Riverwalk Area

Riverwalk Area

Today’s Riverwalk was once a part of Lafayette Street and before that was called East Water Street. The first house along the Riverwalk was that of Cyprian S. and Delaney Hooker. Their 16-year-old son John Hooker and several neighbor Odawa floated the lumber down the Flat River from the sawmill at Fallasburg and helped build the house in December 1846. The house was located roughly where the Flat River Grill’s Tributary is today. The east side of the house was rented out by Chapin and Booth to sell dry goods. The Hooker family lived in the west side. It was here that Reverend S. S. Brown held the first church service in Dansville (as Lowell was first called) in 1848.

An article written in 1885 describes a cooper shop (wooden barrel making shop) located behind the Hooker’s house along the river. It recorded that “Robert Marshall came to Lowell in an early day, purchased the cooper shop along the east bank of Flat River, Oct. 15, 1858, and has owned and controlled it ever since. This shop has remained the old standard one of this place; others have risen, flourished for a time, and went out. Marshall's cooper shop has for a long time filled all orders of our large and flourishing flour mills. About five years ago, when the flouring mills shipped flour in cloth sacks to a large extent, Mr. Marshall did not propose to be idle, but purchased the engine, boiler and tools of a handle factory, put them in the north end of his shop, and turns ax handles, whiffletrees, neck yokes, and other handles to the amount of $2,000 annually. The cooper shop turned out in 1880, 28,000 flour barrels, 18,000 apple barrels, and 200 pork barrels, besides other smaller tubs and casks. Marshall’s Cooper shop was still in business in 1900. They made barrels for King Milling Co and had as many as 20 employees. In 1902,  the Lowell Cooper Shop was still making apple barrels, and flour barrels for King Milling.

In the early 1900s a second cooper shop along the river was owned by King Milling. The King Milling Cooper shop was further up the Riverwalk almost to the boat launch. It was in part of the old King, Quick, King sawmill building. In 1909 an article reported, “King Milling company purchased the large Clark barn, now used as livery by Birt Carr, and expects next spring to move it to its cooperage lot and install a complete cooperage machinery plant. This will enable the company to expedite rush orders on apple barrels and to do a larger business than with entire dependence upon scarce hand labor.” In 1934 the King Milling cooper shop was sold to the Lowell Board of Education and demolished. It became the playground area for the school.

In 1910, Charles Billinger of Elmdale moved to Lowell and built a cement block machine and auto repair shop, 30’x50’, on Marshall’s old cooper shop lot.

In 1937, a Municipal Garage was built by the Works Progress Administration (WPA) under the direction of foreman Archie Lewis on Lafayette Street at the intersection of Avery Street. A force of 25 men first had to raze the old Gould Garage building on the site. The new garage had four purposes: to house village trucks and autos, to house Showboat equipment, for use by the American Legion post, and to hold 30 rows of Showboat bleacher seats on the roof with each row being about 80 feet long. The building had a frontage on Lafayette St of 86 feet and was 55.5 feet deep. It was one story high, all steel and concrete construction and had concrete pillars measuring about three-foot square to support the roof. Wayne Dowling operated Lowell Automotive, a NAPA parts store, at 113-115 Lafayette St. from 1973-1995. The Lowell Chamber of Commerce moved here in 2000. Part of the Municipal Garage was renovated in 2021 to include public restrooms.

In 1947, Lafayette Street was quite a business district. The businesses found there included:  Williams Radio Service; Myrle Kingdom, machine shop; Stanley (Mike) Lewis, cement contractor; Elizabeth Phelps, paper agency; and Bob Starkey, electrician.

Part of Lafayette Street between Main and King Streets was closed to traffic in 1996 and turned into the “Riverwalk.” The first Riverwalk Festival was a two-day event over Labor Day Weekend in 1995, 30 years ago. More about the Festival will be discussed in another  article.

Images
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The King Milling cooper shop was in the old King, Quick and King Sawmill building along the Riverwalk just south of today’s boat launch. Some of the coopers in this picture were Frank Randall, Shorty William, Sol Randall, Gus S. Schenard, and Harry Delk.

This lithograph from 1870 shows the Cyprian Hooker house, the first frame house in Lowell built in 1846, was on the west end of the block centered where The Tributary restaurant is located today.  In 1858, Robert Marshall operated a cooper shop behind Main Street facing the river across the Riverwalk from where the Showboat is today for nearly 50 years.

Cyprian S. Hooker in 1876

Robert Marshall in 1876.

This 1885 map shows Robert Marshall’s Cooper Shop and Handle factory along the E. Water Street (Riverwalk). The barrel making was done on the south end of the building and the handle making on the north. The engine and boiler can be seen on the northeast end. There were several warehouses, a shed, a coal storage building, two liveries and two dwellings in the area behind the Main Street businesses. There were perhaps wooden walkways from the saloon to the livery across the alley.

This 1900 map shows the Robert Marshall Cooper shop along E. Water Street along with a warehouse, coal storage and two sheds.

The 1910 map shows that the cooper shop is gone. Dr. Towsley’s new barn was built in 1906 on Monroe St. north of the current North Country Trail building on Main Street. Dr. Draper used it as his blacksmith shop pre-1910 when he built his Main Street building (currently Roger’s Neighborhood Realty). E. M. Doxey of Sturgis bought the Towsley barns in Jan. 1910 to be used after Dr. Draper moved to his new location.

Map of 1910 shows the King Milling Co. Cooper Shop and Storage. This was north of the Englehardt Library along today’s Riverwalk. The building could have been part of the former sawmill building or else was reconstructed from the Clark barn they purchased in 1909.

Map dated to 1955 shows that the Showboat grandstand is above the roof of the Municipal Garage, Auto repair shop and warehouse. It temporarily extended down into Lafayette and Avery streets during the week of Showboat. Showboat performances were at this location until 1974 when the amphitheater was built on the north end of the Riverwalk.

The men are building a temporary bleacher extension for Showboat, 1958. The school’s home economics house can be seen on the left. The house was purchased by the school district to be used for classses about cooking, sweing and other useful homemaking skills. The house was razed in 1975. The furnishings were sold at that time and Museum Curator Luanne Kaeb’s mother purchased the bedroom suite from upstairs. It was said that Louis Armstrong slept here the nights he performed at Showboat.