Credits
Original negatives of The Detroit News are housed at the Walter P. Reuther Library at Wayne State University. We appreciate their assistance on this project.
Gary Miles, Editor and Publisher
Kevin J. Hardy, Managing Editor
Nolan Finley, Editorial Page Editor
Aaron Velthoven, Vice President, Marketing, Communications & Events
Marcy L. Viselli, Consumer Marketing Brand & Events Specialist
Chapter introductions and photo research by Charlotte Massey
Editing and writing by Charlotte Massey, Bill McMillan, and Caitlin Waite
Copyright © 2023 by The Detroit News • All Rights Reserved • ISBN: 978-1-63846-064-0
No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission of the copyright owner or the publisher.
Published by Pediment Publishing, a division of The Pediment Group, Inc. www.pediment.com. Printed in Canada.
RIGHT Before there was a Navin Field, a Briggs Stadium, or a Tiger Stadium, the National League‘s Detroit Wolverines played baseball at Recreation Park on the near east side of town at the corner of Brush and Brady Streets, July 4, 1887. The team did not draw well, even after winning the championship in 1887, and folded in 1888 after eight seasons in the National League. THE DETROIT NEWS
The Early Years
ABOVE A police station was established on Belle Isle in 1889. Sergeant Cahoon, front row far left, was in charge. THE DETROIT NEWS
LEFT The Evening News, November 6, 1889.
OPPOSITE TOP RIGHT This hay market was established on the northwest corner of Michigan and Trumbull Avenues, the future home of Bennett Park, Navin Field, and Tiger Stadium, in 1875. The city’s weighmaster collected a fee for weighing hay, straw, coal, and livestock before they were sold. In 1881 the fees were ten cents per head for cattle and five cents for sheep. THE DETROIT NEWS
OPPOSITE TOP LEFT Wood was the principal fuel used in Detroit in the 1870s, much of it brought from the north in schooners. The Peacock wood and coal yard at Griswold and Clifford was positioned across the street from the Clifford Street engine house. THE DETROIT NEWS
OPPOSITE BOTTOM Horses pull a streetcar down Woodward Avenue at Campus Martius, circa 1885. Although horse-drawn carts were not speedy transportation, their steel wheels riding on iron rail right-of-ways in city streets delivered a smoother ride than on rough cobblestones or dirt. THE DETROIT NEWS
The 1940s
ABOVE Strikers confront a strikebreaker during the 1941 walkout of Ford‘s Dearborn Rouge plant. Detroit News photographer Milton Brooks took the picture, which was the first photo to win in the new Pulitzer category for photojournalism.
MILTON BROOKS / THE DETROIT NEWSABOVE LEFT Strikers hold up The Detroit News announcing the end of the strike at a Ford Motor Company plant in April 1941. After a long and bitter struggle on the part of Henry Ford against organized labor, Ford Motor Company signed its first contract with the United Auto Workers and Congress of Industrial Organizations (UAW-CIO) on June 20, 1941. THE DETROIT NEWS
LEFT Workers at the Ford Rouge plant assemble an airplane engine, November 26, 1941. THE DETROIT NEWS
OPPOSITE The Detroit News, April 11, 1941. “With only a few dissenting votes in a crowd of about 20,000, a United Automobile Workers (CIO) meeting in the State Fair Coliseum Thursday night approved the Governor’s Ford peace proposal and authorized a committee to call off the strike as soon as a satisfactory settlement was reached on a company counter proposal.
Cheers greeted statements of leaders that ‘for the first time in its history, the Ford Motor Co. has recognized the UAW-CIO.’ Promises that a formal contract would be obtained ‘after the UAW-CIO wins exclusive bargaining rights in a labor board election’ also brought wild applause.
Gov. Van Wagoner was praised by the speakers and cheered by the audience, especially when one official stated the Governor had refused to call out troops to protect a back-towork movement.”
The 1950s
ABOVE Miners load salt on a conveyer belt at the Detroit salt mine underneath the city, August 6, 1950. This gigantic mine, 1,160 feet beneath the surface, spreads out over more than 1,400 acres with fifty miles of roads. THE DETROIT NEWS
ABOVE LEFT The Nash-Kelvinator float in the parade celebrating Detroit’s 250th birthday, July 31, 1951. THE DETROIT NEWS
OPPOSITE The Detroit News, June 25, 1950. “Communist forces from North Korea at dawn today invaded South Korea on a wide front and U.S. military advisers feared it was the long-expected invasion.
Approximately 500 U.S. officers and men of a military advisory mission are here. In addition, there are numerous U.S. officials, businessmen and missionaries. The last U.S. combat troops were withdrawn from South Korea in June of 1949.
A military adviser said it was probable the northern invaders might push as far south as eight miles from the border in most places before meeting an established line of resistance.
The attack came as Brig. Gen. William L. Roberts, who commanded the advisory group here, was to sail from Japan to the United States and retirement.”
LEFT General Motors automative designers created full-scale drawings of vehicle designs in 1951. THE DETROIT NEWS
ABOVE Fans find plenty to cheer about at the 1951 All-Star Game at Briggs Stadium in Detroit. THE DETROIT NEWS
ABOVE RIGHT Detroit Lions co-captains Johnny Prchlik and Bob Smith (40) carry coach Buddy Parker off the field on December 28, 1952, as the Detroit Lions celebrate their victory over the Cleveland Browns for the world championship. Others (from left) are mascot William “Moon” Baker, Stan Campbell (67), Gus Cifelli, and Bill Doran.
LEFT The Detroit News, November 5, 1952. “Sweeping to victory with the greatest popular vote ever run up by an American political candidate, Gen. Eisenhower has won election as the thirty-third President of the United States. Nearly completed returns this morning showed the general leading 429-to-102 in the electoral college.
…as returns from the hardfought election came in, it was apparent that the voters had chosen a change to Eisenhower, not to the Republican Party as a whole.
… Women outvoted men in scores, and perhaps hundreds, of Detroit’s 1,480 polling precincts Tuesday as the city turned out to set an all-time record for voting.”
ABOVE President Barack Obama enters to a cheering crowd to speak at Detroit Diesel in Redford, Michigan, on December 10, 2012. Daimler AG planned to announce $100 million investment into the facility at Detroit Diesel.
ROBIN BUCKSON / THE DETROIT NEWS
ABOVE LEFT Michigan State’s Adreian Payne takes the ball to the basket as MSU plays North Carolina on the deck of the USS Carl Vinson in the Carrier Classic, November 11, 2011. DALE G. YOUNG / THE DETROIT NEWS
LEFT Detroit Tigers starting pitcher Justin Verlander celebrates in the locker room after Game 4 of the American League Championship Series between the Tigers and the New York Yankees at Comerica Park in Detroit, October 18, 2012. The Tigers won 8-2, and swept the Yankees in the series 4-0.
DAVID GURALNICK / THE DETROIT NEWS
ABOVE Jake Poole, front, and Cameron Carvama paddle a small boat through flood waters on Southfield freeway service drive near Outer Drive, August 12, 2014. Many of the neighborhood roads in the area were flooded after heavy rains the previous day.
BRYAN MITCHELL / THE DETROIT NEWS
RIGHT The front page of The Detroit News on August 13, 2014.
BELOW Flooding on Interstate 75 southbound near Warren Avenue in Detroit Monday August 11, 2014. Some cars were stuck, some were able to get out.
ELIZABETH CONLEY / THE DETROIT NEWS
The financial insurance giant that has vigorously attacked Detroit’s “grand bargain” is accusing court-appointed mediators of engineering a “fraudulent” plan to rescue city pensioners and preserve city-owned art at the expense of other creditors.
Syncora Guarantee Inc. on Tuesday filed a blistering objection to Detroit’s bankruptcy exit plan, accusing Chie District Judge Gerald Rosen and attorney Eugene Driker of being “agenda driven, conflicted mediators who colluded with certain interested parties to benefi select favored creditors to the gross detriment of disfavored creditors.” The bond insurer which so far has had little success in derailing Detroit’s fast-track bankruptcy, wants U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Steven Rhodes to reject the “grand bargain” on grounds that Rosen’s mediation process was “tainted.” David Heiman, one of Detroit’s top bankruptcy attorneys at the Jones Day law firm, said Tuesday Rosen and Driker have been “very balanced, very neutral, very sophisticated and
75 and 696. “Let’s make sure we do the assessments, and then we’l do the follow-up to say what aid and assistance is available,” Snyder said. The flood was responsible for at least two deaths, both in Warren. A 31year-old woman was found inside a vehicle that was stranded in about 3
ABOVE One-hundred-and-fourteen-year-old Jeralean Talley claps along with a song at the church service and birthday celebration in her honor at New Jerusalem Missionary Baptist Church in Inkster on May 26, 2013. At the time, Talley was the oldest known person in the United States.
ABOVE LEFT Michigan State quarterback Connor Cook holds a rose in his teeth as MSU beats Ohio State, 34-24, at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis in the Big Ten Championship game, December 7, 2013.
LEFT Spartans mess up coach Tom Izzo’s hair in celebration as MSU beats Louisville, 76-70, in their NCAA Elite Eight game at the Carrier Dome in Syracuse, New York, on March 29, 2015.
ABOVE Tigers’ Torii Hunter, Miguel Cabrera, and Prince Fielder head to the dugout for the start of the game as the Tigers take on the Boston Red Sox in ALCS Game 1 at Fenway Park in Boston, Massachusetts on October 12, 2013.
ABOVE RIGHT Tucker Alberts of Howell is airborne and not really in the position he had hoped for, but he makes the take-down anyway during the Steer Wrestling competition at the Michigan High School Rodeo Association’s 2015 State Finals Rodeo in Ovid on June 5, 2015.
DALEBishop’s family fights church over inheritance
Grandchildren claim megachurch founder left them up to $10M
BY ORALANDAR BRAND-WILLIAMS
The Detroit News
Bonner
a age 93, after suffering from dementia and complications from a stroke.
He founded Solomon s Temple n 1944, which has grown into a 2,500-sea sanctuary on East Seven Mile. t was among the irst churches in the city to broadcast ts sermons and services, watched by thousands across the country. Under Bonner s leadership, the Church of Our Lord Jesus Christ expanded to numerous cities across the country and around the globe, church of icials say He also founded the W.L Bonner Bible College in Columbia, South Carolina.
Bonner s real estate empire includes as many as 30 homes and other properties in Michigan, New York, South Carolina and Washington, D C., his family says.
His survivors want the church to open its books on the late bishop s financial affairs to give them more information about the bishop s will detailing property and cash tha they say should be part of their inheritance. But lawyers for Bonner s estate, which is overseen by a church bishop, say the family should take their questions to church leaders, which Bonner s granddaughters say they have done without success.
The family which has no role
Please see Inheritance Page 13A
Body
A former Detroit water official is reigniting a controversy about whether Flint could have aved money by staying with Detroit s system and avoided a switch that eventually led to contaminated water in the Genesee County community
While under the control of a state-appointed emergency manager in 2013, Flint rejected an offer to remain with Detroit water system ha could have saved an estimated $800 milion over the life of a 30-year contract, said Bill Johnson, former public affairs director for the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department. Critics say tha decision led to Flint joining a new regional authority and put the city on course to draw water from the Flint River — a move that eventually resulted in lead contamnation issues.
But supporters of the new regional body — he Karegnondi Water Authority — rejec that version of events and say it represents the kind of public relations ba tles waged three years ago be ween officials in Genesee County and Metro Detroit. They stress tha the deciion to break from the Detroit water system was separate from the later choice of tapping he Flint River as a temporary water source. Flint s long-running lead contamination problems have prompted a new round of inger-pointing over who was ultimately responible for the split.
Johnson this week released an email outining the offer to Flint area of icials in April 2013 — just before the city agreed to join Kaegnondi. The email, written by then-Detroit Water and Sewerage Department Director Sue
ABOVE Samuel Smith is happy to receive a case of bottled water and a new water filter at home, as volunteers accompanied by Michigan State Police and Genessee County Sheriff’s Deputies work their way through Flint neighborhoods on January 12, 2016. DALE G. YOUNG / THE DETROIT NEWS
LEFT The Detroit News, January 27, 2016. “A former Detroit water official is reigniting a controversy about whether Flint could have saved money by staying with Detroit’s system and avoided a switch that eventually led to contaminated water in the Genesee County community.
O verhaul e xpec ted f or FCA operations
Marchionne likely to focus more on Jeep, N. America market
AYLAND oit News
ysler Automobiles
V CEO Sergio Marchionne vised master y tha is exted to reshape the automaktfolio and signift manufacturing opnited States. ts from the all Street to the altered 2014-18 te more heaviysler s thriving orth Ameritions, while lowering tions for the renaissance of talian luxury brand Alfa Romeo and emerging markets such as Brazil.
“ would try to exploit, as much as I can, the Jeep brand,” said Andrea Balloni, a Fidentiis
While under the control of a state-appointed emergency manager in 2013, Flint rejected an offer to remain with Detroit’s water system that could have saved an estimated $800 million over the life of a 30-year contract, said Bill Johnson, former public affairs director for the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department.
Live coverage today: FCA eleases earnings, details 5-year plan. Go o detroitnews.com
Equities SA analyst based in Itay “Alfa Romeo is in its very early stages of revamping I can be a success, it can be a failure. While for Jeep, you know that it s going to be a success. The company s commitment o Jeep plays into a $5.3 billion U S. investment plan by the auomaker tha was loosely outined under a four-year deal with the United Auto Workers n 2015. Marchionne has conirmed parts of the plan, but not all. I is expected to impact a handful of vehicles and at least
Critics say that decision led to Flint joining a new regional authority and put the city on course to draw water from the Flint River — a move that eventually resulted in lead contamination issues. But supporters of the new regional body — the Karegnondi Water Authority — reject that version of events and say it represents the kind of public relations battles waged three years ago between officials in Genesee County and Metro Detroit. They stress that the decision to break from the Detroit water system was separate from the later choice of tapping the Flint River as a temporary water source.”
Please see FCA, Page 3A