The Nankin Township Historical Society

Plymouth Mail , October 25, 1946 HALLOWE'EN Masquerade DANCE Masonic Temple Sat. Oct. 26 9:00 to 1:00 Sponsored by Plymouth Jaycee Auxiliary PRIZES FOR COSTUMES Mike Kleinschmidt's Orchestra ADMISSION, $1.50 COUPLE

Plymouth Mail , November 3, 1899 If Schrader was the ambulatory mode of transport for the sick in the middle 20th century then the horse-driven hearse was the chariot that took one to the Great Beyond. This advert for Lewis & Lewis Funeral Directors of Plymouth almost makes one wish to time travel back for death. Their offices were above A. A. Tafft's Store in Plymouth.

There'll be some jumping around here because that's what I do. This photo of Earl Trinkhaus by photographer Edwin P. Baker of Plymouth is currently available on eBay for $150. It's a great photo but...a little too rich for my tastes. I could only find incidental mentions of Trinkhaus in the newspapers but am told that he was a carpenter who lived in Northville and is buried at Riverside Cemetery. Baker was a longtime photographer in the village having worked there most of his 60 years in the profession. He died at the residence of his granddaughter Mrs. C. H. Rauch in P lymouth. He was married to Marie Marshall in 1853 and they had two children. All three preceded him in death. He is buried in Riverside Cemetery. The Plymouth Mail , November 19, 1915 As is Ephraim Partridge, who I assume had a much more eventful life than having been the father-in-law of Laura Ruppert Partridge , the schoolteacher who went insane and drowned herself in the lake at Eloise. Mr. Partridge...

Detroit Free Press , August 26, 1892 Although the temptation is great since the pickings are abundant I'm not going to stay too long on this Romulus search which I have already found 3 great items from. Or perhaps I should. Raising hickory poles was still in fashion in 1892 as is evidenced with this article concerning Romulus Democrats erecting a 95 foot specimen for Grover Cleveland and Adlai Ewing Stevenson (no, not that one) at the behest of John Sherlock. Despite the announced speakers not showing up there was a baseball game to amuse the gathering. The team from Romulus lost to the visiting Plymouth Club. The batteries for each were: Plymouth (Penny & Wilbur) Romulus (Rutter & Perkins).

I also picked up a 1930 Building Code Ordinance booklet from the Village of Plymouth at the estate sale this morning. It's fairly straightforward with no photographs and only a few small charts and illustrations. A bit worn and creased but still well-worth the dollar paid. I shall scan and post the booklet in its entirety some year soon.

I know nothing about the Eckles Oil Division of the Consumers Petroleum Co. of Plymouth but they had a "peace of mind" wise owl fuel budget plan and this was a brochure to procure said service. Since there is a 5 digit zip code it's not older than the early 1960s. Here's the flat scan of the foldout. No clue where I picked this up at but I would assume it was in Plymouth in some desk drawer or in a book.

Detroit Free Press , September 23, 1953 I've detailed dozens of accidents concerning cars and trains in the vicinity of Eloise and since Nankin was the center it only makes sense that pattern wasn't confined to the hospital. Blanchford Patterson and his son Samuel were hit and dragged 100 feet by a train at the Hix Road crossing. They were treated and released from WCGH with minor injuries. The trained was engineered by Harry Huebner of Plymouth.

TORNADO SAFETY! The paper and print screams the 1960s or '70s but the information provided makes me believe that it might the 1980s or later. I guess a better determining factor would be to figure out when SKYWARN and REACT began but I have limited time this afternoon. I found this on the side of an old filing cabinet at the Farmington sale this morning and I just couldn't let it be tossed into the trash as it surely would have been.

The Detroit Times , December 28, 1928 An article like this detailing the robbing of Orlaw Owen's store at 857 Penniman Street in Plymouth in 1928 surely made him the butt-end of a few cruel jokes. But when you get robbed by a ne-er-do-well in overalls and dancing pumps while your wife is forced to hide in the back room a bit of pity is owed to you.

Detroit Free Press , February 4, 1859 So maybe my idea for this sort of Historical Society isn't so far afield. It seems that our suburban forebears of the county Wayne in 1859 tried to form their own county named Washington. It was to be comprised of the townships of Livonia, Taylor, Dearborn, Nankin, Brownstown, Redford, Plymouth, Canton, Sumpter, Huron and Van Buren. According to the article below the townships included were all part of the Third District in Wayne County elections. They met at the J. L. Robert's Hotel in Wayne in September of 1852. Detroit Free Press , September 7, 1852 Originally, they proposed some parts of east Washtenaw as well but those inhabitants weren't having any of it. The bill easily passed the Senate but stalled somewhere because I could find no further hits.  Within the new by-laws was the provision that all paupers and persons residing in the County House and in jail who were not residence of the new Washington County would be returned t...

During the Civil War noted poet Walt Whitman visited battlefield hospitals to give comfort to the maimed, including his own brother. He wrote about many of them in his poetry and prose and eventually wrote in his official capacity for the U. S. government on behalf of veterans receiving pensions. One such recipient was a Nankin farmer named Reuben Farwell (or "little Mitch" as he referred to him in his book "Specimen Days".). Several references refer to both Plymouth and Nan kin, of which Plymouth was a part of said township, as his home but Nankin is the preferred location.  They met in 1864 while Farwell was suffering from a crippling foot injury at Armory Square Hospital in Washington D. C. After spending several months there Farwell was released back to the 1st Michigan Calvary where he finished out his enlistment. The men exchanged letters for a short time afterwards and then rekindled their correspondence in 1875 when Whitman began recollecting on his past f...

Detroit Free Press , March 22, 1873 Life in Plymouth during the 1800s wasn't the creature comfort mecca that it is today. Bucolic, surely, but not exactly the upper crust ease known by modern residents of the city. This story of a unnamed man and his dog roughing it in the woods in 1873 attests to that fact. Working in the employ of Esbon Blackmar cutting cordwood he made a makeshift bed of leaves within makeshift walls of stacked wood and covered himself with a blanket. A continuous fire blazed beside his humble abode and a copy of the Bible warmed him throughout the bleakness of a Michigan winter.

scroll through the pages with the arrows at the middle edges of the book This is a fairly hardscrabbled collection of confessional verse that touches the heart like a stab wound from a dying cactus. Outside of the fact that these women were criminals there is nothing outstanding about the works. Still, it quenches my ephemeral lust just a little. I did research one case, that of Charlene Westerville, a baby killer, and that can be read on my now defunct Eloise blog . The other prisoner contributors are as follows: PUSH ON PEOPLE by Glenda Faye Buffing THE WAY I FEEL by Harriet Walker THE RUDE AWAKENING by Jannie Thomas THOUGHTS OF YOU by Sanda Watkins WHAT IS IT? by Ann Marie Felton SNOW by Sandra Magnuson WHERE HAVE I BEEN, WHERE AM I GOING? by Yvonne Patrick Kaufman I REMEMBER by Anonymous REFLECTION by Anonymous DEATH OF NOT ENOUGH by Sylvia Peper JAIL by Willie Jones LIFE by Ruth Ann Nichols PETRIFIED by ShaBooDie CLOUDS by Mary Cuevas HERE I SIT by Arcenia Skinner WORDS OF WISDOM ...

Detroit Free Press , September 9, 1965 The other day I decided that I needed myself a postcard, envelope or anything with a NANKIN postmark so I did a little research on the matter, having found no example on eBay or its ilk. It turns out there may be a reason why such a specimen is so scarce. Up until 1964 the towns within the township--Wayne, Garden City, Inkster and Plymouth (Livonia must have already had their own; then again I didn't even know that Plymouth fell within the boundaries of Nankin)--were getting mailed stamped with their respective town names. Obviously, this didn't last long since Nankin went kaput in 1966 so it's obviously going to be quit difficult to locate one. Old Nankin, on the other hand, might be the easier prospect of the two. More specifically East Nankin, which I believe existed into the early to mid 1900s.

I've always wanted a Burroughs adding machine but whenever I see one at an estate sale at a decent price--which most are because nobody wants them besides me--I realize that it's an impractical idea and I take leave of my foolish desires. Luckily, I found the next best thing: a photo of some sort of gigantic reproduction that was as big as a house. Which seems weird except that the Detroit area also has a huge Uniroyal tire on the side of I-94 heading into the city. Regardle ss, I've been unable to find out anything about the interesting photo. I would guess that the location is somewhere in Detroit. Burroughs adding machines were popular office gadgets in the late 1880s into the first half of the 1900s. Based in Plymouth, Michigan the company moved to Detroit after the owners death and became the standard for adding machines in the United States. It later became Unisys in the 1980s but has since returned to being Burroughs something or other. As for The Burroughs Mag...