Video: Detroit, Michigan 1920s

[Kathleen]

This remastered colorized photo of Detroit in the 1920s has just been posted to YouTube.



Saw many familiar sites. You will too!! Enjoy!!

[Jimaz]

I recently saw a colorized photo of my dad in his army outfit. The artificially ignorant software colored his pants blue instead of olive drab. LOL!

[Hermod]

Except for the evolution and modernization of cars to today's models, what has 100 years of "progress" done for Detroit?

[Gistok]

Well one thing that 100 years of progress has done... is cleaned up the air. Look at how polluted the air was back in the 1920s!

[Richard]

What’s the steel frame building under construction @ the 2:08 mark?

Nuther one at 5:53 after showing the trampy women showing their ankles at the lake.Belle isle?

And one lone holdout with his horse drawn cargo buggy.

[EGrant]

What’s the steel frame building under construction @ the 2:08 mark?

First National Building, with the Hammond Building in the foreground on the right.

[MikeM]

What’s the steel frame building under construction @ the 2:08 mark?

First National Bank Building

Nuther one at 5:53 after showing the trampy women showing their ankles at the lake.Belle isle?

Fyfe Building

[Henry Whalley]

Except for the evolution and modernization of cars to today's models, what has 100 years of "progress" done for Detroit?

People dressed up -- no sweat pants, baseball caps, t-shirts, etc.

There were no mass killings, no AR-15s

[Richard]

Yea there was and Michigan still holds the record,1927 don’t need AR15 when dynamite was readily available.

[Richard]

Thanks for the responses on the steel framing going up,it’s interesting watching how the city developed.

Even more so the roads were paved with asphalt verses the street pavers that were still prevalent in many major cities.

The electric streetcars,one line dates the 1800s where there is another line with the newer 19th century cars.

Fyfe building - construction started in 1916 completed in 1919

First national bank building - built between 1921 - 1930

[oladub]

At 7min 40sec, there is a large passenger boat shown, the "Greater Detroit". It was the largest side paddle wheel boat on the Lakes and ended its service to Buffalo, NY in 1950. SS_Greater_Detroit

[Cincinnati_Kid]

And not a person of color in sight. The "Good Ole Days" eh? I guess they were systematically left out.

[mkd]

And not a person of color in sight. The "Good Ole Days" eh? I guess they were systematically left out.

Well, Detroit was 95.8% white in 1920. Perhaps we could have the video edited and re-released with CGI people of color to promote inclusivity...

[Ray1936]

And not a person of color in sight. The "Good Ole Days" eh? I guess they were systematically left out.

You best check photos of Cincinnati back at those times before you point out a city 400 miles away.

[Cincinnati_Kid]

You best check photos of Cincinnati back at those times before you point out a city 400 miles away.

I'm pretty sure that was the norm everywhere at that time. I'm just making a observation Ray, we all know they were around. No harm, no foul...

[Lowell]

Great find Kathleen! I'm alway impressed how everybody wore hats, how many people smoked and how polluted it was with smokestacks lining the riverfront.

As much as I like the present riverfront, I do wish that somehow a few blocks of the seedy riverfront with docking boats remained, for a bit of a New Orleans Latin Quarter feel.

[kathy2trips]

What about the Bath Condolidated School bombing in the 1930s? There were mentally I'll people back then, too. There were also mental hospitals and resources to deal with it. They didnt mutter "civil rights", and let lunatics loose on the streets.

[kathy2trips]

Agreed! Things seem rather manufactured and inorganic now.

[kathy2trips]

And yet, Detroit was much more culturally diverse in those days. Allow me to open a giant can of worms: 1920s Detroit was literally an international city. There was an actual, organically developed Chinatown. Neighborhoods defined by nationality and culture was celebrated, not demonized. My mother grew up in the Mack and EGB area near Indian Village. She grew up with Lebanese, Flemish, German, Italian, Greek, Syrian and...yes...black kids. I have her 1940 Barbour school yearbook to prove it. I'm not saying that redlining didnt exist, but it didnt exist everywhere in Detroit. And it behooves me to mention that the first Italian American was permitted, by court order, to move into Grosse Pointe in 1961. For all the "diversity" whining, it seems to me that Detroit is the least diverse its been since pre-Revolutionary War days. And IMHO it's to its detriment.

[Zacha341]

Good and bad. Black people, mostly from the south migrated to Detroit, and Michigan in general ca 1910. Picking up speed in the 40's as part of the great migration to the north inclusive of New York, Chicago, Ohio, etc.

https://www.archives.gov/research/af...20Migration%20[[

My family [maternal and paternal] were part of that - arriving mid-fifties, bringing their siblings. They would go on to varied occupations, and careers. Renting and later buying their first homes, building and buying cars, starting their families. Not always in photos but we were there.

And not a person of color in sight. The "Good Ole Days" eh? I guess they were systematically left out.

[Zacha341]

That's right. My family had a stop off in Cinci widely known as 'up south' in terms of jim crow and bold-faced racism you'd think was only in the deep south. Cincinnati had a rep for that. Many of my family chose to settle in Ohio however. The state overall still beat the share-cropping options of the deep south.

You best check photos of Cincinnati back at those times before you point out a city 400 miles away.