history

The Beauty of Detroit’s Brush Park

Posted on October 13, 2025October 13, 2025 by farlane

The Detroit Historical Society shares some great information on Detroit’s Brush Park neighborhood that begins:

Established in 1860, Brush Park is one of the oldest historic neighborhoods in Detroit. Today it encompasses twenty-four blocks, bounded by Mack Avenue on the north, Woodward Avenue on the west, Beaubien Street on the east, and the Fisher Freeway on the south. In the late 1700s, the land was part of a ribbon farm owned by the Askin family, prominent fur traders and British loyalists.

Askin did not approve of American independence, so in 1802 he and his wife moved to Canada, leaving control of the farm and the enslaved people who worked there in the hands of his son-in-law Elijah Brush, husband to Adelaide Askin. Brush was active in civic affairs, serving as the second mayor of Detroit, the Michigan Territory United States Attorney, and Michigan Territory Treasurer. As a lieutenant colonel in the territorial militia, Brush was taken prisoner during the War of 1812 when the British captured Detroit.

Edmund Brush inherited the estate when his father died. He was also an influential figure in Detroit – a volunteer with the fire department and president of the water commission. In the 1850s, Brush began dividing and selling his land to wealthy families. He named the streets Alfred, Adelaide, Edmund, Eliot, and Brush after family members. Brush had many building restrictions, some which required expensive, large homes for the neighborhood, leading Brush Park to be called “Little Paris” for its mansions. Many famous Detroiters lived in the area in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century including Joseph L. Hudson, Albert Kahn and Grace Whitney Evans, daughter of David Whitney.

Read more and/or see related historical photos & from the Detroit Historical Society, and as someone who used to live on Adelaide, I can’t tell you how wonderful it is to see these wonderful buildings return to life!

Check out all the photos on Terrell’s Facebook page! and follow him there and on his Instagram @UrbanPharaoh444!

More wonderful Michigan architecture on Michigan in Pictures!

Happy National Jiffy Mix Day!

Posted on October 1, 2025October 1, 2025 by farlane

Jiffy Mix – Your Cornbread Comes From Right Here by Steve Brown

October 1st is the first ever National Jiffy Mix Day, a celebration of the family-owned Chelsea Milling Company that got its start in 1901 and launched the iconic Jiffy thanks to the vision of Mabel White Holmes:

When a friend of her twin sons Howard and Dudley visited their home, Mabel noticed the biscuits in the boy’s lunch were flat and unappetizing. She set out to find a way to create a pre-made mix which would assist the boy’s single father in the kitchen.

In 1930, with the support of her husband Howard Samuel Holmes, Mabel’s home-grown project became the first prepared baking mix sold to the public. The convenient, simple to use mix only required the addition of milk to produce perfect biscuits every time. By keeping their “JIFFY” brand baking mixes affordable, the Holmes’ new venture was able to help many families who were recovering from the effects of the Great Depression.

Read lots more from Jiffy & cheers to everyone who looks at a child’s lunch with an eye towards making it better!! There’s a poster from the Chelsea Area Chamber of Commerce below with info about the festivities on tap today that include games & prizes, a treasure hunt, food trucks & a visit from Detroit Lions Mascot Roary.

Steve passed on a couple years ago, but his photos and his love of history remain (click for his Michigan in Pictures features). Here are a few more pics of Chelsea – see more great shots from Chelsea in his Chelsea Michigan gallery on Flickr!

Mabel White Holmes inventor of Jiffy All Purpose Baking Mix

What lies beneath might be a shipwreck

Posted on September 23, 2025 by farlane

The Great Lakes Shipwreck Aurora by Bob Gudas

Janelle D. James of Bridge Magazine wrote last week that Michigan is facing the worst drought in over a decade. Although we’ve gotten some much needed rain with more on the way, the Michigan Storm Chasers share that it probably won’t be enough to make a significant difference. Rather than bum you out with ways that drought sucks, let’s focus on this cool photo & story from when drought was even worse!

When Bob shared this photo in October of 2012 he wrote, “The remains of the Great Lakes steamer Aurora. The wreck recently became visible due to record low waters in Lake Michigan basin. The 300 foot wooden steamer was built in 1887 and burned to the waterline at this spot in 1932. The stern was subsequently covered with water where it remained until the drought of 2012. Approximately 2 weeks ago the water receded off of the wreck. This view shows approximately 200 feet of the wreck with another 100 feet being buried under a sand dune.

A Shipwreck World article on the Aurora add that the Aurora was significant as one of the last great wooden steamships: When launched by the Murphy and Miller of Cleveland on August 23, 1887, the 290-foot, steam-driven propeller was the largest and most powerfully built wooden vessel on the Great Lakes. The 3000-ton vessel was initially owned by John Corrigan of the Aurora Mining Company of Milwaukee which paid $150,000 for its construction. It was used to ship iron ore from the Gogebic Range Ironwood, Michigan, to Cleveland and coal from Cleveland on the return trip.

View & purchase Bob’s work on his website, and check out a seasonally appropriate pic in Autumn’s Rainbow: the colors of fall on Michigan in Pictures!

Big Penny celebrates munching her 100th truck!

Posted on August 28, 2025August 28, 2025 by farlane

Number 98 by STUPID – Lansing

Back in May, we introduced you to Big Penny, Lansing’s Truck Munching Bridge & now she’s back to show the Mighty Mac it’s not the only bridge making news. This diminutive 12-foot tall bridge has taken some big bites over the years – so many that as of May 1, 2025 she had snacked on 87 semis since counting began in 2004. Despite the added exposure Penny has been on an absolute tear in 2025, and yesterday our friends at STUPID Lansing threw a party celebrating the 100th truck munched! WLNS Lansing was there to document this historic occasion, and you can head over to STUPID – Lansing for more on this important story & some great Big Penny merch!

Law & Order: Back to School Edition

Posted on August 26, 2025August 26, 2025 by farlane

1931 Ford Model AA School Bus in Greenfield Village by Steve Brown (in memorium)

mLive shares that the decision to start the school year before or after Labor Day has long been a point of debate in Michigan due to the need for student workers in the hospitality & agricultural sectors. Even though the law requiring schools to start post-Labor Day passed 20 years ago, most Michigan schools are still starting before summer’s end:

…The Michigan Department of Education only tracks districts that are granted Labor Day waivers, but not which districts use their waiver or their start dates, according to spokesman Ken Coleman. There are currently 185 waivers held in the state, covering more than 500 school districts and public academies.

Forty-eight of those are held by intermediate school districts (ISDs) or area educational agencies and their waivers almost entirely cover all districts within their regional boundaries. Additionally, 102 individual charter schools or public academies have their own waivers, as well as 30 school districts outside of ISDs. A few hundred more schools and districts, including several ISDs, are not waiver eligible that automatically start after Labor Day. Still, more Michigan schools than not are starting before Labor Day despite the mid-2000s law.

Steve passed on a couple years ago, but his photos and his love of history remain (click for his Michigan in Pictures features). He took these back in 2018 at Greenfield Village, Henry Ford’s outdoor living history museum in Dearborn. The Model AA school bus was acquired from Florida and visitors can use the historic bus for transportation around the Village (for a price). See lots more in his Classic Busses Old & New gallery on Flickr.

The Goldenrod Spider didn’t bite Frank Carter

Posted on August 25, 2025August 25, 2025 by farlane

Goldenrod Spider by Gowtham

Cathy Griffin of the Traverse Area Historical Society shared a little news from 120 years ago in 1905:

FRANK CARTER, local resident who had been in Chicago and Grand Rapids during the summer, returned Monday night being ill from the poisonous effects of a spider which walked over his arm, leaving a poisonous track at every step. Last week, while lying on the ground at Grand Rapids, an immense yellow spider jumped on his arm near his elbow and ran down to his wrist. Mr. Carter smashed his poisonous body on his arm and it immediately began to swell from the poison. The arm was inflamed and swollen with white spots. Under the advice of a physician, Mr. Carter went home to care for his arm.

It’s been a minute since I’ve featured a photo from Gowtham. He shares that while driving through the back roads of Huron Mountains from Houghton to Marquette, “I took a few wrong forks in succession and one of those forks had a plethora of Blue Vervains (the flower in the picture). Taking one wrong fork after another, driving slow and paying attention paid off – as one of those blue vervains had an uncommon yellow tinge. I stopped to look carefully and much to my surprise was this tiny little Golden Rod Spider.”

…These spiders may be yellow or white, depending on the flower in which they are hunting. Especially younger females, which may hunt on a variety of flowers such as daisies and sunflowers, may change color “at will”. Older females require large amounts of relatively large prey to produce the best possible clutch of eggs. They are therefore, in North America, most commonly found in goldenrod (Solidago sp.), a bright yellow flower which attracts large numbers of insects, especially in autumn. It is often very hard even for a searching human to recognize one of these spiders on a yellow flower.”

See more in his Michigan Wild Flowers gallery on Flickr & be sure to keep an eye out for the little things!

I want to be very clear that this spider is not venomous (and no spider has “venomous tracks”). Only the Northern Black Widow and the Brown Recluse have bites that endanger humans. The rest are out there happily dispatching harmful pests. My guess is that it was a Brown Recluse as their bites have sort of a bullseye pattern with a white center.

See some Rare Birds at the 2025 Woodward Dream Cruise!

Posted on August 15, 2025 by farlane

RARE BIRD by pkHyperFocal

The Woodward Dream Cruise will be celebrating its 30th year tomorrow (August 16, 2025). It is the largest one-day automotive event in North America, drawing nearly one million people & 40,000 classic cars every year.

pk got this shot of a 1971 Superbird dressed in Sassy Grass at the 2023 Woodward Dream Cruise. Here’s a few they have shared – see more great shots in their Wheels gallery on Flickr!

The last look at Jimmy Hoffa

Posted on July 31, 2025 by farlane

Last portraits of Jimmy Hoffa by Tony Spina

50 years ago on the morning of July 30th, 1975 Chief Photographer for the Detroit Free Press Tony Spina took what would be the last pictures of former Teamsters president James Riddle Hoffa. Wayne State’s Walter P Reuther Labor Library shares:

Spina was sent to visit Hoffa at his cottage on Square Lake in Lake Orion to take portraits of him for the Free Press and Newsweek. The images were not intended for a specific story; they were meant to update older photo files, which were likely outdated due to Hoffa’s incarceration from 1967 to 1971. At the time, Hoffa was challenging a federal restriction that barred him from holding a leadership position in the Teamsters until 1980, thus making him newsworthy once again.

According to Spina’s account, the backyard photo shoot was almost entirely uneventful. The two were old friends and chatted as they moved around the backyard, chasing the best light. The only notable moment occurred when Hoffa had to step away to take a call about a meeting scheduled for after lunch. It is assumed that this was the meeting held at the Machus Red Fox Restaurant in Bloomfield Hills, from which Hoffa never returned.

Lots more in the Reuther Library and for sure check out photos in the awesome Tony Spina Collection online!

Jimmy Hoffa Negatives Walter P Reuther Library.jpg

Detroit’s Hottest Day was also its 233rd birthday!

Posted on July 25, 2025July 25, 2025 by farlane

Trolly to Navin Field, Detroit 1934 by Corktown Historical Society

Yesterday Model D editor Aaron Foley took a fascinating look at July 24, 1934 which remains the hottest day in the Detroit’s recorded history when the temperature struck 104.6°F at 4:10 PM on Detroit’s 233rd anniversary:

That brutal day came during a nationwide heat wave that swept from the West Coast through the Great Plains and into the Midwest, ultimately settling over the Motor City. More than 700 people died across the country due to the heat. Detroit’s death toll was lower than most. An eight-month old baby named Rosie May died of heat exhaustion and two men drowned swimming while trying to cool down. But low death toll or not, the city felt the heat.

And 105°F isn’t just “hot.” It’s desperate. On Van Dyke, on the city’s east side, a lumber yard fire broke out, engulfing nearly 10 acres. The blaze destroyed nearly 3,000 telephone lines, and claimed five lives

The Corktown Historical Society shares this photo depicts the historic intersection of Michigan & Trumbull aka “The Corner” in Detroit’s Corktown neighborhood in 1934, a year the Tigers won the AL pennant. They share “Trolley cars were a popular source of transportation to Tigers games during the 1930s, at least for those who could afford the fare during the Depression. In this photo, hundreds of fans exit a trolley car near Navin Field.”

Click through to their Instagram to see photos of Bennett Park & Briggs Stadium & follow them on Facebook for the latest … or is that earliest? 😉

No Kings in Michigan: James Jesse Strang edition

Posted on June 16, 2025June 16, 2025 by farlane

Sunrise at St James Harbor by Andy Farmer

I confess that when I started today’s post I had no idea that June 16, 1856 was the date when assassins mortally wounded Michigan’s only king. To be clear, this is a post about kings being a deeply stupid & un-American thing, not a post about killing them.

Michigan religious leader & politician James Jesse Strang was a major contender for leadership of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints after the death of founder Joseph Smith. Here are some excerpts of the wild ride of a Wikipedia that is the James Jesse Strang entry & chronicles his life as a lawyer, minister, prophet & politician who ultimately became something of a king. Please feel welcome to add your favorite tidbits in the comments!

Strang rested his claim to leadership on an ordination by an angel at the very moment Joseph Smith died (similar to the ordination of Smith), requirements that he claimed were set forth in the Doctrine and Covenants that the President had to be appointed by revelation and ordained by angels, and a “Letter of Appointment” from Smith, carrying a legitimate Nauvoo postmark. This letter was dated June 18, 1844, just nine days before Smith’s death. (he also claimed to have divine plates a la Smith that he discovered in Voree, Wisconsin)

…About 12,000 Latter Day Saints ultimately accepted Strang’s claims.[30] A second “Stake of Zion” was established on Beaver Island in Lake Michigan, where Strang moved his church headquarters in 1848. Strang’s church had a high turnover rate … Many defections were due to Strang’s seemingly abrupt “about-face” on the turbulent subject of polygamy. Vehemently opposed to the practice at first, Strang reversed course in 1849 and became one of its strongest advocates, marrying five wives (including his original spouse, Mary) and fathering fourteen children. Strang defended his new tenet by claiming that, far from enslaving or demeaning women, polygamy would liberate and “elevate” them by allowing them to choose the best possible mate based upon any factors which were deemed important by them.

…Strang was crowned in 1850 by his counselor and Prime Minister, George J. Adams. About 300 people witnessed his coronation, for which he wore a bright red flannel robe which was topped by a white collar with black speckles. His crown was made of tin, rather than gold, and it is described in one account as being “a shiny metal ring with a cluster of glass stars in the front.

On Monday, June 16, 1856, Strang was waylaid on the dock at the harbor of St. James, the chief city on Beaver Island by former disciples who shot him in the back.

Read a lot more in Wikipedia!

Andy shared these pics back in August of 2016 in his Beaver Island, MI gallery on Flickr, and I’ve included a couple images from Wikipedia as well.