Cora Reynolds Anderson, born on April 10, 1882, was the first woman elected to the Michigan House of Representatives, serving one term from 1925 to 1926. She is also believed to be the only Native American woman elected to the Michigan House or Senate.
While in the House of Representatives, Anderson concentrated on public welfare issues and chaired the Industrial Home for Girls Committee. She was particularly interested in public health issues, especially the fight against alcoholism and tuberculosis. Prior to her term, she had organized the first public health service in Baraga County and was instrumental in securing the county’s first public health nurse. She also became actively involved in the Michigan Grange and served as the Upper Peninsula officer.
Anderson was educated as a teacher at the Haskell Institute in Lawrence, Kansas, which is known today as the Haskell Indian Nations University. She taught school in the Upper Peninsula for several years. At a time when minorities, including Native Americans, were subjected to considerable economic and social discrimination, Anderson’s determination to attend college and return the benefits of her education to her community was notable. Her role as educator, legislator, and public health reform leader aided the Native American community as well as the whole of society.
Both the Anderson House Office Building in downtown Lansing and the recently opened Cora’s Cafe inside are named after her.
Sources :
Michigan Women’s Hall of Fame.
Rep. Dianda Honors Cora Anderson, Michigan’s First Female State Rep, Michigan House Democrats Blog, December 8, 2016.
“Women’s History Month: Cora Anderson, first in state house”, Lansing State Journal, March 23, 2014.
Photo source : Michigan Historical Review Facebook Page, April 10, 2017.
Detroit, April 10-15, 1882
Elsa Von Blumen Aboard a Highwheeler. Sometimes called a “Bone Shaker”, “Velocipede”, “Penny Farthing”, and “Ordinary”.
In the late 1870s women’s bicycle racing was developing into a popular spectator sport. The first exhibitions and/or races were held in France, but soon spread to the United States and then England. Though some denounced the ladies as common showgirls, they were in fact highly trained and motivated athletes. The press covered many of these events and helped make the female riders stars of the cycling world. And the ladies were willing to compete in whatever fashion that guaranteed publicity and/or prize money, whether it be against themselves, male cyclists, pedestrians, or even trotting horses.
In such a vein, Ms. Elsa Von Blumen (a pseudonym for Caroline Kiner) visited Detroit in April 1882 for an exhibition, promising to ride 1,000 miles in six days, something she’d accomplished in Pittsburgh back in December. A custom velodrome (bicycle track) — perhaps the first in Detroit — was built inside the former Music Hall for the occasion.
More About Van Blumen
According to the Auburn Bulletin, Tuesday, February 22, 1887, recycling an article from the Oswego Palladium, “Von Blumen was born in Pensacola, Florida, October 8, 1859 and moved to Albany, N.Y., in the following year. Her maiden name was Carrie Kiner. In 1865 she lived in Oswego. The cold winters, common to all cities upon the great chain of lakes, proved too severe for her delicate frame. She rapidly declined, and was pronounced by several physicians to be in the first stages of consumption. By the advice of friends, she undertook a course in physical exercise, often walking five or six miles a day, together with light exercise with dumb-bells and clubs. The beautiful results were soon manifest. She became possessed of extraordinary powers of endurance, and showed herself capable of undergoing prolonged exertion without injury. About six years ago she moved with her mother and sisters to Rochester, where she has since resided at No.75 Munroe avenue.” For a short time, she was married, but the brief experience did not end happily and she soon returned to bicycle racing as a pursuit.
Von Blumen first made a name for herself as a pedestrian racer, which was also a popular sport at that time. There were plenty of endurance walking races, including six-day races in places like Madison Square Gardens and even Detroit. While endurance racing was challenging, she eventually switched to highwheeler bicycle racing to help support her mother and younger sisters with prize money and appearance fees.
On one such occasion, on May 24, 1881, about 2,500 people gathered at Rochester’s Driving Park to watch the 21-year-old Von Blumen take on a race horse named Hattie R. They cheered as she beat the horse in two out of three heats.
Elsa Von Blumen racing Hattie R from Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper.
Sue Macy, author of the book “Wheels of Change” says she was “one of the first competitive female athletes in the United States” — a role model for girls and young women at the start of the suffrage movement.
She told Bicycling World in 1881, “I feel I am not only offering the most novel and fascinating entertainment now before the people, but am demonstrating the great need of American young ladies, especially, of physical culture and bodily exercise. Success in life depends as much upon a vigorous and healthy body as upon a clear and active mind.”
Her Detroit Endurance Event
Her visit to Detroit in 1882 didn’t start out well. She contracted a mild form of smallpox (called varioloid) shortly after arriving and was confined to the “pest house.” The case was very light and she soon recovered according to city’s Board of Health report.
To promote her race, images of her were posted at store shops around town. She offered a special invitation to other women.
Her plan was to ride for 91 hours at 11 miles an hour on a track that was 15 laps to a mile. The track was surveyed by the Assistant City Surveyor for accuracy. Chairs were arranged inside the track for spectators. There was a band to play music whenever she rode.
The Free Press downplayed her chances simply based on her appearance, “115 pounds, apparently not possessed of any of the physical characteristics essential to the successful accomplishment.”
She began her Detroit ride on Monday, April 10th, 1882 at 1 AM wearing a steel-gray suit trimmed with bullion fringe. She bowed to the crowd, got on her silver highwheeler bike, and the band started to play. She rode 35 miles in 3 hours before stopping for a two-hour sleep break. At the end of the first day, she’d ridden 140.
She mostly lived out of a Music Hall dressing room, ate three regular meals along with beef tea with crackers and some sips of port wine.
On Tuesday, she rode nearly 60 miles in the morning. Mr. Snow from the Detroit Bicycle Club rode with her for nine miles and crashed “in fine style” per the Free Press. The event manager also offered any local bicyclist $100 if they could match her miles for the final four days. She rode another 100 miles before the day was over.
Wednesday saw a slower pace at just over 10 MPH. Local ride “Robinson” was on the track riding behind her and hoping to win the $100 challenge. She finished the day with just over 449 miles.
Von Blumen continued on Thursday with another 70 miles by 3pm. The Free Press reported her looking “pan and wan, but as determined as ever.” She confidently stated that she would finish, but her nurse did mention her feet were getting cold. They had resorted to using a battery (!) to restore the blood circulation. She ended the day with 583 miles.
Because of the highwheeler’s design, taking a “header” was always a possibility.
Friday’s low moment occurred when a spectator stepped on the track and caused her to crash over the bars. She was thrown up against the steam heaters, hurting her head, and bruising her right leg from hip to ankle. She was carried to her dressing room and everyone thought she was quitting. Not so. She was back on her bike in 30 minutes, dizzy, weak and riding slow. While she ended the day with 707 miles, Robinson was now 7.3 miles ahead of her.
She started riding on Saturday still sore from the previous day’s crash yet got in 46 miles by noon. Her pace quickened. She had 800 miles by her dinner break. Many Detroiters began filling the Hall to watch, but especially women.
At 11:58 PM she got in 850 miles and the crowd burst into enthusiastic applause. As she stopped, so did the orchestra It was an impressive endurance feat, but especially given her illness before the event began.
Robinson did out ride Von Blumen over the four days by just thirteen miles, earning himself the $100 prize.
Financial Troubles
Although the event drew a fair number of paying spectators, it still lost $400. To help pay off her debt, Detroit citizens arranged a benefit race at Recreation Park. Von Blumen would race in a 5-mile time trial event and two 5-mile races against some horses. The Detroit Bicycle Club would also hold races for its members. There was a 25 cents admission.
But before the event took place, her doctor during the 1,000 mile attempt claimed he was owed $121 dollars and the police seized her bicycle.
Fortunately a sympathetic officer let her ride her bicycle and she beat both of the horses before a good number of onlookers.
Another benefit was held a week later where Von Blumen rode a 7.5 miles race against three horse relay team doing 15. She won by a mile, literally.
It appears she departed Detroit for Grand Rapids during the couple weeks that followed and probably stopped at other locations to race as well. In 1886, she rode 367 miles in 51 hours in a race at Rochester’s Convention Hall against a pair of men. They took turns riding, but she beat them without needing a partner. She continued bicycle racing until highwheeler bicycling went out of style.
A sketch of Elsa Von Blumen with her high-wheeler bicycle from 1885 courtesy of the Rochester (NY) Public Library, Local History & Genealogy Division
It doesn’t appear she came back to Detroit, but she certainly left her mark. There’s little doubt her event inspired many Detroit women and girls to take up bicycling, but especially after the safety bicycle became popular in the 1890s.
Elsa von Blumen on a safety bicycle from Wheels of Change by Sue Macy.
Early Detroit Bicycle Shop showing both highwheelers and safety bicycles (Detroit News).
In 1896 Susan B. Anthony noted that “the bicycle has done more for the emancipation of women than anything else in the world.” The bicycle craze helped kill the bustle and the corset, and instituted “common-sense dressing” for women and increased their mobility considerably.
Sources :
Sue Macey, “Elsa Von Blumen & Detroit’s first indoor bicycle track”, m-bike.org , January 26, 2018.
Further Reading: An interesting interview with Elsa Von Blumen about a “very funny incident.” It was published on the front page of the Detroit Free Press on April 28, 1882.
A Vintage Ride entry from the Webster Museum
Caroline Wilhelmina “Elsa Von Blumen” Kiner Roosevelt (1859-1935) entry from Find a Grave.
Mike Fishpool, “Lady Racers: The Origins of Women’s Cycle Racing“, Playing Pasts, June 25, 2018
Wheels of change : how women rode the bicycle to freedom (with a few flat tires along the way) / Sue Macy. Washington, D.C. : National Geographic, [2011] Take a lively look at women’s history from aboard a bicycle, which granted females the freedom of mobility and helped empower women’s liberation. Through vintage photographs, advertisements, cartoons, and songs, Wheels of Change transports young readers to bygone eras to see how women used the bicycle to improve their lives. Witty in tone and scrapbook-like in presentation, the book deftly covers early (and comical) objections, influence on fashion, and impact on social change inspired by the bicycle, which, according to Susan B. Anthony, “has done more to emancipate women than anything else in the world.”
Bicycle : the history / David V. Herlihy. New Haven : Yale University Press, [2004] During the nineteenth century, the bicycle evoked an exciting new world in which even a poor person could travel afar and at will. But was the “mechanical horse” truly destined to usher in a new era of road travel or would it remain merely a plaything for dandies and schoolboys? In Bicycle: The History (named by Outside magazine as the #1 book on bicycles), David Herlihy recounts the saga of this far-reaching invention and the passions it aroused. The pioneer racer James Moore insisted the bicycle would become “as common as umbrellas.” Mark Twain was more skeptical, enjoining his readers to “get a bicycle. You will not regret it–if you live.” Because we live in an age of cross-country bicycle racing and high-tech mountain bikes, we may overlook the decades of development and ingenuity that transformed the basic concept of human-powered transportation into a marvel of engineering. This lively and engrossing history retraces the extraordinary story of the bicycle–a history of disputed patents, brilliant inventions, and missed opportunities. Herlihy shows us why the bicycle captured the public’s imagination and the myriad ways in which it reshaped our world.
Back in 1896-1987, the country was besieged with weird objects in the sky, that the media dubbed “airships.”
These sightings began in California, and from there spread across the country until it hit Michigan.
On the evening of April 10, 1897, the first Michigan airship sighting occurred in Alma. The next night, residents in Benton Harbor reported seeing airships floating over Lake Michigan for about 15 minutes before they faded out of sight. Witnesses from Benton Harbor and nearby St. Joseph claim these objects had flickering blue, red, and green lights.
The next Michigan report came from Black Lake near Holland, who claimed to have actually seen this ‘machine.’ More claims poured in: notably, Battle Creek, Charlotte, Comstock, Hart, Hudson, Kalamazoo, Lansing, Mendon, Middleville, Niles, Olivet, and Pavillion.
Townspeople began claiming to find bits and pieces of these machines, like a wheel and a letter dropped from the sky.
When Lansing residents started saying they saw this airship, the identity of these ‘lights’ ended up being just ‘fire balloons,’ paper balloons with candles to generate hot air to make them float. Afterward, anyone who boasted about seeing these UFO’s were immediately ridiculed…but the sightings continued throughout the state. Saginaw, Manistee, Marshall, Marquette, Saline, and Flint were among the latest cities where these mysterious ships were reported to be seen.
The few who say they actually saw the airship said it looked like a blimp, was around 100-300 feet long, and had wings that flapped like bird wings. One particular hard-to-believe sighting involved an actual landing in Reynolds, Michigan. Just like in the film “The Day The Earth Stood Still,” a very tall alien exited the airship and greeted the earth inhabitants.
Most of these were possibly just faked reports, with people wanting to cash in the notoriety that others across the country were receiving. Or was there actually some weird aircraft over Michigan? In 1897, yet?
California and most states that lead to Michigan all had claims of seeing this strange airship as it/they headed eastward across the nation. You can find out more about this in “Michigan and the Great Mass Hysteria Episode of 1897” by Robert E. Bartholomew by CLICKING HERE.
Read More: John Robinson,Michigan’s First UFO Sighting, 1897 , 99.1 WFMK, November 19, 2019.
Harry Morgan was born on April 10, 1915 in Detroit as Harry Bratsberg (some sites spell it as ‘Bratsburg’). Not long afterward, his family moved to Muskegon, where Harry spent his childhood and teen years. Harry and his siblings grew up during the Depression and were affected by the economic pinch, having to attend school in shoes and clothes that were lined with holes.
Once in high school, Harry became a school debate champion at Muskegon High, and played varsity football. He graduated in 1933.
After graduation he took on the job of a salesman and attended the University of Chicago. He was studying to become a Doctor of Law, but his desire to perform got in the way. He began acting at the University in 1935, followed by joining the Group Theatre in New York in 1937.
Harry appeared in a good handful of stage plays and it was only a matter of time until the movies tempted him west.
His first film role was in the the 1942 movie “To The Shores Of Tripoli” and it snowballed from there. He appeared in over 100 films, some of the most notable being “The Ox-Bow Incident”, “High Noon”, and “Inherit The Wind”.
Harry’s numerous TV appearances included “Gunsmoke”, “Night Gallery”, “The Partridge Family”, “The Untouchables”, and “Have Gun-Will Travel”. He was also a regular cast member of the programs “December Bride”, “Pete and Gladys”, and “Dragnet”.
With such an impressive catalog of film and TV appearances, he will most likely be remembered for his role as Colonel Sherman T. Potter on “M*A*S*H”. He reprised that role in the spinoff series, “AfterM*A*S*H”.
Not bad for a Michigan boy who grew up during the Great Depression.
Harry Morgan passed away on December 7, 2011 at the age of 96.
John Robinson, ” Which Cast Member of M*A*S*H Was the Only One From Michigan? “, 99.1 WFMK, May 4, 2021.
Every Holland schoolchild knows about DeZwaan, the 200-and-some-year-old Dutch windmill dismantled and reassembled in Holland in 1965.
However, the story you’ve heard is just the beginning.
“That story is much more fascinating, complicated and interesting than you would have believed,” Holland’s miller Alisa Crawford said.
For her new book, “DeZwaan: The True Story of America’s Authentic Dutch Windmill,” released this month for the historic machine’s recent golden anniversary in Holland, Crawford traveled to the Netherlands and delved into corners of DeZwaan’s history previously unknown, including just how old the windmill really is.
“This windmill is a lot of things,” Crawford said. “It’s a working machine; it’s a historical structure; it’s a symbol of Dutch heritage; it’s a workplace.”
The mill was formally dedicated on April 10, 1965 in Holland by Michigan Governor George Romney and Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands. They were pulling on a rope attached to a piece of wood symbolizing the release of the brake on the mill. Things went wrong when they brought down the timber instead. Fortunately no one was hurt.
Sources:
“Windmill De Zwaan more than just a symbol of Holland City’s roots; Reassembled in U.S. as a tower mill forty years ago”, courtesy of Wikipedia and GoDutch.com.
Andrea Goodell, “DeZwaan Windmill celebrates 50th anniversary”, Detroit Free Press, May 9, 2015.
Kathy Warnes, “De Zwaan-The Swan- Windmill Immigrates from Holland to Holland”, Meandering Michigan History.
“Take a Look Inside DeZwaan Windmill in Holland, Michigan“, Pure Michigan, April 22, 2014.
Michigan State University Museum has this original Sparty costume in its collections. It’s very popular during collection tours.
Source : MSU Archives Tweet, April 10, 2019
Political leaders representing the City of Detroit, the State of Michigan and the halls of Congress reflected Monday on the life and contributions of the Rev. Nicholas Hood Sr., who served the Detroit community in the political and religious arenas for several decades.
Rev. Hood served on the Detroit City Council for 28 years, according to his biography on his church’s website, before retiring in 1993. Elected to the council in 1965, Rev. Hood worked to help economically disadvantaged, those who were discriminated against and developmentally‑disabled adults.
Rev. Hood also founded Cyprian Center in honor his daughter, Sarah Cyprian Hood, according to his biography, to help developmentally‑disabled adults. Rev. Hood has served on many governing and advisory boards including the advisory board of the Federal National Mortgage Association, the Detroit Economic Development Corp. and the Hannan Foundation.
Hood himself dealt with with a childhood spinal deformity that was corrected through extensive surgery and therapy at the Children’s Hospital of Indiana after he graduated from high school in Terre Haute, Ind., where he was the last of eight children born to Orestes and Daisy Hood, according to an an online autobiography.
He wore a steel body brace on his upper body during his freshman year at Purdue University, where he majored in biology and chemistry in preparation for entering medical school.
It was at Purdue, Hood wrote, that his career plan changed. He said he spent his spare time working with a Methodist student group on building bridges across the racial divide in rural, white churches in northwest Indiana, and he decided to make that his life work. He later spent a year studying liberal arts at North Central College in Naperville, Ill., from which he was the first African American to receive a degree. He enrolled at Yale University Divinity School in 1946 and graduated in 1949.
His first assignment was as pastor of the Central Congregational Church in New Orleans, and was one of the founding members of the Southern Christian Leadership Council, where the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. served as leader.
In 1958, Hood moved to Detroit to become senior pastor at Plymouth Congregational Church. His son, the Rev. Nicholas Hood III, is its current pastor and senior minister.
At the church, the senior Rev. Hood created a housing ministry and spearheaded the building and development of the 230-unit Medical Center Courts apartments in 1963, according to his biography. In 1975, Rev. Hood led the construction of the Medical Center Village Apartments, which consisted of 450 apartments, town homes and high‑rise building for senior citizens.
For the full article, see Rev. Nicholas Hood Sr., religious, civic leader, dies“,
Renamed street honors former pastor, civic leader Hood“,
Street sign dedication ceremony for Rev. Nicholas Hood, Sr.”,
April 10, 2017 : For the second night in a row, metro Detroit will bid farewell to a sports arena. On Sunday, it was the Detroit Red Wings playing their final game at Joe Louis Arena. Tonight, the Detroit Pistons host the Washington Wizards at 8 p.m. for the last game at the Palace of Auburn Hills, ending a 29-year tenure. The teams will share new Little Caesars Arena beginning in September.
For the full article, see Bill Shea, “After 29 years, Pistons say goodbye to the Palace tonight“, Crain’s Detroit Business, April 10, 2017.
 |
James Vernor, Sr. was an American pharmacist, druggist, and American Civil War Lieutenant who became famous for the invention of Vernor’s Ginger Ale. Born on April 11, 1843 in Albany, New York, Vernor moved to Detroit, Michigan with his parents during his youth. As an employee at Higby and Sterns’ Drug Store in Detroit, Vernor began to experiment with flavors in an attempt to create a new recipe for ginger ale. With the onset of the American Civil War, he enlisted and served with the 4th Michigan Cavalry in 1862. Serving in the military until 1865, Vernor became a Second Lieutenant before being discharged.
According to Vernors company legend, before Vernor left to serve in the Civil War, he stored some of his experimental ginger ale in an oak cask. When he returned to Detroit four years later, he opened the cask and found that the drink had been changed by the aging process, tasting even better than it had before. He declared the ginger ale to be “Deliciously Different,” which became one of the many slogans for the drink. However, in a 1936 interview, son James Vernor, Jr. suggested that his father did not develop the formula until after the war, a theory confirmed by former company president James Vernor Davis in a 1962 interview. Around 1880, Vernor opened his own drug store on Woodward Avenue at the corner of Clifford Street, where he sold “Vernor’s Ginger Ale” at the store’s soda fountain. He closed the drug store in 1896, opening a soda fountain closer to the center of the city on Woodward Avenue, south of Jefferson near the riverfront ferry docks, so that he could concentrate solely on his soda business.
Vernor’s Ginger Ale was originally a local drink that was only available in Detroit. However, Vernor quickly opened a manufacturing and bottling plant, which soon made his famous beverage available across the Midwestern United States. Vernors was bottled in Detroit for more than one hundred years, finally ending production in 1985. Today, the soda is made by the Dr. Pepper Corporation, so it has a much larger realm of distribution than ever before. Vernors has become one of the best known brands of ginger ale throughout the world but remains the most popular in the Midwestern United States.
Although he will always be most well known for creating Vernors Ginger Ale, James Vernor was also one of the original members of the Michigan Board of Pharmacy, which was formed in 1887, and he held License No. 1 throughout his career. In addition, he served on the Detroit City Council for 25 years. On October 29, 1927, at the age of 84, James Vernor died in Grosse Ile, Michigan from pneumonia and influenza.
 |
| A view of the the original store that was opened in 1866 by James Vernor at 235 Woodward Avenue at the corner of Clifford Street. The view shows the front and side of a 3-story brick building with the address and name, “235 James Vernor 235,” shown over the front door. It was in this store that the pharmacist developed Vernors Ginger Ale. Photo courtesy of the Detroit Historical Society. |
Source : Julia Teran, Encyclopedia of Detroit
Wunderlich, Keith (2008). Vernors Ginger Ale. Arcadia Publishing
Visit the MSU Special Collections Rare Books and consult Vernor’s ginger ale recipes : invigorating ; easy to make… deliciously different (1953) to come up with a special concoction!
On April 11, 1884 the first effort in the country to introduce brown trout took place in Lake County.
The 4,900 fry came from Germany, and took hold in Michigan’s waters.
Source: Michigan Every Day