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    Novi
    Novi
    Novi
    Ebook138 pages23 minutes

    Novi

    By Barbara G. Louie and Samuel D. Popkin

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    About this ebook

    From a peaceful farming community to a thriving commercial suburb, Novi, Michigan, has undergone many periods of dramatic change, creating a rich history.


    This collection of over 200 photographs provides a fascinating record of the development of Novi through the 19th and 20th centuries. In the early days of westward exploration, the fertile land surrounding Detroit attracted the first settlers of Novi. The town grew quickly after the 1825 opening of the Erie Canal, and by 1830, a bustling business district had emerged. The major changes came in the 1950s, with the building of freeways that cut directly through the heart of Novi. The sudden easy access to Detroit and Lansing ensured the town's future as a true American suburb. Shopping centers soon followed in the tire tracks of the freeway, and the area rapidly expanded.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherArcadia Publishing
    Release dateNov 2, 1998
    ISBN9781439626757
    Novi
    Author

    Barbara G. Louie

    The changing face and character of Novi is captured in this unique collection of photographs, including the architecture of buildings that have long been lost and others that are waiting to be rediscovered. Novi provides a visual journey through time, depicting the contrasts between the city's rural beginnings and its suburban present. Barbara G. Louie has created a fascinating and comprehensive visual record that explores the history of Novi through a vivid combination of images and words.

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      Book preview

      Novi - Barbara G. Louie

      Novi.

      INTRODUCTION

      Novi, Michigan was first settled in 1825, one month before the opening of the Erie Canal. Novi was a swampy, wooded marshland, but the urge to settle the untamed west was strong, and little by little, more people came. The opening of the Erie Canal in May of 1825 provided the impetus for Easterners to travel west, and thousands poured into Michigan and other western states. Travel time between New York and Michigan had been cut down from over one month to just a few days, and to many, the move to pioneer country was irresistible.

      By the time statehood was granted in 1837, Michigan’s population had soared to nearly 200,000 from under 5,000 just two decades earlier.

      Novi, located about 30 miles northwest of Detroit, proved to have enough good farmland to attract a number of people, and most of the early settlers were farmers. Gradually, a few businesses developed, and by 1830 a small town had risen. Located at what is today the intersection of Novi Road and Grand River, Novi’s Four Corners was the center of the business district for many years.

      The sleepy, peaceful farm community lasted for over a century. But Novi’s location along Grand River Road did not allow it to remain stagnant. In the 1950s, construction began on a freeway that would parallel Grand River from the bustling metropolis of Detroit to the state capital in Lansing. The freeway would cut directly through Novi, and the look of the town would forever be changed.

      The freeway connected Novi to the outside world in a fast and easy way, and developers soon saw the opportunities available in the empty spaces that once catered to wooded forests and open meadows.

      The speed of the traffic on the freeways soon became symbolic for the sudden growth occurring in Novi. Housing developments began to spurt up all over town, and Novi’s population climbed. The rapid rate of construction frightened a number of local residents, threatening their previously tranquil way of life. During the next 20 years Novi was cited as one of the fastest-growing communities in the nation. Though a number of local residents still mourn the loss of their old lifestyle, more continue to arrive to take advantage of the ever-changing city.

      In the 1970s, the first major shopping mall was built, and the construction has not stopped since.

      Many of the old, quaint farmhouses and rural stores are gone, but if one looks hard enough, much of Novi’s past still lingers. Today, the growth of Novi is evident everywhere, in its new subdivisions, shopping malls, churches, and businesses. This book is an attempt to show where Novi has been and the direction it is heading. Through comparisons of photographs from then and now, one can see how Novi has survived from a rural farming community to a thriving commercial suburb.

      One

      EIGHT MILE ROAD

      NOVI’S SOUTHERN BORDER

      Novi’s southern boundary begins at Eight Mile—or Base Line—Road. In 1815, when Michigan was

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