Wednesday, April 6, 2016 // The Statement
4B
About a month ago, my friend Derek
stopped by my apartment for the first time in
our more than three-year relationship. I had
slept on the tiny couch in Derek’s Ann Arbor
living room several times, yet last month was
the first time he had ever seen my front door.
I gave him a quick tour of my apartment and
then took him on a walk through the city.
Derek studied the beautifully restored
historical buildings and the diverse groups
of people milling about the streets near the
railroad tracks. Neatly displayed business
fronts greeted us with cheery windows and
welcoming signs.
“I didn’t realize Ypsi was so big,” he said
as we passed Depot Town, heading south on
River Street toward Michigan Avenue.
I launched into the story of Ypsilanti’s two
main commercial districts, separated by the
Huron River, as we came closer to Michigan
Ave.
“Depot Town is definitely the more hipstery
district,” I said, pointing out how nearly every
building is occupied by a local business.
“There’s a lot of unique business models that
cater to the local clientele. But it also seems a
little more white and gentrified than the rest
of the city.”
While many local businesses, City Hall and
the Ypsilanti library call Michigan Avenue
their home, Derek immediately detected the
difference between the two downtowns.
There are vacant buildings, an empty field and
several franchised businesses, all of which are
absent in Depot Town.
We finished our tour, passing the notorious
adult entertainment club Deja Vu, and headed
back to my apartment near Depot Town.
“So, that’s basically it,” I concluded.
“Obviously, there are residential areas and
businesses located on the outskirts of the city,
but we pretty much saw everything within
walking distance.”
Heading toward his car, Derek replied,
“Ypsi seems pretty cool.”
In the almost three years that I have lived
here, only a handful of my Ann Arbor friends
have witnessed Ypsilanti as I see it every day.
There are many reasons: Ann Arbor is a bigger
city that has a lot to offer; you have to commute
to Ypsilanti and traffic is nearly always a
hassle; I already spend a lot of my time in Ann
Arbor with work and school; everybody else
lives in Ann Arbor.
But sometimes I wonder if it’s the perception
of Ann Arbor as better than Ypsilanti that
deters my friends from visiting.
University students in Ypsilanti
According to University spokesman Rick
Fitzgerald, 599 students currently list an
Ypsilanti zip code as either their permanent or
local address. Of those nearly 600 addresses,
only 196 are undergraduate students. For
many, cost is a motivating factor for the move
to Ypsilanti.
One of those students is Chris James, an
LSA senior and the Mass Communications
chair for the Black Student Union. James
lived in Ypsilanti for two years during his
undergraduate career. Motivated by the
affordable housing options, he felt comfortable
moving to Ypsilanti after spending his first
two years in the dorms.
“I had no perceptions,” James wrote in an
e-mail interview about his feelings prior to
the move. “I figured it was a regular city with
more people who look like me.”
James, a Black student from Flint, wrote
that he was not worried about the negative
stereotypes that often depict Ypsilanti as “the
hood” or “the ghetto.”
“It was nowhere near what I had come from
and, in fact, it was a very nice place to stay,”
James continued. “I actually enjoyed staying
out there more than I enjoyed living on (the
University’s) campus at times.”
LSA junior Hannah Klemkow also lived in
Ypsilanti last summer while commuting to
Ann Arbor for work. Klemkow, a Flint native
as well, enjoyed the four brief months she
spent in the city. Similar to James, she missed
the city after returning to Ann Arbor.
“After I moved back to Ann Arbor, I actually
missed living in Ypsi often,” Klemkow wrote
in an e-mail interview. “It is smaller so there is
a bit of a small town comfort in the downtown
area. I also kind of missed being able to be
a part of both the Ann Arbor and the Ypsi
community (sic).”
Miranda Ojeda, a 2015 alum, lived in
Ypsilanti during her junior year of college.
She echoed the nostalgia for Ypsilanti after
moving away from the city.
“When I moved back to campus my senior
year, I would always say I missed living in
Ypsilanti and wish I would’ve stayed another
year,” Ojeda said. “But everyone was against
living off campus and in Ypsi.”
Celina Flegal, a 2015 LSA alum, lived in
Ypsilanti during all four years of college
with her now-husband who attended Eastern
Michigan University. Before moving there,
Flegal had only visited Ypsilanti a couple
times. The first time she drove down Huron
River Drive — a road that passes Interstate
94 and runs parallel to the railroad tracks —
Flegal wrote in an email interview that she
thought to herself, “This looks pretty run-
down.”
But after passing into the residential area
behind EMU and witnessing more of the
city, Flegal was struck by the beauty of the
landscape.
“After living there for four years, I still
think Ypsilanti is a great city,” she wrote. “It
has its problems like any other, but there are
really beautiful parts of it that make it a great
place to live, especially if you are a student.”
However, though there are less than
ten miles between the two cities, many of
the University student also mentioned the
struggles of commuting from Ypsilanti.
“The biggest challenge was without a
doubt the traffic, which was a lot worse than
I expected,” wrote Alejandro Zuniga Sacks,
a 2015 LSA alum and former Michigan Daily
sports editor, who lived in Ypsilanti for almost
a year after graduating.
“Finding a parking spot in Ann Arbor has
become one of the most challenging things
ever,” James confirmed. “I’m not sure why
the city insists on such lack of parking near
the University but that was another game that
needed to be played.”
Flegal noted the commute often created
problems in social situations:
“I also didn’t have the luxury of just inviting
my friends over to hang out or study together,”
she wrote. “They never really wanted to take
the hour bus ride to my apartment, so most
of the time I would have to plan to see them
while I was on campus.”
Ojeda agreed that maintaining friendships
required more work while living in Ypsilanti.
“Since all my friends lived in Ann Arbor, I
would always have to drive to see them,” she
said.
A Historical City
Crookedly winding down the southeastern
portion of Michigan’s lower peninsula, the
Huron River irrevocably altered the trajectory
of human populations in the state. In the 18th
century, Native Americans established a trail
that crossed the river in the area that is now
Ypsilanti. The intersecting area between the
trail and river was used as a camping ground,
a burial site and a trading post by several
different tribes.
When Europeans finally made their way to
Michigan, they immediately took advantage of
the Huron River and existing Native American
trails. In 1809, three French explorers became
the first white settlers in Washtenaw County
after building a trading post, known as
“Godfroy’s on the Pottawatomi Trail,” on the
river’s west bank. Less than two decades later,
early frontiersman Major Benjamin Woodruff
and a handful of his companions founded the
first village, Woodruff’s Grove, in Washtenaw
County.
By 1825, three prominent settlers — Judge
Augustus Woodward, John Stewart and
William Harwood — combined their land to
create a town near where a federally planned
road from Detroit to Chicago was set to cross
the Huron River. Woodward suggested they
name the new settlement “Ypsilanti” after
the heroic Demetrius Ypsilanti, an early
19th century field general in the Greek army.
The remaining residents of Woodruff’s
Grove eventually abandoned their original
settlement, moving about a mile north to the
prospering Ypsilanti.
10 years later, Chicago Road (now known
as Michigan Ave) was completed, propelling
the creation of new settlements like Ypsilanti
along its route. In 1838, a railroad expanding
west from Detroit reached Ypsilanti, further
contributing to the influx of people in the area.
After two decades, a brick masonry station
replaced the original wood-frame railroad
depot on the east side of Huron River.
With accessible transportation and the
initial inklings of industry, Depot Town
became the first commercial district in
Ypsilanti. Soon after, a second commercial
district emerged on the west side of the
river along the newly opened Chicago Road.
Several mills were constructed during the last
few decades of the 18th century with many
used for manufacturing goods such as “The
Union Suit” and the tightly-knit “Ypsilanti
Underwear.”
In its initial phase, the Ypsilanti government
stressed
the
importance
of
education.
Twenty years after the city’s formation, its
first seminary school was established. The
Michigan State Normal School, a teacher-
preparatory school, was created a mere four
years later, becoming the first normal school
in the United States outside of the original 13
colonies. In 1899, the normal school located
in Ypsilanti became the first school to offer a
four-year curriculum in teacher training. The
school was then renamed the Michigan State
Normal College.
In 1959, the college was once again renamed,
officially
becoming
Eastern
Michigan
University. Enrollment at EMU peaked in the
1990s with over 25,000 students. Currently,
the school is governed by an eight-member
Board of Regents which are appointed for
eight-year terms by the governor of Michigan.
As a public university, EMU is not required to
pay land taxes to Ypsilanti’s city government.
As industrialization increased nationwide,
Ypsilanti’s economy also expanded. In 1941,
Ford Motor Company built an automotive
plant in Ypsilanti Charter Township’s Willow
Run neighborhood. The plant was rapidly
converted to an assembly line for B-24 bombers
when the United States entered World War
II. About 100,000 employees worked at the
Willow Run Bomber Plant, producing a B-24
bomber every 55 minutes.
After the end of the war, the Willow Run
Bomber Plant was bought by the independent
automaker
company
Kaiser-Frazer
and
converted back to an automotive plant. In
1953, General Motors purchased the plant
for the production of engine transmissions.
During the 1970s, the GM plant employed
some 14,000 people.
In part due to the presence of automotive
and
manufacturing
businesses,
Ypsilanti
gained thousands of new residents. The
Great Migration — the movement of 6 million
Black families from the South to urban areas
throughout the nation which occurred in
waves over 60 years — helped fill many
industrial jobs and contributed to Ypsilanti’s
growing population.
Other impoverished populations, including
European immigrants and white families in
the rural South, also moved to places such as
Ypsilanti in search of a better life. Rose Will
Monroe — one of the women who appeared in
wartime propaganda videos and was closely
associated with the iconic “Rosie the Riveter”
— escaped rural poverty in the South through
employment at the city’s Willow Run plant
during World War II.
The influx of people to Ypsilanti continued
until it reached its highest population in the
1970 census: 29,538 residents.
However, the construction of interstate
roads and the initial decline of industry had
already begun to change the city’s trajectory.
In 1941, the Willow Run Expressway was built
near Ypsilanti and Belleville, becoming the first
section of I-94 to be constructed in Michigan.
By 1960, road workers had completed the
construction of I-94 in Michigan. Before the
interstate, cars were required to use Michigan
Avenue — the old Chicago Road — and travel
through downtown Ypsilanti when going east
or west in southern Michigan. Now, they could
skip the town entirely due to the interstate
construction of the expressway.
For decades after, many Ypsilanti residents
continued to ride the industrial wave, working
in manufacturing jobs across the city.
Read more online at Michigandaily.com
5B
MORE THAN RUST: THE STORY OF YPSILANTI
BY AARICA MARSH,
OPINION COLUMNIST
ZOE HOLMSTROM/Daily
A bridge is shown over the Huron River near where people first settled when they came to Ypsilanti. The river divides Cross St. and Michigan Ave., separating the city’s two commercial districts.
ZOE HOLMSTROM/Daily
LEFT: A building is shown near Michigan Ave. in Ypsilanti, Michigan. Many of the buildings near this once iconic street face structural issues such as deterioration. RIGHT:
Shops on Cross St. are shown in the popular area of Ypsilanti known as Depot Town. Depot Town has now assumed the role of the popular downtown destination.