REO town was cheap to rent and quite walkable to the city center (or “downtown” as they call it). I liked it more than I thought I would. Many places there aren’t walkable but from REO town to the city center it was possible. One thing I noticed was that walkability wasn’t priced in the rents at all since after a 1 mile walk from the city center, studio apartments were about 800$ (2024) whereas in the city center itself it was more like 1100$ IIRC. In my view going 300$ while just having a 1 mile walk seems like a steal.
MSU is massive nowadays. It’s crazy how big it is. It feels like an actual town. I wonder how big it was then.
As for the article itself. I find it interesting to read how certain groups were just taking action and there was no discernible leadership that could talk to each other. I wonder if this would have happened if that was the case.
The car manufacturing culture in Michigan in general is a low-key tourist worthy thing to check out (e.g. in the Detroit Institute of Art). But I have my father in law for that, haha. Asking Claude what a CNC programmer does because he’s not that great at explaining it to a total noob like me :’) once I understood that he had a macro language inside what he called G-code it was fun to ask what he programmed haha.
A surprising number of people in the state would not consider 1 mile 'walkable'. I'm not saying I agree with that, however in general our car culture and the related urban design means it can be a PITA for a lot of people to live their lives without one.
> MSU is massive nowadays. It’s crazy how big it is. It feels like an actual town. I wonder how big it was then.
For whatever it's worth, MSU was still more of an agricultural college than anything back then. Heck, one of my ancestors actually got indoor plumbing installed by the college as part of a study into how it could benefit the life of a farmer.
My father actually went there near the end of that era, I can ask him for some stories this weekend when we do breakfast. Will be 20ish years off but while it was handled by the 'Board of Agriculture'.
> The car manufacturing culture in Michigan in general is a low-key tourist worthy thing to check out (e.g. in the Detroit Institute of Art)
The DIA has Diego Rivera's mural, worth also noting the Detroit Historical Museum has an example of part of an older style body-on-frame line alongside a lot of other interesting automotive history bits. (Also, in general other important sections for parts of our history, The basement even captures the 1800's cobblestone aesthetic.) Both the Motown and Riot exhibits are worth a good visit.
In general the state has one of the most curious meshes of industrial and rural/agricultural history, between the mining towns in the UP, the Logging towns in the norther LP, the farming history in much of the LP, and the 'Arsenal of Democracy' that was Detroit.
I'm skeptical of the idea that this was all the result of a big misunderstanding. Students were often recruited to act as strikebreakers in the early 20th century.
There's a book that deals with this subject, Strikebreaking and Intimidation: Mercenaries and Masculinity in Twentieth-Century America. Football players were especially valued.
But, MSC is easy enough to determine from context, and ROTC would be a familiar abbreviation for any American.
'“It is indeed refreshing to know,” wrote one lawmaker, “that we have at least one instance of higher learning that is not shot through with communism.”'
Ah. Perhaps this answer's the article's question of why no-one commemorated it with a folk song in the 60s.
Like workers doing the hard work and fighting for their rights to not be exploited. Not to be put in jail for asking better life conditions.
Students on the other side that are lazy brats that fight the workers instead of the system for unclear philosophical "moral" goals...
sigh
In a surprising number of American cities, 1 mile is not walkable, simply because no one thought to put in a sidewalk or have adequate protection for pedestrians. That goes double for places like Lansing, where the sidewalks that are there are often icy during the winter.
I remember one time walking to the Lidl for a 6 mile roundtrip. I think it was the first time when I realized why Americans don’t walk. That walk was one bad experience while nothing bad was happening. For contrast: I live near Amsterdam my whole life.
It's also just that nothing is structured for it. Homes are built relatively far away from businesses and shops due to zoning, and stroads are the common way to get between the two. And where the stroads end, rural roads begin. It's structured not to be walkable not just at the large city level, but at the small city and town level, too. Our infrastructure is dictated by what the people in the 1940s thought, and they were extremely wrong about a great many things.
Right next door is the Impression 5 science museum. While it is aimed at children I've always found it fascinating and it is hands on. Unlike most science museums with which I am familiar they keep building new exhibits.
If you are into history the Michigan History Museum is just South of the Capital. They have an original copy of our state constitution on display. They also got a copy of every computer the state has purchased. Last time I was there they had a room full of old computers. So if you've never seen a Next cube, an Osborne portable, first Compaq portable or an Apple Lisa they are all on display in working order.
https://www.michigan.gov/mhc/museums/mhm
Lastly if you enjoy art visit the Broad Art Museum on the North end of the Michigan State University campus. The building is striking looking and was featured in one of the Batman movies. It is one of the few buildings in America designed by the late Pulitzer prize winning British architect Zaha Hadid.
Course all that pales to Detroit where you could literally spend ten days if you wanted to visit every museum.
Isn't that just the obvious explanation anyways? That a group of people come into your city and shut down your businesses is going to piss people off? Of course people are going to oppose outsiders shutting down people's livelihood.
I'd have expected the students to be split at least, with more supporters for the union than not. I had several family members who managed to graduate from college in the 30s, and it was a grind, with time off for working, more than 4 years, scraping by with hardly any money. I wonder if they saw unions as evil or good or what (can't ask them this question now).
I live 3000 miles from east Lansing.