Meyer's Junction

[NoviRailfan]

Anyone know where "Meyer's Junction" was located? It was either on the PM or the DUR? I'm finding references to it in records for the delivery of kit homes from the Aladdin company of Bay City.

[EWRice]

I have checked all my books and old maps. I show nothing in Michigan for a Meyer's Junction. I did however notice that in Indiana (I think) there was some references to Meyer around certain towns. Hard to say. Around what time period did this paperwork you have come from?

[NoviRailfan]

Late 1910s - early 1920s. Multiple references to houses being shipped to the Redford/Farmington area.

[Standard Railfan]

I have a potential answer to your quandary.

There is a Meyers Road on the west side of Detroit. Where Meyers Road crosses Grand River Avenue and Fullerton Street the Detroit and Orchard Lake Electric RR also crossed Meyers. Just to the south the "West Detroit Branch" of the Pere Marquette runs east and west and makes a turn to the Southeast. This location is about 3.5 miles east of Oak.

The 1905 USGS Topo Map does not show a connection. There does not seem to be a railroad that runs through either Redford or Farmington. It is possible that the house kits were shipped by rail to a siding near Grand River Ave. and unloaded to be shipped by truck to the final destination.

Modern maps also show the Detroit Terminal and PRR Union Belt lines that extend(ed) around the west side of Detroit to Highland Park and beyond. Meyers also crosses these lines about two miles to the north of the above mentioned location. These lines where built in the early 20's and really don't fit into the dates you mentioned.

This is again speculation, but the idea seems plausible. There was also a post office named Meyers in Monroe County but the exact location seems to be lost to antiquity.

Link to 1905 topo [url]http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/topo/mic ... 04.jpg/url]

[SW]

Wow, that just jogged my memory from my earliest childhood years. There WAS a station on that line (West Detroit) just west of Meyers Rd. I remember I was with my dad when we dropped someone off at the station (a temporary housekeeper when my mom was on bedrest) - would have been early 1964 or thereabouts. At the very least, it handled freight. Was there was ever passenger service on that line?

[NoviRailfan]

SR - Houses were typically delivered to the closest location where a boxcar could be unloaded and then the future owner had to retrieve the parts, usually by truck. Although the standard rail lines didn't run through Farmington, the interurban lines did. I've seen references to the interurbans hauling limited amount of freight so I'm looking at the possibility that a house in Farmington might have been delivered by the DUR. But in Redford, I'm assuming that it came from the closest PM spur.

[Standard Railfan]

I am intrigued by your research. I have learned about factory built homes either the infamous Sears home or the National home I grew up in. I never thought about how the house components were delivered.

As I think about your comments, I see how one house worth of parts would be shipped in one carload. It makes sense that the car would be spotted at the nearest team track.

The interurban part of your story is one I have never researched. I didn't realize that interurbans hauled carload freight. I always assumed out of ignorance that the only freight interurbans hauled was LCL like parcels and small shipments.

I am also curious about shipments to the Redford and Farmington areas prior to WW2. From what I learned searching for Meyers, both of those areas were rural farm communities that did not experience a lot of growth prior to the end of WW2. I wonder if there was one home builder who was a dealer for Aladdin in the area.

[NoviRailfan]

SR:
- A photo of a boxcar being loaded with parts for a kit house.

I used to have the same assumption about Interurban freight. But in doing some research on this, I came across a story of a bank in downtown Ann Arbor being leveled by runaway freight cars on the Interurban line that ran through town. Clearly, some interurban lines had freight components to them.

When I get a chance, I'll post the sales records for the Aladdin houses so that you can see what they say. If I have any luck tracking down the homes and a location, I'll post those as well.

[TrainWatcher]

The DUR at one time, if I recall did have some reliable freight service (not sure how many, but IIRC they did interchange with the PM at Plymouth at one time) out in the Plymouth, early Canton Twp and Ann Arbor areas. "When Eastern Michigan Rode the Rails", is the best (I have found) account of the DUR and all the interurban traffic out in suburban Detroit. It is also a great reference to locations that you can look at today and never realize that it didn't exist. For instance, the bridge over Hines Drive in Plymouth was actually at one time a full steel trestle, and wasn't rebuilt to it's current layout until the late 40's according to the bridge marker on the current current bridge piers by the PM.