Johnny Cash was born 93 years ago today, and though he wasn’t born in Michigan, he sang about us and the struggles of workers on the line. In honor of the Man in Black, here’s a photo that Bill shared photo back in 2023 writing “Formerly the Gibson Guitar factory. Rumor has it that Elvis Presley himself came to Kalamazoo to pick up his guitars straight from the factory. Johnny Cash, Steve Winwood, B.B. King, and others also visited to check on their orders.”
Here are couple more photos of the old plant along with Bill’s burning ring of fire (with apologies to Johnny Cash). Follow Bill on Flickr & Facebook for more!
Most of the schools in Michigan were closed today due to single digit or subzero temps as the entire state wonders what box it put the electric blanket in. ArborWiki’s entry for Barton Dam says that:
The City of Ann Arbor purchased the dam from Detroit Edison in the 1960s and restarted hydroelectric generation in the 1980s. The facility has a 900-kilowatt turbine that generates 4.2 million kWh per year.
Barton Dam is one of Ann Arbor’s four dams on the Huron River. It was designed by engineer Gardner Stewart Williams and architect Emil Lorch and built in 1912-13 as part of the development of hydroelectric power on the Huron River by the predecessor of Detroit Edison. The earthen-construction dam is 34 feet high and 1767 feet long, and has a typical surface area of 315 acres and typical storage of 5050 acre-feet. The dam can be accessed from Huron River Drive from the city park located at the foot of Bird Road.
See more including another shot from Barton Dam Nature Area in Bruce’s 2025-01 gallery on Flickr and STAY WARM!!!
One of the stories you read more & more every year is how online shopping is killing downtowns. Discover Holland shares that in the 80s when suburban malls were wreaking similar havoc, downtown Holland business owners & the city created a plan for Snow Free Holland, now the largest municipal snowmelt system in North America:
Joining the conversation was Holland native and Prince Corporation founder, Edgar D. Prince. Prince brought to the table an idea that he discovered while in Europe, a system of underground piping that circulates warm water to keep the snow and ice at bay during the winter months. Using this idea, Prince expanded on the possibilities of snow and ice free access in downtown, and thus began the downtown Holland snowmelt project.
Currently, snowmelt is maintained by the Holland Board of Public Works in collaboration with the Holland Energy Park. Snowmelt was first implemented in 1988 and is the largest municipally-run snowmelt system in North America. By using waste heat from power generation, water is heated and circulated through 120 miles of plastic tubing underneath the streets and sidewalks. The tubes are 3/4″ in circumference; Holland has 600,000 square feet of tubing totaling 4.9 miles and 10.5 acres of heated streets and sidewalks. With the water heating up to 95 degrees Fahrenheit, the system can melt 1″ of snow per hour – even at 20 degrees F with 10 MPH winds!
The 1868 peak in sail-powered ships on Lake Michigan also marked the year the 123-foot Rouse Simmons was launched from Milwaukee’s shipyards. The ship was built by the firm of Allan, McClelland, and Company, one of Milwaukee’s preeminent shipbuilding firms …In the early 1870s, the Rouse Simmons joined the sizeable shipping fleet of wealthy lumber magnate and philanthropist Charles H. Hackley of Muskegon, hauling loads of lumber for Hackley’s fleet from company mills to the various markets around the lake for roughly 20 years.
By the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the popular German tradition of decorating an evergreen tree in the home was widely practiced, and it was not uncommon for a handful of lake schooners to make late-season runs from northern Michigan and Wisconsin loaded with thousands of Christmas trees for busy Chicago waterfront markets. Estimates of the number of Christmas schooners vary, but perhaps up to two dozen vessels in any season delivered evergreens to markets in Great Lakes states.
In Chicago, most vessels, including the Rouse Simmons, sold the trees directly from their berths along the Chicago River’s Clark Street docks. Electric lights were strung from the schooner’s bow to stern, and customers were invited to board the ship to choose their trees. In addition to selling Christmas trees, many boat operators, including Schuenemann, made and sold wreaths, garlands, and other holiday decorations. Barbara Schuenemann and her three daughters (Elsie is pictured above) helped make and sell these items as part of the family’s holiday trade.
You can read on for much more about Herman Schuenemann’s long career as “Captain Santa” which tragically came to an end on Friday, November 22, 1912 when the Rouse Simmons, heavily laden with 3,000–5,000 Christmas trees filling its hold & deck, left the dock at Thompson, Michigan looking “like a floating forest.” Sadly, the Rouse Simmons sailed into a powerful winter storm on the lake that sent her and several other ships including the South Shore, Three Sisters, and Two Brothers to the bottom of Lake Michigan.
On November 23, 1912, Back in 2007 Rich Evenhouse shared this video of a dive to the wreck of the Rouse Simmons. The shipwreck lies upright in 165 ft. at the bottom of Lake Michigan & I’ve heard that every year divers place a Christmas tree on the bow.
Happy Black Friday! It’s an especially happy one for many since for the first time in eight years, we aren’t mourning a Lions Thanksgiving loss!! Yesterday Detroit also hosted another successful Thanksgiving Day Parade on Woodward Avenue (click for some video highlights) which got me thinking about the roots of this holiday tradition.
Thanksgiving parades were created in the early 20th Century by big department store chains to signal consumers that it was time to start thinking about Christmas shopping. The Holidays at Hudson’s video on Detroit PBS explains that the Motor City was no exception. Hudson’s Department Store provided the staff, resources to help launch the annual parade in 1924. A century later, the Parade remains one of the largest in the country.
While you have to donate to view the whole video, the trailer for Holidays at Hudson’s has some great pics & info. One cool fact is that at its apex when a quarter of a million children a year would visit Santa every year at Hudson’s, they were one of the first stores in the country to offer a choice of Caucasian, Black, Hispanic or other Santas. I’ve got a some old pics, a couple parade photos & a video of the Big Heads below!
Hudson’s Float in front of the new Hudson’s by Andrew McFarlane
Skubal is the fifth Tiger to win the award, joining Max Scherzer (2013), Justin Verlander (2011), Willie Hernández (1984) and Denny McLain (1968 and ’69). The dominant southpaw capped his pitching Triple Crown season on Wednesday by winning the AL Cy Young Award in a unanimous vote from members of the Baseball Writers’ Association of America
His 18 wins were the most by a Tiger since Scherzer had as many in 2014. His 2.39 ERA was the lowest by a qualified Detroit starter since Mark Fidrych’s incredible rookie season of 1976. His 5.9 fWAR trailed only Verlander’s 2009 and ’10 seasons as the most by a Tigers pitcher in his age-27 season or younger since 1971. His 6.3 bWAR not only led MLB pitchers, it ranked seventh among all AL players. Skubal became the 22nd player in Major League history to win a pitching Triple Crown. (and first since Verlander in 2011!)
For this year’s Veterans Day photo, let me thank all the men & women who gave their service to this nation, especially those who gave their lives, with a couple of my photos of a powerful memorial in Detroit’s Campus Martius Park. There used to be a cool website called Panorama of Old Detroit by Jim Moran:
At the top of this 1871 monument to Civil War veterans is “a colossal personification of Michigan as a semi-civilized Indian queen menacingly brandishing a sword with her right hand and clutching a shield with the left.” (From an 1870’s Michigan History.) …
At the bottom of the granite monument roost four bronze eagles. On the next tier are four figures representing the miltary services: Infantry, Artillery, Cavalry, and Marine. Bronzed medallions of Lincoln, Grant, Sherman, and Farragut are spaced between. And, just below the figure of Michigan are four allegorical figures representing Victory, Union, Emancipation, and History.
The plaque on the monument reads Erected by the people of Michigan in honor of the martyrs who fell and the heroes who fought in defence of Liberty and Union. The monument was moved several hundred feet from its original location to Campus Martius Park in 2005.
“Does anyone know where the love of God goes when the waves turn the minutes to hours?”
It’s November 10th again, which means that for the 48th year straight year I have Gordon Lightfoot’s legendary ballad to the Witch of November on repeat. My absolute favorite version of the song (as many of you know probably all too wdell) is this version that Joseph Fulton created way back in 2009. Given YouTube’s ruthlessness on music copyright, I have to assume that Lightfoot blessed this because from the moment Harry Reasoner begins speaking, who wouldn’t?
You can join the 49th annual Great Lakes Memorial Service, a remembrance of the crew of the Edmund Fitzgerald in person at Mariners’ Church in downtown Detroit or on their YouTube livestream at 11am today. On November 11, 1975 they rang their church bell 29 times in honor of all the sailors that lost their lives due to the wreck of the S.S. Edmund FItzgerald. They do it every year, and the beloved service also commemorates all sailors who have lost their lives on the Great Lakes.
Here are a couple of photos I took recently of the beautiful stained glass and the historical marker at Mariners’ Church which is between Hart Plaza and the Renaissance Center on the riverfront in downtown Detroit. Lots more about the Edmund Fitzgerald on Michigan in Pictures!
Most of us know that Faygo is a Detroit original, but did you know that Faygo is also the reason we call soda “pop” in Michigan??
Way back in 1907 Russian immigrant brothers and bakers, Ben and Perry Feigenson started creating soft drinks based on their frosting flavors. They bottled their soda – which they called “pop” because of the sound it made when the lid was removed – in fruit punch, strawberry and grape flavors at a factory on Pingree Street & sold it from their horse-drawn wagon the day after it was made! Faygo made a Faygo Kneecap last year for the Lions playoff run so you know they have kept the magic alive!
David took the photos about a decade ago. You can see his latest on his Flickr and read about the pics on David’s blog.
The Lightkeeper’s Ghost tells the tale of George and Loraine Parris who became the beloved caretakers of the Old Presque Isle Lighthouse in the 1970s, running the small museum and giving tours. George was something of a trickster and delighted in playing harmless tricks on visitors. He passed away in 1992, but the story doesn’t end there.
As Loraine was driving to the property on Grand Lake Road, which had a clear view of the lighthouse, she saw that it was illuminated.
She knew that the Coast Guard had rendered this impossible, but there it was before her. By the time that she arrived at the keeper’s house, though, everything was dark. The next day she climbed the steps of the lighthouse to make sure that everything was in order, and she saw that there was no way that someone could have turned the light on. Yet, this same pattern repeated itself again and again. Loraine never said anything about it because she thought that people might think her crazy.
Soon other folks began to see the light, however – a yellowish glow was reported from the lighthouse by several people. Some thought that the light had been put back into operation, but others drove out for a closer look, only to find that it was dark once again.
It was even spotted by members of the Air National Guard, who flew a few missions over the area, and by the Coast Guard, who investigated to make sure that no one could fire the light back up. It had been permanently disabled years before, so there was no way that the light could be shining. Yet it was. Many people believe that the spirit of playful old George is occasionally paying a visit to the lighthouse that he loved so much, just to let folks know that he’s doing just fine and to keep alive the stories of the lighthouse that he loved so much.
I made the photo art for this from an old photo of Old Presque Isle Lighthouse. I do stuff like that and also websites through Absolute Michigan & Leelanau.com. so if you ever need that, holler!
Michigan in Pictures 