RCA Photo of the Week - June 12, 2025

On June 10, the Henry M. Malburg Funeral Home celebrated its 40th anniversary with a party on the property. I was invited to the event and had a great time talking with people familiar with the Malburg family and looking through the funeral home's history.

One of the things that the celebration had was a memory book. It contained photographs from various parts of said history as well as blank sheets that people can write about their memories on. One picture that I noticed was the one seen above. That barn was once located on the Henry M. Malburg Funeral Home area and was moved 30 years ago this month.

According to Romeo Observer staff writer John Jamieson, that nineteenth-century English-style barn sat on the property of the funeral home on 32 Mile Road since it was built in Romeo's early days. Jamieson wrote an article about the building in the June 28, 1995 issue. Henry Malburg was going to demolish the barn to expand the funeral home's parking lot, but Romeo resident Patty Kelly bought it that year. Patty and her husband were preservationists and saw the outbuilding as a priceless treasure. She said, "For me, it's just something of the romance of things that have a history. You can see into the stable and note where horses kicked the wood. And you smell the hay. You see with the heart."

Henry was quite relived that he didn't have to destroy the barn. The plan was to relocate it from 32 Mile Road to where the Kellys resided on Benjamin Street. They wanted to use it as a car garage. In addition, Greg Antonelli - owner of Antonelli Construction - was going to restore the stable to its near-original condition.

They had to find a way to move the 38-by-26-foot barn, and luckily, they did. On June 30, 1995, the outbuilding was successfully relocated to Benjamin Street. How did the barn movers do it? First, they put it on a wheeled sled. Then, a building-mover truck drove it carefully to the new location. The barn movers were escorted by country road vehicles in case anything happened. To add more precaution, "crews from Ameritech and Detroit Edison removed telephone and power lines from the path of the barn."

The only thing that needed to be done after the move was rebuilding the stable doors to a different position due to zoning requirements.

This photo and others from that day were taken by Matt Smith. Some of them were displayed on the front page of the July 5, 1995 edition of The Romeo Observer.

The barn still resides on Benjamin Street to this very day. Even though it's no longer a part of the Henry M. Malburg Funeral Home, it's still a part of its history.

Happy 40th Birthday, Henry M. Malburg Funeral Home! Here's to another 40 years.

To learn more about the Henry M. Malburg Funeral Home and barn, you can contact the Romeo Community Archives at rca@romemodistrictlibrary.org or call (586) 690-4890.

Images and sources courtesy of the Romeo Community Archives; Melvin E. and Joan D. Bleich Collection, The Romeo Observer, June 28, 1995, p.3-B and July 5, 1995, p.1-A

RCA Photo of the Week - June 5, 2025

2025 marks the 50th Anniversary of the founding of the Greater Washington Area Historical Society in Washington Township. To honor this occasion, we'll take a look at the photo above and its significance.

The picture is of James Holcomb holding a gavel. When the historical society formed in April 1975, he became its first president. The article "New Washington Historical Society Has Reversal in Nation's History" by Romeo Observer News Editor John P. McPartlin discussed the meaning of both having James as president and the item in question in the May 8, 1975 issue.

According to the story, James - a chemist at Parke-Davis company - and his family moved "into their century old octagon-shaped Mount Vernon home a little over two years ago from Harrison Township."

The significance of getting a man from Mount Vernon to be the president of a historical society located in Washington was not lost on McPartlin. He stated, "The first president of the United States, George Washington, retired to Mount Vernon after serving his presidency. In Washington Township, the historical society went to Mount Vernon to get its first society president."

This was the reversal that the article title was referring to.

As for the gavel, charter programming member Mrs. Donald Kelley presented it to James to use at their meetings at the charter night when the newly elected officers were installed. It had an unusual background. The wood actually came from the White House itself. In 1948, after Harry S. Truman won the presidential election, a structural inspection of the White House was conducted. His advisors "found the old mansion to be dangerously weakened and the president ordered that the building be re-inforced."

This meant numbering and removing the interior of the presidential home as well as excavating the basement and positioning it with steel beams. Truman would end up serving all but ten months of his four-year term in the Blair House - the residence for visiting dignitaries, while the White House was being repaired.

Mrs. Kelley explained, "The government decided to sell the best pieces of wood which were taken from the building. At this time, I purchased a piece of wood which had been extracted from the foundation of the Blue Room. Later I had it made into a gavel."

Kelley added, "There is nowhere I would rather present this than to our first president, Mr. Holcomb, in the beautifully restored Octagon House in Washington."

The Loren Andrus Octagon House went through some repairs just like the White House did over 25 years prior.

James Holcomb remained president of the Greater Washington Area Historical Society until 2023 when he stepped down. Today, he is the treasurer of that organization. Meanwhile, the gavel remains in the hands of the historical society.

Happy Anniversary, Greater Washington Area Historical Society! Here's to another 50 years.

To discover more about the history of the Greater Washington Area Historical Society, you can contact the Romeo Community Archives at rca@romemodistrictlibrary.org and/or check out the Washington Historical Museum. The latter is open 1:00 pm to 4:00 pm on the 2nd and 4th Sundays of the Month from June through November.

Images and sources courtesy of the Romeo Community Archives; Melvin E. and Joan D. Bleich Collection, The Romeo Observer, May 8, 1975, p. 1-C and Greater Washington Area Historical Society