Lakewood 100 Years Ago

A pamphlet entitled “Beautiful Lakewood” by Thomas A. Knight, published in 1902, gives a fine picture of the suburb:

In the Hamlet of Lakewood, you will find four avenues, the widest of which is 120 feet, the width of Superior Street, and the narrowest of which is 90 feet. Detroit Street has first-class streetcar service at the present time, the schedule ranging from five minutes in the wintertime to a two-minute schedule during the summer months. Several gangs of men are at work on the new boulevard car line, which will be in operation by September 1 of the present year. Work on the West Madison Avenue line will be commenced next spring, which when complete will give the people of this section three good street car lines.

The farms which no longer that ten years ago flanked Detroit Street on either side, have given place to artistically laid-out streets. With few exceptions these are of unusually good width and are paved with asphalt or brick. Lined with shade trees that are characteristic of Lakewood; garnished with well-arranged lawns and gardens, these streets present model locations for the erection of a home.

In many respects Lakewood is as much a city as a majority of the towns of the state. Its population is in the neighborhood of 5,000 with every prospect of having twice or three times this number of inhabitants within the next ten years. On the other hand, it has none of the disadvantages of city life. The objectionable features are left to Cleveland. It is from this place that the Hamlet obtains many of her necessities. There are no coal yards, no lumberyards, no supply houses to litter up her back yard and add a disagreeable side to life. And yet here necessaries are obtained as cheaply in Lakewood as in Cleveland. Coal, ice, lumber, building material, gas, water and provisions, cost no more here that elsewhere. Merchants make daily deliveries and even the milk, ice cream, bakery products and other light commodities are distributed in this manner.

Outside of two groceries, as many butcher shops, a drug store and one or two establishments there are no stores whatever in the Hamlet. Between Highland avenue and Belle avenue there are no store buildings of any kind, as is the case between Warren Road and the River, making a total distance of about three miles where there are nothing but residences.

Mazie Adams
Lakewood Historical Society Newsletter 11/02

Articles have appeared in the Lakewood Historical Society Newsletter.