Researching the History of Your Home/Building
Researching the history of your home or building is not hard, but can be a time intensive process. The sources are scattered across municipal, state and federal agencies as well as your local and state archives. Maps of many varieties, county histories, building records, city directories and property inventories all provide different facets of the story of your home and neighborhood. Many resources are only available by request, and it is incumbent upon the researcher to make the trip to the archives or Register of Deeds.
Use caution with the built date of older homes. Assessor information (built date) sometimes corresponds only with when taxes began being paid to the current municipality. Additionally, early records may have been lost/destroyed and an approximation was made on the date.
City Directories
City Directories are yearly publications which provide owner/renter
information by street and last name. In older volumes
...(read more)
Maps
& other Land Research Resources
Federal Land surveys, Sanborn Maps, Subdivision Plats and more.
Michigan County Histories
and Atlases Project
Search the 428 digitized titles all published before 1923. Many
homes of prominent citizens from Ingham, Eaton and Clinton counties are
illustrated in these pages.
The Stebbins Collection (Coming Soon!)
- Contact us if you are looking for an old picture of your home or building. 517-334-1521 or vottad@cadl.org
1230 W Willow"Beechenbrooks"-This home was built in 1875 by
Joseph Warner, one-time mayor of Lansing and a circus owner
who maintained a menagerie on the then 80 acre property.
Among the animals he kept here were lions, bears, a tiger, a
jaguar, several monkeys and a hippopotamus.
