Coach Yost’s Last Game
Memorial Stadium, Minneapolis. Saturday, November 20, 1926.—Looking over the playing field before kickoff for what would be his final game, U-M football coach Fielding H. “Hurry Up” Yost was concerned. Three...
Read More2016 November
English Gardens is Open
Greg Pizzino was surprisingly understanding, considering that the Observer had just written that his store was closed. “My wife’s an editor and fact-checker at Crazy Wisdom Journal,” he explained, so he knows...
Read MoreThe Stempel Kidnapping
I was one of more than a dozen FBI agents assigned to surveillance on Braeburn Cir. on Ann Arbor’s south side. After a few hours, another agent, Stan Lapekas, suggested we look in a Dumpster at the townhouse complex for...
Read MoreTurning the Research Ship Around
In her State of the University address in October 2009, then-U-M president Mary Sue Coleman proposed doubling the university’s annual research spending by 2017, to $2 billion. “It would require a tremendous...
Read MoreThree Millages
After years of negotiations following decades of failed attempts, the four-county regional transit millage nearly didn’t make it to the November 8 ballot.Two weeks before the language was finalized, Oakland and Macomb...
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Alexander Weinstein
Alexander Weinstein’s first book Children of the New World, imagines an imperfect future that is partly a logical projection of our current fascinations with new technologies and the social media they have spawned. The...
Read MoreCarhop Hibernation
“Still open for a limited time” reads the A&W Drive-in billboard on Baker Rd. It doesn’t bother to specify–because everyone in Dexter knows–that it’s a seasonal, not a permanent, closing....
Read MoreA Bigger P-Bell, a Tale of Two Lelcajs, and Avalon comes to town
The Pretzel Bell, the recent relaunch of the University of Michigan-themed bar and restaurant, is adding a next-door event space. Called the Captain’s Room, after a basement meeting place in the original P-Bell featuring...
Read MoreLight Poles with Square Plates?
Q. All around town the light poles at main intersections have been sprouting square plates (maybe nine inches) facing down the street. What are they?A. They’re “roadside units” (RSUs) for the Ann Arbor Test...
Read MoreWhite Christmas Sing-along
I walked into the main auditorium at the Michigan Theater and was dumbstruck by the sea of Santa hats. We had arrived more than a half-hour before the annual sing-along screening of White Christmas, but we were having a hard...
Read MoreAn Underground Jeweler in Chelsea
First inspired in an art class at Chelsea High School, Stephen Kolokithas has forged a career in custom jewelry design working from home. Now he’s moving to Main St.: he plans to open Jewelry Set in Stone November 12 in...
Read MoreAn Energetic New Owner at Bread Basket Deli
The signs promising “da best” corned beef in town and “love at first bite” are still emblazoned on the door, but Bread Basket Deli is in the midst of a quiet upgrade since an energetic young franchisee...
Read MoreLa Fiesta Taqueria is now Le Shish
On Packard just east of Carpenter, Le Shish opened recently in the former Taqueria La Fiesta. Ahmad Mourad is the manager and part-owner; his underwriter and silent partner is a brother back in Lebanon. Mourad says he chose the...
Read MoreAt University Flowers, a new owner and a new look.
Not long after she graduated from U-M in 2015, Dani Vignos bought the little flower shop in Nickels Arcade. She’d been looking for a local business to buy, a friend told her this one was for sale, and she was able to get a...
Read MoreVA Murders Revisited
“And everybody is suspect but you.”The conversation took place in the autumn of 1975, when Lindenauer, then chief of staff of the Ann Arbor VA Hospital, was grappling with a situation that had thrown the hospital...
Read MoreReligion vs. Regulation
In 2012, Pittsfield Township rejected MIA’s request to build a new school on twenty-seven acres on Ellsworth Rd. With help from the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the group sued. It looked like the township...
Read MoreA Bigger TV Warehouse
When John Wall’s lease was about to expire on a small, out-of-the-way South Industrial location, he decided The TV Warehouse was ready for bigger and more visible digs. He subleased the former Advance Auto Parts storeroom...
Read MoreChelsea’s Plaid Melon Regroups
Plaid Melon Cafe closed its doors in September after two years in business, citing a staff shortage, but owner Dave Gallinat promised something new in its place. By mid-October, he and his wife Tessa had launched Plaid Melon...
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