Michigan

Name: Legendary Locals of Detroit
Brand: Paul Vachon
SKU: 9781467100427
Price: 24.99 USD
Availability: InStock

Things get made in Michigan. Consult a schematic of Detroit history to connect the Ford dynasty and the myriad auto companies that followed to the Willow Run assembly line churning out B-24 bombers during WWII. But this ingenuity also lives in the crispness of Vernor’s Ginger Ale and the handcrafted perfection of Pewabic Pottery. From the postwar idyll of Detroit’s Grand River and Greenfield neighborhood to the ghostly trickster at the capitol in Lansing, flip the switch on Michigan history with our Michigan history books. [View all Michigan books]

606 products

Sort

Legendary Locals of Detroit

The Ghostly Tales of Michigan's West Coast

Paperback

$12.99

The National Cherry Festival in Traverse City

Paperback

$21.99

Michigan Literary Luminaries

Paperback

$21.99

Previous 1 … 5 6 7

Legendary Locals of Detroit

9781467100427

$24.99

Detroit sports a very uneven background. The city dates from 1701, when Antoine de la Mothe Cadillac planted the flag of New France, some 75 years before America became a nation. Almost two-thirds of Detroit's history was spent as little more than a frontier military outpost—home to French farmers and fur traders who shared the quarters with the soldiers. But as the 20th century arrived, the impact of the automobile roused the city from its slumber. Within a century's time, the industry set in motion by Henry Ford produced a skyrocketing population, a diverse mosaic of ethnic groups, and levels of culture and affluence rivaled by few other places. The literature of Joyce Carol Oates, the architecture of Albert Kahn, and the music fostered by Berry Gordy enriched life and created the Paris of the Midwest. But growing pains were inevitable: growing racial instability culminated in the insurrection of 1967, inflicting deep wounds yet creating new opportunities for harmony and justice that were capitalized on by Rev. William Cunningham. Today, efforts continue to remove the tarnish from this corner of the Rust Belt.

Presque Isle County

9780738599779

$24.99

Norman Rockwell would have found no shortage of subjects for his paintings in any of the small communities in Presque Isle County. It is an idyllic region in Michigan's northeastern Lower Peninsula with more than 50 miles of Lake Huron shoreline, dozens of inland lakes and streams, and sprawling forests of pines and hardwoods. It was probably those attributes that attracted Native Americans to the region about 8,000 years ago. Shortly after the Civil War, the Indians were joined by throngs of European immigrants who found jobs in lumber camps and sawmills or homesteaded farms. The region's lumber boom was followed by a limestone boom in the early 20th century, and it created hundreds of jobs in the quarries and on ships that carried the stone to markets around the Great Lakes. The boom years are just a memory now, but the natural attributes of the county attract tourists and modern settlers seeking a more serene experience than can be found in the tourist meccas on Michigan's west coast.

Capitol Park

9781626193741

$21.99

Capitol Park is the only city park in America where a state's first governor is buried. It's the birthplace of democracy in Michigan. Underground Railroad site. Streetcar and transit hub. Urban canyon. A block north of Detroit's iconic Coney Island restaurants. A symbol of the city's late twentieth-century decay, now a key part of its revitalization in a new millennium. Jack Dempsey, award-winning author of Michigan and the Civil War and president of the Michigan Historical Commission, uncovers tales of a uniquely inspirational public space that epitomizes the ups and downs of Detroit's three centuries.

The Ghostly Tales of Michigan's West Coast

9781467198028

$12.99

Ghost stories from America’s Great Lakes State have never been so creepy, fun, and full of mystery!

Coastal Michigan’s haunted history and local legends come to life—even when the main players are dead. From the souls lost aboard the doomed Alpena, to the restless spirits at Nunica Cemetery, this spooky chapter book will keep readers rapt. Dive into suspenseful tales of bumps in the night, paranormal investigations, and the unexplained; just be sure to keep the light on.

The National Cherry Festival in Traverse City

9781626194267

$21.99

The National Cherry Festival is northern Michigan's most popular event. It turns Traverse City, a beach town of thirty thousand, into a thriving city of nearly one million. Begun almost a century ago, the festival started out as a small, neighborhood affair and grew into an international phenomenon that draws in visitors from all over the globe. Twist and pop a pit of Cherry Festival history with author and Traverse City native Brooks Vanderbush as he recounts the festival's growth and its queens and courts, governing bodies, past personalities and other memorable stories that have made it such an essential part of this vacation paradise.

Michigan Literary Luminaries

9781626199378

$21.99

From Ernest Hemingway's rural adventures to the gritty fiction of Joyce Carol Oates, the landscape of the Third Coast has inspired generations of the nation's greatest storytellers. Michigan Literary Luminaries shines a spotlight on this rich heritage of the Great Lakes State. Discover how Saginaw greenhouses shaped the life of Pulitzer Prize–winning writer Theodore Roethke. Compare the common traits of Detroit crime writers like Elmore Leonard and Donald Goines. Learn how Dudley Randall revolutionized American literature by doing for poets what Motown Records did for musicians. Join author Anna Clark as she unveils Michigan's extraordinary written culture with a mixture of history, literary criticism and original reporting.