Where were you during the 1967 Detroit Riot?

[carlscomputers]

Just got done reading about the Riot deaths... http://www.67riots.rutgers.edu/d_victims.htm

Since I was only 5, my memories are limited to peeking out the window & seeing what I thought was "The Army" driving down our street.

[BrushStart]

A gleam in my father's eye.

[terryh]

A gleam in my father's eye.

I was barely a year old and nowhere near the city, but after reading the victim reports, and based on personal interest and study of the riot-rebellion whatever terminology you choose to use, seems that more than a few policemen and national guard soldiers probably should have been charged with murder or been investigated more thoroughly.... I know that in the Algiers Motel incident the officers were charged, tried, and aquitted...

[Bobl]

Prentis Street

The tabs were kicking in. Someone put an LP on the turntable, and the room was filled with the soft voice of Marty Balin, singing "Coming Back To Me". Prentis Street, in Detroit, at that moment, was a beautiful place and time to be young and alive. Who knew, that in just two months, she would be sent on her Good Humor ice cream route, smack into the middle of the insurrection of 1967...

[stasu1213]

I was too young to remember. I did go to a seminar at Wayne State on the 40th anniversary of the riot. Speakers had said that the death toll was much higher than was reported back then

[lpg]

I was in my senior year in Lincoln Park High School. I lived close to Fort Street, so I sat on my parents front porch and watched the army convoys headed north. As they were passing, I would see jeeps with machine guns mounted driving through both alleys east and west of Fort providing security in case of snipers.
I was in the gas station on the corner by my house when LP police came in and said "By order of the Govenor of the State of Michigan, I order this establishment closed immediately." The guy who was the manager said he couldn't. The cop glared at him and said "You can shut this place and go home, or I will shut it down and you go with me to the station." The manager closed up quickly. You could not buy gasoline in any container.
When the curfew was imposed a high school of mine was on his way to see his girlfriend who lived down the street from me. I told him it was 8pm and he would not make it to her house. He just laughed and said he would talk to me later and left. He only made it 1 house down from me when the cops arrested him for curfew violation.

[reddog289]

Speaking of gleams in the eyes of fathers,mine cut short his and my moms honeymoon as he was an auxiliary police officer in Garden City at the time.From a young age I was told stories of the riots.To this day I am still amazed that any city could do so much harm to oneself.

[Ray1936]

I was the fifth from the back, wearing a tan tear gas vest and reaching for my visor.

[RYANGUARD]

It was an insurrection but calling it a riot sounded better.I grew up on the north side of Detroit,not too far from the State Fair grounds and you could hear the helicopters taking off and landing at all hours of the day and night.By my house was the Boydell paint factory and a tank farm for Marathon that held heating oil.There were National Guardsmen on the Grand Trunk RR tracks with a .30 cal machine gun and on the roof of the paint factory was another .30 cal machine gun manned by the National Guard.An exciting,but scary,time for a 10 year old boy...

[oladub]

I had a job unloading busses at the Greyhound terminal. I came to work in the afternoon on the Ford and Chrysler. I had the road to myself. Streams of smoke were rising from all over. Along the Chrysler, a grocery was burning and some girls were running toward the store overhead on a pedestrian walkway to do some last minute shopping.

Not many people were coming in on the busses,. Some of the employees couldn't make it to work. At night some of us employees would sit on carts outside the bus entrance and watch the police cars and army troop carriers rushing around. That was the only traffic except for a legless guy who scooted along with his hands on some sort of skateboard device a block away. Very wierd.

After the riots, not so many people wanted to visit Detroit. Greyhound passenger volume was way down. Over 40 of us, mostly students, were laid off. I got another job the next week on the SS South America and went to Montreal.

[gazhekwe]

I worked downtown. On Monday, the office was closed. On Tuesday, the office opened and I had to go in. The Express bus wasn't running. It was just me and the driver on the Joy Road bus, threading through the streets going around W. Grand Blvd at Grand River, where we saw the tanks sitting, and the National Guard soldiers standing at ready. I don't know about the driver, but I definitely had a very sensitive feeling between my shoulder blades as I thought about the reports of snipers in that area. The air was thick with the smell of burning. I can still conjure that smell to this day. Gaping storefronts were everywhere up and down Grand River.

When I got to work, it was a skeleton staff, and me, Junior, the student intern. We spent a bit of time discussing where we were, what we thought, and what we saw. One woman was living at Wayne State, and reported lying on her floor watching tracers going past in the night sky. Stores everywhere were closed, and gas stations. In those days, you had to go to a grocery store to get milk for the baby, and at Wayne State, apparently you couldn't get any because the only store, on the corner of Second and Prentiss, was closed. The woman told of Leni Sinclair standing outside shouting to get into the store because she needed milk for the baby. I hope someone gave her some milk

[Packman41]

6011 Cadillac Avenue, just a few houses south of the Ford freeway. My parents owned 2 rooming houses there and sent me, my twin brother and younger brother to watch the places as their hired manager left town. I was going to Wayne, my twin was at Highland Park CC and my younger brother was going to Cass Tech. All schools were closed and we were not venturing out much during the day. We were sleeping with 12 guage shotguns next to our beds. If we did go out it was to walk up the block to look up and down the Ford freeway. Nothing was moving except for national guard patrols in larger trucks and jeeps. Monitored the police scanner and TV constantly. Never heard any shooting or had any trouble. Just a number of days in lockdown mode and wondering what had happened to the city and how we would ever recover.

[carlscomputers]

Wow! Thanks for all the stories, thanks Ray for the pic! keep 'em coming. I personally think that history is most enjoyable when it comes from those who lived it. Even though it was a dark period in Detroit history, we shouldn't pretend it never happened, nor forget those who died & were affected by it... Not trying to drag Race into this thread, but, being Black, I just try to understand why Rioters burned & looted the places where they lived, shopped & worked? I guess I need to do a lot more research on the psychology of Civil Unrest? Sports teams win, people Riot... Unfavorable Court rulings, people Riot... ultimately nobody gains anything but a few looted items & a temporary sense of empowerment.

[goirish1966]

I was in college [[Wayne State) and worked part-time [[Saturday shift) at National Bank of Detroit. Got off work about 6:30pm and took the Gratiot bus [[Great Lakes) home. The next day my girl friend and I attended a Tiger doubleheader [[against Boston, I think). We saw all the smoke rising from the west side and talked about driving over there when the games were over. We decided against it [[luckily). There was still a news blackout on the event. During the week, I operated a press at a small shop in Roseville. It was eerie to see an army tank on the grass of the Mack/Gratiot precinct when I took the bus to the bank on the following Saturday. I seem to remember that there was a ban on the sale of alcohol in the tri-county area, so I went with a neighbor to Port Huron to buy beer for our block [[14 houses).

[karl jr.]

I was 8 years of age and on vacation with my parents in southern Illinois, my uncle came in to my grandmothers house and told my mom there was a "race riot" going on in detroit. I was thinking "Race cars" and wondering what he was talking about but then my mom started crying and dad started packing up then I knew something bad was happening. We arrived back in Detroit tuesday. I remember a lot about the riot, helicopters, tanks, my dad saying the 101st airborne on the ground in Detroit but my most vivid memory was looking out the front and back upstairs windows and seeing the skies glowing orange. Detroit was burning and I scared to death.

[Whitehouse]

I think I was still in the design stage.... Still there were some factory mistakes...

[douglasm]

Working downtown at Mary Jane Shoes [[or Crosleyy's...which ever one was across Woodward from the Kern block. It's been 40+ years for pity sake). Didn't go to work the first 4 days. I very much remember armored personell carriers on Woodward, and a National Guardsman coming into the store. Manager greeted him like an old friend. The Guardsman used to work there.

Sunday night, me and a date were at The Music Hall watching The Sand Pebbles when the film was stopped, and the manager walked in the front of the theatre on the small stage in front of the screen and said something to the extent that the mayor had declared an emergency, and that all patrons were requested to go home.

As to why people burn and loot places they shop, I wish I knew. Don't know if anyone has an answer, either.

[Nanska]

I was still in pigtails during the Riot. I remember the scratchy feel of our old blue couch that I crouched on to peek thru the living room window curtains so I could watch the tanks roll down Wildemere. Whenever I go back home, I look out that same window and "see" those tanks rolling thru the intersection. Will never forget it. Daddy was stuck out at the Rouge so I got to sleep in my parent's bed with Moms - who had Daddy's pistol underneath her pillow. Moms says that what she remembers most about the Riot was the large number of cars with out-of-state license plates.

[Blueidone]

I lived in Washington Twp at the time. I had just graduated high school. I was driving from my house to Romeo for some reason that escapes me right now. As I hit the intersection of 28 Mile and Van Dyke, there was a line of MSP cars headed south on Van Dyke. I had no idea why at the time, but after talking to my mother later, I found out they had left the Romeo MSP post to head to Detroit.

I worked at the Gateway Theatre in Sterling Heights at the time [[it's not a theatre anymore...turned it into some kind of office building) which was located just north of 14 Mile Road. 14 Mile was the cutoff border for buying alcoholic beverages and, I think, gasoline. My parents were very worried about me driving in that area at night because lots of people were heading to that area to buy stuff they couldn't buy elsewhere.

And in Romeo...just to be funny...some of the black people set an old abandoned house on fire that they had been trying to get torn down for years. As I recall, there were no racial problems within the area itself though. There was no rioting or anything there.

I remember feeling far removed from it all, but still being scared that it would accelerate.

[gazhekwe]

At the time, there was some thought that the looting and burning was an attack on the white store owners. Many of the owners along Grand River were Caucasion, some Jewish. Some people painted SOUL on their stores to try and save them. SOUL was supposed to indicate the store had black owners. They got burnt out too.

[beachboy]

Toolin' down 12th St with my parents in Dad's 1967 cherry-red Olds Toronado. It was Dad's idea of fun...he kept saying, "ja, dis is vat Berlin looked like after da war..." I still have the Super-8 movies, a little shaky, tho'...memories...

[Philbo]

I lived around the Harper and Van Dyke area and there was a fair amount of looting. My Dad drove a charter bus and had to drive up Linwood avenue that Sunday night to drop off some passengers. When he got home that night he was all shook up and if anybody in the world needed a drink it was probably him. Its funny when you think about it now.

[carlscomputers]

Toolin' down 12th St with my parents in Dad's 1967 cherry-red Olds Toronado. It was Dad's idea of fun...he kept saying, "ja, dis is vat Berlin looked like after da war..." I still have the Super-8 movies, a little shaky, tho'...memories...

Wow! Your Dad lived through the War in Berlin? I'm sure this was nothing [[not taking away from the seriousness of the Riot) to him! Ha! Ha!

[Ray1936]

"Whenever I go back home, I look out that same window and "see" those tanks."

Those were not tanks, Nan. They were armored personnel carriers [["APC's). They were loaned to the DPD by Cadillac Tool and Gauge about the third day of the riot.

I became a life-long admirer of the Salvation Army during that riot. They kept us in coffee and chow for ten days. I still make a hefty donation at Christmas each year.

[beachboy]

carlscomputers asked:
> Wow! Your Dad lived through the War in Berlin?

Dad was a US citizen. He was there but never told why. Somehow, he got to Hiroshima two days after the blast [[checked this out with Dad's friends after his death) - he described the destruction vividly but refused to say why he was there. From what I've heard, a lot of strange things happened before VE- and VJ-days...

Dad was a wonderful guy, a man's man, full of love and kindness and gentility. Inside was a hard-ass adventurer, so it shouldn't have been surprising that he wanted to sashay thru smoking ruins after getting his "new car". Geez, I remember Mom shitting bricks in the back seat!! I was a zit-faced sophomore and thought he was cool as hell.

> I'm sure this was nothing [[not taking away from the seriousness
> of the Riot) to him!

Actually, Dad was very angry at the way the Govt handled the riot. He sided with the Black folks and was sympathetic about them being abused. I think after what he saw in WW2, he just wanted to build a better world any way he could...some of the WW2 guys were like that. Anyway, he felt the riot was the middle of the end for Detroit...unfortunately correct.

Dad's been gone more than 25 years, and I still miss him ... a lot. He was my best friend.