1900 the address was 18 South Main. This caused me some confusion because there also was a 118 S. Main which was a residence.

The earliest picture I found of the area is from ca. 1860. Our building is not entirely in the picture, as it is a picture of the “American Block” which (as you will see) later became the “Bank Block”.

Here, I’ve noted what I believe is the location of 18 S Main:

Notice that there’s a row of leather goods shops. I think that the theme continues along the street, and the noted building is also a boot and shoe shop.

Sometime between 1860 and about 1867 the American Block was torn down and the handsome building you see today was erected. When they replaced the American Block they stopped at what is now the north side of the building lobby.

Here’s a ca. 1867 picture of the site:

Let’s zoom in on the little building to the right:

Aha! A name with which to search. Jacob Vandawarker was a shoemaker, who arrived in Ann Arbor in 1834 and did very well for himself and his family. I believe the sign says “E Vandawarker” which would likely be his son Edwin, continuing on with the family business. There is also a Frank Vandawarker, but Frank went to medical school and didn’t get involved in the family business until his father’s death in 1881.

Also, the Michigan State Gazetteer and Business Directory for 1867 says “Vandewalker, Ed., boot and shoe maker, Main.”

At some point between 1867 and 1872, E. Vandawarker’s shop moved to 6½ Huron.

From about 1870 to about 1892, there were a series of small businesses housed in the space, which also had living space in it. About 1872, it was the home of “Ann Arbor Trading Association” doing business as “The Farmers’ Store”. In the late 1870s “Jonathan Sprague, tailor” was listed at 18 S. Main. The 1892 Glen V. Mills Directory of the City of Ann Arbor says that “Allmendinger Band, Henry Otto, leader” occupied the location. I haven’t been able to find anything out about the band yet.

At some point between 1892 and 1910 EF Mills, which provided “ladies’ furnishings” moved from 20 S Main to 118 S Main.

Past and Present of Washtenaw County, Michigan (1906) says that Goodyear was at 118 S Main in 1888, and bought out Mills in 1902 (and then moved to 120 S Main). But the 1910 directory gives Mills at 118. I don’t really trust the information in this book, because I have yet to see Goodyear’s location in 1888 (unless Goodyear gave over some space to Otto’s “Allmendinger Band” in 1892).

And that’s as far as I got. More research is likely to benefit only me; it’s pretty clear that the space has long housed retail establishments — starting with boots and shoes, moving to tailoring, general merchandise, ladies’ merchandise, antiques… and also briefly hosted a band office. It is not officially part of the Goodyear building (Bank Block), but over the century and a quarter(?) of its existence has become intertwined with it.

From Buchanan’s Journal of Man, December 1877.

The pugilist Sullivan is the hero of Boston; he received a splendid ovation in the Boston Theatre, with the mayor and other dignitaries to honor him, and a belt covered with gold and diamonds, worth $8,000, was presented, besides a large cash benefit. His departure for England was honored like that of a prince by accompanying boats, booming cannon, and tooting whistles, and he is said to swing a $2000 cane presented by his admirers. How far have we risen in eighteen centuries above the barbarism of Rome? There is no heathen country to-day that worships pugilism. Perhaps when the saloon is abolished, we may take another step forward in civilization. London has rivalled Boston, giving Sullivan a popular reception by crowds which blocked up the principal streets.

From: Buchanan’s Journal of Man, December 1877.

From Buchanan’s Journal of Man, July 1887.

Lord Kelvin, in the year 1881, briefly, but very significantly, classified the sources of power available to man under the five primary headings of tides, food, fuel, wind, and rain. Food is the generator of animal energy, fuel that of the power obtained from steam and other mechanical expansive engines; rain, as it falls on the hill-tops and descends in long lines of natural force to the sea coasts, furnishes power to the water-wheel; while wind may be utilised to generate mechanical energy through the agency of windmills and other contrivances. The tides as a source of useful power have hardly yet begun to make their influence felt, and indeed the possibility of largely using them is still a matter of doubt. The relative advantages of reclaiming a given area of soil for purposes of cultivation, and of converting the same land into a tidal basin in order to generate power through the inward and outward flow of the sea-water, were contrasted by Lord Kelvin in the statement of a problem as follows: Which is the more valuable–an agricultural area of forty acres or an available source of energy equal to one hundred horse-power? The data for the solution of such a question are obviously not at hand, unless the quality of the land, its relative nearness to the position at which power might be required, and several other factors in its economic application have been supplied. Still, the fact remains that very large quantities of the coastal land and a considerable quantity of expensive work would be needed for the generation, by means of the tides, of any really material quantity of power.

It is strange that, while so much has been written and spoken about the possibility of turning the energy of the tides to account for power in the service of man, comparatively little attention has been paid to the problem of similarly utilising the wave-power, which goes to waste in such inconceivably huge quantities. Where the tidal force elevates and depresses the sea-water on a shore, through a vertical distance of say eight feet, about once in twelve hours, the waves of the ocean will perform the same work during moderate weather once in every twelve or fifteen seconds. It is true that the moon in its attraction of the sea-water produces a vastly greater sum total of effect than the wind does in raising the surface-waves, but reckoning only that part of the ocean energy which might conceivably be made available for service it is safe to calculate that the waves offer between two and three thousand times as much opportunity for the capture of natural power and its application to useful work as the tides could ever present. In no other form is the energy of the wind brought forward in so small a compass or in so concrete a form.

From: Twentieth Century Inventions. A Forecast., by George Sutherland, 1901.