East Liberty Historic District
East
Liberty Historic Block
This cluster of houses, now a center of
commercial activity, has a special identity and serves a special
purpose in the downtown area. Many Ann Arborites view this block as an
attractive way-stop between State and Main Streets. They prize its
"human scale," its homey quality (most buildings have residents as well
as shops), the diversity of rooflines, and trees and small grass plots.
This block is a valuable link between the larger commercial historic
districts. It draws pedestrians and affords to everyone (pedestrian and
driver) a visual historic connection between the districts. It also
dramatizes the separation of the old commercial districts. It will
interpret for future generations and visitors a fact well known to
older Ann Arbor citizens but now fading: that Ann Arbor once had a
clear division between "town and gown" - two almost self-contained
communities on either side of Division Street, each with its own
shopping area, neighborhoods, and aspirations. Perhaps twenty years
from now, when these districts have grown together, these houses will
be an even more eloquent reminder of the past.
Two of the houses in this district are very old: the Enoch James House,
at 321 E. Liberty (built in 1847), and the Emmanuel Lueck House, built
ca. 1845. Around the corner on Fifth Avenue is the Jacob Shuh House
built in 1866. The other houses date from either the late-nineteenth or
early-twentieth centuries. They offer an interesting variety of gables
and rooflines, but their chief value is that they stand where they were
built, furnishing a sense of age and historic identity in the midst of
newer and larger buildings springing up around them.
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