Page 3 - Demo

They were beau%ufffdful, and inspired me to create my own album of postcards depic%ufffdng The Detroit River and Belle Isle Park. I had always been drawn to Lake St. Clair at the end of our Grosse Pointe street, the Detroit River it drained into, and the smokebelching freighters plying their steel-gray waters. My parents had not denigrated this nearby waterway as they had the city itself. Apparently it had posed no threat to their wounded selves. A%ufffder an exci%ufffdng small mountain of postcards arrived from eBay and other on-line sites, I enjoyed assembling my new album by placing all the cards in just the right order, and wri%ufffdng ar%ufffdcles describing them. At the %ufffdme, I assumed this would be the sole collec%ufffdon that would pay homage to my past. However, about two years later, as John con-%ufffdnued to work on his Indiana albums, I found myself growing more and more curious about the Detroit I never knew. One day, to my own surprise, I blurted I wanted to create an album of postcards for the City of Detroit. At once, John turned to his computer and we began ordering scores of cards from Detroit%u2019s glory days%u2014the late 1800s to the Great Depression%u2014and others up to the %ufffdme I was born.As the growing mass of vintage postcards arrived, I gawked open-mouthed at proud bird's eye vistas of a majes%ufffdc vital downtown with towering office buildings and fine hotels; views of world-class parks and museums; scenes of massive, smoke spewing factories; and much more. I was truly dumbfounded. This once marvelous city had existed only a few miles and a few decades from me. Yet, I had been completely oblivious to most of it.Because of these wonderful old postcards, I am now able to embrace Detroit with a new sense of pride%u2014 not with the condescending dismissiveness I absorbed from my parents. In fact, I now fully claim my birth city, and I pay homage to its illustrious past as one of the most important and vibrant urban centers in the world. And, while it did fall from its once lo%ufffdy height, it is now slowly rising once again. And that makes me smile.Lynn Marie Bower