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As I was perusing the plat maps–as I do late at night when sensible people are sleeping–I noticed something I had difficulty explaining. I have heard before from sources forgotten that “Hall Street” actually used to be called “Maxson Street”, but the name was changed and the Maxson moniker applied to another new street instead, between Packard Street and Hall Street east to west.

However, the evidence I was seeing in the maps told a far less simple story: it seemed that, at some point, Maxson Street itself had rotated ninety degrees.

I know, that sounds bizarre. It doesn’t sound correct to me, either. But Maxson, travelling north-south, did not fall where Hall Street presently does. Hall Street is no simple renaming of Maxson Street; Maxson Street was originally meant to cut north-south through F. W. Maxson’s plot below, whereas Hall Street cuts through the former L. W. Hall plot, below:

Several streets have different names from the ones we use today:
Federal Street will become Cedarwood Terrace.
Stratford Street will become Macbeth Street.
Bonner Place will become Packard Street, and Jersey Street will become Illinois Street.

Notably, the aberration from the present-day layout of area streets crops up around 1915-16: Maxson street appears as a listing for the first time in the 1915-1916 house directory and the 1916 city streets directory, but unlike the street we today know as bridging Packard Street and Hall Street east to west, it is instead listed as running north-south between East Main Street and Macbeth Street:

Indeed, the north-south oriented Maxson appears in the 1918 plat map:

Bonner Place is beginning to be cut in from East Main Street.
Durham Street is cut through the former George & Mary Crouch estate.
Stratford Street has become Macbeth Street; Jersey Street has become Illinois Street.

Maxson Street is cut through former F. W. Maxson estate–north to south.

Above: Excerpts from the 1925 and 1926 directories; 1925 was the last year Maxson Street was listed as a north-south street between East Main and Macbeth streets.  The 1926 directory lists Maxson as running its now-familiar east-west course between Packard and Hall streets.

Intriguingly, Maxson Street’s north-south course appeared in 1915’s directory, whereas F. W. Maxson did not die until late 1916; meaning this street was first being planned and constructed before Maxson’s death. Perhaps Maxson had made arrangements for the city to cut a thoroughfare through his land in that direction, and then–at some point after his death–the realities of the plan changed. It’s hard to say.

Many questions remain. Was this simply a plan that didn’t bear fruit, or was there in fact a roadway between East Main Street and Macbeth called “Maxson Street”? And either way,what caused the shift in plans?

Regardless of how it all went down, by the time the 1926’s plat map was published Maxson Street was in its present position, and has remained that way ever since.

But that’s hardly a satisfying blog entry. So let’s go a little deeper, and see if we can discover more about Maxson Street’s namesake, the late F. W. Maxson.

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Frank Willard Maxson

Frank Willard Maxson was born in Brockport in 1857 to Willard Jay Maxson, a mason, and his wife Sarah. In 1870, Willard and his family moved to Rochester, first living at No. 50 Weld Street. As of 1875, Willard was living and working out of No. 28 Caledonia Avenue.

Frank W. Maxson was particularly active in three surprisingly interrelated fields: printmaking, tire vulcanizing, and bicycling.

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Stamps & Printmaking

Early on, F. W. Maxson’s skills were primarily put to use in the printing industry.

At least by 1895, Maxson’s printing shop ran two Gordon Jobber presses, printing leaflets and brochures and cards for businesses, organizations, and events. This video [https://youtu.be/48J1O0Rky3U] demonstrates the operation of a 1902 model of this same type of press.

Sometime during 1899, Maxson left the rubber stamp and printing business in the capable hands of an employee, Norman J. Henry.

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Patents

In his enterprising capacity as a machinist, Maxson patented two devices; one, for the printing of sign-cards, and the other for repairing pneumatic tires. These are reproduced below.

[https://www.google.com/books/edition/Official_Gazette_of_the_United_States_Pa/KBO6aCIO6WoC?hl=en&gbpv=1] (pp.988-999)

Saturday, June 24, 1899
[https://www.newspapers.com/article/democrat-and-chronicle-maxson-fraud/132495635/]

It was the above tire vulcanizing device that Frank W. Maxson accused his nephew, John Frederick Roberts, of fraudulently stealing for use in a competing bicycle shop. The device was a trade secret of Maxson, and he refused to sell it within Rochester to avoid undercutting his own profits. J. Frederick Roberts, who was son of Maxson’s wife Hester’s brother Alvord Roberts, had a shop at No. 241 East Main that he underhandedly acquired a vulcanizing machine for.

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Hester Esther Roberts

Frank W. Maxson married Hester Esther Roberts around 1880, as their 1900 census states they had been married 20 years at the time. Until 1898 they lived together at 11 Siegel Street, the home of Hester’s parents Eleazer B. and Clarissa A. Roberts.

In 1899, Frank W. Maxson and Hester would move to No. 96 Hayward Avenue, the address of which changed to No. 554 Hayward the year after, in 1900.

The year following that, Hester Maxson died, recordedly of “surgical shock.”

After a remarkably brief mourning period, Frank Maxson remarried to Elizabeth Paddock in 1902:

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Maxson Vulcanizing Works

After leaving the printing business and patenting his device for repairing pneumatic tires, Maxson operated a business as Maxson Vulcanizing Works at No. 54 North Fitzhugh Street. The business specialized in vulcanizing, patching, retreading, and general upkeep of tires, from carriage to car to bicycle. Originally operating under the name of his first wife, Hester E. R. Maxson, the Vulcanizing Works seems to have fallen to Frank upon her death in 1901.

In 1901 Maxson Vulcanizing Works moved to 115 West Main Street, where an engine once exploded:

The buildings in the above Sanborn map are all parking lots now, and very close to the original site of the sulphur spring and bathing house which used to be on Buffalo Street in the early 19th century.

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Bicycles & Flower City Wheelmen

Obviously interrelated with Maxson’s capacity for tire repair and machining was his avid adoption of bicycling as a hobby. Turn-of-the-century models of bicycle taking much know-how to ride and maintain made this no small endeavor. He and many other “wheelmen” in the east side of the city grouped together for the purposes of socializing, riding competitions, and charitable events, calling themselves the “Flower City Wheelmen”.

Here’s an interesting connection; William H. Dutcher, mentioned above as “starter”, was my great-great-grandfather’s next-door neighbor on Mark Street. This would have been the year he moved to Copeland Street.

Maxson was also a dealer in bicycles, such as the “Catford Premier” advertised above.

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No. 85 North Street

Frank Maxson would move his Vulcanizing Works to No. 85 North Street in 1913. Happily, Mr. Albert R. Stone captured a photograph of the building during Maxson Vulcanizing Works’ tenancy there:

The above photograph shows the below businesses :

To think, Frank W. Maxson may have been inside his shop when the photograph was taken!

Oh, and lest I forget one odd tidbit: apparently Frank W. Maxson was also a seller of… celery?

After Frank Maxson’s death in 1916 one of his employees, William T. Ferguson, took on the Maxson Vulcanizing Works.

The business declared bankruptcy in 1929.

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No. 1700 East Main Street

Frank W. Maxson bought a house in Brighton, No. 1700 East Main Street, not long before the annexation by the city of Rochester. His parents Willard Jay and Sarah boarded with him there.

Interestingly enough, photographic evidence exists for the Maxson house! As touched upon in an earlier entry, photographs of football games played on Old University Field contain tantalizingly clear glimpses of houses along neighboring streets, one of which was East Main Street. The below views towards the north end of the football field show the houses from the above map, with Maxson’s house No. 1700 East Main Street marked with a red dot.

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Death of Frank W. Maxson

Frank W. Maxson died August 7th, 1916.

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Maxson St. Develops

Frank Maxson’s widow, Elizabeth Paddock Maxson, offered up a section of the East Main Street property for the cutting of a new road, Maxson Street:

1918
Maxson’s widow offers East Main Street land to City of Rochester.
[https://www.google.com/books/edition/Proceedings_of_the_Common_Council_for_th/_zUtAQAAMAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=0] (pp.342-343)

Elizabeth P. Maxson would live at No. 1780 until 1922, at which point Willard S. Hastings purchased the property. It would change hands several times, even being split into a two-family home in 1928–before it was destroyed due to the expansion of No. 1800 East Main Street next door.

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What’s “Mayo Street”?

Intriguingly, this document describing the opening of Maxson Street also describes opening another street, “Mayo Street”, which would have been named for Emerson S. Mayo, a nurseryman whose land was to the west of Maxson’s. He was involved in Glen Bros. Nurseries, who had a location at Nos. 1778 and 1776 East Main Street.

The D&C article above also mentions Mayo Street alongside Maxson and Hall Street.

By studying the 1918 and 1926 plat maps, a few clues appear:

One can see that there’s a driveway connecting the E. S. Mayo plot and Glenwood Nurseries to East Main Street via a narrow southern extension.

In the 1926 Plat Map, several revisions have been made by literally gluing amended maps over previous ones. An imperfect art to be certain, as some glimpses of previous iterations remain visible. Above we can see that I have highlighted in yellow the edge of what appears very much like the edge of a road, that has been covered up by residential plots.

Perhaps a good old fashioned slidey comparison picture will illustrate this better:

One can observe that the highlighted edge of roadway peeking out in the 1926 plat map corresponds exactly with the edge of the empty narrow southern area of the E. S. Mayo plot. This corresponds to the 746.82′ measurement from the northwest corner of Berry and East Main Streets as described in the Proceedings of the Common Council publication, page 130, regarding the opening of Mayo Street.

Therefore, I surmise that Mayo Street was meant to launch from East Main Street at that point, and meet up with Maxson Street. Some event yet to be uncovered by my research must have made continuing Bonner Place through to East Main more feasible, and Mayo Street was abandoned. Finally, in 1925, Bonner Place became Packard Street.

Let’s all pour one out in rememberance of Mayo Street.

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No. 1800 East Main St.

In 1925 Woodhead & Lindsay built an automobile dealership at No. 1800 East Main Street, in the lot to the east of the former Maxson house, at this time addressed as No. 1780 East Main Street. The dealership and house would live side-by-side for a couple of years until the construction of an addition onto the west rear of the Woodhead & Lindsay lot. Along with this addition, a parking lot was added, razing No. 1780 East Main Street in the process. This most likely took place around 1928 or 1929; the expansion was definitely in place by 1931.

1926 City Directory
[https://www.libraryweb.org/rochcitydir/images/1926/1926w-z.pdf]

The shot above shows a similar view to the previous Old University Field photographs, facing north towards East Main Street. The photograph is from 1946, long after Maxson’s house was razed. The view roughly corresponds to the 1950 Sanborn Map, below:

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Elizabeth P. Maxson’s Death

With the death of Elizabeth P. Maxson on September 3rd, 1941, there’s a sense of finality. Frank W. Maxson’s business is gone, his house is gone, his late wife and his widow are gone, and he himself is gone. But on two blue signs–one on Hall Street, one on Packard Street–his name lives on.

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