History Rich

Michigan Avenue’s lively past endures in stately manors

By Beth Anne Piehl
Photography by G. Randall Goss

They were elegant days on Michigan Avenue early in the 1900s, when chauffeurs polished limousines in their uniforms and families hosted parties with cocktails and caviar served convivially along ample front porches. Husbands and fathers rode the Resort Special train up for the weekend, and took it back to Chicago or Cincinnati or St. Louis on Sunday night, arriving just in time for work on Monday morning; wives and mothers stayed with the children until summer’s splendor faded into fall ...

Edith Gilbert, Charlevoix’s witness to history as an author of books about the most storied eras, remembered from her home on Michigan Avenue the day the road was closed for a neighbor’s 70th birthday party. “They had a piano in the middle of Michigan Avenue and everybody was dancing in the streets,” Gilbert recalled. “And there were no restaurants and no caterers, so when anybody had a party everybody shared the cooking, because everybody brought their staffs up — they had cooks and maids and governesses and chauffeurs.”

While you might not be able to close the road for a birthday party, and an influential lady might not be able to stop a sidewalk from passing in front of her home by sitting in the way of construction all afternoon with a pitcher of lemonade, the stately elegance of Charlevoix’s Michigan Avenue endures.

It’s found in particular in two landmark homes that hearken back to the days of parasols and panache, of sophisticated lifestyles that appreciated architectural details and dramatic design — and how to throw a proper soiree, too.

Chuck and Mary Adams and Dr. Frederick (Eric) and Gloria VanDuyne are the owners of the two most visible side-by-side homes on Michigan Avenue, both built by the May family, of May Department Stores acclaim.

The homes, each with sprawling square footage in the 10,000-plus range are an homage to their era. They were built as summer cottages in 1917, by David May (the Adams home) and his brother-in-law, Louis D. Beaumont (the VanDuyne home).

Today, each remains spectacular and distinctive.

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