MARK: Let’s start by talking about your childhood. Unlike many of my exit interview subjects, you actually grew up in Ann Arbor…

NEWCOMBE: I was born here, yes, and went through the school system (Mack, Slauson, Pioneer), but my mother took me to India on extended sabbaticals every year through most of my primary school. So I also have a second hometown in Pune, which is about 150 km inland from Mumbai.

MARK: And your parents actually met at the Fleetwood Diner, right? Do you know the circumstances?

NEWCOMBE: My understanding of the story was that, at the time (somewhere around 1978 or ‘79), my father was working for the late Ned Duke (who owned Mr. Flood’s Party and Leopold Bloom’s, which were located where Grange and West End Grill are today) as a carpenter, bouncer, mechanic, basic jack-of-all trades. My mother, who had known of my father back when she was a waitress at the Gandy Dancer, was, at that point, trying to make it teaching yoga, while she was also tuning and restoring pianos. They apparently met while sitting on the two northernmost stools along the counter at the Fleetwood, when they were in their mid 20s. The marriage lasted a few years in a rented house on Plymouth road, which was razed to make way for a Wendy’s and a carwash (which are still there today). In 1984, my parents separated, and my mother rented her and me a small pink house on North Ashley, seven blocks away from the Fleetwood. For the past nine or so years, I’ve lived in an apartment on Liberty, a half block from the Fleetwood. So I guess, over the past three decades, I haven’t gone far from the late night hippy hash and associated last-call amorous intentions of my origin.

MARK: One of the themes you kept coming back to when I was interviewing you at the Concentrate event was craftsmanship, and your belief that there’s a resurgence in Ann Arbor of people who are thoughtfully making things with their hands, and taking pride in their work. Assuming this is the case, I’m wondering how it can continue, given the ever rising costs associated with living in the City…

NEWCOMBE: It’s a trend that is probably becoming more prevalent everywhere in the western world, post-economic downturn. What was once mass consumption of “design porn” in magazines and Gucci logos on our sticky mats has become a return to, and desire for, the authentic. And, from a business perspective, where there is desire, there are often growth opportunities to market to it. Brooklyn is full of young kids waiting in line for free-range organic brunches and insisting on only wearing denim that has a story. Portlandia makes fun of this trend well. It’s a cultural thing. I’m OK with being caught up with it because it speaks to my own intrinsic motivations.

You’re right, however, that it is still probably a luxury that few in Ann Arbor can afford given the cost of living and the reluctance in the market to pay more for something handcrafted. I’m seeing much more of it here though. Vellum, Mani, Last Word, Babo, Rock Paper Scissors, Mark’s Carts… I’m not sure if these businesses would have made it five years ago because, yes, the rents were higher, and, as a market, we wouldn’t have rewarded them with our business for their slightly higher prices and their uniqueness of offerings.

I remember while growing up my father had a hard go at his carpentry and my mother at her yoga. They still devoted their life to pursuing their craft, and I’m fortunate for being raised under that appreciation for skill and rigor… We could barely pay the bills, however, and for most of that time they had to work other jobs outside their craft to keep me clothed and fed. And that was even when Ann Arbor was more modestly affordable than today.

MARK: Speaking of affordability, you mentioned that your mother bought the home you were raised in for not too much, and that, if it were to sell today, 30 years later, it would likely sell for 6-7 times that, or more… which makes me wonder how life might have been different for you had you been born now. In other words, would you agree that Ann Arbor has become a less viable alternative for single mothers, families on the poverty line, etc? And, assuming you agree, what are the long term consequences of that shift?

NEWCOMBE: The unique circumstances of my upbringing are very much, I think, a function of Ann Arbor’s history over the past 30 years. It’s not likely a story that can, or should, be repeated in the same way, because my opportunities came with a lot of pain and lack of opportunities for others. Briarwood Mall opens in 1973 because that’s what we culturally wanted to have happen at the time. Also, at that time, if you were poor and/or black you could only often get mortgages in certain neighborhoods, like near North Ashley (now called “Waterhill”) and in Kerrytown. As an aside, I wish we were more honest with ourselves about these facts. Race continues to be something that has shaped most of Michigan for the past 100 years, and Ann Arbor was not immune.

So the mall, and racial steering, bottomed out most of our downtown in the 70s and 80s. They also created opportunities for poor, young 20-somethings to do things downtown, like open a small deli in Kerrytown (1982), a seafood restaurant on Main (1975), save and run a historic movie house (1982), and raise a kid as a single mother on modest means on North Ashley while studying yoga on the side (1984-1999).

We were poor, and we moved into a neighborhood that was cheap. It also happened to be in a neighborhood with a great school system that I could walk to, and a recovering downtown that was my playground. My life is forever changed because of that move of necessity. My childhood was full of art and knowledge and optimism. It made me appreciate a life that was full of possibility, rather than restriction. It made me ambitious. It made me not afraid to take risks.

If I had a child today and made what my mother raised me on, I likely couldn’t even afford to visit Ann Arbor on a weekend, let alone live downtown, and raise the child in the way that I was. The unique opportunity I had, I don’t think can happen again today for those in similar economic situations, without more market manipulation. I’m OK with this, by the way, and I wish we did more of it. I would just rather see us get there this time by subsidizing housing or commercial rents rather than by building more malls or racially steering people to certain neighborhoods.

I don’t know what the long-term consequences of the lack of affordable opportunities are. My guess is it means more people in Washtenaw County that are born into poverty will stay in poverty. They don’t get access to a good school system or access to cheap real estate to start businesses. This translates to more people in need and more money spent for long-term care and extended social benefits. Much more money over a much longer time than it would take to just build more affordable housing and maybe subsidize a dozen or so storefronts today.

MARK: There were two data points that you noted during our conversation that I’d like to have you share here. The first, as I recall, had to do with the greying of the Ann Arbor population. And the second concerned the number of downtown living units that we’d have once all of the construction projects currently underway were completed. Would you mind repeating those here for our readers?

NEWCOMBE: The concentration of 20-35 year olds in Washtenaw County (excluding students, who are not polled as residents) in 1980 (the year I was born) was roughly 50%. When I last checked (2010) they made up less than 7% of the population. Now, it’s not necessarily the case that we have fewer total young people. That number has actually ticked up a few. Rather it’s that while, over the last 30 years, the overall population of Washtenaw doubled, the same demographic balance wasn’t maintained. The net result is that a town that was once balanced, if not dominated (at least from a voting block and commercial market standpoint) by the young, is now overweighed towards the old. Many towns in America have similar demographics today. And, it’s worth noting, none of these towns are doing well today. There’s quite a bit of research on why this is, but most of it boils down to this – cities with lots of young people, who have lots of extra time to work and money to spend, tend to do better.

Growth… and frankly, in America today, if you’re not growing, you’re suffering… has been shown to be only possible with lots of young people of working age and ambition. Technology, being borderless, isn’t a driving factor economically. It’s pure math – when you’re young, you can be more mobile, and you can more easily move to cities that give you the opportunities you require. You take your money and your labor with you to these places. Other demographic groups, with less disposable means, tend to benefit from this migration if it goes towards them. They tend to suffer as it flows elsewhere.

I’m not advocating replacing any older citizen with someone who’s been around the sun less. I’m saying, however, there are consequences for all ages if so little of your total population is 20 to 35 years old.

The other statistic I mentioned was about beds in the DDA boundary, which is what most people consider the measurable boundary of our downtown. Just in the last four to six years alone, that number has gone up close to 7x or 8x. It’s gone from a number around 600 or so, back when we started counting, to approximately 4850 today. And that’s not even including the projects currently under construction. That kind of shift in density in such a small area can have dramatic consequences. Some of these consequences will be quite positive, some perhaps negative. It depends on your viewpoint, I suppose.

Regardless of what happens, fighting change in our downtown is a lost battle. We’re already in the new reality. One or two new buildings, whether they house students, and student-aged people, or not, is not going to reverse what has already changed. Even a half dozen more buildings won’t have the same factor of increase as we’ve seen through the last half-decade – a period, I might add, where most cities in the world, let alone in Michigan, couldn’t pay people to invest in the same way. We’ve been lucky.

MARK: I don’t want to put words in your mouth, but I think it’s safe to say that you don’t count yourself among those who bemoan the loss of “old Ann Arbor,” at least when it comes to retail. Is that correct? (Bonus points if, in your response, you explain why it is that Shaman Drum’s transition into a Five Guys franchise is a good thing for the city.)

NEWCOMBE: “Old Ann Arbor” may never have existed, at least not in the form people seem so bent on protecting. The reason nostalgia is often effective as an influence tactic (i.e. marketing strategy) is perhaps because it is often free of hard truths. It’s an idealized version of history and we’re often cognitively too lazy or ashamed to be honest about what actually happened.

Records are a little spotty, but I think the truth is that “Old Ann Arbor” was bought from the Federal Government for about $800 in 1824 by land speculators (i.e. ‘out of town developers’) who kicked out the local Ojibwa. “Old Ann Arbor” was a small village full of poor German immigrants living mainly below the floodplain in shoddily built Sears Roebuck ‘kit’ houses. We were too far from Detroit to be wealthy. (Ironically, Ypsi was the wealth barrier back then too. It was just reversed.) And we were too uneducated to better our circumstances much beyond plowing earth and brewing beer. Our landlords and landowners were wealthy people of British descent, happy to take our rent, but not too excited about increasing our cultural or educational prospects.

Then, in the early 1830s, another group of land speculators cobbled together around 40 acres to the East of the Village of Ann Arbor to try and win the bid for the new state capital. But, when Michigan became a State in January 1837, Lansing became our capital, and those profit-driven speculators sold the land to the State so that they could move the University of Michigan from Detroit. And. Boom. Economic Development. ‘Historic’ houses were razed for bigger houses or apartment buildings (i.e. student housing).

The Irish, Greeks, and Italians smelled the money and came to town wanting to make a life and a living, much to the dismay of the Germans and the Brits over the loss of “Old Ann Arbor”.

Repeat the story over 4 or 5 generations and, then, in the 1960s and 70s, the young and the liberal (my parents), pissed off over Vietnam and other justifiable grievances, move to Ann Arbor to make a life and a living…. much to the dismay of their parents over the loss of “Old Ann Arbor”. And so on, and so on…

What we see today, with all of the anger and frustration on both sides, is regrettable, but it is nothing new. Even the arguments are rehashed. You could probably do a Mad Libs of an old City Council meeting transcript over a controversial project, or an op-ed over the loss of another retailer. Just swap out the names of the projects and the storefronts, and move those that were on the one side 30 years ago to the other today.

As for Five Guys, I’m not a customer myself, but if they offer a good product and do a good job, I’m happy they’ve decided to invest here. If that changes, we’ll get someone new. If Shaman Drum had closed down in any other city in Michigan at the time they would have likely been replaced with an empty storefront.

MARK: In my case, I’d like to think it’s more than just nostalgia. Maybe it’s that I spent so much time in the American Culture program here at U-M, but I fear that we lose something as a culture when we see these big, sweeping changes. And, yes, I appreciate your point about how this is nothing new, but it still pains me to see the record store were Iggy Pop once worked turned into a sub sandwich shop. And, before you say it, yes, I realize that Discount Records was a chain, but, still, I get the feeling that we’re allowing our history to melt away… that we’re trading our communal history for a fast buck. And, once gone, it’s not an easy thing to get back.

NEWCOMBE: I absolutely agree. My guess is that the chain that closed down Discount Records to drive traffic to their new Big Box store south of town would also agree with you today, given how things worked out for them. Same with a certain shuttered national bookstore chain.

When digital changed everything, stores with smaller footprints and knowledgeable staff have resurged as perhaps the only profitable way to deliver content through brick and mortar storefronts. Curation is difficult to commoditize, and a very effective business strategy. And if you or I want to save the culture we think we’re losing, or have lost, spend your money at Literati and Encore rather than online with the river people. We’ve already stopped spending it at Big Box and Borders, mainly out of convenience and price. History, it would seem, is often cheap to evoke, but rarely cheap to protect.

We can blame landlords for killing our downtown, or we can take a look in the mirror, be honest with ourselves, and maybe give the UPS man a break for a week or two… or perhaps even more, honestly. We can stop stealing people’s work online without paying for it at all. Words alone don’t pay the bills. Speak with your wallet. And go shop at places you find value in.

MARK: In your defence of Ann Arbor retail during the Concentrate event, you mentioned the fact that we still have independent stores, like Vault of Midnight, downtown. In the case of Vault of Midnight, though, they have a landlord that buys into their vision, and has priced the space in such a way as to make the store viable. My sense is that those kinds of landlords, who are willing to restrain themselves in a market where that sub sandwich place is on a corner where rents are as high as $60 a square foot, are going to become increasingly more rare. Would you agree?

NEWCOMBE: Over a long enough timeline, vacant storefronts are often always more expensive than maximizing rent with new tenants. Some landlords, and some tenants for that matter, don’t always realize this, or can’t, given their capital structure.

That’s still no excuse for not engaging in best practices as a tenant. Vault has spent a lot of time getting really good at what they do. That’s why they’re successful, not because of their, perhaps lower-than-market, rent. I dropped a ton there last week for product I can just put in my queue for free at the library a few blocks away. Again, they offer not only a product, they offer a service, and a sense of community. I’ll be a customer for life because Curtis will gladly debate Batman’s motivations with me at length. The online river company just tells me what more I should buy. At the library, it’s free, but I’m left to my own poor taste and advice. No thanks.

It depends on what you sell, but to be a sustainable and viable business, real estate expenses should rarely run you more than a ¼ of your revenue. For a low margin business like comic books, it should be lower, much lower. Yes, we as a community could help on subsidizing rent, but, in the meantime, shame on you and your landlord if you’ve thrown best practices out the window and signed a lease at a rent your business can’t afford, even at your most successful.

If you do need some help understanding your numbers and your real estate, make the investment and hire someone who knows what they’re doing, and ideally not someone that is paid more when you spend more. This is why people are mistrustful of real estate professionals, and I understand that. But still, if people stop signing leases at high rents, rents will fall. The fault is communal on this one in my mind.

MARK: In discussing your decision to move, I think you may have offended a few people when you said that people in Ann Arbor don’t have to strive for “excellence”. You said, and I’m obviously paraphrasing here, that you wanted to live in a city, for a change, where only the strong survive, where there are people who you could really learn from. By way of contrast, you painted a portrait of Ann Arbor, where no one excelled because essentially everyone works for the University, and doesn’t have to worry about competition, or where their next meal is coming from. While I appreciate your candor, I was wondering if you might want to modify the statement any, given the fact that you yourself claim to have a great many mentors here in Ann Arbor, who, I would think, would like to believe that they strive to be excellent in their fields.

NEWCOMBE: Always appreciate the opportunity to remove foot from mouth. My comment was not that we don’t have people here that are excellent, it is that I don’t feel we have a density of people here that are required to strive for excellence in order to survive. Trying to be excellent is a lifelong pursuit in my mind. It’s hard, uncomfortable, stressful, and lonely. People rarely reward you for your efforts. Unless you cannot help yourself, why would you choose that lifestyle if you don’t have to?

For this next phase in my life, I want to be pushed harder by more people in more ways than I think Ann Arbor has the density of experts to do currently. Sure, I could just do it myself without external motivation, but I think, if we’re all being honest, we rarely push ourselves ahead and above unless we feel we have to.

Bannister broke the 4-minute mile only with multiple fresh sprinters on the track to race against. In other cities, more people are either forced to improve by competition (like New York, London, San Francisco) or by ingrained social and cultural norms (Tokyo, Seoul, Paris). Ann Arbor is obviously not a big city like those that I mention… but there’s no reason we can’t all more collectively try to push one another to be better every day… no reason other than the fact that we don’t have to. I’ve been so incredibly fortunate to have mentors in my life, and in this town, that are striving for excellence every day. I just haven’t been able to find a density here moving forward… but I think that’s changing, as I mentioned prior. It will just take time, and I want to selfishly spend the next 30 years of my productive working life being pushed and pulled to be better by many others, rather than finding the strength to do it alone.

MARK: For what it’s worth, having lived in LA and DC, and spent quite a bit of time in New York, I can tell you that not everyone in the cities strives for excellence. I’ll give you that, because of their significantly larger populations, there’s a greater population of individuals doing inspiring work, but I think the notion that everyone there wakes up determined to push the envelope in incredible ways, as I think you suggested during our interview for Concentrate, is overstating it a bit.

NEWCOMBE: Absolutely. It’s not everyone in any market, but I think it’s a higher density in certain places, and in certain fields. Especially (I hope) in the particular city and profession I’ll be in. I don’t want to put words in your mouth but you’re kind of making my point if you’re saying that only big cities can get the best because they’re big. They’re big, perhaps, because they have the best. They continue to attract the best because they’re big. So, and not to create a paradox here, but if you claim to be excellent in a city which is densely excellent, you are therefor not in a small city. If you are in a small city, you’re then therefore, not excellent. This I don’t believe to be true necessarily, but I do believe that I’m not alone in being attracted to the presence and possibility of excellence. This attraction grows cities. If Ann Arbor was full of excellent people, you couldn’t stop the growth. Incredibly smart and ambitious people would claw their way to be here, growing our city exponentially… and yet our population growth is tepid, if not stagnant.

If, say, in one of the big cities we mentioned above, there is a generous estimation that 4 of 10 push themselves towards excellence over a meaningful period, those that don’t may get selected out over a year or two.

Not all those that move back to Michigan do so just because family is a big draw. I don’t know a lot of people my age or older who quit highly successful, meaningful careers to return home by choice. If returning to Ann Arbor meant the same level of competition and rigor, I’m not sure they would rush back. This is anecdotal, but many of those I know that have come back from my generation find it a much easier time here… and they’re not all terribly proud or satisfied about being back so soon to a life that is less challenging.

Life in Ann Arbor is fantastic. I want to be very clear about that. I’m not sure however that I will achieve the level of rigor and excellence I want for myself if I stay through the next period of my live. I’m rather certain, however, I’ll have a better shot if I do it in a professional and social environment that puts more of a requirement on it. Again, this is not a size thing for me. Small cities have always been my preference personally. I’m just trapped in a paradox of wanting to believe we’re ALL smart and excellent in Ann Arbor, but not having the logical justification to back that claim.

MARK: How do you respond to those who would say that you should stay and fight to make this community a better place, instead of leaving for a community where things are already somewhat established? Which I think goes back to your point about excellence. How do we build a culture of excellence, when those who care about such things are always leaving.

NEWCOMBE: My point above. I can spend the next 30 years fighting here, sure. A quick web search will show I did spend the last 10 year fighting for the things I think we need. All I can say is the prospect of always being the first through the door can leave you exhausted and full of bullet holes. This City wants to be better, it just doesn’t always want anybody to do it. Because better means different, and different means change, and change is scary, when the here and now isn’t all that bad.

We’ve lost dozens of fighters over the past six years. You’ve interviewed a lot of them. People much smarter, harder working, and more likable than me. They’ve gone to cities that don’t want or need them to fight to improve their surroundings. And, as much as they loved Ann Arbor, and as hard as they fought to make her better, they are much happier not having to fight for a while.

MARK: As many of my readers know, you waged an unsuccessful independent bid for Ann Arbor City Council not too long ago. I’m curious as to how your view of the city, and its inhabitants, changed as a result of this experience.

NEWCOMBE: My view has changed for the better, absolutely. I had some very particular goals I wanted to accomplish with my campaign — being elected and serving my term was only one of them… and not very high on my list, if I’m being honest. Also, I don’t know who said it, but I believe in the wisdom of the old saying that everyone should run for office at least once in their life.

I’m much more aware of my own impatience at times after the run. And, subsequently, I’m much more able to understand when it can be an effective or harmful influence. I got a lot of great advice from very smart people during the campaign. The one thing that stuck with me most was that, at any given time, there is a limited range of possibilities of what people will tolerate. You can’t change too much too fast and get ahead of the voters, nor can you do too little too slow and fall behind the curve. To be successful in the long term (and/or to avoid being tossed out of office) you need to stay in that range and avoid pushing the margins too much. If, however, you want to widen the margins, you can, but you will likely fall on your sword for doing so. The question posed to me by this particular mentor was, “Which result are you trying to create?”

I suppose, at the time, I wanted to push the margins wider more than I wanted a successful political career. If I ended up doing that, and in some ways I think I did, I’m happy with the outcome. There was certainly a price to pay for it. As such, I realize now that it was a choice I made rather than one that was forced on me out of fiduciary to boards or clients of mine or necessity of my circumstances. I’ve always loved Ann Arbor and her citizens. Post-election, I also now have much less judgmental blame or doubt in our collective actions and abilities. We, in this community at any given point, have a collective margin of tolerance. If any of us don’t like this margin, we each have a choice: push it, or move. That’s on us individually, and is not Ann Arbor’s fault. “I love you, now change,” isn’t fair to anyone. And knowing that is different for me now, post campaign.

MARK: Speaking of politics, did Michigan politics play a role in your decision? Or, to put it another way, is it easier to leave a state that’s doing things like forcing through anti-union “right to work” legislation, defunding Planned Parenthood, stripping domestic partner benefits from gay state employees, seeking to protect healthcare workers who don’t want to serve gay patients, instituting Emergency Managers, and the like?

NEWCOMBE: I’m not happy about any of the above. I am very much my parent’s son after all. There isn’t, however, a state that I know of that gets everything right for me. If I had a goal for Michigan, I would like us to just shoot for the middle for a few years. Being best in education will take incredible investment and likely sacrifices we don’t want to make short term. As would being “first” in weakening the Unions. Michigan as a state is probably far from where I would want us to be long term personally. But I don’t own property, don’t have kids, and I’m a young and healthy, well-educated white man. Personally, I’m not terribly at risk from backward political thinking anytime soon. It’s convenient for me to shake my head at some of what comes out of Lansing that I hear on the radio each morning, but it doesn’t really affect me yet. This will likely change as my situation does, but it isn’t enough to compel me to move or stay at this point. I could do more, sure, but again, I’m not in the fighting mood for the next 30 years.

MARK: As you mentioned at the Concentrate event, Ann Arbor is already changing as a result of the increasing density downtown. You noted, for instance, that Babo likely wouldn’t have been possible even a few short years ago. Given that you made your living as a commercial real estate broker prior to going back to U-M for your MBA, I’m wondering if you have thoughts as to other opportunities that might arise as a result of this increasing downtown population.

NEWCOMBE: Ironically, the things most people say they miss downtown (e.g. bookstores, markets, even a soda fountain here or there) are more possible with more density. To return to the past, we have to allow the change to the future. As I mentioned, the global reality of a free market is that to even maintain, let alone thrive, you have to grow. If you just absolutely hate the idea of a half dozen towers full of college students, try and remember that the U isn’t growing that quickly in terms of student population; in fact, some colleges and schools in the system are shrinking to maintain rankings and competitiveness. Stagnant or shrinking overall student population and more student housing on less land downtown means that those red-cupped partiers are going to be sucked out of the neighborhoods.

This can create more pressure for landlords to improve the existing housing stock and/or lower rent. If they don’t, they’ll have to sell it to others at a discount, thereby creating opportunities for young families and/or people of more modest means to move close to downtown. You want to create more affordable housing and not use tax dollars to do it, allow more dense housing to be built. It’s a net win for everyone as I see it. Stronger neighborhoods, more diverse downtown shopping and service options, less use of city services per capita—It’s a total win… unless, of course, you own existing student rentals and/or live directly next to these new buildings… which most of those protesting actually check both boxes off on.

MARK: If you had to do it all over again, would you have used your time here differently?

NEWCOMBE: Yes. I would have gotten rid of my car ten years ago. Best decision of my life. I’ll never live or work anywhere that can’t affordably and reliable get me to the office, a gym, a market, the airport, and the train station without public transportation ever again. Ann Arbor transportation isn’t perfect, but it’s by far the best in the Michigan in providing this. I waited way too long to get rid of my car. Other than that, I’ve had an incredibly blessed life here. I am equally thankful for all the mistakes and failures I’ve made along the way as I am for the successes. I wouldn’t change a thing… other than getting rid of the car.

MARK: I have no idea how old this footage of you talking about how Ann Arbor is a microcosm of Portland and Rotterdam is, but I’m wondering how you might state things differently, if interviewed today.

NEWCOMBE: That footage is about three or four years old, I think. Part of a Public Broadcasting series on what’s great about cities in Michigan. I think it’s called Under the Radar. Great, positive show and worth checking out.

The interview was right before I started B-School, which ultimately was the beginning of what is pulling me out of Michigan now. I’ve spent most of my young professional life working hard, and being optimistic about how great Michigan and Ann Arbor is, and could be. My efforts had the knock-on effect of also getting me a lot of attention and accolades. That attention, along with the hard work, and a ton of luck, allowed me to be professionally successful in my previous real estate and consulting career.

I perhaps cashed in too much of that social and political capital when I “pushed the margins” with my development projects, and the campaign. My messaging, however, has stayed pretty consistent throughout, and I stand by that clip. Truth is, I’ve now got this really expensive degree and a great opportunity to test it. That opportunity, and ones like it, is not yet unfortunately in Michigan in abundance. Signs look rosy that there will be more to come in the future, and I look forward to seeing how that will play out. It will then just likely be an older me in the stands, excited for the those that are stepping up to the plate… rather than me standing there myself to swing at bat.

MARK: What would the ideal job be for Newcombe Clark?

NEWCOMBE: I, of course, have high hopes my new job will be satisfying in all the ways I’ve outlined in this interview. I care deeply about how people interact with their social environment. I’m curious about why we make the decisions we do. What we spend our time and money on, where we go to spend it, and why. This, in the past, included focusing on place-making through real estate and community and arts involvement. Moving forward with my career there will likely be more of a focus on building international businesses and brands through product and service innovation and other related growth strategies.

In more plain speak perhaps, I like solving puzzles more than I like solving problems. My new firm works with clients that are trying to find ways to grow and better service their customers through what they sell and how. Other firms I considered (and quickly eliminated as a poor fit) are more often tasked with coming up with solutions to crisis or hardship. Downsizing and the like. That’s not for me. You may be the best surgeon in the world, but that rarely means people will call you up and say, “Hey Doc, feeling great. Can you cut me open?” It’s certainly noble work to heal what’s sick and fix what’s broken. Emotionally, however, I don’t want to apply whatever skill I may have to being around pain all the time.

Now, if for some reason this new job isn’t everything I hope it’s going to be (or if I’m not everything they’re hoping I am), I’ll have to reassess. I think however there will be a consistent intrinsic motivation to continue to develop a craft. It’s how my parents raised me, and it’s something that I value. As such, it doesn’t much matter what the job is, or what I make doing it, as long as I can meaningfully apply myself everyday to getting better at what I do, and how I do it. This, to me, is how I can regard myself with honor and live a life of purpose and meaning.

MARK: What are the odds that you’ll be back?

NEWCOMBE: I suspect that once I cut anchor I won’t necessarily call any particular place home again as much as I did Ann Arbor. The life I currently want and envision myself leading is a bit less tied to any particular geography or culture. To do well at my chosen profession I don’t think it can be. But, I’m still just 32 and I could be back in six months. The only thing I know for certain at this age is that what I still don’t know vastly outweighs the little I do.

[For your further enjoyment: Here are links to video of my live exit interview with Newcombe, and the MarkMaynard.com exit interview archive.]

At some point in 1991, I had the occasion to witness a basketball-related riot in Ann Arbor, as I stood wedged between an open 450-degree pizza oven and a large plate glass window facing the intersection of Church and State. I can’t recall, but I don’t think my friend Roger and I, who were busy making some of the City’s least expensive/tasty pizzas at the time, were even listening to the game that set the events in motion. We were just cranking out the “za”, as the rich New York girls liked to call it, as fast as we could for the drunken frat crowd, and watching the events unfold on the street in front of us. I’d love to see a time lapse video of it now, after over 20 years have passed. It felt at the time like a tornado, the way it kind of gathered from nothingness. There was a stillness, followed by a few people running by, and then, all of sudden, all hell just broke loose. I don’t know how long the riot lasted. I just remember standing in the window, watching the street signs swaying, and the people climbing up on top of whatever happened to be around. I think I may have heard things being smashed, but, for some reason, I don’t think it even crossed my mind that the large window that I was looking through could be a target. (Maybe they left us alone because we were open, and it was easier to smash the windows of stores that were dark inside, or maybe it was just that they liked pizza more that they liked violence, but, for whatever reason, no bricks were hurled in our direction.) And, then, at the height of it, a phalanx of faceless riot police, who I guess had learned a thing or to two during the ’89 riots, started marching slowly down South University, launching teargas canisters in front of them as they went. The crowd scattered. Those of us at work, however, had to keep right on going, with our eyes swollen closed, and snot running from our chins in torrents. Roger and I eventually decided to lock up and call it a night, but, as I recall, it took us a while to get everything shut off and cleaned up, given that we couldn’t really see, and spent half our time rubbing our eyes and screaming out in pain. And, it must have been somewhere in that half hour or so, that I came to the realization that life isn’t fair. (I’d already come to the realization that I hated frat boys, but this certainly reinforced that belief as well.) I tell you, there’s nothing like being teargassed for the crimes of spoiled, drunken rich kids who didn’t have to work their way through school to radicalize a man…

So, today, as I sat at work, it occurred to me that I’m owed a riot. Sadly, though, I don’t know that I’m now in any condition to enjoy it. While I could probably toss a brick a few feet (underhand), I don’t think that I’m in any condition to scale walls, or flip cars. I can, however, post things to Craigslist… which has me thinking that I should ask the spoiled rich kids of today to repay the debt of their predecessors, and give my fat ass a boost onto the awning of a local business when the time comes, and hold onto my things for me, while I help kick it to the ground…

All this nonsense aside, I don’t have a problem with riots per-se… God knows there are things that people should be in the streets about… I just have a problem with alcohol-fueled sports riots. They seem a huge waste of time and energy, but I suppose that’s their purpose. They keep people occupied, divert attention from the real problems at hand, and relieve societal pressure.

I’m tempted to go downtown tonight with a sign… “YOUR RIOTING ABOUT THE WRONG THING!”

One question: Will there be a riot tonight regardless of the game’s outcome? I’m not up to speed on American riot etiquette. And, if there is a riot, what form will it take? Will couches all over the City be pulled into the streets and set aflame, or will everyone come together in one place to tip news vans on their sides?

[note: This post has been edited to reflect the fact that, knowing very little about sports, and having a terrible memory for dates, I'd originally identified myself as being present at a different riot altogether. In the future, I will take better notes when surrounded by mayhem. I promise.]

MARK: Perhaps, before we get started talking specifically about your work, you could share a little background about the Southern Foodways Alliance, how it got started, its mission, etc.

AMY: The Southern Foodways Alliance was founded in 1999. A member-supported non-profit, based at the University of Mississippi, we stage symposia on food culture, produce documentary films, collect oral histories, and publish compendiums of great writing.

Our mission is to document, study, and celebrate the diverse food cultures of the changing American South. We set a common table where black and white, rich and poor—all who gather—may consider our history and our future in a spirit of reconciliation.

Since 1999, we’ve added more than 700 oral history interviews to our online archive and produced 35 documentary films. We’ve only just begun.

(Go here for more on our history, and visit our SFA Founders’ Oral History Project, to read interviews with most all of our 50 founding members.)

MARK: When I first became acquainted with your work, I have to tell you that I was more than just a little bit jealous. As someone with an appreciation for the South, having grown up moving between Kentucky, Georgia and South Carolina, and degree in American Studies, who attempted to make a go of it at an historic archeologist, before giving it all up for the security of an office job, your career, at least as I understand it, is the stuff that dreams are made of. Please tell me one really bad thing about your job before we get into the good stuff… I think that might make this interview easier for me.

AMY: You know, I didn’t even know a job like this existed before I found myself in it. It is a really wonderful gig, I have to say, but there is one giant albatross around my oral historian neck: processing. For every week spent in the field collecting interviews, four more are spent in front of a computer screen. We’re now able to have multiple people collecting fieldwork for us, so I manage that, too. It’s all worth it, though, of course. So is the uptick in my waistline.

MARK: OK, now the good stuff. Tell us what it is that you do for the Southern Foodways Alliance?

AMY: I am the SFA’s lead oral historian. I travel the region collecting stories from people who make, grow, serve, and consume Southern food and drink. Until just a few years ago, I was the only oral historian but, as the organization has grown, we’ve been able to bring more people into the fold and invite colleagues to collaborate with us on projects throughout the region. Here lately, I’ve been attending more conferences to spread the good word about our documentary archive. I also conduct a week-long oral history workshop every May at our headquarters at the University of Mississippi.

MARK: In the time that you’ve been collecting oral histories have you noticed any larger trends? Are you, for instance, seeing any evidence of the old ways dying off? Or, are people, perhaps, coming to appreciate regional food traditions more, with the advent of “food tv” and the constant advance of corporate chains across the American landscape? In your opinion, is there a concerted effort to keep these things alive? And, if not, how do we get there?

AMY: After a decade doing this work, the only things I see dying are people. Southern food is on the upswing. It’s more popular that ever, it seems. It’s the generation of people who are connected to almost a century of the South’s culinary history that we’re losing. People like Alisa Lay of Greenwood, MS; Bill Tinker of Louisville, KY; Edna Stewart of Chicago, IL; and Joe Pope of Rosedale, MS, to whom we dedicated our Mississippi Delta Hot Tamale Trail. They are precisely why we are committed to oral history.

MARK: The work you’re doing is incredibly important. It’s vital that we capture the history of regular Americans, of all walks of life, and food, perhaps more than anything else, really gets to the heart of who we are. It’s our history, our heart, our culture, all rolled up into one. I’m curious if you have any sense just how much of this history was lost before your group, and others, began documenting it. It’s easy to see on a satellite image, for instance, just how much of the Amazon rainforest disappears each year, but how do we measure the loss in this area which you study?

AMY: In my oral history workshop I always share the African proverb, when an old [person] dies, a library burns to the ground. There’s no way to measure what’s been lost, only document what remains. Again, this is precisely why we’re doing this work.

That said, there are plenty of young people doing new and exciting things, and we’re committed to documenting them, too. Take, for example, Hieu Pham in Atlanta, GA. Pham is a born-and-raised Atlantan, but his parents bring a mix of Cambodian, Chinese, and Vietnamese heritage to the table. In 2008 at the age of 25, Pham opened Crawfish Shack Seafood on Atlanta’s Buford Highway, where he serves fresh po-boys with a Vietnamese-influenced remoulade, spring rolls made with Louisiana shrimp, and a traditional Vietnamese drink of pressed sugarcane spiked with sweet Louisiana satsumas in lieu of sweet tea.

Hieu Pham, Crawfish Shack Seafood, Atlanta, GA:

MARK: I’m curious to know if there’s a great white whale in your field of study. Is there some culinary myth that you’ve heard about for years, but haven’t been able to find real evidence of?

AMY: No great white whale, only a driving urge to document and share. That, and culinary myths aren’t really our bag. We’re more interested in celebrating the uncelebrated, exploring culture through food, and building an archive that documents the changing foodways of our region. The latter is only just now beginning to show its value. Take, for example, our Southern Boudin Trail, where we feature more than 40 oral histories about boudin (pork liver, rice, onions and various other herbs and spices squeezed into a sausage casing and served hot). They are all interesting stand-alone interviews. Collectively, though, they tell a bigger, broader, deeper story about the evolution of a particular food in the context of a certain place and time. Which is to say, the boudin that old-timer John Saucier of Saucier’s Sausage Kitchen makes (using not just the liver but all of the organ meats form a hog) speaks to boudin’s origins and the fading boucherie tradition of South Central Louisiana. It’s is a far cry from the alligator and chicken boudin being served in some establishments today, which are perfectly acceptable and actually quite popular versions of boudin, but they have very little to do with what John Saucier makes.

John Saucier, Saucier’s Sausage Kitchen, Mamou, LA:

MARK: I’m not sure to what extent, if at all, you’ve researched New Orleans, but I’m curious what the post-Katrina diaspera meant for the food culture that was there.

AMY: We’ve conducted quite a lot of fieldwork in and around New Orleans. In fact, our Southern Boudin and Southern Gumbo Trails were specifically created to spur culinary tourism in the state after Hurricane Katrina.

Just last year we produced the Down the Bayou oral history project, and many of the subjects who shared their stories mention of Katrina. Nick Collins of Collins Oyster Company in Golden Meadow, Louisiana, is a good example. Katrina remains a part of the cultural fabric of southern Louisiana — and southern Mississippi, I might add.

Visit our Oral History Project index and scroll down to the Louisiana heading to see all the work we’ve collected in the sate.

MARK: How is your work funded?

AMY: Our documentary work is funded in large part by private and corporate donations.

MARK: Can you tell us about one of your favorite interviews?

AMY: Too many to count! But my interview with John Saucier of Saucier’s Sausage Kitchen, an interview from the Southern Boudin Trail that I mentioned earlier, is definitely a favorite. I happened upon one of his handmade signs while in the field in Cajun Country, found my way to his front door, and talked him into visiting with me. He was a lovely interview, and, as I mentioned above, his boudin story ended up being very important to the project. I often know who I will be interviewing before I head into the field, but it’s interviews like this ones—the surprises—that are especially memorable. What’s more is that after the interview, Mr. Saucier and his wife invited me to join them for a lunch of venison stew, homemade bread, and peppers from their garden.

Another memorable interview was with Leann Hines, a chicken farmer in Greenwood, Mississippi. She is an inspiration. And, in fact, I just had an email exchange with her the other day. In a postscript she added, “I love all my new friends that I never would have known if not for the chickens and one little mosquito.” Listen to her audio slideshow online, and you’ll understand just what she means. She is AMAZING.

Leann Hines, Levee Run Farm, Greenwood, MS:

MARK: How did you come to this career?

AMY: I fell into it really. I have a fine arts background (BFA from Maryland Institute College of Art) but in 2001, at the age of 30, I decided I wanted to go back to school. Not for art but for a cultural studies degree. More than that, though, I wanted to get out and explore. Long story short, I found the Southern Studies program that’s part of the Center for the Study of Southern Culture at the University of Mississippi and knew immediately that it would be a good fit. It was the documentary studies part of the program that hooked me. I had a graduate assistantship with the SFA, which, at that time, was only three years old. They were just turning their attention to oral history, so my classmate Joe York (who now makes all of our documentary films) and I collaborated on the SFA’s very first oral history project, documenting barbecue joints in Memphis, TN. I continued to do projects for the SFA after graduating in 2003 and was hired as the SFA’s full-time oral historian in 2005. I still make paintings and have an annual show at Koelsch Gallery in Houston, Texas.

MARK: What was your favorite meal?

AMY: Milkshakes with A. L. and Gloria Quick at the Burger King in Apalachicola, Florida. I made three fieldwork-gathering trips to Franklin County, Florida, for our Florida’s Forgotten Coast project, and I made this date with the Quicks each time.

Second favorite meal might have to be the one with John Saucier mentioned above.

MARK: If there was one food you’d like for people everywhere experience, what would it be?

AMY: Anything shared by the person who grew/harvested/cooked/served it. Food is always better when there’s a story to go with it.

MARK: If I were to be looking for the best fried chicken in the world, where would I be most likely to find it?

AMY: I hope to never find the best. I’d rather keep tasting, comparing, craving. Greatness should be a never-ending quest. That said, I have to confess that I’ve eaten at Gus’s in Memphis twice in the past ten days.

MARK: Is there anything that you’ve seen prepared that you’ve refused to eat?

AMY: Nope. I’ll eat whatever doesn’t eat me first. This, of course, is not a job requirement, but it does come in handy. For me, it’s never usually about the kind of food but the quantity of a certain thing being consumed over a short period of time that can be hard. Spending a week in the field to document barbecue, for example, has its hazards.

MARK: If things aren’t going well, and you’re just not connecting with your interview subject, what do you do? Do you have a foolproof question that you break out in case of emergency?

AMY: In the decade I’ve been doing this work, there have really only been a few people who have not being giving interview subject. Generally, people like being paid attention to, celebrated for what their doing, and sharing their story. If the interview happens to not be going well, you just have to gauge your subject and try to find a way around the problem. Every situation will have different solutions because people are different. There is no foolproof question, although asking someone what they had for breakfast — and the beginning of an interview or when the need for a change of tone shows itself — is a great was to get people out of their own head and think about something specific instead of how nervous or uncomfortable they are. It’s a wonderful icebreaker.

MARK: Do oral historians hang out together somewhere? If so, what do they talk about?

AMY: They do, actually. The Oral History Association has an annual meeting, and there are other groups and events that bring people together to talk about the field of oral history. And when they get together, they talk shop. I’ve also found that oral historians are quite chatty, which likely has something to do that we’re always the ones listening.

[note: The painting above, of the man in the overalls, is a portrait of Robert Earl "Doc" Mathis, done by Amy, who, as she mentioned above, can be found painting, when she's not traveling through the South, eating, and collecting oral histories.]

[note: The videos above only contain small snippets of the interviews which Amy has collected. If you follow the associated links, you will find her transcribed interviews in their entirety.]

And, if all that talk of boudin and fried chicken got your mouth watering, you’ll be happy to know that The Southern Foodways Alliance has produced an awesome cookbook.

Oh, and this is the short documentary film on country ham that first brought the Southern Foodways Alliance to my attention. It was produced by Amy’s associate, Joe York, and features Madisonville, Tennessee’s world-renowned bacon and country ham producer Allan Benton. And it totally brings back delightful childhood memories of eating ham and biscuits at my grandmother’s table in Liberty, Kentucky.

Cured from Southern Foodways on Vimeo.

Admittedly, I don’t follow Facebook that closely. I know that, since the company “went public” a while ago, there’s been a huge push to monetize each and every element of their now ubiquitous platform, but I was totally caught off-guard this morning when, attempting to send a note to a woman who had left a comment on this blog, I was met with the above screen, asking me to please deposit $1. Is this something that people have encountered before?

And I know that maybe this makes me sound like an old man, ranting about how, back in his day, “Water was free… damn-it,” but this really does strike me as odd. I can see why they might want to keep people from sending messages to folks who aren’t in their “friend” network, but this is like saying, “Yeah, we’ll give anyone the ability to send you messages for a buck.” That’s like an operator saying, “Sorry, sir, that’s an unlisted number… but, if you really want it, I can give it to you for a dollar.”

As for the woman that I was attempting to write to, her name is Eldora M. Trimble, and she’s the daughter of Roland Maynard, the author of that book I was telling you about not too long ago about the history of my ancestors in Kentucky. Apparently she’s republished the formerly out-of-print book, and wants to sell me a copy… If all goes well, I hope to be able to tell you all about it shortly, as I know that many of you only come to this site for the super-popular Maynard genealogy updates.

MARK: First, let’s start with what a Master Plan is, and why the city needs one. I think I know the answer, but I’m curious as to what you’ll say.

TERESA: The Master Plan is the guiding document for the city’s next 10-20 years. Practically, it’s something that I use frequently, as do others, to make sure that the projects we take on are in-line with the community’s vision as to where the City should be heading. The implementation tool of the Master Plan is the zoning ordinance, and that revision will follow the drafting of a new Master Plan… I think it’s important for Ypsilanti, especially now that we’ve gone through de-industrialization, and both a housing boom and bust. There are questions as to where we want go, in terms of our economy, our neighborhoods, and the transportation options available to us. In a time of diminishing resources, it’s still important to make deliberate choices, and to build on the existing physical infrastructure and our community character, which is Ypsilanti’s greatest strength. Ypsi is growing and changing, and sticking with the current plan, and the zoning requirements which were drafted to support it, limits where we can go. It’s time to rethink and redefine the City’s direction together as a community.

MARK: Are Master Plans required by law? Are there communities without them?

TERESA: The State of Michigan Planning Enabling Act requires the State’s Planning Commissions to develop and adopt a Master Plan, as well as update it every 5 years.

MARK: When did we last go through this process? Was it at all contentious? If so, why?

TERESA: The last time the process happened was in the late 1990s. (Our current plan, which was largely written in 1998, can be found here.) I don’t know the details of the process… maybe folks can discuss it in the comments section. I do know that, with most large-scale zoning changes, there is often concern as folks try to stay abreast of changes that might impact their neighborhoods, properties and commercial districts. After the Master Plan is adopted, the next stage is to move toward a major zoning ordinance revision, and a “form based code.” I expect that will also draw attention and opinions. I’m hoping for creativity and exploration, although I know sometimes it’s easy to take on a defensive posture when it comes to potential changes to one’s own property.

MARK: I’m not familiar with the phrase, “form based code.” What’s that?

MURPH: A “form based code” is a zoning ordinance that focuses most of its attention on the physical aspects of a building and site — how big is it, where is it relative to the street and sidewalk and neighboring properties, how much parking does it have — and spends less time listing the uses that are permitted or prohibited on the site. The form-based approach has gained in popularity in recent years as a way to focus regulations on the aspects of development that have the greatest impact on community character, and reducing the amount of micromanaging of what types of businesses can exist in a particular building.

MARK: Thanks, Murph. That makes more sense…. Earlier, Teresa, you mentioned that Michigan law requires that we update the Master Plan every five years. Is it safe to assume that, while we haven’t rewritten ours from scratch in some time, we have made edits to reflect changing circumstances? Assuming that’s the case, I’m curious to know what the most recent changes have been.

TERESA: In 2008, the City amended the Water Street area plan, and, in 2010, the City amended the Master Plan to include the Non-Motorized Transportation Plan. No overall update has been completed since 1998, though.

MURPH: We’ve done small amendments as individual developments came up, too — when Ave Maria closed their campus on Forest Avenue, for example, we had to amend the plan’s “future land use map” to allow anything other than an institutional use there.

MARK: How do people, if they want to engage in the process, go about doing so?

TERESA: This week, we’re in the Discover Charette phase of the process, and there are a number of events taking place. It’s essentially a week-long workshop that started with a Community Conversation on Tuesday night. (Thanks to the 50-some folks who attended!) Then, on Wednesday, and again today, we had the studio open at 206 West Michigan Avenue for people to drop in and give us their ideas and opinions as to what to preserve, change or create in the City. There were posters with questions related to our various housing and commercial areas, with the intention of getting the community to weigh in on what’s working and what’s not. And, on Friday, we’ll be reporting back what we’ve learned – showing images of what things currently look like, and sharing ideas as to where we’ll go from here. That will be at 5:00 PM, at SPARK East… Then, we do it again in April at the Design Charette. There, the planning team will have examples and sketched-out scenarios for people to respond to. We’ll have a public meeting to start it, another studio event, and other neighborhood meetings similar to what’s happening this week, wrapping up with another Friday presentation. We’ll keep the website up-to-date on the details.

MARK: Have we done what you would consider a good job of benchmarking other cities? I’m curious to know if, in the process of doing so, we’ve come up with any ideas that might be worth considering here? For instance, I didn’t read it yet, but a friend sent me an article awhile ago about an ordinance that was passed somewhere on the west coast that made it easier to construct secondary housing units on one’s property, as a way of increasing density, etc. If I’m not mistaken, the article made the case that doing so proved to be incredibly beneficial for the community in question. I’m not suggesting that we do that specifically, but I’m curious as to how broadly we’re casting our net. Is everything on the table?

TERESA: This is where our planning team comes in. They’ve done work in Michigan and the Midwest, as well as Florida, Vancouver (where everything is lovely), and tons of other places. We get to rely on their experience, and, yes, everything is on the table. In focus groups, and already this week, we’ve talked about travel lane conversions, roundabouts (what?), development in and around Depot Town, dinosaurs on the Water Street Trail, relocating the Ypsi bus terminal, the reuse and new development on the old Boys and Girls Club site on Park Street, and and that’s just what’s at the top of my mind after a long day of talking with folks. Planning out 10-20 years gives us more room to shape the city in ways as simple as making available more uses in downtown districts to encourage more business, to rethinking our street network, and imagining reuse scenarios for underutilized sites. Someone suggested a rollercoaster today – not sure where that will go – but yes, bring the ideas.

MARK: I’m reminded of the situation a few years ago when EMU made a move to close College Place, one of the main thoroughfares which connects the University with the City. I don’t recall if, in the ensuing debate, the Master Plan was ever invoked, and that makes me wonder if it has teeth. I guess what I’m asking is, how enforceable is the Master Plan?

TERESA: That was part of a neighborhood plan that I don’t believe was ever formally adopted. The teeth of any Master Plan is the subsequent zoning ordinance, and community by-in. If people are included in the plan, and invested in the process, then, in addition to the ordinance, their support and encouragement to move forward will keep it active and relevant.

MARK: What are some of the more ambitious ideas that have come to the surface so far? Is anyone pushing for a downtown garbage incinerator, or zoning changes that would allow for a Water Street hog processing plant? Is anyone advocating for the selling of public park space? Has anyone argued for the lessening of historic district standards?

MURPH: I haven’t heard anything shocking — apparently I missed the dinosaur rollercoasters. There was some talk about reconfiguring the Cross & Washtenaw intersection, to put the water tower at the center of a roundabout; a lot of talk about turning the one-way streets into two-ways (the traffic engineers seem to think this is realistic); consolidating all the tobacco and medical marijuana businesses and the Vu into a vice district; generating all of our own energy in town. Strong support for getting a burrito place in town.

MARK: I imagine one of the major drivers behind the drafting of this new Master Plan is our desire to make something happen on Water Street. What, specifically, are the major issues, as you see them, which need to be addressed relative to that particular 38-acre downtown parcel?

TERESA: It has less to do with Water Street than it does making relevant an out-of date plan that had no direction for redeveloping a former industrial properties (the former Ford plant), no concept of our housing needs post housing crisis and with higher unemployment impacting our neighbors’ abilities to keep their homes. It doesn’t talk about addressing inequities that exist within the community, and it doesn’t speak well of managing and building off our natural resources or any of the legs of the sustainability table. The current plan was revised to address redevelopment of Water Street a few years ago, and Water Street is important, but so is addressing difficulty of pedestrians to get from EMU to downtown due to traffic flying through town. The Master Plan is bigger than any one piece.

But you didn’t quite ask me that. The community worked together on a full plan for Water Street in 1999. That resulted in Biltmore’s proposal for the site, and later Freed’s in 2006. It’s fine that today we’re willing to sell off portions of the site, as a developer would, to construct in phases. What’s tricky is that we don’t have a clear picture as to how we should guide that development. The City needs to set the stage with an idea of the form we’re looking for on the site, how to provide the infrastructure, and a clear process for seeking and guiding developers through construction. Currently staff can’t say to a developer – “Yes, we want that type of development in that location.” Every aspect is up for negotiation, almost to the point where the community has to convince itself each time that this is a good idea. (And you can interpret that to be a single project or the whole Water Street idea.) We know Water Street has baggage, and it will never be perfect. Nonetheless, we have to have a direction. It can’t be, “I’ll know it when I see it.” We have to find a direction and then we all have to get out of the way and make it happen.

MARK: What are the most common complaints you hear about the current Master Plan?

TERESA: Mainly that it doesn’t seem to reflect the creative, active community we have now… Which doesn’t mean that it failed. It just means it’s time for us to take the next step.

MURPH: The Master Plan is supposed to provide policy guidance to the Planning Commission especially as we consider zoning amendments or applications that we have some discretionary role in. Looking at it from 15 years later, I see the 1998 Master Plan as focused on “clean up”, on dealing with the sore thumbs and nuisance issues in various neighborhoods. For one thing, I think the city has achieved a lot of those goals–closing nuisance businesses that were operating illegally; getting dangerous buildings torn down or fixed up; etc.–and can focus less on those issues. The other side of this is that, since the plan focused on the details of what we had at the time, it didn’t provide much guidance for other developments: there’s no indication in the 1998 plan of what should be done with the old Ford/Visteon/ACH property, for example, because the plant was operating at the time and didn’t seem to be a concern. Similarly, when we undertook zoning ordinance amendments to more clearly permit arts-based businesses in town, there was nothing in the Master Plan that gave useful guidance on this.

I’d like to see our new master plan provide a better policy framework for things that aren’t anticipated at the time of the plan: rather than a checklist of “do this, then do this, then do this”–the old plan has several hundred very detailed recommendations about individual properties or specific programs–we need guidelines for how to approach various situations that we can’t anticipate. We’ll still have specific action steps in the new plan, but I like the starting point of talking about our values as a community, because these are higher-level things that can be applied when considering unforeseen things that come in front of us.

MARK: And this whole process is being called “Shape Ypsi,” which, to me, sounds like a local women’s gym franchise… but I suspect you’ve been hearing that a lot.

TERESA: I thought that myself, but most people have been kind enough not to say it. In our focus groups, we’ve been literal, giving folks playdough with which to reimagine the “shape” of Ypsilanti. I have been impressed by clock towers and tridges. There was also a castle (they were trying to convey that there were too many moats), an “elephant in the room,” and a Water Tower. I was surprised that we only had one of those.

MARK: I like that the website which has been launched to accompany the process allows for people to post questions. So far, though, there aren’t that many. I liked the comment from the person who wanted to suggest that we not pursue a local rail stop, as it would act as a portal, allowing nefarious Detroiters a way to enter Ypsilanti, as though they couldn’t find their way here by car, or some other form of conveyance.

TERESA: That was our first comment on the website! The second comment at Tuesday’s meeting, was about the problem of public urination, something I clearly haven’t thought about enough… We slowed down on the online questions once we started the focus groups, but I have a feeling that, after this week, we’ll put up a few more. Or, maybe you could give us suggestions on what we’ve yet to ask that needs to be asked.

MARK: How are things ultimately decided on? Does the Steering Committee vote on what’s included? And, once they’re done with the document, does it get voted on by City Council? Is there a process by which members of City Council members can then advocate for changes? Also, as I mentioned the Steering Committee, who’s been appointed to serve on it?

TERESA: The Steering Committee was formed by the Planning Commission. They ultimately will adopt the plan, but only after City Council approves release of the Master Plan to other communities for review (per state ordinance). The Steering Committee is guiding the process overall and will continue to work on outreach and championing the process and ultimate plan, as we hope other people in town will including City Council as well.

Here’s the Steering Committee:

Ricky Jefferson (City Council, Ward 1)
Pete Murdoch (City Council, Ward 3)
Rod Johnson (Chair, Planning Commission)
Richard Murphy (Vice Chair, Planning Commission)
Phil Hollifield (Planning Commission)
D’Real Graham (Recreation Commission)
Anne Stevenson (Historic District Commission)
Leigh Greden (EMU administration)
Desmond Miller (EMU student government)
Bee Roll (Business owner)
Teresa Gillotti (Planning staff)

MARK: What are some of the issues being raised in the focus group process that you hadn’t anticipated?

TERESA: A few times people suggested that a guiding value should be fun. I really like that notion.

MARK: Can you give me an example of a guiding value that you think might be appropriate? Do you, for instance, have something in mind like Google’s “Don’t be evil”? Or are you thinking of something a little less broad?

TERESA: We have a draft list of 10 values. None are as catchy as Google’s. The first three are: Safety comes first. Diversity is our strength. Ypsilanti is sustainable. The rest build off of those.

MARK: How would you suggest that people get involved, assuming they can’t make it out to any of the upcoming meetings that you’ve mentioned.

TERESA: If folks can get out tomorrow or Friday that would be great. Otherwise join the listserve on the website or the Facebook group. The team will be back the 3rd week in April for another intensive week. After that, we’ll be putting together a draft plan. So now is the time.

I quarel with my friend Pete about these matters frequently. We sit together over lunch – me bemoaning the creeping spread of corporate homogeneity across the American landscape, and him defending the ubiquitous presence of national chains, arguing that they’re more efficient, and often treat their employees better than their locally-owned competitors. For the past several years, these heated discussions of ours have taken place over a table at Mahek, a small Indian restaurant in Ann Arbor that we’re both quite fond of. When we met to eat there a few days ago, though, we found that it too had closed – the most recent casualty in a war on authentic, non-commoditizable, non-scalable American culture. In the case of Mahek, it doesn’t look as though its building is going to be taken over by yet another Starbucks or 7-Eleven, as it was purchased by local restauranteur Sava Lelcaj, but that doesn’t seem to be the norm these days, as downtown rents continue to climb beyond the reach of local entrepreneurs who don’t have national chains behind them. No, most of the time we hear about this kind of turnover happening, it’s something like a Five Guys franchise moving into the shell of Ann Arbor’s beloved local book store Shaman Drum.

Before we move on, I should acknowledge that Discount Records was itself a chain, and that Potbelly, despite its non-local ownership, likely pays its people better than some local restaurants, and at least professes to care about the environment and the communities in which it operates its 200+ identical stores. So, yes, these are complex issues, which don’t lend themselves easily to the black and white thinking we all love so much. This, of course, is something that many of us heatedly discussed recently in the thread that emerged from my interview with local entrepreneurs Jean Henry, Lisa Waud and Helen Harding, the founders of the local entrepreneurial support group Small & Mighty.

In the past several weeks, we’ve learned not only that Mahek was closing, but also that Blimpy Burger, Eastern Accents and the Herb David Guitar Studio would be going out of business. And, before this most recent round, it was White Market, which closed this past summer, after over 8o years in business. The building now houses franchises of both Florida-based Firehouse Subs and Wisconsin-based Toppers Pizza.

But, maybe there’s hope. Maybe, in time, the pendulum will swing back the other way, as it has in Ypsilanti, where unsuccessful chains have a tendency to be taken over by small and scrappy independent businesses… Our our local prepared food CSA, Harvest Kitchen, is in a former Qiznos. Our local Thai restaurant, Tuptim, is in a former Long John Silvers. The Blue Wolf Grill, which just recently opened on Washtenaw, is inside the shell of a former Taco Bell. Pacific Beach Burrito, before it closed, was in a former A&W. And Pita Pita exists where a Dunkin’ Donuts once stood. I take some comfort in that… in knowing that something better, and more authentic, might be waiting in Ann Arbor’s future. Let’s keep our fingers crossed.

The threat is so great, according to Beck, that he’s written a book about it, just in time for the holiday shopping season. The book, entitled Agenda 21, shows us what life will be like in a post-Agenda 21 world, says Beck.

Here’s a clip from the dust jacket:

“I was just a baby when we were relocated and I don’t remember much. Everybody has that black hole at the beginning of their life. That time you can’t remember. Your first step. Your first taste of table food. My real memories begin in our assigned living area in Compound 14.”

Just a generation ago, this place was called America. Now, after the worldwide implementation of a UN-led program called Agenda 21, it’s simply known as “the Republic.” There is no President. No Congress. No Supreme Court. No freedom.

There are only the Authorities.

Citizens have two primary goals in the new Republic: to create clean energy and to create new human life. Those who cannot do either are of no use to society. This bleak and barren existence is all that eighteen-year-old Emmeline has ever known. She dutifully walks her energy board daily and accepts all male pairings assigned to her by the Authorities. Like most citizens, she keeps her head down and her eyes closed.

Until the day they come for her mother.

“You save what you think you’re going to lose.”

Woken up to the harsh reality of her life and her family’s future inside the Republic, Emmeline begins to search for the truth. Why are all citizens confined to ubiquitous concrete living spaces? Why are Compounds guarded by Gatekeepers who track all movements? Why are food, water and energy rationed so strictly? And, most important, why are babies taken from their mothers at birth? As Emmeline begins to understand the true objectives of Agenda 21 she realizes that she is up against far more than she ever thought. With the Authorities closing in, and nowhere to run, Emmeline embarks on an audacious plan to save her family and expose the Republic — but is she already too late?

Beck, of course, didn’t really write the book. According to an editor who had worked on the project some time ago, it was written by a nurse named Harriet Parke, who was inspired by Beck’s entreaty to his Fox viewers to “do your own research” on Agenda 21. Here, by way of background, is how this editor describes the UN document from which the book takes its name, to the readers of Salon.com.

…If you’re not an urban planner, here’s a crash course on the novel’s eponymous United Nations Agenda 21. It’s a 40-chapter behemoth written in 1993. It lays out non-binding guidelines for promoting economic growth, environmental protection and social equality. Basically, it is a recipe for living within our means today, so that we do not pass along to our children a degraded economy, environment and society. It addresses topics as various as toxic waste, biotechnology, conservation and green transportation, all with the goal of helping poor countries develop economies — in large part, by encouraging wealthy countries to dial back in sensible ways on their consumption of resources.

Today, city and regional planners support the concepts that underpin Agenda 21, because they translate the big picture to local efforts to save people time and money. In other words, think globally, act regionally. After all, the planning profession is about supporting a community’s efforts to collaboratively make the best of change — such as whether your community is growing or shrinking, or becoming more rural, suburban or urban. Change is inevitable: Brookings reports that “our population exceeded 300 million in 2006, and we are on track to hit 350 million in the next 15 years.” And that “America will probably be older, more diverse, more urban — and less equal” than we are today.

Planners help communities find common-sense, constructive ways of using limited resources wisely. It looks for ways to make transportation inexpensive, keep energy plentiful, and help towns and cities avoid the kind of bad economic decisions that lead to eyesores like, say, a half-deserted strip mall anchored to an abandoned Wal-Mart. Thanks to zoning, for instance, which was created in the 1920s to protect property values, no one can come in and inappropriately construct a landfill or a steel mill next to your house.

Glenn Beck and fellow pundits hate Agenda 21, however, because they interpret a few lines from chapter four out of context. Their scare tactic is to say it’s the narrow end of a wedge that will insert global UN authority over American towns and cities, allow the government to confiscate private land, reallocate resources by force, and evict people from their single-family homes. Never mind that the law of the land begins with the United States Constitution and that our relationship with the UN can hardly be described as lockstep. Moreover, the United States has no land use laws at the federal level, whatsoever. All land use decision-making authority in the United States lies with the states, who delegate authority to local governments. Relatively speaking, the United States has some of the strictest protections for private property in the world.

Agenda 21 is simply a non-binding, unenforceable menu of guidelines that exists to help any town or city that signs on to it. But when removed from all sensible context and cast forward into a dystopian future, Agenda 21 becomes the novel “Agenda 21,” which tells the story of a post-American settlement where people are forced to ride bikes and walk on treadmills to generate electricity, told whom to marry, raised in communal kibbutz-like nurseries, and forced to swear allegiance to a scary green one-world socialist entity…

Unfortunately, though, some people are taking the “threat” of Agenda 21 very seriously, as evidenced by the fact that, during this last summer’s Republican National Convention, the Republican Party adopted a resolution opposing Agenda 21, adding the following line to their official platform: “We strongly reject the U.N. Agenda 21 as erosive of American sovereignty.” Furthermore, several state and local governments have considered or passed legislation opposing Agenda 21.(Alabama became the first state to prohibit government participation in Agenda 21, and Arizona just recently rejected a similar bill.) And, irate Tea Party activists, waving copies of the Agenda 21 guidelines, are not only making the lives of city planners in America miserable, but also derailing significant projects. The following comes from a report earlier this year in the New York Times.

Across the country, activists with ties to the Tea Party are railing against all sorts of local and state efforts to control sprawl and conserve energy. They brand government action for things like expanding public transportation routes and preserving open space as part of a United Nations-led conspiracy to deny property rights and herd citizens toward cities.

They are showing up at planning meetings to denounce bike lanes on public streets and smart meters on home appliances — efforts they equate to a big-government blueprint against individual rights.

“Down the road, this data will be used against you,” warned one speaker at a recent Roanoke County, Va., Board of Supervisors meeting who turned out with dozens of people opposed to the county’s paying $1,200 in dues to a nonprofit that consults on sustainability issues.

Local officials say they would dismiss such notions except that the growing and often heated protests are having an effect.

In Maine, the Tea Party-backed Republican governor canceled a project to ease congestion along the Route 1 corridor after protesters complained it was part of the United Nations plot. Similar opposition helped doom a high-speed train line in Florida. And more than a dozen cities, towns and counties, under new pressure, have cut off financing for a program that offers expertise on how to measure and cut carbon emissions…

And, thanks to our friends at BetterGeorgia.com, who recently attended a four-hour briefing session for Georgia’s Republican State Senators, we now have some insight as to how this particular conspiracy theory is making its way though our state legislatures. Following is hidden camera video, shot on October 11, of a four-hour Agenda 21 information session for Georgia legislators called by Chip Rogers, the Republican Majority Leader of the Georgia State Senate, and Treasurer of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). During the session, Rogers shared what he’s uncovered about Agenda 21 with his fellow State Senators. (The invitation to the event promised that the presentation would explain: “How pleasant sounding names are fostering a Socialist plan to change the way we live, eat, learn, and communicate to ‘save the earth.’”) I particularly like the part, at about 23 minutes into the presentation, when we hear conservative operative Field Searcy relate to the Senators how Obama is using a mind-control technique known as “Delphi” to trick the American people into accepting this UN-orchestrated coup, which will ultimately see all of us forcefully relocated to cities. (It should be noted that Rogers was just two votes short of getting anti-Agenda 21 legislation approved by the Senate last session.)

Agenda 21 Full Video from Bryan Long on Vimeo.

And, did you catch that Majority Leader Rogers is the Treasurer of the ALEC Board of Directors? (He’s also their Georgia State Chairman, and winner of ALEC’s State Chair of the Year Award.) I find that connection really interesting, given ALEC’s well-established role as the lead entity pushing the extreme legislative agenda of corporate America. As one doubts that the very intelligent individuals behind ALEC truly believe that President Obama is attempting to enslave us, and hand our country over to the United Nations, I can’t help but think that they’re involved in the pushing of this conspiracy theory for other reasons… most notably, to stop environmental legislation that would negatively impact the bottom lines of America’s largest and most powerful corporations. This, in other words, has nothing to do with the threat of creeping Socialism, and everything to do with a desire on the part of America’s CEOs to operate outside of the law. This is about keeping cap-and-trade from being implemented, and keeping our coal-powered factories belching black smoke into the atmosphere.

And, on that note, I give you the ad for Glenn Beck’s book. Be sure to watch until the end. Otherwise, you won’t learn about how, in the future, we burn old people alive for energy.

note: I should add that I think this subject matter should be fair game for fiction writers. Dystopian novels, when done well, as in the case of 1984 and the Handmaid’s Tale, can be incredibly powerful. And, as we find ourselves, right now, at a time in history when natural resources are dwindling, population is rising, and our climate seems intent on wiping humanity from the face of the planet, I think we need to begin exploring, through fiction, and all other means available to us, how our countries might choose to intervene in hopes of salvaging what can be salvaged. It’s certainly plausible, I think, that we could find ourselves in a situation, for instance, where people are incentivized to give up their cars, move into urban centers, and use mass transportation. (Personally, I’d like to think that we could figure out how to make cheap, efficient solar power ubiquitous before resorting to the burning of our elderly, but I suppose it’s an alternative worth considering.) No, what I object to isn’t the book, but the fear mongering being done by certain people on the right who have a vested interest in the status quo. I have a problem with ALEC taking up the Agenda 21 conspiracy theory as a way to drive terrified and poorly-informed individuals into the offices of their elected officials, demanding that we not, for instance, legislate the emissions of coal plants, because it’s all part of Barack Obama’s evil Socialist plot to overthrow our great and powerful country. And, it pisses me off that Glenn Beck is building an empire on this nonsense, peddling fear between ads for gold coins, local gun shops, and so-called “survival seeds.” So, it’s not the book that I object to – it’s the completely disingenuous propaganda campaign surrounding it.

My intention is to eventually type up all of my notes and post them along with this audio file, but, as the 50th anniversary events begin tomorrow, I thought that I should probably just go ahead and share what I have already.

I hope that you enjoy this discussion as much as I did.

And here are my very rough notes on our discussion. If you should happen to find anything that needs editing, or requires clarification, please let me know…

SEVERAL TIMES DURING MY DISCUSSION WITH HAYDEN, I reference an earlier conversations with Alan Haber, the founder of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), the organization responsible for the production and disseminated the Port Huron Statement, which, as most of you know, was primarily authored by Hayden. Video of my discussions with Haber, for those of you who are interested, can be found elsewhere on this site (Part I, Part II).

HAYDEN AND I BEGIN BY DISCUSSING THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN IN 1957. He doesn’t mention it here, but, in a previous conversation, he tells me that, by the time he reached campus, the specter of McCarthyism had lifted somewhat. (As you may recall, when I spoke with Haber, he mentioned that one of his first memories at U-M, as a freshman in 1954, was interacting with a small group of faculty, on the steps of the Union, protesting the dismissal of professors Chandler Davis, Mark Nickerson, and Clement Markert, all of whom had been fired for having refused to “name names” in front of the House Unamerican Activities Committee.) Hayden’s introduction to progressive politics, it would seem, was more gradual.

Hayden was interested in journalism at a young age, and, when he came to the University in 1957, he found a home for himself at the Michigan Daily, where he eventually became the paper’s editor. In his capacity as a student journalist, Hayden began writing about the sit-ins and lunch counter protests taking place in the south, and the activities of fellow students, like Haber, who were seeking to organize like-minded individuals on campus. Over time, as Hayden traveled across the United States, covering student movements for the Daily, he felt himself becoming more political… Hayden hitchhiked from Ann Arbor to Berkley in 1960 to report on the activities of students there, and, that same summer, he attended the Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles, reporting on Kennedy’s nomination. Things finally started to crystalize for him, however, in the spring of 1961, when he and some friends drove to Fayette County, Tennessee, to work with share croppers who were fighting for the right to vote. The sit-in movement, he says, hit him viscerally. And, as a result, in the summer of 1961, he joined SDS, alongside Haber.

He says that Haber, Bob Ross and Sharon Jeffrey had been encouraging him to get involved for a while. Haber, according to Hayden, wanted him to be a pamphleteer for the group, producing written materials, and traveling to other northern campuses, in hopes of starting additional SDS chapters. Hayden says that he was different from the others in the group, in that he didn’t come from a UAW, old left, labor background. He describes himself at that time as being a “non-conforming intellectual with an affinity toward Jack Kerouac and On the Road.” He was primarily interested, he tells me, in traveling, getting to know those individuals who where putting their lives on the line to fight for equality, and documenting the struggle in print. This evolution continued to the point where, in 1961, Hayden chose to take part in the Freedom Rides, putting his own life on the line to challenge the status quo of the segregated American south.

HAYDEN MENTIONS IN OUR DISCUSSION THAT HE’S WRITTEN A NEW PIECE FOR THE MICHIGAN DAILY, on the 50th anniversary of the Port Huron Statement. As luck would have it, the article just went live a few minutes ago. Here’s a clip.

…Nothing turned out as I once imagined. There was one constant: the tides of movements and counter-movements kept churning. Movements based on participatory democracy eventually gained some meaningful reforms: voting rights for southern black people and 18-year olds, the fall of two presidents, amnesty for 50,000 war resisters in Canada, the Freedom of Information Act, democratic reforms of the presidential primary systems, collective bargaining rights for public employees and farmworkers, the Roe v. Wade decision, the Clean Air, Clean Water, and Endangered Species acts, a long list of reforms gained in less than a decade.

Social change did occur, precious inch by bloody inch, becoming sacred ground that had to be protected, decade after decade, from both reaction and oblivion.

Underlying all of this tumultuous history lay the rocky river of participatory democracy – “the river of my people” – which kept flowing.

Now, to paraphrase Port Huron, we are the elders of this generation looking uncomfortably to the world we leave behind as inheritance. The reforms we achieved are under constant assault from the right and stagnating with the passage of time.

We are in the process of a new beginning, signaled by the deep American discontent with the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the threat of more wars to come and the immense diversion of trillions of tax dollars from our needs at home for health care and affordable education. Like the ’60s, another imperial presidency is on the rise, unleashing covert military operations in multiple countries without serious congressional oversight or civic awareness. Like the ’60s, the long war leaves greater economic inequality and environmental depletion in its wake…

MORE LATER…

The following is from the Christian Science Monitor.

The Google homepage today depicts an old-fashioned comic strip, in muted hues of blue, red, green, and yellow. Click on the tab on the bottom right of the doodle, and watch a pajama-clad boy tumble, panel by panel, through a fairytale land of clouds, castles, and princesses, before finally landing back in his own bedroom. The doodle is an homage to the artist Winsor McCay, and his most famous creation, Little Nemo, which turns 107 years old today.

McCay was born in Canada, probably around 1867 or 1868 – the exact date and location remain unclear. When McCay was still a child, his family moved from Canada to Spring Lake, in Michigan. The young McCay drew fervently, and around 1880, one of his illustrations, of a sinking steamer, was apparently snapped up for use in postcards.

Eventually, McCay was discovered by John Goodison, a drawing professor at Michigan State Normal School. Goodison agreed to tutor McCay informally, although McCay never officially enrolled at (what is now Eastern Michigan University)…

And, here, with more on McCay’s time in Ypsilanti, is a clip from the very much missed Ypsilanti Citizen, written by local historian Laura Bien.

…Zenas, who later called himself Winsor, loved to draw since childhood. His father had a more practical career in mind.

In 1886, Winsor and three friends came to Ypsilanti to attend the Cleary Business College. The friends rented a large room together. Ypsilanti was bigger and more bustling than Spring Lake.

However, according to one 1880′s Cleary advertisement, “the innumerable attractions of city life which alienate the attention of students from their studies are not to be found in Ypsilanti.”

But Detroit had one such attraction — Sackett and Wiggin’s Wonderland, a dime museum.

Created by P. T. Barnum in 1841, dime museums were a sort of walk-through version of the Victorian “cabinet of curiosities.” The museum’s ostensible purpose, according to Barnum, was education and moral improvement through entertainment. Dime museums presented a heterogeneous mix of freak shows, circus performances, religious tableaux and sometimes less savory displays—for personal edification.

Winsor loved drawing the varied scenes in the dime museum and eventually became one of the attractions, working there as a caricature artist.

In 1888, Winsor displayed a drawing in downtown Ypsilanti. “The work of Art exhibited at the Post Office by Winsor McCay,” said the Feb. 10, 1888 Ypsilanti Commercial, “is a great credit to the young man’s artistic ability.”

That ability caught the eye of Normal School geography and drawing professor John Goodison.

Goodison entered the Normal School in 1856 and taught there until his death in 1892. An “In Memorium” in the 1893 Normal School yearbook singles out his patience, perseverance and intelligence—when he wanted to read a geography text written in German, he taught himself German.

When Goodison recognized the talent in McCay’s work, he met with and praised the young artist.

Goodison had worked in stained glass before teaching at the Normal and one source says McCay developed his vivid palette in part from the influence of Goodison’s stained glass. Less uncertain is that Goodison imparted a strong sense of the power of perspective in art to McCay, whose later “Little Nemo” comic strip is noted for unusual, sometimes breathtaking, perspectives.

Goodison encouraged McCay. In 1889, McCay left Cleary Business College for Chicago and found work drawing advertising posters for a circus.

He moved to Cincinnati, married and then moved to New York. In 1904 his comic strip “Dreams of the Rarebit Fiend” began in New York’s Evening Telegram.

The strip presented a series of gradually more surreal events. The last panel always shows someone waking in bed from a dream, regretful for having eaten some odd food, usually rarebit…

And the rest, as they say, is history. His masterpiece, Little Nemo in Slumberland, began appearing in the New York Herald on October 15, 1905. (It later started running in William Randolph Hearst’s New York American newspapers.)

Just a few quick notes, as I’m about to drift into Nemo-like slumber.

1. I’d lobbied to name my son Nemo. I lost. While Linette likes the work of McCay, and found the Ypsi connection interesting, those things apparently weren’t enough to outweigh the fact that there was another Nemo in popular culture – a brilliant, yet blood-thirsty man of science, driven to madness by his all-consuming quest for vengeance. (I believe I told Linette that I’d wanted to name our son in tribute to McCay’s visionary young protagonist, but, truth is, I kind of like the idea of my son growing up to be an idealistic scientist-loving pirate revolutionary.)

2. Wouldn’t it be cool if we had an Ypsi Exit Interview with the young Winsor McCay? And, even cooler still, what if one of the brilliant young people that I’ve interviewed over the course of the past several years, ends up doing work that’s similarly revolutionary? Who’s to say that one of the young people that we’ve talked to here, as they’re making their way out of Ypsilanti, won’t create a new field of artistic endeavor.

3. I don’t know where we’d put it, but we should have a plaque somewhere in the City noting the fact that McCay learned his trade here.

4. I find it interesting that Google could do this with McCay’s work, but probably couldn’t do the same thing to commemorate the first appearance of Micky Mouse in Steamboat Willy due to copyright restrictions still enforced, now almost 90 years later, by Disney.

5. I didn’t like the use of the ET soundtrack in the video above. I get what they were going for, but I found it distracting. I would have preferred something more appropriate to the time.

6. I don’t know that anyone’s ever seriously compared the two, but I think it would be fascinating to look at the careers of Winsor McCay, who first started creating animated films in 1911, and Walt Disney, who gained widespread popularity in 1928 with Steamboat Willie. What accounts for the difference in their career trajectories, I wonder. Why was McCay relegated to showing his wildly innovative films on the Vaudeville circuit, when Disney went on to create a multi billion dollar industry? Was it all timing? Was it Disney’s business acumen? If McCay had been willing to hire animators, and create an animation factory, might we all be taking our kids to Winsor McCay World right now? Or, did Disney just have a better eye for what the public wanted? Was McCay too cerebral? Or, did Disney just have the good fortune of starting out at a time when synchronized sound was becoming possible? I’d love to know what it was, and what McCay made of Disney’s success.

7. I like that Cleary Business College, back in the 1880′s, advertised the fact that there was nothing going on in Ypsi to distract students. I’d love to see EMU use the phrase, “the innumerable attractions of city life which alienate the attention of students from their studies are not to be found in Ypsilanti,” in their marketing materials.

8.Although local puppeteer Naia Venturi named Ypsilanti’s Dreamland Theater in honor of Winsor McCay, she didn’t know, until I mentioned it to her a few years ago, that he’d actually lived here in town, and likely walked right by the front door of what’s now the Dreamland Theater hundreds of times. I find that an incredibly cool coincidence. (I love serendipity.)

9. Here, for those of you who have never seen McCay’s animated work, is Gertie the Dinosaur, from 1914.

“Unlike any comic strip before or since… (Little Nemo in Slumberland) represented a major creative leap, far grander in scope, imagination, color, design, and motion experimentation than any previous McCay comic strip (or those of his peers).” -McCay boigrapher John Canemaker

[note: The accompanying single-panel comic, which he signed using his alias, Silas, was the only image of his that I could find that referenced Ypsilanti. I'm sure there are others, though, and I intend to keep searching.]

…Unfortunately, the device never made it in the marketplace, as it was as big as a fucking house.

I made this stupid joke to someone today, after stumbling across the above image of Tesla, who, had he not died at the hand of Edison, would have turned 156 today. Unlike most of my stupid jokes, though, I couldn’t get this one out of my head. Something about the idea of Tesla being driven to create a giant cotton candy machine just made me really happy. So, I wanted to record it here, in hopes that it might continue to amuse me in my old age.

Speaking of cotton candy, I just did a little research, and its history is fascinating… Did you know that it debuted at the 1904 World’s Fair under the name “Fairy Floss”?

The following comes from Wikipedia:

…Cotton candy was first recorded in the 18th century. At that time, spun sugar was an expensive, labor-intensive endeavor and was not generally available to the average person. Machine-spun cotton candy was invented in 1897 by the dentist William Morrison and confectioner John C. Wharton and first introduced to a wide audience at the 1904 World’s Fair as “Fairy Floss” with great success, selling 68,655 boxes at the then-high price of 25¢, half the cost of admission to the fair (equivalent to $6 today). Joseph Lascaux, a dentist from New Orleans, Louisiana, invented a similar cotton candy machine in 1921. In fact, Lascaux patent named the sweet confection “cotton candy” and the fairy floss name faded away. In the 1970s an automatic cotton candy machine was created which made the product and packaged it. This made it easier to produce and available to sell at carnivals, fairs, and stores in the 1970s and on…

And is it just a coincidence that dentists have been the ones behind the development of cotton candy, or do you think that they may have purposefully set out to create and popularize a better mechanism for delivering sticky sugar to human teeth?