A Few Laps Around Tenney-Lapham

On one summer's day I found myself with a couple hours to blow as my car was being deep cleaned in preparation for a lengthy trip. While a cup o' Joe from the shiny new coffeehouse down the street sounded good, I was by this time already fully caffeinated. And so I hit the pavement.

The first thing that came to mind was to take a couple snaps for a pair of then and now scenarios. A reader had directed me to the Madison Railroads Instagram page and I thought it'd be fun to take a look at what the streetscapes looked like now in a couple of the old photographs.

This first picture shows a train crossing Dickinson Street in 1965.



I believe I managed to take my snap from more or less the same spot.



A few blocks east at Dickinson and Wilson Street was this scene back in the late 1960s.



And here's the intersection sans railroad tracks today.



It is weird to contemplate trains traveling right down the center of Wilson Street but so it was. For more about trains – passenger rail – in Madison, checkout my blathering and other people's really neat photographs here.

Just up the street I ducked down Northern Court and found Stateline Distillery. I hadn't sampled their spirits at the time but have since come to appreciate their gin.



Across the street was this anthropomorphized glass block.



Back up Dickinson I went where I detoured to check out the seemingly abandoned warehouse on the 1400 block of East Washington. I think it's owned by the Mullins Group. Quite recently I learned that this building used to be the Red Dot potato chip factory. There is a room on the south side of the building that you can peer into. When I did so, I saw a few artistic ditties leaning against the wall.



Crossing East Washington I found myself in the Tenny-Lapham neighborhood. The Tenney half of the name is for Daniel Tenney who was a member of the Madison Common Council and an important early figure in the formation of Madison parks. Increase Lapham was a naturalist who resided in Milwaukee. He mapped the Wisconsin Territory, charted Native American effigy mounds, and studied the flora and fauna of the state. In addition to having half a neighborhood named after him, there's also an elementary school and a beer.

I zipped over to the Yahara River Parkway and down to the shore.



Being in a train mood, I decided to check out the rails that traverse the Yahara River.



I'm not sure when the second set of tracks was removed. There was a pile of disused timbers (a.k.a. – sleepers) slowly decaying away off to the side as well as a cement base for what I presumed was a signal. Tucked away in the trees was a utility pole which presumably powered the signal at some point.



Down by the river were more remnants of railroading past. A section of conduit came to an abrupt end while what I figured was the base of a pile(?) stood empty.



Back down to East Wash I moseyed around the building that is home to the Parched Eagle Taproom and the Art In.



The building is home to perhaps the most positive, self-image boosting sign in the city.



Back to Dickinson and northwards where I poked around all of the sheds around Dayton and Mifflin. I recalled an article in Isthmus about the Trachte Bros. Company who made metal buildings in Madison from 1919 until 1986.



Were any of these sheds Trachte Sheds? Indeed some were.



I felt a bit sad that, despite having lived just down the street for a few years, I couldn't recall ever having checked out this part of the neighborhood during that time. Better late than never, I suppose.

Next stop: trying to find the house I used to live in.

A few more laps

Summertime Perambulations: Homeward Bound

Previous perambulation

The final leg of my journey saw me back in Eastmorland ambling down Atwood Avenue. The owners of one home apparently got tired of mowing and so their front yard was full of flowers and other non-grass plants. I did a double take when I saw cacti amongst the flora.



It had been a while since I'd seen cacti outside in Wisconsin – since my visit to the Wisconsin Desert, in fact.

Somehow the southeast corner of the intersection of Atwood Avenue and Cottage Grove Road became mural central without me noticing. One day the art treatment on one building caught my attention and then on my next visit to Walgreens it appeared as if the murals had multiplied like rabbits because they were all over the place. The Rockwell Tattoo parlor, Java Cat, Exhaust Pros, Jade Monkey, and the mall all have all been muraled up. So here are a few of them beginning with the Exhaust Pros building which looks like it was conceived by the same person who did the Karben4 logo while they were playing QBert.









Of course the utility box on the corner has been artified and of course I forgot to take a picture of it.

The area around the intersection was designated as one of two "activity centers" a few years back by the city and thusly city planners developed a, um, plan (PDF) for it. It makes various recommendations to increase population density, promote economic development, make use of vacant space, and whatnot. And now an apartment complex called The Grove is under construction on the north side of Cottage Grove Road. It will be mostly low income apartments with retail at ground level.



The mall across the street seems to be on life support. The Ace Hardware store which used to occupy most of it is sadly missed. By me, anyway. The space formerly occupied by Ace is now the temporary Pinney Library whose new home is under construction down the street. Closing signs cluttered the windows of the Bethesda Thrift Store. That leaves an art supply store and Diane's Draperies. My understanding is that the owner of the mall is looking to sell, figuring that they could fetch a good price with all of the development happening in the area. Hence the short-term lease offered to Ace and that its closure.

Farther east on Cottage Grove Road is Chief's Tavern.



I still think of it as the Packer Inn, the joint where Madison-area music legends The Goose Island Ramblers played regularly after the campus bar Glen and Ann's became The Nitty Gritty.



The former Surco Peruvian restaurant building looks to have some renovation going on but I don't know if a business is actually going to move in.

Even bigger than The Grove development is Royster Corners, the foremost project in this 70 acre plot that was formerly home to a fertilizer factory.



It's a sprawling mixed-use thing to be anchored by the new Pinney Library. If Eric Klinenberg is right, the area's civic life should improve. I can certainly see it as a spot where low- and middle-income residents will meet and socialize. In addition to the library, the complex will have market rate apartments and retail.

Just across Royster Oaks Drive are the Pinney Lane Apartments, another complex with low-income housing. I hadn't noticed the artwork/plaything in the courtyard previously It's like a Möbius strip that has been cut.



In the same area there are a few dozen plots for single-family houses. There are 7 or 8 homes now either occupied or to be soon.



What really surprised me was that there was an alley, a rarity in Madison.



I look forward to seeing what comes of it all – the shiny new library which has the potential to be a meeting ground for residents old and new, middle-class and of lesser means; all of the new commercial space too. I don't expect a brewpub or any other such marker of "gentrification" but some restaurants would be nice. Plus a hardware store, pet supply store, bookstore, and a record store, please.

Oh, and better bus service would be nice. Madison Metro has changed the route of the 38 bus to accommodate the Royster Commons development but it only runs on weekdays and only during rush hours. The future residents of The Grove will be better served by transit but all-day routes that run on Atwood Avenue only appear once an hour. While The Grove and Royster Commons gets all the press, an apartment building went up on Claire Street just south of Cottage Grove Road not too long ago. Considering the arterial status of Cottage Grove Road, it's a shame that buses mostly serve it via north-south routes instead of one that runs the length of the street. This really exaggerates the division caused by Highway 51.

It was time to circle back and head home so I made my way to the bike path, a.k.a. – the Capital City Trail. I had to cross a couple sets of railroad tracks including one that was abandoned. I'm guessing that happened back in c.2006 when the fertilizer factory closed as this spur turns to the south where the factory was and joins the main line a few blocks to the west.



There's a retention pond here that is home to a native Wisconsin plant farm as well as geese aplenty.

I hoofed it down the trail until Ring Street where another retention pond starts and I walked along it.



While it took some stooping, I made my way under Dennett Drive and saw the light at the end of the tunnel.



I also pissed off a lot of spiders as most of their webs ended up in my hair. Besides seeing a lot of minnows in the water, I saw a couple of turtles.





Not being a herpetologist, I am not sure what varieties they are but my hypothesis is that the top one is a painted turtle while the bottom is a juvenile snapping turtle.

I emerged at Walter Street, where this trek began, with sore feet.

Summertime Perambulations: On the Shoreline

Previous perambulation

Walking along the northern shore of the Yahara River means walking through people's backyards. One gentleman was doing some littoral lounging and flashed me the peace sign as I walked by. It doesn't get much more Madison than that. Reaching Lake Monona I came to Yahara Place Park, the home of the final Sid Boyum sculpture** that I see on my walk, "FuDog Lantern".



Does anyone know why lakes with a Native American name are "Lake " while those with English names are " Lake"? So, for instance, in the Madison area you have Lake Monona and Mud Lake. And why don't rivers have the same naming convention? It's the Yahara River and the Rock River, by way of comparison, not River Yahara. You sometimes hear "The River Thames" but never "The River Mississippi" or "The River Danube". The Brits just have to be different. I wonder if they have something similar wit, say, Welsh names for lakes.

Apparently "Yahara" is a corruption or bad translation of the Winnebago word for "catfish". While I'm at it, the origin of "Monona" is unknown but it is theorized that it may be a corruption of the name of a goddess of the Sauk-Fox people.

There was a nice breeze coming off the lake as I traversed the northern shore and I was quite pleased that it didn't reek of algae or decaying fish. I eventually made it onto Lakeland Avenue which is home to some Native American effigy mounds.





Here's a map of mounds present and past on one stretch of Lakeland Ave.



Robert Birmingham is the expert when it comes to the area's effigy mounds and his Spirits of Earth is, according to former co-workers at the Wisconsin Historical Society, the definitive work on the subject. However, here's a nice blog post about the mounds to tide over any inquiring minds until they buy the book.



Continuing I walked by the Corry Carriage House which is a city landmark built in 1911.



**I also spied a sculpture in someone's front yard which was of a horse or unicorn in faded blue that I thought was rather neat and Boyum-esque. Only later did I read that it was, in fact, "Fantasy Seahorse" by the man himself. Oops.

Before long I made it to Olbrich Park and found this bit of art near the shore.





A cursory exploration of Google turned up nothing about this installation. Still, I rather like it.

Nearby was a memorial for someone named Ernie who presumably is no longer with us.



Over where Starkweather Creek meets Lake Monona is "ACT" by William King.



This twenty-some-odd foot tall bit of aluminum statuary dates back to 1979 and its original home was behind the Civic Center, now the Overture Center. I am not sure when it was moved. Perhaps when the OC was built.

Strolling up the shore of the creek and onto Atwood Avenue, it wasn't long before I was back in my native Eastmorland neighborhood where there was more yet to be explored.

Onward to the journey's end

Summertime Perambulations: Sex and Chocolate

Previous perambulation

In our last exciting episode we left off as I was exiting Tangent after having had a spot of lunch and a most salutary gruit. It didn't take long for another ghost sign to come into view. All of ten feet or so.



The front of the building also has a ghost sign – "STORAGE" – but I neglected to take a photo.

Strolling down East Washington I couldn't help but be somewhat amazed at all the tall buildings. Well, tall for Madison. This despite riding a bus past the Constellation, the Galaxie, the Sparx, etc. every weekday to and from work. While I perceive them as normal parts of the streetscape, I suppose, these "skyscrapers" are still new to me having gotten used to a street without them for so long. They get 10 out of 10 points for ridding us of empty lots but minus several million for style.

At Paterson Street I find myself in front of the old Gardner's Bakery with some of a ghost sign visible from down below.



Just across Paterson in front of the still shiny new Hotel Indigo is another decorated utility box. I find this one much more pleasing than the faux fabric of the box at Winnebago Street and Riverside Drive.



On a building on the 1000 block of East Wash I spied some metallic star hoolies.



I had noticed similar things a couple blocks up on the Gisholt building during a previous walk.



Anyone care to take a guess as to what they were for? Mounting points for awnings or some such things, perhaps? I cannot find any historic photographs showing any awnings, however, nor anything hanging off the facade.

Across the street is a harbinger of things to come.



This nice little pocket of greenspace will soon be no more as an 11-storey mixed use building is soon to be erected. And behind it will be the Madison Youth Arts Center.

Continuing my trek, I walked by the city building where fire trucks are kept in working order.



But now that the city has a fleet services building on the way, I suppose this one will be sold and developed into yet another mixed-use affair.

By this point I needed chocolate. But before I would be able to fulfill that desire, I had to take a photo of some locally-sourced graffiti lovingly spray painted in honor of one of the best rock bands Madison has ever produced. This has sadly been painted over since.



Just listen to the glorious "King of Sex". Listen!

Crossing the river I came to my next destination: CocoVaa. The proprietor is my wife's cousin and she makes sinfully tasty chocolates.



Vata won some fancy schmancy award last year and she most certainly deserved it. Her chocolates not only taste magnificent they also look like works of art. Now if I could only get a steep family discount.

I threw the bonbons into my backpack but a pain au chocolat was quickly gobbled down as traveled the riverside east to Lake Monona.

To the shores of Monona Lake