Album
Battelstein's Wig - Houston Texas
Battelstein's was Houston's earliest and largest department store. Philip Battelstein built this "multimillion dollar merchandising firm from a handmade tailor’s bench” and he immigrated to America at the age of 13 with just $.50 in his pocket. In 1897, he moved to Houston, where he opened a shop in a 12 ft. x 12 ft. space in the Prince Theater building next to Sweeney and Combs Opera House.
The first shop burned down, but Philip opened another at 618 Main Street. His sons, Abe and Henry eventually joined him in the growing business. In 1924, the store again suffered from a fire and Battelstein - again - opened another shop on Main Street.
By the mid-twentieth century, Houstonians were becoming more prosperous with the growth of the oil industry, and downtown was the leading area for retail shopping. Houston's population grew from just under 50,000 in 1900 to over half a million by 1950.
Thus, Battelstein’s business went from a "small tailoring shop to a glittering many-storied downtown store." By 1950, Battelstein’s enlarged to include 10 floors in its downtown location and added a lady’s shoe department. After many decades of great success in Houston the retail enterprise was closed in 1981. #abandoned #houston #texas #retailapocalypse #nightphotography #lightpainting
Northridge Mall, Milwaukee, WI
We met up with some amazing people in Milwaukee who brought us to the vandalized ruins of the Northridge Mall (opened in 1972). Northridge is one of the last remaining dead malls of America. Others, such as Rolling Acres (Akron, OH) or Dixie Square (Harvey, IL) are long gone. Northridge is close to that fate. "The city wants to pull the plug," said a Milwaukee Magazine article. "But a nebulous, name-changing, promise-unfulfilling [corporation] with unclear intentions is keeping the ventilator plugged in." The million-square-foot building almost seems cursed - starting in 1992, Jesse Anderson stabbed his wife to death in the parking lot and claimed that two African American men were to blame. Later, it was revealed that Anderson (a White man) fabricated the story. More recently, 37-year-old father-of-six, Victor Diaz (a handyman at the abandoned mall) died after being electrocuted by a damaged transformer outside the mall (likely due to vandals or copper thieves).
It's possible the Northridge Mall could have been reused, but the building's corporate owners neglected to keep the building heated. Earlier owners placed thermometers along the walls of the building and asked the building to be kept at least above 32 degrees. When journalist Andy Tarnoff visited the building in 2012, he noted that the thermometers were all below freezing. Undoubtedly, pipes burst that winter, causing irreperable water damage.
By 2019, the City of Milwaukee ordered the demolition of the building and later that year, Victor Diaz was electrocuted while trying to repair a fuse box. Ironically (and perhaps unsurprisingly) this symbol of conspicuous consumption is now beyond salvage. Even worse, taxpayers will be partly responsible for its demolition and removal. In December of 2023, Governor Tony Evers awarded a $15 million American Rescue Plan Act grant to cover the demolition costs of this private development...
Epworth Methodist Episcopal Church Theatre
The basement theater of Mary Manse College. The building originally housed the Epworth Methodist Episcopal Church, which was originally founded in Toledo, Ohio in 1894. In 1958, an arsonist's fire destroyed much of the interior and the congregation move elsewhere, leaving the 1890s church vacant. Mary Manse College bought the property in 1960, and started raising money to convert it into a library. Over the next seven years a flat roof replaced the original peaked one lost in the fire, and the nave was converted into a three-story library holding 52,000 books. A 154-seat auditorium was installed in the basement, along with audio / visual rooms and offices. Construction was completed in the spring of 1967.
Mary Manse College closed in 1975 due to financial problems. In 1991, the building was bought and reopened by a small Church of God in Christ congregation, which used the first floor for services. Exactly when the church left is unknown, but the building has since fallen into deep disrepair, with water ruining the remaining books and causing heavy structural damage.
Schmit Family Farm, Bryant, Indiana
Not much is known about the Schmit family of Bryant, Indiana. I discovered that their family was large and Catholic. The Schmits were committed to agriculture, and had a long history in the community of supporting the FFA and 4-H. Schmit children served in the armed forces and had a deep conviction to their faith and country. Campaign paraphrenelia in their home indicates that they supported the Wallace-LeMay campaign of 1968 (Wallace was a strong supporter in states rights for racial segregation). In the end, Nixon won, and we all know how that turned out...
Notes in the home indicate that the final resident was Robert "Bob" F. Schmit, who passed away Dec 5, 2019, in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Bob was well liked and respected in his small, rural community, receiving the Citizen of the Year award in 2012 and recognized in the FFA Ag Hall of Fame. He enjoyed taking friends and family members to the Indianapolis 500. He owned a number of classic cars, which - to this day - sit abandoned on his property. He was the first among his many siblings to pass away. His home - the historic home of his parents and siblings - sits abandoned and collapsing in Bryant, Indiana.
As a photographer, I am conflicted in sharing these private family moments and artifacts. I enjoy sharing the stories (controversial and complicated) of the past, but I never want to judge or implicate a particular family for their own experiences until they can speak for themselves. I appreciate their past, but I also know that we are moving forward as a country and as a culture. There are scores of families like the Schmits - who may have possibly moved politically/culturally forward themselves (I hope). I know I have invaded their privacy, and for that I hope I am forgiven. I am only sharing a moment in the past, despite its flaws and distance. I hope we can accept that people change.
Tanner's Creek Generating Station
Tanner's Creek was a large, 1100-MWe coal-fired power plant along the Ohio River in Lawrenceburg, Indiana. Its four generating units, ranging in capacity from 153 MW to 580MW were put into service between 1951 and 1964. In 2015, Indiana Michigan Power announced that the plant would close, and 92 workers were subsequently laid off. The company decided to idle the plant in order to meet EPA emission standards. The plant was sold to St. Louis–based Commercial Development Company in October 2016 with the ultimate intention of converting the property into the Indiana's fourth port. The building, generating units, and smokestack have since been demolished, heralding an era of new, cleaner energy for the region. Special thanks to @Lisa for sharing.
Marble Window Sill - Edgewood / Queen City Nursing Home
A. E. Burckhardt House / Edgewood / Queen City Nursing Home was built in 1886 as the "country" estate of Bavarian-born furrier Adam Edward Burkhardt. The renowned Cincinnati architectural firm of Samuel Hannaford & Sons was hired to design a lavish Romanesque, Queen Anne, and Victorian-style mansion that contained 33 rooms with ten bedrooms, seven bathrooms, and approximately 8,000 square feet of living space.
In all of Avondale there is no place more beautiful than Edgewood, the home of Mrs. A.E. Burkhardt, and in all the annals of Cincinnati’s social history, no reception has excelled in sumptuous appointment the one she gave yesterday to meet her niece, Miss Clara Erkenbrecher. The house of stone is built on the edge of one of the most picturesque woods in the Ohio valley and has a far-away view from every outlook.
In 1892, the Cincinnati Enquirer described the mansion as having an "interior is of royal magnificence, with its rare painting and statuary pieces from the A. T. Stewart collection, bric-a-brac picked up at intervals in Europe, and an abundant wealth of the floral world filled the house with delicious perfume and added to the general gorgeous effect... The rooms above the stairs were greatly admired, especially the Moorish room, and Mr. Albert Erkenbrecher’s bachelor quarters on the third floor."
After several owners, the mansion was converted into the Queen City Rest Home in 1946, later becoming the Queen City Nursing Home. The mansion was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in March 1980 and remained in operation as a nursing home with 37 beds until 2004. It was acquired for $250,000 in 2005 and was proposed for demolition in 2014.
Gabe's Tower in Owensboro, Kentucky
Gabe's Tower was a 1963 motel, which made it likely to be the oldest freestanding, cylindrical tower in the country of its kind. With its groovy cylindrical form, its pastel-paneled façade, its 12th-floor restaurant and cocktail lounge, and its heated roof garden with swimming pool and retractable glass roof by local architect R. Ben Johnson (1921-2009) for restaurateur and local legend, Gabe Fiorella, Sr. (1900-1977), Gabe's Tower was the hippest place in town in the 1960s and ‘70s.
The tower was owned for a period of time with intentions of being converted into housing for homeless veterans. Plans fell through and the city of Ownesboro put out an RFP for development proposals in November of 2019. Nobody came forward and the city soon demolished Gabe's. Gabe's no longer exists.
Loch Sheldrake Diner turned Laundromat
The former Hollywood Diner is a Kullman from the 1940s. It was gutted for use as a laundromat and has been abandoned for years.
The property was included in the book 'Diners of New York' by Michael Engle and Mario Monti, First Edition, 2008. The following is an excerpt taken from page 202: "The former Hollywood Diner is in Loch Sheldrake, five miles east of Liberty on Route 52. This shell of a Kullman Challenger diner from the 1930s sits near the lake."
Gundlach School
Gundlach School was constructed in 1931 in the Jacobethan style. This historic structure boasts over 35,000 square feet, terrazzo floors, marble work, woodwork, and intricately designed railings and light fixtures. The school, like hundreds of others in the greater St. Louis area, was constructed in the quintessential "Ittner" style, named after the leading school architect of the early 20th century, William B. Ittner.
Wayne Braslerw attended a nearby school, but frequently found himself in Gundlach in the 1950s. "Gundlach impressed with its wide hallways, linoleum floors and something Laclede (my school) did not offer - a lunchroom! With really delicious dining! At the time, St. Louis public schools ranked among the best in the nation and the most creative."
Gundlach closed forever in 2009. The public school system in St Louis is currently offering it up for sale to private developers.
Loch Sheldrake Diner turned Laundromat
The former Hollywood Diner is a "Kullman" from the 1940s. It was gutted for use as a laundromat and has been abandoned for years.
The property was included in the book 'Diners of New York' by Michael Engle and Mario Monti, First Edition, 2008. The following is an excerpt taken from page 202: "The former Hollywood Diner is in Loch Sheldrake, five miles east of Liberty on Route 52. This shell of a Kullman Challenger diner from the 1930s sits near the lake."
Northridge Mall, Milwaukee, WI
We met up with some amazing people in Milwaukee who brought us to the vandalized ruins of the Northridge Mall (opened in 1972). Northridge is one of the last remaining dead malls of America. Others, such as Rolling Acres (Akron, OH) or Dixie Square (Harvey, IL) are long gone. Northridge is close to that fate. "The city wants to pull the plug," said a Milwaukee Magazine article. "But a nebulous, name-changing, promise-unfulfilling [corporation] with unclear intentions is keeping the ventilator plugged in." The million-square-foot building almost seems cursed - starting in 1992, Jesse Anderson stabbed his wife to death in the parking lot and claimed that two African American men were to blame. Later, it was revealed that Anderson (a White man) fabricated the story. More recently, 37-year-old father-of-six, Victor Diaz (a handyman at the abandoned mall) died after being electrocuted by a damaged transformer outside the mall (likely due to vandals or copper thieves).
It's possible the Northridge Mall could have been reused, but the building's corporate owners neglected to keep the building heated. Earlier owners placed thermometers along the walls of the building and asked the building to be kept at least above 32 degrees. When journalist Andy Tarnoff visited the building in 2012, he noted that the thermometers were all below freezing. Undoubtedly, pipes burst that winter, causing irreperable water damage.
By 2019, the City of Milwaukee ordered the demolition of the building and later that year, Victor Diaz was electrocuted while trying to repair a fuse box. Ironically (and perhaps unsurprisingly) this symbol of conspicuous consumption is now beyond salvage. Even worse, taxpayers will be partly responsible for its demolition and removal. In December of 2023, Governor Tony Evers awarded a $15 million American Rescue Plan Act grant to cover the demolition costs of this private development...
Penn-McKee Hotel - McKeesport, PA
Abandoned Penn-McKee Diner Counter, McKeesport, Pennsylvania. Pittsburgh and McKeesport were in hot competition in 1926, and the Penn-McKee Hotel was at the center. Designed by renowned architect Benno Janssen at the behest of McKeesport civic leaders, Penn-McKee stretched an entire block and featured 98 modern rooms, a coffee shop, lunch room, and cocktail lounge.
Its highlight was a glass-ceilinged, crystal-chandeliered, 700-seat ballroom featuring a 60-by-75-foot parquet dance floor built to accommodate 250 couples.
Penn-McKee was known most famously for hosting the first Kennedy-Nixon debate in the spring of 1947 (over a decade before the presidential election). Nixon felt that the debate created a bond between him and JFK, with Nixon self-proclaiming victory. Little did Nixon know...
Holding the debate in McKeesport was an intentional choice, says Dr. Charles McCollester, retired labor history professor at the Indiana University of Pennsylvania. "It was the heart of an area where more than 100,000 unionized industrial workers were employed and central to the emerging post-World War II economy."
By the 1970s, the hotel had changed owners and fallen on hard times. Unions were dying. Penn-McKee had become a boarding house for the poor and elderly in the 1980s. Within a decade, it had become vacant and gutted. Labor was dead - or so it seemed...
Posey Tube Exhaust System
The beautiful and functional exhaust system of the 1928 Posey Tube of Alameda / Oakland, California. It was the first tunnel for road traffic built using the immersed tube technique. The 4,436-foot-long tunnel was the first precast concrete tube, and was cast at Hunter's Point by California Bridge & Tunnel Company. Each approach to the tunnel is buffeted by Art Deco ventilation buildings designed by architect Henry H. Meyers, which house the massive fans.
Unlike earlier tunnels, which were ventilated in one direction with fresh air coming in one end and vehicle exhaust out the other, the Posey Tube was one of the earliest to use two fan systems, one for exhaust, which was channeled above the vehicles through an elaborate system of louvers and board formed concrete desgned in intracate curves; the other fan system provided fresh air through the floor of the tunnel.
One piece of interesting trivia about the Posey Tube: A pair of canaries were used during construction as living air monitors; although one canary died during construction, it was an accident caused by being penned up with a pet cat and not a toxic atmosphere.
In 2016, the towers were completely rehabilitated and a new security system was added, making the tunnels no longer accessible to illicit explorers looking to photograph the hidden passageways and nooks of the system. We took our last photos here in late 2014. There are public tours of some sections now available through Oakland Heritage Alliance, which I strongly recommend!
Sakai - Oishi Nursery - Richmond, California
The Sakai nursery started in 1906 with an initial 2.5 acres in Richmond and a single greenhouse salvaged from Berkeley. Sakai shut down in 1942 during the World War II relocation of Japanese-Americans in concentration camps. It was arguably the last of the intact pre-WW II Japanese nurseries in California. The Sakai nursery - at one time - included over 40 structures, including greenhouses, warehouses, residences, sheds, and more. In a deal that included preservation of just a few structures (less than half a dozen), some 80 affordable housing units were constructed. The historic buildings became an afterthought, and the home of the Sakai family, including the few existing remnants of their ingenuity and perseverance remain rotting and victim to vandalism and the ravages of time. There is no question: Housing matters, but so do stories... Apparently housing trumped the difficult and important story of Japanese Americans being unjustly imprisoned (incarcerated?). History and housing are complementary. Sickening that someone wasn't creative enough to think of the bright idea that affordable housing can tell the stories of shame and contrition. Otherwise, it seems whoever let the Sakai buildings decay is apparently erasing genocide in place of their own benefit, which is something our decision-makers should answer to (provided that their well-funded special interests don't ask them first) #abandonedca #demolished #thisplacemattered #richmondca #affordablehousing
Northridge Mall Theatre, Milwaukee
We met up with some amazing people in Milwaukee who brought us to the vandalized ruins of the Northridge Mall (opened in 1972). Northridge is one of the last remaining dead malls of America. Others, such as Rolling Acres (Akron, OH) or Dixie Square (Harvey, IL) are long gone. Northridge is close to that fate. "The city wants to pull the plug," said a Milwaukee Magazine article. "But a nebulous, name-changing, promise-unfulfilling [corporation] with unclear intentions is keeping the ventilator plugged in." The million-square-foot building almost seems cursed - starting in 1992, Jesse Anderson stabbed his wife to death in the parking lot and claimed that two African American men were to blame. Later, it was revealed that Anderson (a White man) fabricated the story. More recently, 37-year-old father-of-six, Victor Diaz (a handyman at the abandoned mall) died after being electrocuted by a damaged transformer outside the mall (likely due to vandals or copper thieves).
It's possible the Northridge Mall could have been reused, but the building's corporate owners neglected to keep the building heated. Earlier owners placed thermometers along the walls of the building and asked the building to be kept at least above 32 degrees. When journalist Andy Tarnoff visited the building in 2012, he noted that the thermometers were all below freezing. Undoubtedly, pipes burst that winter, causing irreperable water damage.
By 2019, the City of Milwaukee ordered the demolition of the building and later that year, Victor Diaz was electrocuted while trying to repair a fuse box. Ironically (and perhaps unsurprisingly) this symbol of conspicuous consumption is now beyond salvage. Even worse, taxpayers will be partly responsible for its demolition and removal. In December of 2023, Governor Tony Evers awarded a $15 million American Rescue Plan Act grant to cover the demolition costs of this private development...
