Southeastern Michigan

July 14 to July 21 

Detroit and Vicinity


More family visits and dinners with Donna's Aunt, Uncle, Cousins and families.

On Sunday, we drove into Detroit and to the Motown Museum.  

No pictures allowed inside.  Berry Gordy started MOTOWN Records in the house called Hitsville USA in 1959.  Over the years he purchased 7 additional buildings along this street to house all the components of the business.  One thing remains and that is the recording studio in the converted garage of Hitsville.  

Berry Gordy borrowed $800 from his family to start his business.  It was open 24/7 and if an idea for a song came to you in the middle of the night, you could just drop in at the studio and put it to paper or record it.   He often said a kid off the street could come in one door an unknown, go through a process and leave by another door as a star.  He made sure every song released on the label had the potential for greatness. 

One of the most interesting things I picked up was the way he got that reverb-like sound in an era when there were no synthesizers and no computers.  He placed speakers in the attic to relay the music from the recording studio to the attic and microphones to pick up the echo-like sounds from the attic to be recorded.  The Motown sound.

Motown was housed in this group of buildings from 1959 to 1972 when it moved to Los Angeles.

                     

After leaving Motown, we got lost a bit, but found our way to the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History.  It's located in the Cultural Center of Detroit at Wayne State University.

Again there no photos of the exhibits allowed.  When I was  reading about this museum, I had no idea that it would affect me the way it did.  I grew up learning about some of the warts of our American history, so I had read and learned of some of the horrible things that human beings are capable of doing to other humans, but there was one exhibit that took that information to a whole new level, it was so real that I just wanted to cry.

The exhibit was a life sized replica of part of a slave ship.  On the upper level there were sound effects of men ordering the slaves around and the sound of whips snapping and full sized figures of both the "merchants" and their "cargo".  On the lower level, was the belly of the ship and hundreds of life sized figures of men, women and children laying close together like the pictures, I remembered seeing in my history books.  The sound effects were coughs, muttering, and moans.  This depiction doesn't come close to seeing it life sized.

Pulled from the internet

There was also an exhibit of evolution and a history of the African communities, their development as societies, and how they adapted to the various climates of Africa.  Their innovations in farming, textile weaving and dying, and other industry was amazing.

The photos I was allowed to take are of the exterior of the building and the rotunda.

There was also an art exhibit by Samella Lewis.  One of her paintings can be seen in the background.


I pulled some of her art from the web to show the various styles and media she used.

Again, we ran out of time and didn't get to visit the other exhibits, but if you're ever in Detroit it is well worth visiting.  It will surely leave a lasting effect.