We picked up West Main Street in Belleville just east of the old Belleville West Township High School and headed southeast for awhile.

While it’s still a little residential, it quickly becomes strictly commercial after a block or two, and demonstrates how the city was a bustling center of industry in the Nineteenth Century.

Duplexes such as the one below are common throughout Belleville.

While most houses are brick, there are occasional wood frame buildings such as this Second Empire home below.

There are few businesses left open on the street today, and some former storefronts have been converted into apartments.

But grand buildings such as the one below point to the splendor of what must have once been a bustling corridor.