Remick, Jerome H., and Company, Building

The Jerome H. Remick & Co. Building housed the editorial offices and printing plant of Jerome H. Remick & Co., during the period 1907-1912 when the firm became the leading Tin Pan Alley music publisher in the nation and the publisher of "Dill Pickles Rag," "Black and White Rag" and other million selling rages.

In the early 1900's popular music had become a thriving business and ragtime was the rage throughout the country. Songs were being published for home entertainment at the piano and many music publishing companies were springing up in various United States cities. Jerome H. Remick (1869-1931), a Detroit businessman, recognized the growing interest in sheet music and in 1902 purchased the Detroit firm of Whitney-Warner Publishing Company whose offices were at 10 Witherell Street. He soon determined that most of the publishing action was in New York City. In 1903 he became partners with Maurice Shapiro of Shapiro, Bernstein & Company and established the new firm of Shapiro, Remick & Company with offices in New York. At the end of 1904 Remick bought out Shapiro and in 1905 he established the firm of Jerome H. Remick & Company. The firm became the largest music publishing house in the world with editorial headquarters in Detroit and branch offices in New York and Chicago and more than fifty retail stores throughout the country.

Under the direction of composer Charles N. Daniels, the firm prospered. It not only published well over one hundred rags, but established an enormous catalog of every kind of popular song, with a number of hits. So large was his output that Remick was forced to build his own printing plant. On May 4, 1906 a building permit was issued to A.C. Varney, a successful Detroit architect, to build a three-story, brick building at a cost of $20,000. at the location of 68-70 Farrah St. (Farrah Street was renamed Library Avenue in 1912.) In 1907 the new building was completed for Jerome H. Remick & Company and for Jerome H. Remick Printing Company, a subsidiary corporation. The building housed Remick's music publishing offices, wholesale department, and printing plant.

The first million-selling rag published by Remick was Charles L. Johnson's "Dill Pickle Rag" in 1907. The company's second million-selling rag was George Botsford's "Black and White Rag" in 1908. Eighteen hundred rags were published during this decade, most of them originating from ragtime's regional, small-town roots. Remick also published many of America's favorite popular songs. His catalog included such all time favorites as "Won't You Come Home Bill Bailey," "By The Light Of The Silvery Moon," "I'm Forever Blowing Bubbles," "Moonlight Bay," "Ain't We Got Fun," "In The Shade Of The Old Apple Tree," "Shine On Harvest Moon," "Put On Your Old Grey Bonnet" and many more. His volume of published songs remained the largest of any Tin Pan Alley firm until the end of the First World War.

In 1912 the Remick editorial office moved to 131 West Forty-first Street in New York City. In 1915 Remick moved the Detroit office and printing company to 137 Fort. Until his retirement in 1928 the company's sheet music bore both a New York and a Detroit imprint.

Remick was also very active in the Detroit classical music scene. He alternated as president or vice president of the Detroit Symphony Society from 1917 to 1931 and he was responsible for bringing Ossip Gabrilowitsch to Detroit as a conductor. His importance to Detroit music is memorialized in the Jerome H. Remick Music Shell, built on Belle Isle in 1950.

After Remick moved out, probably in 1915, three stories were added to the building and an elevator installed. In 1917 the J.L. Hudson Company, Detroit's major retail department store, took over the building as its annex. Hudson's Toyland was located there in 1917 and in 1918 it became the J.L. Hudson Co. Music Store. Hudson's was undergoing a tremendous growth period and had been slowly building and adding onto its main store on Woodward Avenue. Downtown Detroit had become a mecca to shoppers due to the many department stores that were locating there. The Hudson's Music Store became a popular location for shoppers to buy pianos, victrolas, sheet music, piano rolls and records. The Music Store remained in the building until 1931, at which time Hudson's incorporated the store into its main building on Woodward. (City addresses changed in 1920 and 68-70 Library became 1250-54 Library.)

City directories list the building at 1250-54 Library as vacant until 1935. In that year the Berry Rug Co. (rug dealer) occupied the building until 1942. In 1942 the Posselius Family purchased the building and moved in the Good Housekeeping Shops. Good Housekeeping was a popular appliance store whose trademark name was well known throughout the city. Good Housekeeping became an established resident in the building occupying it through the 1970's. Good Housekeeping finally closed just as many of downtown Detroit's department stores were moving or going out of business. The family kept their offices in the building until 1991 when it was sold to Thomas Carleton of Fieldstone Properties, the current owner.

The Jerome H. Remick & Co. Building is a six story commercial building built to house the editorial offices and printing plant of Jerome H. Remick & Co., one of the nation's leading music publishers of ragtime. The lower three stories were constructed in 1907, the upper added about 1915. The building has exterior walls constructed of red brick with a simply detailed limestone and brick front facade containing three bays of windows occupying most of the facade. Entrance to the building is in the middle bay on the first floor. The building storefront has undergone major alterations over the years. Each floor of the interior now consists of open loft space. Currently the first floor houses an art gallery while the second through fifth floors are residential lofts.

The Jerome H. Remick & Co. Building is located in what was once the heart of Detroit's shopping district. It sits directly behind the J.L. Hudson Building, determined eligible for the National Register of Historic Places, and the downtown branch of the Detroit Public Library. Two buildings to the north sits the L.B. King and Company building, also listed in the National Register of Historic Places.

The overall footprint of the building is rectangular, measuring fifty-one feet wide and one hundred and two feet deep. It is six stories in height and rises eighty-one feet above finish grade. The building sits over a full basement with a ceiling height of appoximately nine feet. The exterior facade material is red brick on all four sides with limestone used in the front facade. A fault line is barely discernible between the third and fourth floors marking the base of the top three floors added around 1915. The first story is taller than the five stories above it.

The symmetrical facade contains three vertical banks of windows. The bays culminate in an Arts and Crafts cuspered treatment of molded limestone segmental arches below the parapet with patterned brickwork between the arches. Stone quoins frame the windows on the second through fifth floors. The wall surface between the windows is of cut limestone. A dentil cornice runs above the first floor and a masonry string course separates the fifth and sixth floors.

The windows on the third through fifth floors are each a single light in a double-hung wood frame in groupings of three. The sixth-floor windows have been replaced with single-light glass in an aluminum clad vinyl double-hung frame. The windows on the first and second floors have been completely changed from the original. The first-floor display windows consist of single-light glass in stainless steel frames. The second-floor windows are a combination of single-light steel framed and venting wood casement windows. The sixth-floor rear windows are also of aluminum clad vinyl with a fixed light over an awning window. The remaining windows on the rear facade consist of clear wired glass in steel sash with awning windows.

Pressed galvanized steel and stone panels in the first floor elevation result from later renovations by Good Housekeeping (circa 1942). Two steel sign faces extend out from the front facade, one located at the second floor and the other on the fourth floor. A steel canopy approximately ten feet wide which extended the full width of the building has been removed, leaving behind the exposed connecting steel plate.

The building has a wood post-and-beam structured system with brick masonry walls on the side. The basement walls are of brick masonry. The floors consist of a wood substrate and a hard wood finish floor. The roof is a pitched builtup roof running from front to rear. A roof parapet wall runs continuously around the building extending twenty-four to forty-two inches above the roof surface. A large water tower sits on top of the roof.

Typical interior floors are open with some existing partitioning. The passenger elevator and a stairway are located near the front right side corner of the building. Another stairway is located in the opposite rear left corner, and a freight elevator is located in the rear right side corner of the building. Each floor has three bays separated by rows of columns with a total of four columns in each row. Each row runs from front to rear with a pier located on the exterior wall. The interior materials are wood stud walls with wood lath and plaster. The ceilings are of wood lath and plaster, with plaster cove moldings located along the two major support beams running from front to rear. The interior contains few decorative elements.