The State of My Origin by Merlyn

I chose to remember Detroit Michigan the way it was when I was a kid.

It was a great place to live at that time. Everyone had the attitude that anything and everything we could dream about could be accomplished if we worked at it.

Detroit was the manufacturing capital of the world.

Automotive pioneers Henry Ford, the Dodge brothers, Packard, and Walter Chrysler lived there.

Union leaders like Jimmy Hoffa of the Teamsters and Walter Reuther of the autoworkers lived there and helped bring a living wage to the people.

The Detroit Theatre District is still the second largest Entertainment and performing arts center in the United States. (Note: I don't know if anyone goes there anymore.)

Detroit has a total land area of 143.0 square miles

I was born in Highland Park Michigan. It is a three square mile city that is inside the Detroit city limits.

Henry Ford changed the world when he opened the world's first assembly line at the Highland Park plant in 1913 and paid his workers enough to buy the cars they helped make.

Chrysler Corporation was founded in Highland Park In 1925 the company's headquarters stayed there for the next 70 years till 1995.

Sometime in the 40’s a WWII vet took an old railroad car and made a diner out of it on Woodward Ave.  

When I was 16 years old when a black guy named Berry Gordy, took one of Detroit’s nicknames at the time (motor city) and started Motown Records a not far from that diner.

The Supremes, Marvin Gaye, the Temptations, the Four Tops, Gladys Knight & the Pips, The Commodores, Stevie Wonder and The Jackson 5, Recorded their hit records there.

My best friend Denny Morgan and I would go to the diner and watch and listen to the stars from Motown while they ate lunch and made changes to the songs they were recording.

Times have changed and the only people that live in the city now are the people that don't have the skills to make something out of themselves.

In 1950 there were 60,000 people living in that 3 square mile area called Highland Park it was one of the best places to live in the country. Today the population is down to 10,000 people; 97% black with an average household income of $16,000.

I moved to the suburbs of Detroit in 1969 then out of the state in 1979.

         There isn't any reason to ever go back there now.

About the Author

I'm a retired gay man now living in Denver Colorado with my partner Michael. I grew up in the Detroit area. Through the various kinds of work I have done I have seen most of the United States. I have been involved in technical and mechanical areas my whole life, all kinds of motors and computer systems. I like travel, searching for the unusual and enjoying life each day.