Ypsi Stories

ypsi experimental space was started by accident on January 1st, 2016, at the site of a former drugstore turned black box theater (8 N Washington Street) and ended by eminent domain on January 1st, 2023. While it remains a mystery as to why "yes" came into existence and little is known about the perpetrators who were said to have started this madcap venture, the main premise was ostensibly to cause some creative mayhem from time to time. Besides the playing of ping-pong, slideshow karaoke, and showing of films, there were reportedly evenings consisting entirely of experimental poetry, music, politics, theater, and a broad range of impromptu performances and exhibitions that still defy description. Occasionally, "yes" was even turned into "8," an intimate experimental dinner theater, where 8 delicious courses were paired with outrageous provocations by creative miscreants. While the "yes" itself no longer exists, the creative spirit lives on in the lives of all who entered its hallowed portal. For more information about this and other episodes of Ypsi Stories, including photos and bibliographies, check out ⁠⁠ypsilibrary.org/ypsistories If you don't want to miss any future episodes, you can always subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts, AntennaPod, or wherever you find your podcasts!⁠ To keep up to date on this podcast, as well as all the great things the Ypsilanti District Library is doing, you can follow the library on Facebook, Instagram, Bluesky, TikTok, and YouTube, and of course, you can always check out our webpage at ⁠⁠ypsilibrary.org.

The Parkridge Community Center on Harriet Street opened in December 1945 as a recreation center for Southside residents. It was funded through a World War II program that built recreation centers for war workers and their families. But, the story of how the Parkridge Community Center came to be located on Harriet Street as a segregated facility for African American families has been mostly forgotten. In this podcast, historian Lee Azus recounts the struggle by residents of the Southside to build an interracial community center on what was called the "buffer strip" between white and black Ypsilanti near Michigan Avenue. Their story illustrates their vision and its limits as it came up against the power and the purse-strings of Federal bureaucracies and the Ypsilanti City Council. For more information about this and other episodes of Ypsi Stories, including photos and bibliographies, check out ⁠⁠ypsilibrary.org/ypsistories If you don't want to miss any future episodes, you can always subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, AntennaPod, Escapepod, or wherever you find your podcasts!⁠ To keep up to date on this podcast, as well as all the great things the Ypsilanti District Library is doing, you can follow the library on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube, and of course, you can always check out our webpage at ⁠⁠ypsilibrary.org.

For all of us there comes a day which is the end of the line, but how we are dispatched changes with the times. It would be unusual for a person in Ypsilanti today to die in a boiler explosion or to be run over by a train, but such events were common in the nineteenth century. Nobody in either time period would likely be crucified or fall on their sword as might have happened in the first century Roman Empire; everything has its time and its place. In this episode we'll have a conversation with historian and circulation clerk emeritus Jerome Drummond about the culture and institutions related to death and dying in 19th Century Ypsilanti. For more information about this and other episodes of Ypsi Stories, including photos and bibliographies, check out ⁠⁠ypsilibrary.org/ypsistories If you don't want to miss any future episodes, you can always subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, AntennaPod, Escapepod, or wherever you find your podcasts!⁠ To keep up to date on this podcast, as well as all the great things the Ypsilanti District Library is doing, you can follow the library on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube, and of course, you can always check out our webpage at ⁠⁠ypsilibrary.org

The Ypsi Farmers & Gardeners Oral History Project (YFGOHP) is a new YDL digital archive sharing the stories of Ypsilanti's Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) and/or working class food growers. Based on community input, the project started by collecting oral histories from elders and including portrait photographs of each farmer or gardener. The initial interviews were completed in October and November 2023 with more planned to start with farmers and gardeners of all ages in 2024. In this episode, we have the opportunity to have a discussion with three of the coordinators of this local oral history project to learn more about it:  Dr. Finn Bell, Omer Jean Winborn, and Briana Hurt. YDL librarian Madelynne Rivenbark, our engineeress, also contributes. During this episode we will also feature clips of the oral histories themselves, as well as follow up questions. The full oral histories from this project, as well as other oral histories and historical materials are located at history.ypsilibrary.org  For more information about this and other episodes of Ypsi Stories, including photos and bibliographies, check out ⁠⁠ypsilibrary.org/ypsistories If you don't want to miss any future episodes, you can always subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, AntennaPod, gPodder, or wherever you find your podcasts!⁠ To keep up to date on this podcast, as well as all the great things the Ypsilanti District Library is doing, you can follow the library on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube, and of course, you can always check out our webpage at ⁠⁠ypsilibrary.org

In the months that followed the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, December 7th, 1941, the United States began the transition from a peace economy to a war economy. Production of household items such as refrigerators and cars had to change to tanks, trucks, guns, and planes. It was not an easy transition. Eight months later, President Roosevelt in Washington was receiving reports on the failure of the production war. Everything was behind schedule, including the production of B 24 Liberator bombers at the Willow Run Bomber Plant, built by the Ford Motor Company just outside of Ypsilanti. President Roosevent decided that he wanted to go see for himself what was happening. In today's episode, we learn about President Roosevelt's secret visit to Ypsilanti in 1942, from local historian, James Mann. For more information about this and other episodes of Ypsi Stories, including photos and bibliographies, check out ⁠⁠ypsilibrary.org/ypsistories⁠ If you don't want to miss any future episodes, you can always subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you find your podcasts! To keep up to date on this podcast, as well as all the great things the Ypsilanti District Library is doing, you can follow the library on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube, and of course, you can always check out our webpage at ⁠⁠ypsilibrary.org

The 19th century in Ypsilanti, as elsewhere, was on the doorstep of the remarkable medical advances of the twentieth century. People who came down with even a minor illness could be dead in hours. Was that a cough or a death-rattle? The doctor might know or might not, and what was in his bag might help you or the undertaker. In this episode, historian and clerk emeritus Jerome Drummond will discuss the reasons we should definitely be happy to see a doctor in the twenty-first century. For more information about this and other episodes of Ypsi Stories, including photos and bibliographies, check out ⁠⁠ypsilibrary.org/ypsistories⁠ If you don't want to miss any future episodes, you can always subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you find your podcasts! To keep up to date on this podcast, as well as all the great things the Ypsilanti District Library is doing, you can follow the library on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube, and of course, you can always check out our webpage at ⁠⁠ypsilibrary.org

From 1997 through 2002, the LGBTQ community in Ypsilanti fought for their rights in the form of a Non Discrimination Ordinance for the City of Ypsilanti. The result of this struggle was one of the first Non Discrimination Ordinances in Michigan, with protections for LGBTQ Ypsilantians. Seventeen years later, in 2019, Ypsilanti teenager Miriam Berman Stidd interviewed Non Discrimination Ordinance campaign veterans, and Normal Park neighbors, Lisa Bashert, Beth Bashert, and Lisa Zuber, for a podcast episode project for her Communications class at Washtenaw International High School. Four years later than that, in 2023, Ypsi Stories hostess Shoshanna was able to work with Miriam Berman Stidd to unearth this podcast episode, which we are airing in its entirety, followed by a 2023 conversation with Miriam Stidd, Lisa Bashert, and Beth Bashert, facillitated by Shoshanna, about the original episode itself, and about changes felt between 2019 and 2023, as members of the LGBTQ community, in Ypsilanti. For more information about this and other episodes of Ypsi Stories, including photos and bibliographies, check out ⁠ypsilibrary.org/ypsistories ⁠ If you don't want to miss any future episodes, you can always subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you find your podcasts! To keep up to date on this podcast, as well as all the great things the Ypsilanti District Library is doing, you can follow the library on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube, and of course, you can always check out our webpage at ⁠ypsilibrary.org

In this season's episode we learn about the Shadow Art Fair, which was a local social, cultural, and interactive art experience that for many years in the 00s and 10s marked the peak of summer in July, while providing a warm, community-based, secular gathering each winter as well. We'll be speaking with some of the core organizers of the Shadow, including Mark Maynard, Jennifer Yates, and Melissa Dettloff.For more information about this and other episodes of Ypsi Stories, including photos and bibliographies, check out ypsilibrary.org/ypsistoriesIf you don't want to miss any future episodes, you can always subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you find your podcasts!To keep up to date on this podcast, as well as all the great things the Ypsilanti District Library is doing, you can follow the library on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube, and of course, you can always check out our webpage at ypsilibrary.org

In this season's episode we learn about the history of the 2014 campaign to expand transit in Ypsilanti, the state of transit then and now, and the power that this work had in terms of connecting the community through movement organizing. We'll be speaking with some of those involved in the 2014 campaign, including Martha Valadez, Gillian Ream Gainsley, Tad Wysor, and Kathy Meagher. For more information about this and other episodes of Ypsi Stories, including photos and bibliographies, check out ypsilibrary.org/ypsistories If you don't want to miss any future episodes, you can always subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you find your podcasts! To keep up to date on this podcast, as well as all the great things the Ypsilanti District Library is doing, you can follow the library on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube, and of course, you can always check out our webpage at ypsilibrary.org

Lee Osler is a musician who has lived in Ypsilanti almost his whole life, since he was two years old, and is most well known for his 1983 local hit, “Back to Ypsilanti,” released on his own label, Mustache Records. He started singing in fifth grade and has performed in parades, auditoriums, festivals, and cabarets. In Part 1, we'll be learning about Mr. Osler's childhood growing up in Ypsilanti, his early life in music in schools and in earlier groups, such as the Soulful Soulmates, Masterpiece, and the Three Masters of Soul. We'll learn about the local music scene when Mr. Osler was in his teens and twenties, the beginnings of the legendary Black Arts Festival, and the state of downtown Ypsilanti in the early eighties. In Part 2, we'll learn about the development of the Back to Ypsilanti song from Mr. Osler. We'll learn about Lee Osler & the Ypsi City Band and its connections to fundraising to restore the Rutherford Pool in Recreation Park. We'll learn about other songs composed by Mr. Osler, including songs for other cities, his musical life after the success of Back to Ypsilanti, and his musical family. If you missed Part 1, definitely check that out first! For more information about this and other episodes of Ypsi Stories, including photos and bibliographies, check out ypsilibrary.org/ypsistories If you don't want to miss any future episodes, you can always subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you find your podcasts! To keep up to date on this podcast, as well as all the great things the Ypsilanti District Library is doing, you can follow the library on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube, and of course, you can always check out our webpage at ypsilibrary.org

Lee Osler is a musician who has lived in Ypsilanti almost his whole life, since he was two years old, and is most well known for his 1983 local hit, “Back to Ypsilanti,” released on his own label, Mustache Records. He started singing in fifth grade and has performed in parades, auditoriums, festivals, and cabarets. In Part 1, we'll be learning about Mr. Osler's childhood growing up in Ypsilanti, his early life in music in schools and in earlier groups, such as the Soulful Soulmates, Masterpiece, and the Three Masters of Soul. We'll learn about the local music scene when Mr. Osler was in his teens and twenties, the beginnings of the legendary Black Arts Festival, and the state of downtown Ypsilanti in the early eighties. In Part 2, we'll learn about the development of the Back to Ypsilanti song from Mr. Osler. We'll learn about Lee Osler & the Ypsi City Band and its connections to fundraising to restore the Rutherford Pool in Recreation Park. We'll learn about other songs composed by Mr. Osler, including songs for other cities, his musical life after the success of Back to Ypsilanti, and his musical family. Stay tuned for Part 2 of this two part episode! For more information about this and other episodes of Ypsi Stories, including photos and bibliographies, check out ypsilibrary.org/ypsistories If you don't want to miss any future episodes, you can always subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you find your podcasts! To keep up to date on this podcast, as well as all the great things the Ypsilanti District Library is doing, you can follow the library on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube, and of course, you can always check out our webpage at ypsilibrary.org

In this episode, Lee Azus looks at the effect of Federal Housing Administration underwriting policies, Home Owners' Loan Corporation risk maps, also known as redlining maps, and racially restrictive covenant agreements, on communities like Ypsilanti. By focusing on policies and policy discussions at the federal, state, and local level, he is able to show how discriminatory housing practices can trickle down from Washington, to Lansing, all the way to Ypsilanti. For more information about this and other episodes of Ypsi Stories, including photos and bibliographies, check out ypsilibrary.org/ypsistories If you don't want to miss any future episodes, you can always subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you find your podcasts! To keep up to date on this podcast, as well as all the great things the Ypsilanti District Library is doing, you can follow the library on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube, and of course, you can always check out our webpage at ypsilibrary.org

In this episode, we will be learning about the work of the Washtenaw County African American Genealogy Society from founder and Co Chair, Cheryl Garnett. Ms. Garnett will also be discussing special issues regarding genealogy for people with African American ancestry, sharing some of her experiences in the African American genealogy community, and recounting some of her ancestral history. For more information about this and other episodes of Ypsi Stories, including photos and bibliographies, check out ypsilibrary.org/ypsistories If you don't want to miss any future episodes, you can always subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you find your podcasts! To keep up to date on this podcast, as well as all the great things the Ypsilanti District Library is doing, you can follow the library on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube, and of course, you can always check out our webpage at ypsilibrary.org

The Kiwanis Club of Ypsilanti celebrated its 100th birthday on April 13, 2021. So, what is this service club all about and what has it done during this past century? In this episode, we'll be speaking to long time members of the Kiwanis Club of Ypsilanti, Bill Nickels and Jerry Jennings about the history of this service club. For more information about this and other episodes of Ypsi Stories, including photos and bibliographies, check out ypsilibrary.org/ypsistories If you don't want to miss any future episodes, you can always subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you find your podcasts! To keep up to date on this podcast, as well as all the great things the Ypsilanti District Library is doing, you can follow the library on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube, and of course, you can always check out our webpage at ypsilibrary.org

Unless a town was founded for reasons other than the pursuit of agriculture, as was the case with lumbering or mining towns, the first industry established in most towns of the Upper Midwest were mills. Ypsilanti was no different and the first mill recorded was established by Benjamin Woodruff on the Huron River in 1824. No one then could foresee how this industry would blossom in the Age of Steam and bring Ypsilanti along with it. In this episode, we'll be learning the history of milling and industrialization in Ypsilanti from circulation clerk Jerome Drummond. For more information about this and other episodes of Ypsi Stories, including photos and bibliographies, check out ypsilibrary.org/ypsistories If you don't want to miss any future episodes, you can always subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you find your podcasts! To keep up to date on this podcast, as well as all the great things the Ypsilanti District Library is doing, you can follow the library on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube, and of course, you can always check out our webpage at ypsilibrary.org

Highland Cemetery is perhaps the finest example of the garden cemetery in Michigan, which intended to make cemeteries beautiful. Highland Cemetery is a place of peace and nature, the perfect place to take a troubled soul for a walk. In this episode, we are going to be learning about the history of Highland Cemetery, and of previous cemeteries in Ypsilanti, from local historian James Mann. For more information about this and other episodes of Ypsi Stories, including photos and bibliographies, check out ypsilibrary.org/ypsistories If you don't want to miss any future episodes, you can always subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you find your podcasts! To keep up to date on this podcast, as well as all the great things the Ypsilanti District Library is doing, you can follow the library on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube, and of course, you can always check out our webpage at ypsilibrary.org

In this episode we'll join historian Matt Siegfried as we learn how the UAW-CIO came to Washtenaw County at the end of the Great Depression, and through a victory at Ford led the workers at Willow Run during World War Two, transforming the social landscape of Ypsilanti and bettering the lives of tens of thousands of people. We will dispel some myths about the "Arsenal of Democracy" as we look at the housing crisis, racism, resistance to unions, and the expendable treatment of thousands of workers. We will look at the role of the labor movement, including Socialists and Communists, in confronting multiple war time crises. From the rights of women workers to the struggle against segregation, from the fight for housing and services to the campaign to keep open the plant after the war and retain jobs and the community, the activities of those years would shape our region to this day. This is part two of a two part episode! If you haven't listened to the first episode yet, definitely give that a listen first! It's the one called "Episode 11, Part 1" in your podcast app! If you ::already have:: listened to part one, this is the next part of the story! For more information about this and other episodes of Ypsi Stories, including photos and bibliographies, check out ypsilibrary.org/ypsistories If you don't want to miss any future episodes, you can always subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you find your podcasts! To keep up to date on this podcast, as well as all the great things the Ypsilanti District Library is doing, you can follow the library on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube, and of course, you can always check out our webpage at ypsilibrary.org

In this episode we'll join historian Matt Siegfried as we learn how the UAW-CIO came to Washtenaw County at the end of the Great Depression, and through a victory at Ford led the workers at Willow Run during World War Two, transforming the social landscape of Ypsilanti and bettering the lives of tens of thousands of people. We will dispel some myths about the "Arsenal of Democracy" as we look at the housing crisis, racism, resistance to unions, and the expendable treatment of thousands of workers. We will look at the role of the labor movement, including Socialists and Communists, in confronting multiple war time crises. From the rights of women workers to the struggle against segregation, from the fight for housing and services to the campaign to keep open the plant after the war and retain jobs and the community, the activities of those years would shape our region to this day. Tune in next week for part 2 of this two part episode! For more information about this and other episodes of Ypsi Stories, including photos and bibliographies, check out ypsilibrary.org/ypsistories If you don't want to miss any future episodes, you can always subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you find your podcasts! To keep up to date on this podcast, as well as all the great things the Ypsilanti District Library is doing, you can follow the library on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube, and of course, you can always check out our webpage at ypsilibrary.org

Hey there Ypsi Stories listeners! This month's episode is going to be coming a little later than usual, and it's going to be a two parter! This month, in honor of Labor Day, we'll be learning about how the labor landscape changed in Ypsilanti and Willow Run in the 1930s and 1940s with the arrival of the United Auto Workers union from Matt Siegfried. Matt has so much knowledge to share that we just couldn't fit it in one episode, so keep your ear out for a new, two part episode, later this month! Then at the beginning of October, in honor of Halloween, we'll learn about the history of the Highland Cemetery from James Mann. That'll close out the first year of the Ypsi Stories podcast! But don't worry, we aren't going anywhere! We have many more local stories to share, and we'll keep putting out new episodes each month! As always, you can find links to all our episode pages with additional materials including pictures, videos, biographies, and bibliographies at ypsilibrary.org/ypsistories, and of course, the best way to be notified when the newest episode comes out is to subscribe to Ypsi Stories (that's two words) on your favorite podcast app! Hope you have a great end of the summer, and we'll be back very soon! Bye, but just for now!

When settlers set out for the northern Midwest, it was more than loading the kids and a picnic basket in the family van. Having established in Episodes 1 and 6 how land to settle was purchased and how news was transmitted between the American frontier and the East Coast, there was the trouble of transport to be solved. In Episode 1 we saw that some settlers actually walked to Ypsilanti from New York state in the 1820s and 1830s. In this episode we will learn about two avenues for the less hardy. For more information about this and other episodes of Ypsi Stories, including photos and bibliographies, check out ypsilibrary.org/ypsistories If you don't want to miss any future episodes, you can always subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you find your podcasts! To keep up to date on this podcast, as well as all the great things the Ypsilanti District Library is doing, you can follow the library on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube, and of course, you can always check out our webpage at ypsilibrary.org

The city of Ypsilanti has the most often misspelled and mispronounced name of any community in the state of Michigan. To add to the fun, the city is named after a man, who not only had nothing to do with its founding, but was never even in North America. Local historian James Mann shares the story of how this came about. For more information about this and other episodes of Ypsi Stories, including photos and bibliographies, check out ypsilibrary.org/ypsistories If you don't want to miss any future episodes, you can always subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you find your podcasts! To keep up to date on this podcast, as well as all the great things the Ypsilanti District Library is doing, you can follow the library on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube, and of course, you can always check out our webpage at ypsilibrary.org

Nearly seventy Ypsilanti men served in the Civil War's Black regiments, including many who had previously escaped from slavery. A dozen never returned. Whether with Michigan's 102nd United States Colored Troops or the “Glory” regiments of the 54th and 55th Massachusetts Infantries, Ypsilanti men were largely stationed on the Sea Islands off the coast of South Carolina. There they were at some of the War's most iconic moments like the assault on Fort Wagner, the liberation of Charleston, and Sherman's March to the Sea. In this episode, we will learn from historian Matt Siegfried about who the Ypsilanti volunteers were, their life in camp, the racism they faced in the military, the battles they fought, the plantations they liberated, and the lives lived in Ypsilanti after the war as we take a look at Ypsilanti's Black Civil War experience.

Ypsilanti's Water Street Sculpture Garden, also known as the Water Street Commons, was a rhizomal happening and community run outdoor space in the city of Ypsilanti which was most active between June 2013 and April 2016. Professor Beth Currans, as a researcher, as a participant, and as an observer, was in the perfect position to study and document this phenomenon in recent Ypsilanti history.

Ypsilanti District Library Clerk Jerome Drummond takes us back again to Ypsilanti in its earliest years. Settlers traveling west had left their homes on the east coast behind but not their interest; how would information be gotten? The federal government considered it crucial to its plans of westward expansion that unity of the population be maintained by shared information; the tool for achieving this was the United States Post Office. If, however, information was to rise above the level of hearsay, letters alone would not be sufficient, so the government allowed special low postal rates for newspapers at the same moment that newspapers were undergoing a transformation that would bring their price down to the person on the street. We will examine some aspects of this institution and note the similarities and differences between our time and then through the careers of two Ypsilantians: Charles Woodruff and Charles Pattison.

In today's episode, we'll be in conversation with members of Ypsilanti's Palm Leaf Club. The Palm Leaf Club was formed on October 30th, 1904 as the Trustee Helpers of Brown Chapel African Methodist Episcopal Church and changed its name to the Palm Leaf Club in the 1930s when it officially separated from the church and became its own civic and social African American women's organization, the only organization of its kind in Ypsilanti. It is a member organization of the Ypsilanti Association of Women's Clubs, Michigan State Association of Colored Women's Clubs and the National Association of Colored Women's Clubs. Legend has it that the name comes from the Palm Sunday Scholarship Teas. Dr. Dyann Logwood, who was on our previous episode in February 2021, was an awardee of the Palm Leaf Club Scholarship.

In today's episode, we're talking with Dr. Dyann Logwood, who grew up with her family in the historic Willow Run neighborhood before moving to southern Ypsilanti Township, where her family would be one of the few Black families in the area. Dr. Logwood tells us personal stories about her experience as a kid in a Black family in 1970s and 1980s Ypsilanti. She talks about how things were different between Willow Run and southern Ypsilanti Township, and also tells stories that provide a snapshot of what life was like during that period.

In January 2017, amid nationwide response to the inauguration of President Donald Trump, many major cities and even smaller towns saw resistance gatherings in the form of Women's Marches, focusing on issues of sexism at a national level. While most chose to align themselves with the national Women's March organization, Ypsilanti, as it often does, did things a little differently. On Friday and Saturday, January 20th and 21st 2017, an organization known as LRAY, or Love Resilience Action Ypsilanti, held a two day event which focused on issues of community building and resistance, as well as issues of sexism, racism, classism, and homophobia. They also held a march in January 2018, with a chief focus on issues of gentrification in the local community.

In February of 2016, the Ypsilanti District Library hosted a talk by Lee Azus on the history of Ypsilanti's urban renewal program. He followed up with a presentation in April of 2018 on how racism in twentieth-century American housing policy shaped Ypsilanti. In today's episode, we're going to be hearing from Lee Azus on the effects of Urban Renewal on Ypsilanti's Southside neighborhood.

In the first episode of Ypsi Stories, circulation clerk Jerome Drummond educates us about early land speculation in the Ypsilanti area, focusing chiefly on the prominent land speculator, Lucius Lyon.