From Motown and Henry Ford to riverfront walks and world class museums, Detroit has reinvented itself as one of the most exciting US cities to visit. Discover Motor City’s transformation.
You may have heard it through the grapevine, as the late great Tamla Motown singer Marvin Gaye used to say.
But, just in case you haven’t, Detroit, the city that made Marvin a superstar, is rapidly turning into one of America’s top tourist attractions.
Detroit Riverwalk and Downtown Revival
The industrial downtown area, where once people feared to tread after dark, has been completely transformed.
Now it’s full of luxury hotels, theatres, sports stadiums, casinos, fancy restaurants and posh bars, with a lovely three-and-a-half mile riverwalk which has been voted the best in the USA three years in a row.
And a little oddly, for a city known around the world as Motor City because of its automobile industry, there are very few cars.
These days if folk don’t walk, they hop aboard the People Mover, an elevated, driverless train system, or the Q-Line tram, which both loop the downtown area – and both of which are free.
Henry Ford and the Birth of the Motor City
Still, there is no getting away from the fact that Detroit remains synonymous with the name of Henry Ford.
It was here that that the first of his 15million Model T cars rolled off the production line in 1908. And by 1923 every other car on the road in America was a Model T.
In fact, over the years, only Volkswagen’s Beetle and, more recently, the Toyota Corolla have sold more.
The Ford Piquette Avenue Plant, where they were originally built, now houses a fascinating collection of more than 60 cars and trucks, dating back more than 100 years.
Roofs and other “luxuries” like windshields, speedometers and headlights, which had to be lit with a match, were all originally optional extras.
And oddly, even though the Americans have always driven on the right-hand side of the road, until 1919 the steering wheels on their cars were, like ours, also on the right.
Contrary to popular belief, the early Model Ts weren’t black either. They’d be painted bright red, green, blue and grey.
It wasn’t until 1913 that, in order to stem soaring costs, Henry famously announced, “You can have any colour you want … as long as it black.”
Exploring the Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation
At Dearborn, just on the outskirts of the city, there is another unmissable attraction bearing his name – the Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation.
I spent most of a day wandering round here and still didn’t see half of it. There’s the huge black Lincoln limousine that carried President John Kennedy on the fateful Dallas day when he was assassinated.
Amazingly, the car was cleaned up afterwards and made bulletproof before being used by his White House successors Lyndon B Johnson and Richard Nixon.
Then there’s the yellow bus that Rosa Parks was travelling on in Montgomery, Alabama, when she refused to give up her seat to a white passenger.
You can actually sit where Rosa did that day in her protest which eventually led to the ending of the country’s Jim Crow racial segregation laws.
There’s also the rocking chair that Abraham Lincoln was sitting in when he was assassinated at the theatre by John Wilkes Booth.
Trainspotters will marvel at a huge Allegheny locomotive, twice as long as Flying Scotsman and three times as heavy, which once hauled mile-long coal trains through the Appalachian Mountains.
While for aviation buffs, a giant Douglas DC-3 airliner hangs from the ceiling in one room, not far from a life-size reproduction of the Wright Brothers’ Kitty Hawk.
There’s even a fascinating Mathematica Room full of amazing demonstrations, often counter-intuitive, about the wonderful and baffling, world of numbers.
Motown Magic at Hitsville USA
Now while old Henry may have been the first to put the city on the map, it was another genius called Berry Gordon who spread Detroit’s fame further during the 1960s.
From his otherwise unremarkable home on West Grand Boulevard, Gordon launched the Tamla Motown phenomenon, producing 110 number one hit singles between 1961 and 1972.
The first was the Marvelettes’ “Please Mr Postman”, which the Beatles recorded two years later. After that the hits kept coming from stars such as the Supremes, Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, the Four Tops and Stevie Wonder.
Gordon’s old house is now the Hitsville USA Museum, which describes itself as “the beating heart of the extraordinary Motown legacy”.
Rather grandly, it claims its mission is to “preserve, promote and celebrate the authentic Motown story as a platform for others to flourish as thinkers, creators, neighbours and entrepreneurs”.
Michigan Irish Music Festival
Now Detroit’s not the only place in the surrounding state of Michigan with a thriving music scene.
I was there in September when the small city of Muskegon, on the shores of Lake Michigan, held a three-day Michigan Irish Music Festival.
Actually, it was more a Celtic Music Festival because one headliner Skerryvore, a rock ’n’ roll band fronted by a guy strutting about playing bagpipes, hails from Scotland.
But the Screaming Orphans, four shit-kicking Diver sisters from Bundoran, Co Donegal, also put on one hell of a show.
If you’re in the area, watch out for it next year between September 17 and 20. Both Skerryvore and the Orphans are already booked to return.
Discovering Michigan Beyond Detroit
And it’s worth taking a drive across picturesque Michigan to Bay City, nestling by the bank of the Saginaw River which flows into Lake Huron.
Spare an afternoon to visit the Delta College Planetarium and Learning Centre. You can see astronauts’ suits, up-to-date information direct from NASA and watch multi-media astronomy displays.
You can even buy out-of-this-world packets of rather tasty freeze-dried ice cream, cherries and other treats that astronauts tuck into while on the International Space Station.
I stayed at the excellent Hilton Doubletree Hotel, overlooking the river, where the staff couldn’t have been kinder.
Wandering through the quiet streets, past antique shops and cosy little restaurants, I followed the strains of some great blues music to the Drift Shoreside Beer Garden.
It was a band called the Eric Ryden and the Unk of Funk, and I shared a beer with them later. If you’re ever in Bay City, look out for them. They’re excellent.
Back to Detroit, where I stayed at the rather smart Godfrey Hotel with its rooftop bar giving spectacular night-time views of the city.
Iconic Landmarks and Public Art in Detroit
Downtown, summing up the city’s new spirit, is a giant bronze sculpture of the great 20th century world heavyweight boxing champion Joe Louis’s clenched fist.
Twenty-four feet long and weighing 5,000lbs, this massive monument to the legendary “Brown Bomber” is supposed to represent freedom and the “tireless fight for equality around the world”.
But it also points menacingly across the River Detroit at the Canadian city of Windsor on the other bank, where the Maple Leaf flag can be seen proudly flying.
Which, in view of President Trump’s ambitions to make Canada the USA’s 50th state, might just be a tad worrying!
Things to Do in Detroit
For more information about what to do in Detroit, go to www.visitdetroit.com, and for Michigan: www.michigan.org and for the Bay City Area, www.gogreat.com
Getting to Detroit Michigan
Delta (www.Delta.com) have direct flights from London to Detroit. But I flew from Dublin, where I was able to clear both immigration and customs before boarding. As a result, all I had to do after landing in Detroit was pick up my luggage and collect my rental car from the Hertz desk. Another advantage, of course, is that I got to spend a night in Ireland before my flight!
You might also wish to follow Roberet Spellman on his Michigan Road Trip.
