The Lowell Area Historical Museum presents a new weekly online series. Missing Along Main explores the buildings that once occupied Main Street but are no longer there.
318 E. Main St.
The 7th building east of Monroe St. was in the center of the “Old Wooden Row.”
This block, once known as the Old Wooden Row, was the first business block in Dansville (Lowell). Built between 1846 and 1870, it contained 11 wooden buildings along the south side of Bridge (Main) Street between Monroe and Washington Streets. This building is nearly in the center of the row.
This wooden building was built as a bakery which included a bake room with an oven. It was the bakery and restaurant of M. M. Chase as early as 1870 and is described as being opposite the Music Hall. It was known as the Emmett Chase building. He is listed in the Michigan Gazetteer as the baker from 1879-1891. Perhaps M. M. Chase and Emmett Chase refer to the same person.
It continued as a bakery throughout its time on Main Street. Charles Lawrence and family lived in the upstairs and operated Lawrence’s “City Bakery and Restaurant” from 1891-1895.
This was the time period that Frank M. Johnson, who founded the Lowell Ledger lived next door. He describes the following incident in his “Remember When—The Old Wooden Row” article (1931): “I remember that Mr. and Mrs. Lawrence were away one evening leaving their 3 girls, Clara, Lila and Ariel to lock themselves in and go to bed. On returning, their parents were unable to awake the children to let them in. They rapped and knocked and pounded and yelled to no avail. Then they tried pounding on the girls’ upstairs bedroom window with fish poles; and still the girls slept on. Finally, Charles had to break a door down to get into his own house, and the girls knew nothing of it until next morning.”
Mrs. J. H. Nicklin became proprietor of City Bakery and Restaurant in 1896. She advertised bread, buns, pies and cakes. Ice Cream by the gallon, quart, pint or dish. Warm meals, 25 cents only.
In 1909, the building was moved up Monroe St. almost to Oakwood Cemetery where it became the residence of Bert Carr. The lot the bakery vacated was purchased by the Lowell Board of Trade to be used for the new Lowell Auto Body factory.
Leave a Reply