1884 Fowlerville Cornet Band

The cast of characters:

James G. Blaine (from Wikipedia) was "an American Statesman and Republican politician who represented Maine in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1863 to 1876, serving as Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives from 1869 to 1875," and etc. and in 1884 was nominated by the Republican party to run for President, ultimately defeated by Democrat Grover Cleveland in the election.

John C. Fremont had a huge life, which you can read all about here.  After this stop in Fowlerville, he lived six more years and died quite suddenly from a case of peritonitis (abdominal infection).

General Russell A. Alger was just plain rich, being "an army officer, financier, lumber baron, railroad owner" and holding high government offices, according to Wikipedia.  Supposedly, he was a distant relation to author Horatio Alger.  A bit of trivia -- Alger County in Michigan is named at the general.

Quite a group stopping by Fowlerville and being serenaded by the Fowlerville Cornet Band.

Note:  All information on the three men was found at www.wikipedia.org.

1947 Fowlerville Lumber Company

Part of the Fowlerville Lumber Company's advertisement philosophy was to make the customer laugh.  Weekly, they would have this little "newsletter" published in "The Fowlerville Review" to keep their name in the forefront:

1880 Opium Addiction

I did a little browsing through some of the 1880 issues of "The Fowlerville Review," looking forward something interesting to put on this blog.  Sometimes it is almost overwhelming, there's so much from medical and dental treatments for the time, store openings (such as by R. Fowler), council minutes, prices of dry goods and groceries.  

The following article grabbed my attention as I see more and more articles in the local paper of an opiate problem here in Fowlerville and its surrounding area.  I guess nearly 140 years ago it wasn't quite so different.

If anyone has a subject matter, era, names and/or businesses they would like me to research, let me know and I'll see what I can do.  

1907 Grain Elevator Fire

On the 13th, I posted some information regarding the Rounsville house.  The other day, as I'm doing some research in 1907, this article caught my attention:

Two years later, a tornado came through this area and took off the top part of the grain elevator, no doubt some of being the newly-installed fire-proof roof.

1965 Beginning of Community Park

This month, Fowlerville lost one of its leaders from long ago -- Irwin Glover.  You can find his obituary under the "Remember" tab on this blog.  His funeral was a celebration of a life well-led and I feel honored I knew him for these last 18 years.

Irwin was one of the first I met when I joined the Rotary Club in 1999.  He was kind, generous, and outgoing, and he was the reason we sang songs at the beginning of each meeting.  

So, I post the following article that happened to catch my eye this week as I was looking for something interesting.  In May of 1965, this announcement was in "The Fowlerville Review" to bring the community out to work together on putting the Community Park (large one on North Grand) in order.  Irwin, along with Frank Utter and numerous other Rotarians, worked hard to make this happen and aren't we all glad!

A few years back, the Rotary Club funded the paving of what is now known as the "Rotary Mile."  I love using that walk and hopefully many more make use of it -- and, for that, we can thank men like Irwin Glover.

1963 Haire and Jackson

I've been opening up the digital version of "The Fowlerville Review," published from 1874-1972, randomly choosing a date and then doing some scrolling.  If something catches my eye, I save the article or picture and post here.

Please let me know if you would like me to look for anything in particular during those 98 years.  If you give me an approximately date, I can do some looking.

Today's picture was on the front page of the newspaper May 8, 1963.  This picture shows the North Grand Avenue view of the storefront for Haire and Jackson.  Years before, it was the location for Curtis Grocery and years later, the Decorating Center was located here.  Currently, it houses Maria's School of Dance.

Following is the ad from page 7:

1969 'Round the Town News

Thought this might be fun to post here.  

Every week, including the week of May 7, 1969, social and other events of some of the residents showed up in the news.  Some of you might recognize family names and what was happening in late spring of that year.  Enjoy!