ENCORE FIVE FAVES
Muggs Celebrating His Birthday, H.J. Cooper Auto Dealership, 1941 Sometimes
photographs become favorites because they are beyond belief. This is one of them. Meet Muggs, owned by auto dealer Howard J. Cooper, who purchased the lion cub in 1939 from a circus that came to Kalamazoo. Muggs lived at the dealership, located on the southwest corner of West Michigan and North Park streets. When Muggs was young, Cooper would walk him around downtown on a leash, and at times the lion cub slept on the desks at the dealership. Because Muggs lived in Kalamazoo during World War II, when there was a ban on auto sales to the general public, it never was known if his presence discouraged customers. Wanting Muggs to have more room, Cooper gave him to a zoo in South Bend, Indiana, in 1946.
Kalamazoo Stove Co. Circa 1935 In the late 1930s, photographer Mamie Austin took this image of the Kalamazoo Stove Co. for a series she did for the Kalamazoo Public Library’s art collection documenting the city. The images were available for circulation, particularly for classroom teachers. Austin worked at and later owned her father’s photographic studio in Kalamazoo and came to the library through the Works Progress Administration, a New Deal program. Her photographs, taken between 1936 and 1943, cover a wide variety of businesses, industries, schools, parks, buildings and other sites in the community. I have many favorites among hers, including this one showing molten metal being poured into a frame at the stove company. You can see Austin’s photographs on the Kalamazoo Public Library’s website.
About the Author Lynn Houghton is the regional history curator at the Western Michigan University Archives and Regional History Collections. She leads the Gazelle Sports Historic Walks, a series of free architectural and historic walks in Kalamazoo and other parts of the county during the summer and fall, and is the co-author of the book Kalamazoo Lost and Found. She also participated in the PBS series 10 that Shaped America. She has bachelor’s and master’s degrees in history from WMU and a master’s in library and information science from Wayne State University. Photos courtesy of WMU Archives and Regional History Collections, the Kalamazoo Valley Museum and the Kalamazoo Public Library’s Local History Collection. w w w.encorekalamazoo.com | 15