9956 East Forest Avenue
People's State Bank, Alderman Gage Company, Krueger Tool & Engineering Company, Christian Light Missionary Baptist Church
This is one of many near-identical structures built for the People’s State Bank. This iteration of the building still stands at the corner of Forest and Cadillac.
The plans for the structure, designed by Donaldson & Meier, were utilized in numerous places across the city. The design would eventually be adapted but retained most of the same architectural details of the original plans.
People’s State Bank came into the world through the merger of the State Savings Bank and People’s Savings Bank. Their main branch was at the corner of Fort and Shelby downtown, which still stands.
By 1943, the central bank branch had been sold, and so had this branch at 9956 East Forest Avenue. That year it became the Alderman Gage Company. The business made precision snap, ring, and flush pin gages. Jerry Alderman, the founder, ran the company with the motto that you could expect a long life of accuracy from Alderman Gages.
During the Great Depression, there were a lot of vacant bank buildings in Detroit. As wartime production ramped up, many were used for the effort as machine, tool & die, and other small manufacturing shops. It’s hard to imagine it today, but there were dozens of small bank buildings like this used for manufacturing in the 1940s.
A piece in a 1943 edition of the Detroit Free Press read, “Custom Gauges, requiring the highest skilled workmanship and made to closest of tolerances, are contributing materially to America’s accelerated war effort in more production and exacting accuracy it is pointed out by Jerry Alderman, head of Alderman Gauge Co.”
In July 1944, the company’s founder, Jerry Alderman, joined the army. He was originally from Manton, Michigan, a small town north of Cadillac. He left the business under the supervision of Charles Hill, the foreman who had been in the industry for decades.
However, by November, the company had been sold to Herman A. Krueger. The name was changed to the Krueger Tool & Engineering Company, and the new owner used the experience gained at the Heidrich Tool & Die Company to run the business. By the time he purchased the company, the war was nearly over, and many small tool shops transitioned to supplying other industries in Detroit or closed shop.
On September 23, 1947, the assets belonging to the Krueger Company were sold at a public auction. The contents included metal working machinery and equipment.
After the sale of Krueger’s company, the waters become murky. At some point, it became a church, but I haven’t been able to trace when that was. I’d guess it continued to operate as a small manufacturing facility or office until the 1960s and transitioned into a church then. At some point, the roof and steeple were added on. Whereas I’m not sure when this happened, I’m confident that by 1982, it housed a Baptist Church.
Christian Light Missionary Baptist Church was founded in 1972 in Detroit’s East Village neighborhood. A decade later, their registered address changed to the structure pictured here, where it’s been ever since.
As recently as two years ago, I saw the congregation meeting at this church. However, I haven’t seen any activity here in the past year. The most recent pastor is Pleze Gardner Jr., who lives in Eastpoint. The nonprofit corporation still exists; however, they have not filed paperwork yet for 2022, which isn’t uncommon.
The intersection of Forest and Cadillac is a little odd. Still, considering the number of structures that remain here, it could become a walkable mini-neighborhood without much effort, especially because it’s right on a main bus line. Pingree Park and Indian Village continue to expand nearby, so this could become a reality in the coming years.
In the next few weeks, I plan to post a handful of other identical structures on the east side of Detroit that remain standing.
