 
Tponetom
Member
Username: Tponetom
Post Number: 110
Registered: 06-2007
| | Posted on Wednesday, August 29, 2007 - 12:07 am: |    |
I am going "ga ga" after reading more than a few hundred, maybe a thousand posts in the last five days. I am trying find the ‘lowest common denominator' that encompasses the major issues that are being discussed. "Harper Woods" - " Grosse Pointe in Tune" - "Who or What is a Real Detroiter?" - "Hamtramck" - and dozens of others.
The boundaries of Detroit seems to be a popular subject. It seems to be a divisive issue in many of the discussions. Recreation and culture, among other things are discussed and the geographics of location becomes the dominant issue. Separatism is rearing its ugly head.
Of course, my opinions on the subject are jaded.
That being said; I used to hitchhike through Grosse Pointe to get to the Golf course.
I paid a dime to get on the Crosstown Bus and take the 13 (?) mile ride out to River Rouge Park. Riding a bike to Mt. Clemens was just a lark. (Those mineral baths did one Big Bang of a Business. You younger people may not have a clue to that.) When living in SCS I had a job at the Marathon Refinery down river. No expressways in those days. Taking the car ferry to Windsor was a gas. Jefferson Beach and Murray Beach were the Riviera's of Detroit
So here is my point. Detroit is, was and always will be the umbilicus of all the suburbs attached to it. If you live in GP and work DT, you either drive through Detroit to get to work or you take a boat. (On the Canadien Side?)
I never once thought of Detroit as being an "island" surrounded by all of those pesky suburbs. They needed everything that Detroit had to give and Detroit needed everything that the suburbs supplied.
In the posts that I have read there were many valid statements about the advantages or disadvantages of one suburb over another. That's the way it should be. We all look for something different. You can cut the center out of a bun and make it a donut. Detroit is the heart of the Metropolitan area. We know it needs some surgery, but not a transplant.
Being a "Detroiter" is not a question of address or location. It has to be in your heart.
Digression: I wonder if Hamtramck is still the edifice or monument to the will of a community of people refusing to leave the homes they cherished. My maternal grandmother owned a boarding house on E. Grand Boulevard near the Dodge Main ??? Plant. She vowed that she would never sell the place because she had too many friends in Hamtramck. We carried her out of the house in the fifties,,,in her casket. |
Crumbled_pavement
Member
Username: Crumbled_pavement
Post Number: 4
Registered: 08-2007
| | Posted on Wednesday, August 29, 2007 - 2:36 am: | |
It's funny you mentioned separatists. America is supposed to be a melting pot, yet there are those who want everything separated. That's like having a pot of seafod gumbo with all the shrimp on one side, the okra on another, the tomatoes can't touch the crab meat, the crab meat can't touch the broth, yet it's supposed to be a gumbo..
That being said, I guess America is truly for everyone including the separatist. I say to the separatist, black or white, city or suburb, stay on your island, the rest of us will mingle |
Jtw
Member
Username: Jtw
Post Number: 158
Registered: 06-2005
| | Posted on Wednesday, August 29, 2007 - 9:13 am: | |
good post, tom - certainly one of the most level-headed assessments of the region. if only more of us had such an approach... |
Tponetom
Member
Username: Tponetom
Post Number: 111
Registered: 06-2007
| | Posted on Wednesday, August 29, 2007 - 1:15 pm: | |
C_p
Gumbo! A great analogy. You hit the nail on the head. |
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