C. Howard Crane built the Fox Theater, an example of a movie palace architectural design, in 1928. At the time, the theater had the largest clear span balcony in the world. Fox was the product of William Fox, a famous theater promoter and developer. The building is a 10-story steel-frame that occupies an entire city block of Woodward. The five-story main lobby includes a grand staircase that leads to the upper auditorium, which seats 5,042 people.

Greektown has served as the ethnic retailing district for more than 140 years. The area started as a pioneer farm, evolved into a German area, and finally served as a Greek dominated neighborhood. The region is comprised of Victorian two and three-story commercial and industrial buildings.

The Michigan Stove is located at the Michigan State Fairgrounds, and was originally built in 1892 by the Michigan Stove Company. It was made of hand carved wood and measured about 25 feet high, 30 feet long, 20 feet wide and weighed about 15 tons. The Stove was painted in such a way that it appeared to be a cast iron stove of the day. After 1880, Michigan was known as the stove capitol of the country and that was the reason for creating the structure. Construction of the stove was supervised by a man named George Barbour the vice-president of the Michigan Stove Company. The stove was constructed to represent Detroit at the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago. After the exposition, the structure was taken apart and shipped back to Detroit and put up in front of the Michigan Stove Company. In 1957, Schafer Bakeries purchased the stove and donated tn to the city of Detroit in 1965. The city erected the stove at the State Fairgrounds. In the early 70’s the stove was in such poor condition, it was moved to the Fort Wayne Museum. In 1998, the stove was restored and unveiled by former Governor John Engler.

In 1822, the Pontiac Company gave the city the first land for a village cemetery. In 1839, Captain Hervey Parke was employed by the village of Pontiac to survey the lot, and the cemetery was plotted out. The Oak Hill Cemetery was located at the intersection of Saginaw and Huron Streets and includes the Buckland Memorial Chapel. Major General Israel Richardson, Colonel Stephen Mack (manager of the Pontiac Company), Governor Moses Wisner and David Ward all have monuments there. Twenty-seven Civil War soldiers and WW I Congressional Medal of Honor recipient Dr. Harold Furlong are also buried in the Oak Hill Cemetery.

The Boston-Edison District is one of the earliest suburbs in Detroit. It is comprised of many large, single-residence homes that were built between 1900 and 1925. When the Henry Ford Hospital was built in 1915, numerous physicians built home in the district. Some notable occupants of the Boston-Edison District were Charles Burton, donor of the Burton Historical Collection at the Detroit Public Library, Rabbi Leo Franklin, organizer of the United Jewish Charities, Henry Ford, Michigan Supreme Court Justice Joseph Moynihan and Ford Motor Company secretary and treasurer James Couzins.

The Ford House is located at 140 Edison Avenue in Detroit. The house was occupied by Henry and Clara Ford from 1908 to 1915 and cost more than $480,000. The family built a machine shop above the garage for their son Edsel, who later carried on his father’s automobile legacy. In 1915, the Ford family moved to their Fairlane estate in Dearborn.

The Cultural Center District spans from 5200 and 5201 Woodward and 100 Farnsworth Avenue. These three addresses signify three buildings the center of the city’s Cultural Center. The Detroit Public Library, The Detroit Institute of Arts (DIA) and the Horace H. Rackham Education Memorial Building are the structures that display the most spectacular architecture of the time. The Detroit Public Library is a marble Italian Renaissance designs and was built by Cass Gilbert from 1915 to 1921. The DIA was created in the Beaux Arts style and was designed by Paul Phillippe Cret in 1921 to 1927. Finally, the Rackham Education Memorial Building is a made of limestone and was created by the firm of Harley, Ellington and Day in 1941. The three structures were built during the City Beautiful movement of the early twentieth century. After the Rackham building was built, the Cultural Center added a few other notable structures such as the Detroit Historical Museum, the International Institute, the Society of Arts and Crafts Art School, the Detroit Science Center and the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History.

The Whitney mansion is a three-story Romanesque Revival building with pink South Dakota jasper walls. The house includes Tiffany glass windows and jasper columns help support multiple arches throughout the house. Over 42 rooms in the mansion are adorned with onyx, marble and hand-carved woodwork. Whitney was a lumber baron and steam ship owner who was one of Detroit’s wealthiest citizens. He commissioned Detroit architect Gordon W. Lloyd to build the mansion from 1890 to 1894. The Whitney is currently used as a restaurant and is located on Woodward Avenue.

Orchestra Hall is home to the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, which was the city’s original concert hall. It was built in 1919 by one of Detroit’s premier theater architects, Charles H. Crane. The hall was completed in only four moths in order to get internationally renowned conductor Ossip Gabrilowitsch. In the 20 years following it’s construction, Orchestra Hall hosted over 260 Detroit premieres, 18 American premiers and three world premiers. Igor Stravinski, Serge Rachmanioff, Vladimir Horowitz and many other well-known artists have performed at the hall. Over the years, Orchestra Hall has served as the Church of Our Prayer (1955) and also operated as the Paradise Theater for vaudeville and movies. Efforts to restore the building began in 1970 and many Michiganians now enjoy the hall. –Jacquie Trost

Orchestra Hall photo by detroitderek