Livernois-Fenkell riot of 1975

**Oddz313** · January-24-14, 11:38 AM

Not as big or significant as the 67 riots or 12th street riots but does anyone remember this time in this cities history.

Bolton's Lounge in 2005 [Previous DetroitYES discussion here >>]
Image added by admin

Back in the day image from WSU.

**Oddz313** · January-24-14, 11:39 AM

I ment the 67[[aka:the 12th street riots)

**Danny** · January-24-14, 12:47 PM

Yes there was a small late night riot near the Livernois-Fenkell Commercial District in 1975. It started from a motocycle club on Livernois St. Luckily the Detroit Police came and stop the riot from spreading. Coleman Young knew about the matter and told people 'There's nothing to worry about!' By 1980 Eighty-Five Percent of the mom and pop businesses at the commercial strip have either shut down or move away to the suburbs.

**Gary** · January-24-14, 01:28 PM

IIRC...It started at a white owned bar called Bob Bolton's. The bar owner shot and killed a black kid who was allegedly tampering with cars in the parking lot. Things got pretty messy for awhile and the incident could have quickly gotten out of hand but order was restored.

**brotherzeus** · January-25-14, 03:23 PM

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liverno...93Fenkell_riot

**txlady** · January-25-14, 05:23 PM

I would have been 14, but never heard a word about this. Then again, my parents managed to keep the whole Oakland County Killer from me too.

**mikefmich** · January-25-14, 05:29 PM

I was working a short distance from there in 1975 on Schaefer & Lyndon...at first it didn't jog any memory. After I read the Wiki link, I remembered because of the poor Shoah survivor that was murdered.

**txlady** · January-25-14, 05:42 PM

I live in Houston now, have for nearly 10 years. Before that I spent about 15 in Dallas. Before that, nearly 30 in Detroit. The racial tensions in Detroit were horrible, in Dallas I can only say they were better. Houston, they're there, but it's so much better than either.

I wonder what Detroit would be like, right now, if somehow we'd been able to overcome the useless hate 100 years ago when the city was really booming? If people had been able to rent or buy homes anywhere they wanted to, if the little, unsung riots like this hadn't happened?

The car economy would be the same, but how much better would everything else be?

**Ben** · January-25-14, 11:09 PM

The racial situation at that time was terrible. All I can say is how sad I feel for poor Marian Pyszco. All he was doing was driving home from work and he got murdered by a group of thugs because he was white. I wish that Raymond Peoples [[A founder of YBI, a group I hold responsible for the deaths of many young people) , who lead a mob that killed the poor, innocent, and defenseless Marian Pyszco, had been put in prison.

GUSHI · January-26-14, 10:56 AM

If someone comes toward me with a screwdriver and I have a gun, I'm shooting to.

**Honky Tonk** · January-26-14, 11:53 AM

Originally Posted by GUSHI

If someone comes toward me with a screwdriver and I have a gun, I'm shooting to.

Maybe they just think you have a screw loose......

**gparkinson** · February-02-14, 04:44 PM

The murder of Marian Pyszco was a tragedy, particularly after what the man had already endured in his life. It's bitterly ironic that the man could survive the Nazi genocide only to be murdered in the country that liberated the camps.

I'm also disturbed that there is so little sympathy for Obie Wynn, who was only 18 years old when Andrew Chinarian murdered him. At worst the kid was trying to break into a car, armed only with a butter knife or screwdriver [[reports differ).

The idea that Chinarian was acting is self defense is laughable, and Chinarian himself claimed that he was trying to shoot over Obie Wynn's head and hit him by mistake in the BACK of the head as he was running away. I find this explanation ridiculous; the claim of a warning shot to the back of the head is the punchline to a sick joke.

Here's a report of Chinarian's testimony:
http://news.google.com/newspapers?id...=3756%2C779911

And fwiw, Coleman received much praise [[even from white people!) for his handling of the riot. It could have been much worse.

**Richard** · February-02-14, 05:51 PM

Feb 11 Bob Seger and Foghat ,tickets $6 advailable at J.L Hudson's.
Jan 28 1976.

**MEB** · March-25-14, 04:20 PM

This guy has done an outstanding job collecting the history of the Livernois-Fenkell as well as Bolton's event and analyzes it through a social justice/critical framework in his dissertation, "Wildcat of the Streets: Class Composition and Conflict in the African American Community and the Punitive Turn in 1970s Detroit". It's not up on this blog but you can contact him at his email address--super cool guy who is also an activist interested in sharing his research. He's around in Detroit on occasion giving a talk here or there; more recently, at Marygrove College's Institute for Detroit Studies.

http://michaelstauch.wordpress.com/