Poletown was a once vibrant, ethnically diverse neighborhood in Detroit. In its prime, it had a store on every corner. Its theaters, restaurants and schools thrived, and its churches catered to a multiplicity of denominations. In 1981, General Motors announced plans for a new plant in Detroit and pointed to the 465 acres of Poletown. Using the law of eminent domain with a quick-take clause, the city planned to relocate 4,200 residents within ten months and raze the neighborhood. With unprecedented defiance, the residents fought back in vain. In 2004, the Michigan Supreme Court ruled that the eminent domain law applied to Poletown was unconstitutional--a ruling that came two decades too late.

Poletown was a once vibrant, ethnically diverse neighborhood in Detroit. In its prime, it had a store on every corner. Its theaters, restaurants and schools thrived, and its churches catered to a multiplicity of denominations. In 1981, General Motors announced plans for a new plant in Detroit and pointed to the 465 acres of Poletown. Using the law of eminent domain with a quick-take clause, the city planned to relocate 4,200 residents within ten months and raze the neighborhood. With unprecedented defiance, the residents fought back in vain. In 2004, the Michigan Supreme Court ruled that the eminent domain law applied to Poletown was unconstitutional--a ruling that came two decades too late.

More than 4,200 residents of Detroit's "Poletown" community lost their homes in the 1980s when the neighborhood was razed to accommodate construction of a Cadillac plant on land where generations of Polish immigrants had lived, worked, and worshipped. Poletown is the story of the only group in Detroit to oppose the construction plan: the Poles and blacks who fought side by side to save their neighborhood, one of the city's oldest integrated communities. "This book is about the ramifications of raw corporate power going unchecked." -- John Conyers, Michigan congressman "Racial class is a fundamental problem in America. But Poletown demonstrates that economic class is even more fundamental." -- Rev. Jesse Jackson

A young college grad buys a house in Detroit for $500 and attempts to restore it—and his new neighborhood—to its original glory in this “deeply felt, sharply observed personal quest to create meaning and community out of the fallen…A standout” (Kirkus Reviews, starred review). Drew Philp, an idealistic college student from a working-class Michigan family, decides to live where he can make a difference. He sets his sights on Detroit, the failed metropolis of abandoned buildings, widespread poverty, and rampant crime. Arriving with no job, no friends, and no money, Philp buys a ramshackle house for five hundred dollars in the east side neighborhood known as Poletown. The roomy Queen Anne he now owns is little more than a clapboard shell on a crumbling brick foundation, missing windows, heat, water, electricity, and a functional roof. A $500 House in Detroit is Philp’s raw and earnest account of rebuilding everything but the frame of his house, nail by nail and room by room. “Philp is a great storyteller…[and his] engrossing” (Booklist) tale is also of a young man finding his footing in the city, the country, and his own generation. We witness his concept of Detroit shift, expand, and evolve as his plan to save the city gives way to a life forged from political meaning, personal connection, and collective purpose. As he assimilates into the community of Detroiters around him, Philp guides readers through the city’s vibrant history and engages in urgent conversations about gentrification, racial tensions, and class warfare. Part social history, part brash generational statement, part comeback story, A $500 House in Detroit “shines [in its depiction of] the ‘radical neighborliness’ of ordinary people in desperate circumstances” (Publishers Weekly). This is an unforgettable, intimate account of the tentative revival of an American city and a glimpse at a new way forward for generations to come.

This book is a mix of stories about growing up in Detroit, going to Catholic school, and the Polish people in the fifties and sixties. The author tried his best to present everything in this book accurately despite not having a research staff like the famous writers have. He only had himself, his computer, his memory, a big pile of books, and note cards that he painstakingly used to put this story together. As a fireman, one of the things the author learned was that it takes three things to make a fire: air, fuel, and heat. Remove one, and you can't have a fire. He believes that it takes three things to make everything. Similar to making fire, there are three things that it took to make this book: the city of Detroit, the Catholic Church, and Polish ancestry. If you have one or two or maybe all three of these things, you may like this story. So if your mom wore a babushka, if nostrovia is your toast, if you had a last name that kids made fun of, or if you grew up reading your catechism while looking at church steeples and smokestacks, maybe this book is for you. Bob Dombrowski also wrote, 38 Years: A Detroit Firefighter's Story.

This extensively revised and updated edition of Planning in the USA continues to provide a comprehensive introduction to the policies, theory and practice of planning. Outlining land use, urban planning and environmental protection policies, this fully illustrated book explains the nature of the planning process and the way in which policy issues are identified, defined and approached.

Between 1914 and 1951, Black Bottom's black community emerged out of the need for black migrants to find a place for themselves. Because of the stringent racism and discrimination in housing, blacks migrating from the South seeking employment in Detroit's burgeoning industrial metropolis were forced to live in this former European immigrant community. During World War I through World War II, Black Bottom became a social, cultural, and economic center of struggle and triumph, as well as a testament to the tradition of black self-help and community-building strategies that have been the benchmark of black struggle. Black Bottom also had its troubles and woes. However, it would be these types of challenges confronting Black Bottom residents that would become part of the cohesive element that turned Black Bottom into a strong and viable community.