Mark Maynard | 2016 | March

Bee Roll shows off her new Beezy’s space, and talks about her plans to incubate and launch new companies

By Mark | March 17, 2016

Several weeks ago I had Bee Roll, the owner of Ypsilanti’s Beezy’s cafe, on the radio with me to discuss her plans to expand into a second location. And, today, after eating lunch at her place, I asked Bee if she’d show me around the space, which is directly across the street from Beezy’s, and tell me a little more about what she has in mind.

In the video, which you can watch below, Bee walks me around the space, and explains what will happen in the various areas of the soon-to-open two-story operation. For the most part, according to Bee, this new space will be an event and production space, allowing her to host relatively large affairs, like weddings, as well as crank out bigger catering jobs. [The building has a large kitchen in back, that, when functional, should really increase her productivity significantly.] Among other things, Bee she’s she’s also considering the possibly of offering grab-and-go foods at this location, and hosting pop-up events.

One thing Bee said did catch me a little off-guard. She mentioned, about half way through our conversation, that, after running this second spot for two or three years, she’d like to hand it off to a partner or two, who would buy-out her interest in the business and either take it over as is, or morph it into something else, “like a brewery,” she hinted. She said that she’s gotten to a point in her career where she’d like to start spending more time helping people in the extended Beezy’s family to launch and run their own businesses. “(It would be) kind of modeled after the Zingerman’s Community of Businesses, but maybe a little more fluid,” she tells me. [If you happen to be out there, Theresa Rickloff, Bee mentions you by name at this point, suggesting that you come back and launch the pie company in earnest.]

Our conversation is short and worth watching if you care about Ypsi’s Washington Street corridor. I particularly liked the part where she said that, from upstairs in the new location, she can easily spy on her employees at Beezy’s. Oh, and I also liked the part of the conversation, toward the end, where it dawned on me that the back door of this new space of hers is just a few feet away from the back door of the building that Jesse Kranyak and I are in the process of buying.

Here’s the video. Check it out… and, I guess, let Bee know if you want to have your wedding there this summer.

[note: If the Star Wars reference I made when walking over her little metal bridge thing didn’t make sense, here’s a photo that should help explain.]

Posted in Local Business, Locally Owned Business, Uncategorized, Ypsilanti | Tagged Bee Roll, Beezy's, catering, Crow's Nest, dining, entrepreneurism, events space, grab-and-go food, North Washington Street, pies, pop-up dining, pop-up retail, Riki Tiki Pies, Star Wars, Theresa Rickloff, weddings, Zingerman's Community of Businesses | 4 Comments

The launch of Landline Creative Labs, and the development of 209 Pearl

By Mark | March 16, 2016

As you may have heard today, Jesse Kranyak and I are attempting to purchase and renovate a building in downtown Ypsilanti. The 9,000 square foot building, which was constructed about 100 years ago by Michigan Bell Telephone, has been largely vacant since the summer of 2014, when a fire ended its most recent incarnation, which was as a boarding house. While we still don’t actually own the building, we’re the better part of a year along the path and we’re cautiously optimistic. We have both a signed purchase agreement with the current owner and we’ve come to terms with a bank on the financing. Now it’s just a matter of executing on the few hundred things we need to do before closing, like figuring out the tax situation with the City, confirming with the Building Department that we can actually do what is that we want to do, and filing all of the necessary paperwork. [Jesse and I just signed our partnership agreement earlier this evening, and we’re filing the incorporation paperwork for our company tonight.] So, by the end of the month, if all goes well, the building at 209 Pearl could be ours.

When completed, assuming we’re able to pull off what we have in mind, 209 Pearl will be home to 11 creative companies, a loft apartment, a bar/restaurant, and Frank D’s barbershop.

While the bar/restaurant is still a long way off, we’ve already begun work planning out the 11 offices, which we’re collectively referring to as Landline Creative Labs. We’ve actually already gotten commitments from our first three tenants; a graphic design firm [Invisible Engines], a video production company [7 Cylinders, and a photography studio [CS Photo].

While we’re starting with a focus on photographers, graphic designers, web architects, writers, filmmakers and the like, we’re not adverse to the idea of broadening our scope to include record labels, podcasters, app developers, community news organizations, arts non-profits, etc. The most important thing to us is that we bring in bright, creative and engaged people who are in the process of making interesting things happen. As each company will have its own private office, collaboration isn’t mandatory, but we’re confident that, by putting such people in the proximity of one another good things will happen, not only for their own individual businesses, but for Ypsilanti in general.

[above: This is what the Landline space looks like now. It’s still raw, and there’s quite a bit for fire damage to contend with, but we’re confident that we can make it work.]

If you’d like to read more about our plans, both Concentrate and MLive posted features this morning. Here, because I think it’s funny, is a clip from the Concentrate piece.

…The two partners became friends shortly after Kranyak, an EMU alumnus, moved back to Ypsi in 2011 to open the Wurst Bar. They bonded over a shared passion for the Ypsi community, and the mutual admiration between them is obvious. Maynard expresses respect for Kranyak’s management skills, and Kranyak for Maynard’s community influence. Kranyak says he expects Maynard will handle the marketing end of the project while Kranyak focuses on the construction end.

“My back is going, so I’m too old,” Maynard says. “I’ll sit and take pictures of him and blog about it. ‘Look what Jesse’s doing today!'”…

And here we are going over the plans, surrounded by tiny plans that Linette and Clementine brought us from home. Jesse, by the way, if the youthful, energetic looking one. [I’m the one steadying myself on the table.]

“While Ann Arbor remains the hub of Washtenaw County’s arts economy, and its economy in general, the affordability and less stratified feel of Ypsilanti are drawing creative energy eastward.” – July 21, 2015, The Ann

I’m sure I’ll be writing a lot more about this project over the weeks and months to come, but, before I sign off for the night, I’d like to say a little something about why we think Landline is important.

Since my friends and I first started the Shadow Art Fair, probably over a decade ago now, I’ve wanted to do something like this. While it was great and exciting to bring the most interesting and creative people that we could find together for a day, I’ve always wondered what might happen if we could do something more permanent, something with deeper roots into the community. I was confident that the future of this little town that we love lay in the creativity of its people, and I wanted to see what might be possible with a little support and infrastructure. I wanted to have an actual place in town where people engaged in creative business pursuits could work in proximity to one another, occasionally collaborating, sharing insights, and dreaming up new ventures, all while contributing to the vibrancy of our downtown. And, now, thanks to this new partnership with Jesse, who shares this same vision, it looks like we might actually have a chance to try it out.

Will it succeed? We’re not sure… We feel relatively good, however, about placing a bet on the creativity of Ypsilanti.

[For more information about securing a space at Landline, click here.]

Posted in 209 Pearl, Art and Culture, Landline Creative Labs, Uncategorized, Ypsilanti | Tagged 209 Pearl, economic development, Frank D's, Jesse Kranyak, Landline Creative Labs, Mark's bad back, Shadow Art Fair | 35 Comments

R.I.P. Freeda, the best dog in the world

By Mark | March 15, 2016

The best dog in the entire world passed away this morning. Her name was Freeda, and, for the past 13 years, she’s lived here in Ypsilanti with me and my family. She’s been a constant in our lives ever since our friend Monica brought her to us, after finding her wondering around Southwest Detroit just after Christmas 2002, looking for food. She was here waiting for us when we brought Clementine home from the hospital 11 years ago, and she was actually right there with us seven years later when Alro was born in our living room. Our kids have never known life without her. Every single time they walked into out house, she’d be waiting by the door for them, wagging her tail. And, this morning, with all of us around her, she took her last breath.

Freeda grew up with us. While she was probably already about a year old when she first came to live with us, she still had a lot of puppy energy. She drove us nuts those first few years, eating dozens of shoes and terrorizing the cats. But, with age, she became a calm and steady companion that we could count on to take over parenting duties when we needed a break. As Linette wrote this afternoon in a note to friends, “Freeda was a feisty puppy who aged into a sweet and gentle old lady.” And it was a pleasure watching her as she calmed down and her snout turned grey. As much as I loved her as a puppy, I think that’s when I really started to appreciate her, when we could just sit by the river and talk.

Freeda had been living with cancer for the past year, and it finally just became too much. The tumors in her lungs were making it difficult for her to breathe, and she wasn’t enjoying life like she once did. While we were still taking our day walks, they were getting shorter, and she was falling more often. She was sweet and beautiful right up to the end though, putting up with the kids climbing over her, and the new puppy, who was always trying to insinuate herself.

I thought that I was done crying, but then, just now, I started going back trough this site’s archives, reading about how she used to lick my ankles as I wrote, back in the early days of this blog. And now I’m crying again.

[note: The photo at the very top of the page was taken yesterday, as Freeda and I sat on the sidewalk and talked. The second photo was taken shortly after she came to live with Linette and me.]

Speaking of this site’s archives, here, from December 31, 2002, is a clip from the post about the days Freeda came to live with us.

Posted in Mark's Life, Uncategorized | Tagged dogs, Freeda, pet euthanasia, pets | 15 Comments

Trump, having given racists permission to come out of the closet, now tells that that, if they really want to make America great again, they need to “toughen up” and start doling out the violence

By Mark | March 13, 2016

Since we had our discussion a week or so ago about the circumstances within the Republican party that made Trump’s ascent possible, and whether or not the comparison to Hitler is justified, quite a bit has happened. Most notably, we’ve seen Trump’s aggressive, authoritarian rhetoric intensify. And, with this ramped up rhetoric, we’ve seen a marked increase in acts of violence perpetrated against protestors, especially protesters of color, at his rallies.

In the past week or so, we’ve seen peaceful protesters at Trump events violently shoved and sucker-punched to the head. We’ve also heard Trump’s supporters yelling things like, “Go to fucking Auschwitz,” and “Go back to Africa.” And, in spite of these things, Trump continues to encourage his followers to “knock the crap out of” those in the audience who are there to protest, going so far as to offer to pay the legal fees of those who step up and actually do it. “We’ve become weak,” he says to his supporters, recalling a better time in American history when such people would have been “carried out on stretchers.” One of the things contributing to our decline as a nation, he says, is that “There are no consequences to protesting anymore.”

“Knock the hell out of them. I promise you I will pay for the legal fees. I promise.” -Donald Trump

What I find the most troubling is the fact that Trump is increasingly using words and phrases intended to dehumanize those whom he sees as impediments to his quest to “Make America Great Again.” “These are not good people,” he recently told a crowd of his supporters, indicating a group of protestors. “They contribute nothing,” he added. He then went on to say, “These are the people that are destroying our country.” [At the risk of losing credibility by once again drawing the comparison to Hitler, the way Trump talks about protesters reminds me a great deal of how the Nazis talked about the Jews, referring to them as der untermensch, or “the subhuman.”]

Given these comments made by Trump, and the enthusiasm by which they’ve been met, is it really any surprise that, swept up in the moment, people might begin to act in ways that they wouldn’t in everyday polite society?

Alvin Bamberger, the 75 year old Korean War veteran caught on tape a last week violently shoving a young black woman from a Trump rally in Louisville, Kentucky, explained the circumstances in a letter of apology written to the president of the Korean War Veterans Association. “Trump kept saying ‘get them out, get them out’ and people in the crowd began pushing and shoving the protestors,” Bamberger wrote. “Unfortunately a lot of this behavior was happening right next to where I was standing, and, having been pushed to the floor myself, my emotions got the best of me, and I was caught up in the frenzy. I physically pushed a young woman down the aisle toward the exit, an action I sincerely regret.” He also claimed repeatedly not to be a racist, and asked to be “forgiven for (his) actions.” While we can debate Bamberger’s sincerity, I don’t think there’s any doubt that the environment in that room, fostered by Trump, was a huge contributing factor.

Trump’s ascendency has brought things to the mainstream that have always been buried just below the surface. Trump has made it OK for people to say things out loud that, up until a few months ago, they may have just muttered to themselves in their own cars. Trump, through his words and actions, has shown racists that they can come out of the closet without fear of retribution. And, as we’re seeing, they’re taking full advantage of the opportunity.

A lot of us thought that it could never happen here. While we knew that there was the potential for such things to happen, we thought that our political leaders would stop it, or that the media would pull the plug before it got this bad. It hadn’t occurred to us that a good many of our political leaders might actually nurture it along, as it promised to serve their agendas, or that the media might encourage it, seeing as how it’s good for ratings… And now we find ourselves collectively staring into the abyss, asking ourselves why we let it get this far… How did we get to a point where the Republican candidate for President of the United Sates is actually saying that, if we want to “be great again,” we need to increase the level of violence in society?

President Obama, speaking about Trump at SXSW yesterday, asked the audience, “How can you be shocked?” He went on to say, “This is the guy, remember, who was sure that I was born in Kenya — who just wouldn’t let it go. And all this same Republican establishment, they weren’t saying nothing. As long as it was directed at me, they were fine with it. They thought it was a hoot, wanted to get his endorsement.”

Here’s a clip from Obama’s speech.

…”What is happening in this primary is just a distillation of what’s been happening inside their party for more than a decade. I mean, the reason that many of their voters are responding is because this is what’s been fed through the messages they’ve been sending for a long time — that you just make flat assertions that don’t comport with the facts. That you just deny the evidence of science. That compromise is a betrayal. That the other side isn’t simply wrong, or we just disagree, we want to take a different approach, but the other side is destroying the country, or treasonous. I mean, that’s — look it up. That’s what they’ve been saying.

So they can’t be surprised when somebody suddenly looks and says, you know what, I can do that even better. I can make stuff up better than that. I can be more outrageous than that. I can insult people even better than that. I can be even more uncivil. I mean, conservative outlets have been feeding their base constantly the notion that everything is a disaster, that everybody else is to blame, that Obamacare is destroying the country. And it doesn’t matter whether it’s true or not. It’s not, we disagree with this program, we think we can do it better — it’s, oh, this is a crisis!

So if you don’t care about the facts, or the evidence, or civility, in general in making your arguments, you will end up with candidates who will say just about anything and do just about anything. And when your answer to every proposal that I make, or Democrats make is no, it means that you’ve got to become more and more unreasonable because that’s the only way you can say no to some pretty reasonable stuff. And then you shouldn’t be surprised when your party ultimately has no ideas to offer at all…

Now, I think it’s pretty clear, it’s just a matter of time before there is bloodshed. It’s inevitable at this point. I knew it the moment I read what John McGraw, the Trump supporter who sucker-punched the man at the rally in North Carolina, had said to reporters after the incident. “The next time we see him, we might have to kill him,” McGraw said of the victim. “We don’t know if he’s ISIS. We don’t know who he is, but we know he’s not acting like an American.”

And Trump isn’t doing anything to decrease the tension. He’s not asking his supporters to be civil. He isn’t ratcheting down his rhetoric. In fact, as I noted earlier, he’s pushing the boundaries even further… Here, if you haven’t yet seen it, is video of his recent statements compiled by Rachel Maddow.

Trump, for what it’s worth, did come out this morning and say, “I don’t condone violence,” but, at the same time, he continued to maintain that none of it we’ve seen thus far has been his fault, as, in each case, the episodes were instigated by protestors who were sent by his democratic opponents, especially Bernie Sanders, who he refers to as “our communist friend.” As the folks at Talking Points Memo point out, however, while Trump has “repeatedly claimed that instances of crowd violence at his rallies occurred when protestors – ‘bad dudes’ – attacked his supporters and his supporters fought back. Until the events last night in Chicago, there is no evidence that anything like this ever happened. Not once.” Tensions, however, are increasing on both sides. As it becomes more and more likely that Trump will be Republican nominee for President, people are beginning to push back. As we saw yesterday in Chicago, where Trump protestors took to the streets, things are beginning to intensify. And, at this point, I don’t know how we can turn things around. So, as I see it, it’s not a matter of if someone will die, by when.

The only question I have is how people will react when the first person dies at a Trump rally. Will that be the end of Trump, or will it just be the beginning?

Posted in Civil Liberties, Politics, Uncategorized | Tagged aggression, Alvin Bamberger, birther, dehumanization, Donald Trump, fascism, Hitler, incite violence, ISIS, John McGraw, mob mentality, protesting, racism, subhuman, terrorism, threats to Democracy, threats to humanity, un-American, Untermenschen, violence | 101 Comments

The role of the public library in modern America, Ypsi’s Little Bird Cafe, and who knows what else… on this weekend’s edition of the Saturday Six Pack

By Mark | March 12, 2016

This evening’s episode of the Saturday Six Pack promises to be interesting. I tried, to the best of my ability, to book a full and complete show, but things kept getting in way. It was like the universe was pushing back against me. The harder I worked to cobble something together, the more things would fall apart. So, here we are on the day of the show, and I still don’t have the whole thing booked. Yes, I have some awesome guests lined up, and we’ll have a great time, but, because of last minute illnesses, and other unforeseen twists of fate, there may be extended periods of time where I’m either trying to pull people in from the street outside to talk, or begging people to call in and keep me company while I try desperately to finish my six pack. So consider yourself warned, OK?

Here, however, is what we know with some degree of certainty will be happening this evening.

The show will start with a conversation about the changing role of the public library in contemporary America with Josie Parker, the director of the Ann Arbor District Library. [I’d originally intended to also have on Lisa Hoenig, the director of the Ypsilanti District Library, but it’s looking like she might might have caught a bug of some kind. I suppose it’s possible that she could feel better by this evening, but, based on our yesterday, I wouldn’t count on it.] I suspect, among other things, we’ll be discussing the library’s role in disseminating information to the community, the AALD’s move into what you might call non-traditional collections, their recent foray into entertainment journalism with their online magazine Pulp, and the position the library holds as a common space in a community where such places are becoming increasingly more difficult to find.

And, then, at some point, we’ll be turning our attention toward the renovation of the little red brick building at 908 North Congress Street, which, assuming owner Beth Kwiatkowski is able to raise the money she needs to make it happen, will soon transform into a small neighborhood caffe called Little Bird. [The photo below, says Kwiatkowski, was found when removing old flooring from the building.] While we’ll be joined in the studio by Kwiatkowski’s friend Melissa Kuz, who has been assisting with the launch of Little Bird, Kwiatkowski herself will be calling in from Florida, where, at this very moment, she’s getting ready to attend a beer festival… As I’ve never attempted to interview a person who is several hours into a beer festival, I’m very much looking forward to it.

And, I’m still working on a few other things. If they don’t pan out, though, I suspect I’ll just be taking your calls about Donald Trump, who just recently won the Republican primary here in Michigan… Speaking of Trump, if you’re a supporter of his, feel free to give me a call tonight, once my guests have left the studio. I’d love to talk with you.

update: Alright, I’ve got a third segment for us. We’ll be joined later in the show by Beth Ernat, Ypsilanti’s director of economic development, who will be talking with us about plans, announced just yesterday, to build a train platform in Depot Town.

And, here, thanks to AM 1700 senior graphic designer Kate de Fuccio, is this week’s poster, in case any of you want to print copies and leave them at one of your favorite highway rest areas.

FOR THOSE OF YOU WHO HAVE NEVER TUNED IN TO THE SIX PACK BEFORE, HERE ARE THE DETAILS ON HOW TO LISTEN:

Unless you live inside the AM 1700 studio, chances are you won’t be able to pick the show up on your radio. As that’s the case, I’d recommend streaming the show online, which you can do either on the AM1700 website or by way of TuneIn.com.

And for those of you who aren’t yet familiar with the show, and need to get caught up, you can listen to the entire archive on iTunes.

One last thing… If you’d like to tell your friends and neighbors about the program, feel free to share the Facebook event listing.

And do call us if you have a chance. We love phone calls. So please copy down this number and slide it into your sock… 734.217.8624… and call us between 6:00 and 8:00 this evening. The show is nothing without you. Sure, sometimes it’s nothing even with you, that’s true, but usually you make it better.