three, photo by caterpillars.
Laura took a trip to the Anna Scripps Whitcomb Conservatory on Belle Isle. She says she has always enjoyed photographing flowers and tiny parts of nature and finally has the equipment to do so. You have to click through and see it large!
April is Garden Month on Absolute Michigan – check out our feature on the Anna Scripps Whitcomb Conservatory – Belle Isle!
Propeller, photo by country_boy_shane.
Shane says …if you view this large, you can see many signatures on the right-most blade. Talk about neat stuff you can find with your camera! Here it is large and on black.
He has a set of photos from his trip to the Henry Ford Museum and he went with several other photographers, most of whom were shooting HDR. See their collected work in this very cool slideshow.
Here’s the web site for The Henry Ford Museum & Greenfield Village.
Ask “The Brain ” – Marvin’s Mechanical Museum, photo by DetroitDerek.
Derek writes:
“The Brain” is one of the animated mechanical fortune tellers at Marvin’s Mechanical Museum. Marvin has been collecting video games, games of skill, and items such as these ( some date back to 1900, and others were custom built specifically for Marvin) since 1960. Marvin’s opened in 1990, and is listed as one of the 100 most unique museums in the world. Admission is free.
Marvin’s Marvelous Mechanical Museum is located in Farmington Hills and it operated by Marvin Yagoda. It’s designed to be fun for the entire family and the web site is a treat!
Speaking of the weird and wacky, when we don’t forget, the last Wednesday of every month is a “Weird Wednesday” on Absolute Michigan with help from Weird Michigan. We didn’t forget today, and there’s some great stuff on Michigan UFO Sightings today!
Spinners 1, photo by n8xd.
Keith (n8xd) took this photo at Harvest, Michigan’s first commercial wind farm. The farm is owned by John Deere Wind Energy and located near Elkton in the Thumb.
Read more (and see another photo from Keith) in Harvest, Michigan’s first commercial wind farm starts spinning on Absolute Michigan. You can also check out keithdelong.com andbe sure to click through to the photo to see it bigger!
Gophers at Crisler Arena, photo by B Cohen
Crisler Arena at the University of Michigan hosts men’s basketball, women’s basketball, men’s gymnastics and women’s gymnastics. It opened in 1967, was named for Fritz Crisler, legendary UM football coach and athletic director and designed by Dan Dworsky. Wikipedia’s page on Crisler Arena says that is is often called “The House that Cazzie Built,” a reference to superstar Cazzie Russell. Russell led UM to Big Ten titles ’64-66 and his popularity caused the team’s fanbase to outgrow Yost Fieldhouse. The arena seats almost 14,000 and you can read more about it at the Crisler Arena page at MGOBLUE.com.
Wikipedia’s entry for the University of Michigan Wolverines men’s basketball says:
The Wolverines have won 12 Big Ten regular-season conference titles, as well as the inaugural Big Ten Tournament in 1998, which it later forfeited due to NCAA violations. The team has appeared in the NCAA Final Four on six occasions (1964, 1965, 1976, 1989, 1992* and 1993*) and won the national championship in 1989 under Steve Fisher. The program later forfeited its 1992 and 1993 Final Four appearances due to NCAA violations. Other notable players who played for Michigan include Daniel Horton, Bernard Robinson, Gary Grant, Terry Mills, Glen Rice, Jalen Rose, Rumeal Robinson, Jamal Crawford, Juwan Howard, Chris Webber, Cazzie Russell, and Mark Hughes. (I’ll add Robert Traylor, Rudy Tomjanovich and Phil Hubbard to that list)
More items of interest for you include a biggee-sized view from up high, this photoset titled Paging the Fab Five and a couple of photos of Crisler Arena from the Bentley Historical Library.
The Breslin Center, Michigan State University, photo by jgeorge_2006
The Jack Breslin Student Events Center at Michigan State University was named in honor of Battle Creek native and MSU grad Jack Breslin. In 1989, it replaced Jenison Fieldhouse as the site for MSU men’s basketball and women’s basketball games. Wikipedia’s entry on the Breslin Center says that although the arena nominally contains 16,280 seats, seating is about 15,000 for most events.
The arena’s current basketball court is the same floor where the Spartans won the 2000 NCAA Men’s Tournament, which was at the RCA Dome in Indianapolis. The school purchased the floor from the NCAA and Final Four floor installer Horner Flooring (based in Dollar Bay, Michigan) after the title game, and had a plaque installed on the baseline near the Michigan State tunnel to commemorate the floor’s purpose in the school’s history.
The Spartans have won two NCAA championships and ten Big Ten championships in men’s basketball. The Spartans won the National Championship in both 1979 and 2000 NCAA Tournaments. MSU alumns who play or have played in the NBA include Maurice Ager, Earvin “Magic” Johnson, Greg Kelser, Morris Peterson, Zach Randolph, Shawn Respert, Jason Richardson, Scott Skiles, Steve Smith, Eric Snow, Jay Vincent and Kevin Willis.
I’m not entirely certain who jgeorge is, but they have uploaded the photo above large enough for great wallpaper and have many more MSU sports photos.
For more pictures, check out a Flickr search for Breslin Center, the MSU Basketball set by Blackbeard Ben and this incredible shot of the Breslin Center at MSU’s Convocation by Patrick T Power. The photo gallery at BeASpartan.com has a few photos from the Breslin including this beauty.
Oh yes, more ice., photo by {D}.
{D} says when life give you lemons…
I think the rest is “…you take ridiculously cool pictures of ice that make amazing wallpaper and really should be viewed large”!
This is part of her great Snow/Ice photo set (slideshow).
Grand Haven 05, photo by jbatts.
jbatts says that on a whim she drove out Grand Haven and captured these photos from sunset at Grand Haven State Park (slideshow) on a January evening with 25+ mph winds and single-digit windchills.
It’s one of the photos in the new group she started on Flickr for Photographers of West Michigan. Speaking of the photographers of West Michigan, what do you want to bet that you can find the photo from the guy in the red jacket on Flickr too?
Sol, photo by rckrawczykjr.
Ralph took this with his holga from the shoreline of Belle Isle. Be sure to check it out bigger.
If you have a little time, tune in his Belle Isle slideshow. If you have a little more time, you might enjoy some Holga Goodness.
Convocation Center, photo courtesy Eastern Michigan University
From Wikipedia’s Eastern Michigan University entry I learned that the school was founded in Ypsilanti in 1849 as Michigan State Normal School, the first normal school created outside the original 13 colonies. It became the Michigan State Normal College in 1899, Eastern Michigan College in 1956 and ultimately Eastern Michigan University in 1959. In 1991, the school become one of the first to abandon a Native American mascot (the Hurons) for the current name of Eagles. In 1991, when EMU qualified for the NCAA tournament for the first time in school history, announcer Brent Musburger referred to the team on-air as the “No-Names” and there is apparently still a campaign to restore the Huron. EMU is in the Mid-American Conference (MAC) and:
Eastern’s men’s basketball team has appeared in four NCAA Division I tournaments, and have a 3-4 record, tied for third best among Michigan colleges. In the 1996 Men’s Basketball Tournament, Eastern Michigan defeated the Duke Blue Devils in the opening round; it would be the Blue Devils’ last first- or second-round defeat until 2007, when they were upended by VCU in the opening round.
EMU plays their games at Convocation Center, a nearly 205,000 sq ft structure that was completed in 1998. Here’s a photo of the arena dressed up for convocation. They don’t list what programs use the facility, but here’s a link to their women’s basketball (2008 MAC champions) and men’s basketball programs. Basketball Reference lists a number of notable EMU grads in the NBA including Earl Boynkins.
Michigan in Pictures 
