This week our Tuesday group activity was a guided tour of Detroit focused on the areas of Paradise Valley and Blackbottom. This two and a half hour tour saw us depart from Campus Martius and slowly move farther and farther from the city’s core. I found the tour both fascinating and heartbreaking. These areas that are now occupied by highways, stadiums and condos were once the sites of a thriving community. The fact that this community was then systematically destroyed due to the population that lived there is horrible and reminds me how recent in history blatant acts of racism were not only condoned but applauded by portions of the population. That Mayor Cobo continued to win re-election on the platform of segregationist policies is hard to fathom and even more difficult to stomach. Our tour guide also presented a brief history into how the redlining of the 1930’s has resulted in today’s issues of education inequality. The tour was about history but the lessons and impacts of these events no matter how far ago they occurred continue to echo in today’s world.
