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Lansing
- Wayne State University Press
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107 The British-owned Grand Trunk Western Railway opened its new Lansing station in January 1903—a compact, orange-brick English castle in the Tudor style—to nearly rapturous praise from the city’s newspapers. “Nothing in Michigan can compare with it,” declared the Lansing State Republican on January 3, 1903, “for richness of material, completeness of detail and effective decoration.” And in the boilerplate that always seemed to accompany the introduction of any new depot involving considerable investment (this one ran the Grand Trunk $40,000), railroad officials assured everyone that while they had larger stations along their route from Portland, Maine, to Montreal and Chicago, none was handsomer. Interestingly, the impetus for building the station at this particular site was the announcement in 1902 of plans by Lansing auto magnate Ransom E. Olds to build a new factory directly across the tracks. Lansing’s Grand Trunk depot is another small masterpiece by the Detroit firm of Spier and Rohns, who designed far more Michigan stations than anyone else. Other Spier and Rohns commissions include the Michigan Central depots at Niles, Grass Lake, and Ann Arbor (now the Gandy Dancer restaurant )—each and every one gorgeous. But they were all built in varying hues of Richardsonian Romanesque, so popular in the last few decades of the nineteenth century. Only two Spier and Rohns stations involved a style switch to Tudor Revival (sometimes called Jacobethan Revival, a term uniting the style associated with Elizabeth I with that of her successor, James I). Spier and Rohns’s other Tudor station is the dramatic graybrick depot at Dowagiac that’s still in use as an unstaffed Amtrak stop. The firm also built a Lutheran church on Detroit’s West Grand Boulevard, now the Messiah Church, that’s a near twin to the Lansing station. 1903—Grand Trunk Western Railway 1203 South Washington Avenue ARCHITECTS: Spier and Rohns LAST PASSENGER SERVICE: 1971 CONDITION: Poor USE: Lansing Board of Water and Light Lansing Looking very much like a modest castle in Tudor Revival style, Lansing’s Grand Trunk station— abandoned for years—suddenly has a bright future ahead of it.The Lansing Board of Water and Light acquired the building as part of a larger real-estate deal in 2011 and plans to renovate the venerable landmark into meeting space for their commissioners and community groups. 04 Part 3.indd 107 7/10/12 7:24 AM 108 Defining elements of the station in Lansing’s REO Town neighborhood include a four-story battlemented parapet from which it’s easy to imagine seventeenth-century archers with crossbows aiming at peasants below. Perhaps the handsomest detail, however, is the vast square window on the central gable, comprised of twenty large panes—a severe, almost geometric treatment that’s both classically Elizabethan and oddly modern. The main waiting room was housed beneath a barrel-vault ceiling with dark oak support beams. At the east end was what the Lansing State Republican in the same article called a “magnificent fire place . . . set off by pillars.” The ladies’ Tudor architecture reflected the insecurity of the 1400 and 1500s in England, so it’s no surprise builders favored towers and battlemented parapets where skilled archers could rain death upon besieging armies. Another distinguishing feature of the Lansing station—apart from that handy fortress tower, should a violent threat materialize—is the architects’ choice of Roman bricks. Narrower than standard bricks, they serve in this case to flatten the wall surface and emphasize horizontal lines. Since Grand Trunk stopped passenger service in 1971, the depot has gone through several iterations as a restaurant or club. Presumably the TV antennae (right) date from that period. 04 Part 3.indd 108 7/10/12 7:24 AM [3.142.142.2] Project MUSE (2024-04-18 00:49 GMT) 109 04 Part 3.indd 109 7/10/12 7:24 AM 110 waiting room contained “a lounge of leather” and comfortable rocking chairs. A bench ran along the perimeter of the men’s circular smoking room, with a circular group of seats in the center. “Elegant” electric lights were deployed throughout, while the waiting room’s oak benches boasted cane seats. Perhaps the most dramatic event in the station’s entire 108year history was a spectacular train wreck at 4:12 p.m. on October 7, 1941, that injured at least twelve and killed one unhappy newsboy. An eastbound Grand Trunk express freight train with fifty cars carrying cheese, apples, grapes, melons...