Leisure Time and Travel – Early 1900s

Once again, I’ve delved into my collection of early postcards.  On this occasion my focus is on Leisure Time and Travel in the early 1900s.  Of course back in those days, it’s hard to completely separate travel from commerce in general. 

My apologies for the disparity in print, spacing and background in parts of this post...but I'm not mentally disposed to go back and rework the entire post.

This postcard shows the old Union Depot in Kansas City Missouri.  It was built in 1878 but this postcard was mailed from Kansas City to Mrs. J.A. Johnson in Hot Springs Virginia in 1909.

The old Union depot was located in the bottomlands near the Missouri River close to the stockyards and meatpackers...primary shippers for the railroads.  From a passenger’s viewpoint, the location was less than ideal.  From some angles, passengers actually had to avoid trains on the tracks.  Most passengers from the city accessed the depot via a ‘thrilling and noisy cable car ride down a steep incline. 

Visitors to Kansas City left the safety and comfort of their rail cars and they were ‘greeted’ by about 4 blocks of saloons, gambling centers, billiard halls, tattoo parlors and brothels that surrounded the depot.  Smoke from the coal-fired trains coated near-by buildings with black soot.  Then there was the flooding!  In 1903 a major flood convinced the city leaders to build a new and larger depot that would avoid the water issues and better serve passengers.  However, the replacement depot wasn’t finished until 1914.  

  

This old depot was nicknamed the “Jackson County Insane Asylum” by those who thought it was too large and garish.  With its 125 foot clock tower and being a hybridization of Second Empire style and Gothic Revival, it certainly was an attention getter… FYI, it was only the second Union station (a station used by 2 or more rail lines) in the USA.

While the depot was initially thought to be too large, it was overwhelmed in 2 years and by the start of the 1900s, over 180 trains per day passed through the station!  The population of Kansas City Missouri had tripled from the time that this depot opened in 1878 through 1905 or so.  On 10/31/1914, the last train departed from the depot.  It was torn down in 1915.

This postcard from 1908 shows the city of St. Ignace Michigan on the shore of Lake Huron.  It’s located close to the tip of the State’s Upper Peninsula across the Straits of Mackinac.  For years this town has been a gateway to the Upper Peninsula as well as to Mackinac Island, a very popular tourist destination.  As of the November 1957, Michigan’s lower and upper- peninsula have been connected by the Mackinac Bridge.  However, in the early days all traffic went via water, with the vessels departing on the 5 mile journey from St. Ignace.  You can see the piers and a couple of ships in the picture.

In 1882, the Detroit, Mackinac and Marquette Railroad came to St. Ignace.  This rail ferry terminal was the where the connection was across the Mackinac Straits to Michigan's upper-peninsula.  Farmers and the lumber industry could now easily move their product to Detroit, a truly major market.  At the same time tourists ‘discovered’ the charms of Mackinaw Island and began exploring the wilds of Northern Michigan.

A railroad car ferry became the actual link across the straits for both commerce and travelers.  In addition to freight cars, passenger cars would just be loaded/rolled onto the “SS Chief Wawatam”.  The ferry was owned by the Duluth South Shore and Atlantic, the Pennsylvania and New York Central railroads.  The Chief Wawatam was the last hand fired, coal fueled commercial carrier on the Great Lakes.  She was in service from 1911 until 1984.  She was designed to operate year around.  This car ferry was designed to break ice flows with her bow propeller, which could both maneuver the ship and suck water out from underneath the ice to enable it to be broken by the force of gravity.

Roads in the early days were less than ideal or even passable.  Auto ferry services across the Straits of Mackinac didn’t begin until 1923, a year after this second St. Ignace postcard was mailed.  By 1952, the Michigan Department of Transportation was operating 5 ships on this route, with a total capacity of 500 vehicles per trip.  By 1952 the ‘new’ auto ferry route had carried 12 million vehicles and 30 million passengers.  I crossed the straits on one of these auto ferries in both directions in 1952.

Leisure time doesn’t necessarily mean extensive travel.  This postcard showing someone feeding a swan in Chicago’s Garfield Park was mailed in September of 1908.  This park includes 184 acres in the East Garfield Park neighborhood on Chicago’s West Side.  It was designed as a ‘pleasure ground’ by William LeBaron Jenney and its home to the Garfield Park Conservatory, one of the largest conservatories in the USA. 

The first portion of the park was originally named Central Park and it was opened to the public in August of 1874.  Jenney, who is now best known as the father of skyscrapers, based his design of the park on parks he’d seen and visited in Paris.  In 1881, the park was renamed in honor of slain President James A. Garfield.

Note that the park was designed to serve as a ‘pleasure ground’ for Chicagoans.  The idea was that it should be used for passive recreation such as strolling and picnicking.  The large lagoon was added as a means to drain the park site while creating desired and attractive water features.  It was used for boating in the summer and ice skating in the winter. 

Chicago has a number of large and distinctive parks.  This postcard, which was mailed in 1915, pictures Washington Park.  It was built in 1870 and it covers 372 acres in the Washington Park community on the South Side of Chicago.  Named for George Washington, it was conceived by Paul Cornell, a Chicago real estate magnate who founded the adjoining town of Hyde Park.  Cornell hired famed landscape designer Frederick Law Olmstead and his partner to lay out the park.

When Olmsted examined the property designated for the park, he saw a field filled with trees and decided to maintain its character by creating a meadow surrounded by trees.  In keeping with the bucolic picture on the front of this card, he called for sheep to graze on the meadow as a way to keep the grass short.  Through the trees you can just make out on of the lagoons that were included in the design.  As per the back of this postcard, the park “contains 7 miles of charming driveways, walks and bridle paths.

Another leisure time activity back in the early 1900s and continuing today are visits to museums.  The Art Institute of Chicago was founded in 1879 in Grant Park.  It is one of the oldest and largest art museums in the USA.  The building on this 1906 postcard was built in 1893 as part of the World’s Columbian Exposition.  While most of the buildings constructed for the Exposition were temporary, the Art Institute lobbied for a building that would serve as part of the fair, but would be used by the Institute after the Exposition ended.

This building, now greatly enlarged, was completed in time for the second year of the Exposition.  The entrance to the Art Institute is still guarded by 2 bronze lions who were created by Edward Kemey’s in 1894.  They each weigh more than 2 tons!

Chicago’s Art Institute is huge, now reputedly the second largest art museum in the USA.  Its annual number of visitors now totals around 2 million.  Wear good walking shoes and plan for a break or two because it will wear you out!  Laurie and I are fortunate in that we visited the Art Institute many times, sometimes with a private group.  The Institute’s Security Director sponsored a few visits and dinners for his peers in the Chicago area.

To learn more about Chicago’s Art Institute and perhaps to plan a visit, just go to https://www.artic.edu/.  

P.S. I don’t know when someone invented that annoying sparkly glitter…but this postcard is still shedding it!

Yes…we’re still touring Chicago in the early 1900s.  What can I say, this is the postcard album that I picked for this post and it’s still all about leisure time!

This postcard that was mailed to Menomonee Falls Wisconsin in 1911 shows the “Baseball Grounds”.  A bit of research confirmed that this postcard shows West Side Park, the name of 2 different baseball parks that used to be in Chicago.  Both of them were home fields for the team we all know (and love) as the Chicago Cubs.  In this photo, the playing field is covered with fans… Given the date of the postcard, plus the visible stands and buildings, I believe that this is the second West Side Park.

The Cubs played on this field for almost a quarter-century but both West Side Parks hosted baseball championships.  This field was the home of the first 2 World Champion Cubs teams in 1907 and 1908.  In 1906, it was also the home of the only cross-town World Series in Major League Baseball history.

The original layout of the park could seat roughly 12,500 fans.  However, as was common at the time, fans were often permitted to stand along the outer perimeter of the playing field itself.  Early in the 1900s a small covered grandstand was added behind home plate.  Uncovered bleachers extended along both foul lines and into left field.  From 1906 through 1910, the Cubs won 4 National League pennants and 2 World Series championships…and then we waited another 108 years for another championship!

After the Cubs moved to Weeghman Park in 1916, (now Wrigley Field), West Side Park continued to host semipro and amateur baseball events for a number of years.  It even served as a setting for Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show.  This ballpark was torn down in 1920 and the property was sold to the University of Illinois.  It’s now occupied by the University of Illinois Medical Center.

Before the USA had automobiles and/or passable highways, the best way to travel the long distances between and around the Great Lakes was by ship.  From the mid-1800s until into the 1950s, a person could travel most of the lakes in comfort and even luxury.  A Chicago or Detroit businessman could board a ship in his hometown and take an overnight trip to spend the weekend in a cool northern cabin in northern Michigan or Wisconsin.  Then he could take another ship back to work after relaxing a bit…

The SS Theodore Roosevelt was one such passenger steamer.  This postcard, mailed in May of 1918, shows the ship passing through the State Street Bridge in Chicago.  The card, written by ‘Pearl and Fred’ stated that they arrived alright, that they were “going to a show tonight and a ball game tomorrow”.

This ship was built in Toledo Ohio in 1906 and, with one exception, operated on Lake Michigan for most of its useful life.  It was taken over by the U.S. Navy in April of 1918 for service as a troop transport in WWI.  As such, she transported troops back and forth across the English Channel between the United Kingdom and France.  She served in this role for about a year and then was sold to the Cleveland Steamship Company.

Based on the date of the postcard and her draft into government service, the card is somewhat older than the mailing date would imply.

 

In late 1919 or early 1920, the SS Theodore Roosevelt resumed her commercial career as a passenger ship, operating on Lake Erie this time.   In 1926, ownership changed again and she moved back to Lake Michigan.  The final portion of her career was based in Detroit Michigan.  She was sold for scrap in 1950.  

Its amazing to consider that prior to WWII, roughly fifty (50) cruise steamers sailed on the Great Lakes.  Most of these ships were large and luxurious, some having elegant staterooms with private baths…plus another 70 to 100 passenger cabins.

Now we’re off to Detroit, where, on May 1, 1905 at the annual meeting of the shareholders of the Detroit, Windsor and Belle Isle Ferry Company, it was recommended by the company president that a “new boat should be built”…”the new steamer to be a general purpose boat suitable for Bois Blanc, Belle Isle, excursions and to be a very powerful ice crusher and could be used on the Windsor ferry in case of very severe weather.”

This new ship was 164 feet long and 45 feet wide.  As a result of a public competition, which awarded $10 in gold and a season’s pass, the steamer was named “Britannia”.  This vessel entered service on July 4, 1906, with a trip to Bois Blanc Island, aka ‘Boblo’.  This card was mailed in August of 1909 to Mr. Carl Hanson in Fort Dodge Iowa from initials “S.W.”  He reported that he and his group were having a fine time and they were about to board the Britannia for ‘Boblo’.

Bois Blanc means ‘white woods’ in French.  The island was so named because of all its birch and beech trees.  Boblo is an English corruption of the French pronunciation of Bois Blanc.  In any case, the Britannia and several other vessels were in the business of transporting folks to the Boblo Island Amusement Park as well as another more staid park at Belle Isle on the US side.  The Boblo amusement park began operation in 1898 and remained in business until the fall of 1993.

Even though there was a bridge to Belle Isle, most people didn’t have an automobile in the early days so a boat ride up the Detroit River was a fine solution.  As roads improved and the bridge to Belle Isle was more accessible to the public and the size of the crowds headed to Boblo increased, larger boats were needed.  Britannia’s design as an all-purpose boat was a failure…too small for the Boblo crowd and too big for the dwindling ferry business to Belle Isle. 

Britannia was greatly altered and for a short time, 1924 to 1928, she was used for cross-river ferry service to Canada.  When she was replaced by a much larger vessel in 1928, she became a ‘spare boat’.  Then the Ambassador Bridge opened across the Detroit River in 1929, followed soon after by the Detroit-Windsor Tunnel in 1930.  So much for cross river ferry service…

Britannia was idle for several years.  Then she was converted to a tug.  Part of her superstructure, including the main cabin was taken ashore and used as part of a house in Wyandotte Michigan.  The severely modified vessel was used to tow log rafts on Lake Superior and then she was sold again in 1952.  Nothing is known about Britannia after that until she was scrapped at Duluth Minnesota in 1961.  A sad fate for a pleasure boat indeed…

Note: Boblo Island/Bois Blanc Island has an interesting history involving American Indians, Forts, an attempted revolution in Canada, the Underground Railroad and Viet Nam draft evaders… Check it out at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bois_Blanc_Island_(Ontario).

I thought that I’d end this post with a bucolic country scene.  This postcard depicting leisure time along Michigan’s Paw Paw River, was sent in July of 1906.  The sender in Waterville Michigan was “Rob” and Miss Inez Dobbins in Elgin Illinois was the recipient.  Rob assured her that he “was having a fine time”.  Keep in mind, back around the turn of the twentieth century, a postcard was the way to send a short text or ‘email’. 

The Paw Paw River is located in the southeast corner of Michigan’s Southern Peninsula close to the south end of Lake Michigan.  It only flows about 62 miles before it joins the St. Joseph River just before that River flows into Lake Michigan at Benton Harbor.  Native Americans named the river after the pawpaw fruit that grew abundantly along the river’s banks.

The Paw Paw River watershed is known as Michigan’s “Wine Country”.  The land near the river is ideal for vineyards and it’s also rich in biodiversity.  It includes wetlands, prairie fens, barrens and floodplain forests.  That was probably the charm or draw for visitors in the early 1900s.  Today, the Nature Conservancy is protecting the Paw Paw Prairie Fen.  Check it out at https://www.nature.org/en-us/get-involved/how-to-help/places-we-protect/paw-paw-prairie-fen-preserve/. 

I’ll end with a little information on the pawpaw.  It’s an understory tree found in well-drained, deep, fertile bottom-land and hilly upland habitat.  Pawpaw fruits are the largest edible fruit that is indigenous to the United States.  The fruit is sweet and custard-like, similar to banana, mango and pineapple.  They are commonly eaten raw but are also used to make ice cream and baked desserts.  

Just click on any of the postcards to enlarge them…

Thanks for stopping by for a visit!

Take Care, Big Daddy Dave