Beautiful RavenswoodEnabling RoadsGrand River Ave. traces one of the seven or eight significant Indian trials that led to De'troit as the French called it, the town on the Straits. It travels ZZZ miles from the city center through the northwestern suburbs to Brighton, Howell and finally parallels the Grand River before it passes through Lansing, Michigan's state capital. In 1840 the Old Grand River Indian Trail was nothing more than a couple of muddy, muddy ruts. which was often impassable for months of the year. In the late 1840s, plank roads appeared in the United States, and the General Plank Road Act of 1850 allowed private companies in Michigan to build plank roads as long as they met certain specifications. The streets were 16 feet wide, one-inch thick oak or pine with mandatory drainage ditches on each side. 1851 saw the incorporation of the Detroit-Howell Plank Road Company which included such Detroit notables as James Couzens and Lewis Cass among its investors. The new 50-mile turnpike to Howell would later be connected to the capital via the Howell-Lansing Plank road in 1852. Toll booths were installed at intervals of every 5 miles along the oak planks, and lodging houses and taverns often sprang up in these locations . Note: (The intersection of Grand River and Joy Road is exactly 5 miles northwest of Woodward.) Tolls collected at these locations were $xx per mile, and interestingly, many villages sprang up around these ramp predecessors access. Some of these cities survive today as suburbs and cosmopolitan municipalities. Cities like Redford, Farmington, Novi, Howell and Brighton were all stops along the Detroit – Howell – Lansing route. Today a bus stop, the Botsford Inn in Livonia at Grand River and Mi......center of paper......still did a booming business and you could do all your shopping within walking distance away. During this time, small businesses flourished at the intersection of Joy and Grand River. Delis, pharmacies, dime stores, barbers, butchers, and grocery stores set up shop in this neighborhood that grew denser by the day. The neighborhood was becoming so crowded that it even had its own hook and ladder company, XXX at 8xxxx Grande River... 192X would see the opening of the magnificent Riviera movie palace which could accommodate 2xxxx patrons per show. The demand was so great that the Rivera Annex was built just a block away to handle the overflow. To put this into context, the first talking picture, The Jazz Singer, came out in October 1927. It was boom times in America's third largest city and the masses were looking to have fun..