Some new photos from Fort Wayne

[Rob-F]

For a century, General Electric operated a sprawling factory complex on Broadway, south of downtown, in Fort Wayne, Indiana. The factory had a huge sign with the the company's name and logo spelled out in lights mounted on the roof of one of the buildings on the east side of Broadway.


The iconic GE sign remained lit long after the company had closed the factories, but it was finally dismantled on March 29, 2016. According to a local TV news report, the company took the sign down because people had been sneaking into the building and vandalizing the sign.


I made this photograph a few weeks later, as workers were dismantling and removing the steel I-beam frame that had once supported the sign. The building in the foreground is the IUE-CWA Local 901 Union Hall on Broadway, on the south edge of the GE complex. The union had represented the GE workers prior to the closure of the factories.

The sign in 2014

Too bad! It would have been nice to be able to preserve the sign for its historic value. The vandals must have been really motivated, because the sign seems well protected, since it's on the roof. What did they do, shoot at it?

In St. Louis we have the world's largest Amoco sign. It's on a BP station now, and BP keeps it freshened up. I'll see if I can post a shot of it!

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

Too bad! It would have been nice to be able to preserve the sign for its historic value. The vandals must have been really motivated, because the sign seems well protected, since it's on the roof. What did they do, shoot at it?

In St. Louis we have the world's largest Amoco sign. It's on a BP station now, and BP keeps it freshened up. I'll see if I can post a shot of it!

I'd like to see the Amoco sign. GE did save the sign from the Fort Wayne factory; they installed it on a GE factory in another state.

 

[David Murphy]

Fascinating pics. I hope these rust belt towns make a strong comeback. I see them as places of great potential for the future. They still have so many advantages as places to live.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

Fascinating pics. I hope these rust belt towns make a strong comeback. I see them as places of great potential for the future. They still have so many advantages as places to live.

Yes, the cost of living is very low here; Fort Wayne has little crime; the midwest has plenty of water; etc. I don't understand why so many people want to live in places like California. Yes, wages are higher, but the insane housing costs destroy that advantage. Someone making $50,000 a year here has a higher standard of living than someone making $100,000 in San Francisco, for example. I live in a 3000 sq.ft. four bedroom house on a half-acre yard in a middle class neighborhood. The house is only worth $115,000. That's typical house cost here!

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

Another photo of the framework that held the sign atop the former GE factory being dismantled. This worker is brave; its a six story building!

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

This 122 year old brick building stands on the southeast corner of Harrison Street and Superior Street in downtown Fort Wayne, Indiana.


The building's original location was on the west side of Harrison Street, north of Superior Street. In January, 2018 it was moved to the northeast corner of Superior Street and Harrison Street. In February, 2019 the building was moved across Superior Street to its current and final location, on the southeast corner of Harrison and Superior.


The building was originally called the E.M. Baltes Company building, and later was known as the Cambray Building. It was moved to make way for the construction of Promenade Park, Fort Wayne's new riverfront park. The city gave the building to Don Hall's Restaurants, a local chain, in exchange for some riverfront land the company owned. They plan to open a new restaurant in it.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

Early in the morning, three Dekalb County Sheriff's Department cars parked on the street in front of Broadway Cafe in the small town of Butler, Indiana. Right after I made this photograph, the deputies all came out of the restaurant and drove off after enjoying their breakfast!

 

[David Murphy]

Yes, the cost of living is very low here; Fort Wayne has little crime; the midwest has plenty of water; etc. I don't understand why so many people want to live in places like California. Yes, wages are higher, but the insane housing costs destroy that advantage. Someone making $50,000 a year here has a higher standard of living than someone making $100,000 in San Francisco, for example. I live in a 3000 sq.ft. four bedroom house on a half-acre yard in a middle class neighborhood. The house is only worth $115,000. That's typical house cost here!

You are right Chris. At the risk of inviting political ire from some quarters, I can say that to many immigrants coming to our shores from shattered countries (and I know many of them), a place like Fort Wayne would be like Heaven. I can say the same for some struggling in the expensive coastal cities as you've noted. In your town, most people can own a lovely house, make an acceptable living, and live in peace, quiet, and freedom. The opportunities are what we make of them in life anywhere: work, art, culture, friends, nature, etc. These blessings in America are easy to take for granted sometimes. I appreciate them more and more as I grow older.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

The Butler Township District #2 Schoolhouse is a one-room brick school at Butler Center, in rural Dekalb County, Indiana. Butler Center isn't a town, just a crossroads with a couple of houses, an abandoned church, and this schoolhouse. It is the geographic center of Butler Township, at the intersection of County Road 11 and County Road 60, a few miles south of Garrett.


The owner of the schoolhouse lives in a mobile home next to the school; he uses the old schoolhouse as a garage. I've seen a lot of old brick schoolhouses in northeast Indiana that have had large doors cut into a wall so that they could be used as garages or barns.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

This is the London Guarantee Building, located on the corner of Michigan Avenue and Wacker Drive in downtown Chicago. Just as I was about to photograph the building, the man on the sidewalk stopped and stared at me!


The building was built in 1923 for an insurance company called the London Guarantee & Accident Company. It was converted into a hotel in 2016.


I made this photograph in the late 1990s, when I was still an art student.


I shot this on a film I truly miss, the original Agfa APX-400, developed in Rodinal. The So-called APX-400 films sold after AgfaPhoto went under were not the same.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

This little house with a giant American flag is on Tennessee Avenue, east of Saint Joseph Boulevard, in Fort Wayne, Indiana. The flag is so large that it nearly touches the ground!

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

Meyer's Barber Shop is in a small storefront built on to the front of an old house on Lower Huntington Road in the Waynedale area of Fort Wayne, Indiana. There is a women's styling salon in the back part of the building.


Waynedale has several hair salons for women, but Meyer's is the only barber shop! This part of Fort Wayne was once a small town; it was absorbed by the city in 1957, but it still looks like a small town.

 

[ChipMcD]

Meyer's Barber Shop is in a small storefront built on to the front of an old house on Lower Huntington Road in the Waynedale area of Fort Wayne, Indiana. There is a women's styling salon in the back part of the building.


Waynedale has several hair salons for women, but Meyer's is the only barber shop! This part of Fort Wayne was once a small town; it was absorbed by the city in 1957, but it still looks like a small town.

There are shops like this built onto houses out here in the larger Philadelphia area, and talking to the barbers is worthwhile. When Obama was running for his first term, I heard an interview with the then incumbent North Carolina Governor, who thought Obama would win the state. He said this because of consultation with his barber. He claimed that a haircut could teach as much as a political poll costing 10s of thousands of dollars because barbers had an accurate take on their communities. As he put it, "After all, this is a man who puts a straight razor to your neck and starts asking questions, and the law gives him this power."

 

[farlymac]

Happy New Year, Chris, Mack, and Sneaky!


PF

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

Happy New Year, Chris, Mack, and Sneaky!


PF

Thanks, you too! 🙂

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

Sky Show Fireworks was one of the many temporary fireworks stores that spring up every year before the Fourth of July.


It was in the old, largely vacant, brick storefront building next to the Burger King at Foster Park Plaza on Bluffton Road, just east of Brooklyn Avenue, in Fort Wayne, Indiana. The store was closed since the holiday had passed by the time I photographed it, but their sign and American flags were still on display atop the building.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

A woman checks her cellphone while standing in the doorway of the former Hotel Butler building on Broadway (State Road 1), between Main Street and Oak Street, in the small town of Butler, Indiana.


The building is now an apartment building called Broadway Efficiencies. I photographed it back in June.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

Teenagers paddleboarding on the Saint Marys River at Promenade Park in downtown Fort Wayne, Indiana. I don't know how they can balance on those little floating boards; I'd fall in the river as soon as I tried standing up! I photographed them last summer.

 

[froyd]

This little house is on High Street, between Orchard Street and Marion Street (a few blocks west of Wells Street), on the working-class northwest side of Fort Wayne, Indiana.

I always appreciate a photo with an empty chair in it, and this one has three so triple the appeal!

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

I always appreciate a photo with an empty chair in it, and this one has three so triple the appeal!

Thanks, Froyd.

This house is on Main Street in the small town of Hudson, Indiana. The sign in the yard says: "Bless God America - God Bless America."

Hudson is on the southern edge of Steuben County. It adjoins the larger Dekalb County town of Ashley, and the twinned towns are often referred to as Ashley-Hudson.