Detroit, Lift Up Your Weary Head

Sufjan Stevens sings about Detroit (in his song of the same name as the blog title) – “Once a great place…Now a prison. From the trembling walls, it’s a great idea.”

This was an alarmingly accurate depiction of the city we found. We saw building after building after building with every single window broken out, just sitting there and decaying. We had all been cracking jokes before visiting this city about hoping that it hadn’t closed down before we got there, partly because we wanted to tease Professor Spring who had grown up in the area and was excited to show us around a city he was so familiar with. However, none of us were laughing as the utter desolation of a once-booming industrial city really sank in. These abandoned buildings were more than eyesores- they represented the uprooting of peoples’ lives and the death of a once-vibrant industry. This city was the very heart of American car culture- a truly great idea that brought great wealth to the nation and the city. Now certain parts are nearing ghost-town status.

Our first stop in Detroit was the Henry Ford Museum. Never having even heard of this museum, I was expecting an auto museum. I was more than pleasantly surprised to find one of the most impressive history museums I’ve ever encountered, which we did not have nearly enough time to fully explore and was a bright and shiny contrast to the rest of the city we saw. Our guide, Greg, was incredibly helpful and informative, showing our group around the museum and Greenfield Village, which is a piece of land they have set up to represent different time periods of American history. For example, the village features a working farm as it would have been like in the 1800s, the reconstructed courthouse where Lincoln practiced law, churches from the 1920s, old town halls, an original slave cabin from the South and many other structures. It was really interesting, especially seeing a typical home of a Southern African-American family during the Depression compared to the slave cabin of 50 years earlier- they were practically the same size.

As we were leaving the museum, we received a nice surprise from Prof. Spring’s family- his uncle brought us care packages with products made in Michigan put together by Ken’s aunt. Yet another example of the warm hospitality we have encountered all along this trip, and this trend continued throughout our day- every place we went, we encountered friends, family and strangers who were kind and helpful, reaffirming that hope is not lost for cities that are struggling financially- they are still filled with good people.

We had an overwhelming and delicious meal at the Polish Village Café in Detroit, courtesy of Professor Spring’s best friend’s family. This lunch was definitely some of the best food we found on the trip- it couldn’t have been anymore authentic and still be on American soil. The restaurant was dark and cozy, and as another customer said while waiting in the bathroom line with me, still has a very “old world” feel to it- you can peek in the kitchen and see mounds and mounds of homemade fresh pierogis.

After eating far too much, we hopped in the van and rushed off to see the Heidelberg Project. This was definitely one of the coolest experiences of the trip, in my opinion. Heidelberg Street is in a part of Detroit that, like many parts of the city, has numerous houses that have simply been abandoned, often with some of the previous owner’s belongings left behind. However a group of artists have reclaimed some of the houses and yards and decorated them with items that have been left behind. Many of the art installations make provocative political statements, using only items found in these houses or around the community. A couple of the most powerful pieces included a house covered in forgotten stuffed animals, which really spoke to the tragedy of the abandoned lives that once thrived in this city, and a shrine to alcohol, built mostly out of pieces of broken beer and liquor bottles, speaking about our cultural worship of this drug that has destroyed so many lives, especially for people living in poverty.

Next on our agenda was a meeting with the mayor and some town council members of the town of Rossford, the town where Professor Spring grew up. We visited Rossford because we had in our itinerary big cities and national parks, but no real glimpse of small town America, which is often what we idealize as being the traditional American life. Rossford is a town with a population of 6,400 and only became an official city when its population reached 5,000 in 1971. Its economy was completely based on the auto industry because of the local glass factory, which employed most of the adults in Rossford and is still the largest employer. Most of the families there are descended from Polish, Ukrainian, Czechoslovakian and German immigrants who came in the early 1900s to work in auto plants. The economic downturn has brought a 12% decrease in employment for the town of Rossford, and it will likely continue to decline unless they can adapt their local economy to account for the failing auto industry and technology compensating for paid workers in plants.

I really enjoyed getting to hear the mayor’s and council members’ perspectives on their town. They all stressed the importance of community and tight family units as the lifeblood of Rossford. It was especially interesting to hear Leonard Michaels, one of the council members and a professor at Owens College in Toledo. He was from Russia and he says that in Russia, it would have been quite unusual for an ethnic minority to be elected to a public office, but for him as a Russian in an American town full of other ethnicities, it had been no problem and that that was one of the great things about America. All in all, we heard a lovely account of life in small town America as told by people that wouldn’t choose to live anywhere else. Considering the way the economy is changing though, I sincerely hope towns like Rossford can continue to preserve the quality of life they have enjoyed thus far as a result of their hard work and community dedication.

Our day ended with a dinner at a Lebanese restaurant in Toledo with Mark Folk, director of the Greater Toledo Arts Commission and a past schoolmate of Professor Spring’s. He spoke with our group about using the arts to revitalize a city’s economy and at the same time develop the talents of younger generations to gear them towards a creative economy rather than the fading industrial economies of the past. It was a really interesting perspective to hear.

His answer to our ever-present question of what it means to be an American was similar to others’ responses, but it got me thinking in a way that the previous responses hadn’t. He said that America was a land of opportunity and that for the most part, what Americans had in common was the chance to “make it;” even for those who never achieve much economic success, compared to most other countries, our citizens were fairly well-off in terms of having their survival needs met. So, is economic success all that truly unites us as Americans? We have certainly heard this “land of opportunity” story plenty of times; it is a solid part of the American identity that we proclaim and sell to people all over the world. But does it really just boil down to the fact that what we have in common is relative wealth compared to the rest of the world? So what unites those of other nationalities? What about other nationalities in America; for example, is there a unifying factor amongst Polish-Americans, Chinese-Americans, Irish-Americans, etc.? Something that I have been thinking about on this trip a lot is the idea of a constant struggle in our country between strong family ties and individualism. Thinking about these Americans that also have been raised with another ethnic identity, I feel that often you hear that their specific culture is more focused on family than “mainstream American culture.”

Many people bring up this issue of family versus individualism when we ask them about what it means to be an American and what the American identity is, and we have received a diverse sample of similar and contradicting answers. I spoke in Minneapolis to a couple visiting America from Colombia and they both had pleasant things to say about America, except for the fact that family was much lower down on the priority list for Americans compared to Colombian culture, where family means everything. They used this idea to explain why they would never want to live in America. Then we visit Rossford, where we hear that family means everything in a small town and they would never want to live in a big city because it is harder to raise a family there. I think of our visit with Matt Burchett and his wife Holly in San Antonio, talking of how family is such a big part of Texan culture and they moved back to Texas from Nashville in order to be closer to their families. I think of the priest we spoke to in Chicago, who said that he wanted to raise his family in Chicago rather than New York City because Chicago had more of a neighborhood, family-friendly feel. Then we have gotten so many responses to our question of what it means to be American where people answered that in America, you have the freedom to be who you want to be and do pretty much whatever you want, within the confines of the law. These answers speak to an individualistic spirit of America, where familial obligation does indeed take a backseat to “finding out who you are.” I think America does try to proclaim both of these identities and mixed messages, in that you should be your own person but you are also expected to embrace familial obligations if you are going to be a “good American.”