Michigan’s Historic Railroad Stations

Preface

vii Preface Photographing a specific type of building across many styles was a project I had long wanted to tackle. Little did I know how many depots Michigan actually boasts. The Uhelski brothers, who inventoried the state’s stations in the late 1970s, counted over four hundred at the time, though that number is bound to have declined significantly since then. All the same, there are far more Michigan depots than you might expect. Given this, it goes without saying that I have overlooked many fine examples—Standish and Evart come to mind—and to the citizens of those and any other neglected towns, I extend my sincere regrets. To discover which stations were worth shooting, I relied heavily on several websites. The sites Michigan Passenger Stations, Michigan Railroad Passenger Depots, and Michigan Railroads were particularly useful because they post thumbnail images; these gave me a sense of whether a station was interesting for my purposes or not. I also relied on illustrated texts like Kathryn Bishop Eckert’s Buildings of Michigan and Janet Greenstein Potter’s Great American Railroad Stations. And inevitably, I leaned heavily on word of mouth. Don Westcott at the Michigan Railroad History Museum in Durand was a source of many good ideas, as was architect Randy Case in Battle Creek. And I’ll always be grateful to my friend Barbara Murray for steering me to the winning little depot in Suttons Bay. One of the pleasures of this undertaking was discovering three marvelous academic works on the subject, broadly, of train stations—enjoyable, literate essays that vastly deepened my understanding. Carroll L.V. Meeks’s 1956 The Railroad Station: An Architectural History is the standard work on the topic—a slender, remarkably readable trek through the structure ’s evolution since 1830, when the first American depot, Baltimore’s Mount Clare Station, came into use. Equally absorbing was Jeffrey Richards and John M. MacKenzie’s The Railway Station: A Social History, a fascinating look at the integral role the depot used to play in daily life both here and abroad. And finally, Metropolitan Corridor: Railroads and the American Scene by John R. Stilgoe offers a wealth of insight into the impact railroads had on both the American built environment and popular culture. This project ended up consuming two whole summers— giddy seasons spent crisscrossing the state, windows down, iPod on, poking into unknown little towns, searching, sometimes high and low, for railroad tracks that may or may not have been removed. More often than not, I’d stumble on a handsomer-than-expected station bathed in (check one) dawn or sunset light. For those lucky souls who don’t fret about light quality, the hours close to sunrise and sunset—heavy with reddish light—lend a depth and luster to colors that shots at midday, with its flat, bluish cast, simply can’t match. (I’d like to note, incidentally, how envious I am of photographers who make beautiful pictures of buildings under heavy overcast. For the life of me, I don’t know how they do it. Yet anyone who remembers the 2011 Super Bowl commercial that’s come 00 Hodges FM.indd 7 6/26/12 2:50 PM viii to be known as the “Chrysler-Eminem” spot will recall it was gaspingly beautiful, and yet shot under leaden, wintry skies. Go figure.) I should also note that the history of railroad companies over time, and the mergers that generated a parade of everchanging names, is as complex as the succession charts of some European monarchies. Suffice it to say that I take my hat off to those who know the subject well. I make no pretense to anything like that myself. So if I accidentally refer to the “Ann Arbor Railroad” at a date when it was still technically the “Toledo , Ann Arbor & North Michigan Railway,” my apologies to all the sharp-eyed historians out there. The hope with this sort of photo book, of course, is that the pictures are interesting enough to seduce readers who don’t ordinarily give architecture much thought, causing them, even momentarily, to dwell on buildings and the virtues of historic preservation. As a rule, architecture is shockingly little discussed in American culture, so the opportunity to remind readers of the simple pleasures of older structures appealed to the evangelist in me. If this little volume sparks fresh appreciation for the ways in which architecture, that most public of all art forms, frames, organizes, and enlivens our daily...