What a week for the gays in Michigan!

Just when you were ready to put the dismal Supreme Court decision on same-sex partner benefits temporarily behind you, news that protesters from the Westboro Baptist Church will make an appearance at Eastern Michigan University today at noon. If you don't know what to do for lunch, stop by and share in the counter protest!

From the Triangle Foundation press release:
"Known for his "God Hates Fags" websites and propaganda, Fred Phelps is coming to protest against a student organization that allegedly promotes 'the sodomite agenda.'"

"If you would like to join Triangle Foundation and other LGBT and allied organizations on EMU’s campus, we would appreciate your support. Those of us who attend, please do not engage in violent ways or angry reactions. Be mindful he engages in spiritual abuse against LGBT people and our allies. After their protest we encourage our community to assist us in symbolically and physically washing the area of hate, bigotry, and exclusion with mops and brooms."

It's really difficult to see this event as unrelated to the Supreme Court decision earlier this week. The temptation is to say that the Westboro people are a fringe group and the Supreme Court is not. But the result for LGBT people is the same: public denouncement of who we are. Is that connection really such a stretch for straight people to comprehend?

It is doubtful the Westboro group is attempting to create synergy with the court decision, but you never know. They may be hateful, but they're not stupid.

Willow Run: Lessons for Michigan

What factors created Willow Run's persistent social and economic vulnerability?

1. Willow Run's only unifying governing structure is the school district. Being split between Ypsilanti and Superior Townships, the community of Willow Run lacks a unified municipal governing structure through which to shape its future, develop economic diversity or express its unique historic legacy.

2. A large number of wartime workers were recruited from Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama and Mississippi. The fact of a north/south cultural divide doomed Willow Run's prospective annexation into the City of Ypsilanti, which would have allowed it to benefit from infrastructure and services of an established municipality.

3. Residents depended on a single industry for employment. The wartime boom at the bomber plant transitioned almost seamlessly into the postwar boom of the auto industry.

4. Even as parents understood education's importance to their children's futures, children could consider the hard labor of factory work, a worthy well-paid pursuit.

5. Willow Run's historic and cultural identity is manufacturing.

Doesn't this resemble Michigan's present predicament?

1. While we have the appearance of a single governing structure, Michigan's legislature suffers a crippling partisan divide. Never mind two townships; we have two Michigans, red and blue. Or maybe it's a pushmi-pullyou in Lansing?

2. Certainly, the urban/rural cultural rift ensnares the state legislature when considering initiatives to help southeast lower Michigan, generally and Detroit in particular.

3. Michigan's historic and cultural identity is the automotive industry. The entire state has benefited from the auto industry. The tourism of "up north" developed from the prosperity of industry in southeast lower Michigan and the broad availability of cars.

4. While we say we value education, our tax policies say otherwise. And while industry was thriving, high school graduation could suffice. But this is no longer true.

5. Even though plenty of other businesses contribute to our economy, our principal economic engine has been auto manufacturing and associated businesses for nearly a hundred years. This primary dependence on one industry has had devastating consequences at the state level with downsizing and outsourcing.

What can we do?

1. Urge legislators to take view beyond the election cycle, detach from partisanship, and look in the same direction--forward.

2. Begin to see Michigan as a whole entity--one Michigan (Our Michigan), rather than a constellation of opposing, adversarial binaries (red/blue, urban/rural, rich/poor, labor/management, white/non-white).

3. Accept our special history and relationship to the automotive industry, but promote diverse economic development. Encourage small business and promote local economies that can sustain communities and cultivate local culture.

4. Educate children to become human beings, engaged citizens, and independent thinkers, not mere "good workers." Help them develop an appreciation and love of their home state, so that they might want to stay here, and improve the place, rather than become migratory workers in search of better opportunity.

5. Embrace Motown at the state level as the cultural gem that it is.

Any other ideas out there?

"Willow Run is America"

Lately, I have been fascinated by Willow Run, not the factory, but the community. To this day, it is synonymous with the history of government, industry and labor in the mid-twentieth century, and it has become a shorthand for the impact of the global economy on the American factory worker.

Something to ponder from Changing Classes: School Reform and the New Economy (2001), by Martin Packer,"The Willow Run community was a child of twentieth-century state-regulated industrial production, born of a union between the wartime demand for complex fighting machines and the efficiency gains of centralized production, and the power of the federal government. The community was created, and then shaped, to meet the needs of large-scale industry, first the military-industrial complex and subsequently the equally massive automobile manufacturing industry."

Marion Wilson, authored The Story of Willow Run in 1956, two years after the land was bought by Superior and Ypsilanti Townships. As the federal official who oversaw the community's transition from temporary government housing to permanent community, she had a unique perspective on its evolution. Her insight that Willow Run is America held true in the fifties. Then, it was a hopeful statement about community, industry, patriotism, and grit. What about today? And more importantly how is Willow Run Michigan? More to follow...

Chick Inn, Since 1953

"Paul Bunyan Burger 3.75--a half pound of the finest ground beef, cheese, thick sliced onion, crisp lettuce and our special Paul Bunyan sauce served on a 5" toasted sesame bun."
Good ol' American fare, beefy, large, cheap.

I was doing research for an upcoming piece on Willow Run, and spotted the Chick Inn Drive In at the corner of Holmes and Prospect, just west of Willow Run and just in time for lunch.

Mid-century modern architecture and a tall rotating sign immediately grabbed my imagination, so I pulled in and parked the car. Here was a cultural gem evoking a time of audacious gas-guzzling cars, unbridled economic growth and a thriving middle class--the fifties. The Chick Inn has been at this site since 1953, the current building dating from 1955.

It's iconic, a landmark, a relic, the subject of a song, and still a functioning full-service drive-in. For decades, the Chick Inn has been family-owned and operated. That is the case even now, although the restaurant changed hands about three years ago. I asked the current owner, Mr. Lim, about business. He said it's not great and said he thinks it has to do with the economy generally. Our conversation was difficult, as the owner and I grappled with a language barrier. He is Korean. I thanked him for talking with me and went out to the car to order. Paul Bunyan burger with a side of onion rings.

The car hop, a young woman from Ypsilanti, took my order by speaker and brought it out a few minutes later with a smile. She has worked at the Chick Inn for nearly a year. I asked for her thoughts on the Michigan economy. She shared that, "everyone in my family is leaving Michigan because there's no work. People in my family think we need a new president and a new governor. She tries to say everything is alright and it's not. We'd rather hear the truth from her."

Then she remarked about the situation for the Chick Inn. She had heard that business dropped off when regulars found out a Korean bought the place. The regulars didn't like that he raised the prices. Then she added, "this is an American place, you know."

My Disneyland lunch was over. My hope for the Chick Inn took a blow. Sure this is an American place, a quintessential American place, and how wonderful that a Korean immigrant has taken the chance in the 21st century to sustain a historic landmark in Ypsilanti. Our state economy desperately needs people like Mr. Lim--entrepreneurs and small business people--to take risks and make investments in communities. Thank you for taking a chance in Ypsilanti, Mr. Lim.