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CHAPTER XCVIII

BELLE ISLE PARK AND THE GRAND BOULEVARD

NOLLOWING the purchase of Belle Isle there was long

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wrangling over the appointment of commissioners, succes

sive vetoes of commissioners, successive vetoes by Mayor William G. Thompson, appeals to the courts, and letters to the newspapers favoring and opposing the new park. The discontented element proposed a sale of it and Capt. John Pridgeon offered the city $225,000 for the island. On the island was a residence belonging to Richard Storrs Willis, known as Insulruhe. The house was in custody of Patrolman Cohoon. A mob went to the island to evict Cohoon, but the patrolman was armed and held the fort.

The angry discussions slowly subsided and in July, 1881, Mayor Thompson appointed Merrill I. Mills, August Marxhausen, William A. Moore and James McMillan to the custody and control of the island. This commission was known as 'the four M's." In the meantime a ferry service was installed with a temporary dock at the southwestern corner of the island, and people began visiting the new park in advance of its improvement. The Indian name of the island in early days had been Mah-na-be-zee, meaning White Swan. It had been utilized for many years at the lower end as a garden for the military post and as a pasture for cattle and hogs. The island was infested by rattlesnakes and the hogs were permitted to run wild until they had exterminated the snakes. As the hogs were numerous the French settlers styled the island Île aux Cochons or "island of the hogs." The name had been informally changed in the 1850's to Belle Isle, without consulting the owners. On August 29, 1881, the latter name was confirmed by an ordinance of the common council.

In 1886 permission was granted for the establishment of an electric railway on the island, but it was repealed in response

to a public protest before anything was done toward construction. In May, 1889, the legislature consolidated the park and the boulevard commissions. The first incumbents of the consolidated office by legislative appointment were Henry M. Duffield, Elliott T. Slocum, William B. Moran and Francis F. Palms. They were soon superseded by the common council's appointment of George H. Russel, John Erhardt, William Livingstone, Jr., and William K. Parcher.

Soon after the purchase was made the commissioners employed Frederick Law Olmstead, a noted landscape gardener, to lay out the park, and a survey was made by Eugene Robinson. During the year 1882, 268,000 persons visited the island and held picnics and informal gatherings. Canals were planned to serve the double purpose of draining the marshy land and to afford safe canoeing. The island at the first survey was found to be 10,800 feet long and 2,400 feet wide at the widest part. It contained 690 acres. Gradually the island was improved, drives were laid out and graveled. Marshy places were excavated to create lakes. A casino, a lunch and skating pavilion and a boat landing were erected and many miles of drains were laid. In the winter of 1893, when thousands of men were out of work in Detroit, the city converted the marsh at the northeast end into a lake and made a driveway around the outer embankment, which was partly constructed by hauling in the earth removed from the embankments of the old Watson Street city reservoir.

Before the creation of the addition for the James Scott monument the island had been increased to an area of 707 acres. The purchase, which was regarded as very extravagant at a cost of $200,000, is now valued at $16,200,000.

The construction of the first bridge to the island occurred in 1889 at a cost of $295,000. This aroused another violent protest. That bridge stood and rendered good service for nearly 35 years. Several attempts were made to secure a larger bridge as the traffic became more and more congested, but on April 27, 1915, the bridge took fire near the middle and was destroyed.

For two years following the destruction of the bridge the only access to the island was by ferryboats. In 1917 a temporary bridge was built at a cost of $100,000, and this year of 1923 will see the completion of a new permanent bridge 2,193 feet long at a cost of about $3,000,000. Between the American shore and the mainland above the bridge lie several mud flats or middle grounds which are barely covered with water. In the course of time it is probable that the consent of the Government will be obtained to convert these shoals into islands that can be beautified and added to the park.

Detroit's Grand Boulevard, which is now one of the busiest and finest public driveways in the world, was created in the face of violent opposition comparable with that which obstructed the acquisition of Belle Isle Park. The first proposal for the Grand Boulevard system was made by Edward Chope, of Greenfield township. He was aided in the promotion by J. P. Mansfield of the same township. In 1876 this proposal began to find favor with the progressive element in the city and in 1877 Edwin F. Conely presented a bill in the legislature authorizing the construction of a boulevard in the townships of Hamtramck, Greenfield and Springwells and through a portion of the City of Detroit.

Immediately the conservative opposition rushed a strong lobby to Lansing to fight the bill. One eloquent opponent declared the boulevard to be a perfectly useless piece of extravagance; the promotion of a few landowners who wished to profit by the folly of the people of Detroit. The district through which it was proposed to run was so wet and marshy that the boulevard, he said, would be a goose pond during the winter and spring months and a goose pasture in the summer, for who would ever make use of it for a driveway? The bill was defeated by three votes, but the project was by no means dead. At the next session of the legislature Eber W. Cottrell presented it again in connection with the bill for the purchase of Belle Isle, to which the eastern end of the Grand Boulevard was to be the main approach. That bill passed. Mr. Cottrell was an able politician and knew how to handle lobbies.

All attempts to interest the townships in the boulevard failed. They were willing to profit by the improvement, but were not willing to contribute toward it. The city for a time remained cool toward the proposal. In 1880 an appropriation of $250 was granted to the commission for preliminary work and, in 1882, $2,500 more was provided. There the city halted for a time while private individuals provided for the expense. In 1883 a survey was made on lines represented by the boulevard as it is today. Through the dedication of land between Woodward Avenue and Russell Street by Frisbie & Foxen and Col. John Atkinson, the area for the first half mile of a boulevard 150 feet wide was provided. A formal celebration was held when the fences of this section were removed and the first sod was turned. The sod itself was sold for $100, which was the most profitable sale of Detroit realty to date. Next year James A. Randall, who had been an ardent promoter of the boulevard, built a house on the north side of the Grand Boulevard some distance east of Woodward Avenue. Four years later William Stocking built the first house on the section north of Jefferson Avenue and the approach to Belle Isle Bridge. Bela Hubbard, a wealthy landowner and pioneer citizen of the west side, began the improvement of the western section.

For several years the appropriations made by the city were pitifully inadequate: $20,000 in 1885, $15,000 in 1886, and $25,000 in 1887. In the meantime James A. Randall, William Foxen, J. B. Lauder, John V. Ruehle, William W. Wheaton, T. Foxen and several other promoters worked to secure concessions for the right of way and private contributions from persons whose property values would be increased by the boulevard construction. The line of the boulevard now circling the main part of the city between Belle Isle Bridge and the foot of Twenty-fourth Street measures 11.29 miles. The land area expropriated for the right of way was 213 acres, of which about nine-tenths was contributed by adjoining property owners. The sections between Jefferson Avenue and the river and between Fort Street and the river were acquired by condemnation proceedings and purchase at a liberally appraised value.

Mr. Randall procured his own election to the legislature for the express purpose of promoting the boulevard. It was at his suggestion that the park and boulevard commissions were made one body. He also secured authority by which the city borrowed $500,000 for paving the roadway with macadam. For several years the Grand Boulevard was a lonely thoroughfare, but about 1895 it began to build up, and carriages and bicycles became more and more numerous. Today it is one of the most intensively used thoroughfares of the world of a similar character, and traffic policemen are kept busy at many intersections directing traffic and breaking up congestion. The goose pond and pasture of 40 years ago is daily filled with a solid procession of automobiles, because it is the most popular driveway of the city.