Book description
By the end of the nineteenth century, Detroit, founded by the French
as a fur-trading post, was thriving. In 1913 Henry Ford began
mass-producing cars at his Model T plant, transforming the area into
the Silicon Valley of its day. By 1920 it was the fourth largest city
in America and by the mid-1950s General Motors had become the single
biggest employer on earth. Here indeed was 'the most modern city in
the world, the city of tomorrow'.
But by the time Berry Gordy founded Motown Records in 1960 - thereby
creating twentieth-century Detroit's other great assembly line - the
cracks were already beginning to show: big industry was looking
elsewhere for cheaper sites, cheaper labour and better tax breaks;
urban planning was in meltdown; corruption was rife; racial tensions
were running high. The 1967 riots - at the time the worst in US
history - left 43 dead, more than 7,000 arrested and 3,000 buildings
destroyed. Detroit, a former beacon of the capitalist dream, had
degenerated into an urban wilderness where unemployment ran at 50 per
cent. With more guns in the city than people, the murder rate was the
highest in America - three times that of New York.
Mark Binelli returned to live in his native Detroit after a break of
many years. He tells the story of the boom and the bust - and of the
new society to be found emerging from the debris: Detroit with its
urban farms and vibrant arts scene; Detroit as a laboratory for the
post-industrial, post-recession world. Here's what an iconic rust-belt
city now looks like and how it might transform and regenerate itself
in the twenty-first century.
Mark Binelli grew up in Detroit. He graduated from the University of
Michigan and received an MFA from Columbia University. He writes for
Rolling Stone
magazine. He is the author of the novel
Sacco and Vanzetti Must Die!
