Booth was a trendsetter and arbiter of taste in turn-of-the-century Detroit, and had the means to become, through his wife Ellen Scripps Booth’s fortune, a noted philanthropist.   In 1904, the Booths took their drive out Woodward and turned off on the track that was Lone Pine Road. They purchased a nice parcel of land […]

Henry and his Car. Photo by TopSpeed Honest to goodness, I am going to get to the Eames Chair. I swear.   To do that, tough, you have to drive out Woodward Avenue from the Detroit River almost seventeen miles to get to the Cranbook academic and arts community.   To get to Woodward, and […]

  The John C. Lodge Freeway Under Construction, 1950s Photo Wayne State University   Thomas Friedman just wrote about the world where oil is going to cost $200 a barrel. The pipsqueaks who control the black stuff are going to be riding such an unimaginable tide of cash that, according to Congressional testimony given last […]

The Manoogian Mansion, Dwight Street, Detroit 2007   The northern part of the mitten of Michigan is coming alive again after five months in the freezer. Dad said it was one of the toughest winters in years, and he is fed up with it. My folks winter-over in the city by the Bay, members of […]

Mom bought the chair more than fifty years ago. That is remarkable in and of itself, since there wasn’t a lot of money then, and the Eames cachet was pricey then. What’s more, there has been a lot of movement in the last half century, and plenty of opportunity for a chair to get banged […]

Overwhelmed is the only way to put it. I feel like I have been doing The Freddie for a month in a non-stop session of musical chairs.   You may remember dance step, which was popularized (briefly) by one of the British Invasion bands of the late Sixties. Freddie and the Dreamers, was the name, […]

I saw my pal the Admiral out on the street by the loading dock and the still-breathing Clinton National Campaign headquarters. He had paused in his walk to see if I would emerge from the building on my smoke break, which is almost as regular and sacred as a military payday.   The Admiral is […]

I’m not talking about the deaf, dumb and blind Tommy  The Who sang about, though there are a lot of kids with head wounds who are coming home that way. Better medical care and body armor are preventing their deaths on the battlefield, which is a good thing, though their rehabilitation is a very expensive proposition. […]

Tremors   I took a break from the proposal and ducked over to Ted’s to meet with some associates from the Health Care Industry. It was a chance to do some networking in a line of work I enjoyed, and one that is totally divorced from the stuff I have to do to keep the […]

Gentle Colleagues,   I apologize in advance for anyone who may, or even those who may not have occasion to interact with me prior to the opening of Big Pink’s pool. It will be another ten days, as the crow flies, before I can put water over my head and effectively take cover from the […]