WXYZ's Fred Wolf and his Wacky Wandering Wigloo

"Master of Sparemonies," the "Old Percolator," "Swampy Joe," and "King of Detroit Morning Radio," Fred Wolf.

Pioneering Detroit WXYZ sportcaster Fred Wolf was born in Poughkeepsie, New York on May 26, 1910. When Fred was six-years-old, his father died. Fred's mother remarried and the family relocated to Detroit in 1920. The young boy grew up to be a gifted athlete courtesy of the Detroit Recreation Department and their community sports programs. 

Fred played baseball when he attended Cass Technical High School and had aspirations to play in the major leagues. As with most high school athletes, that dream never materialized. After high school, Fred studied engineering in a Ford Trade School apprenticeship program.

At the age of twenty, Fred worked as a pinsetter and began to bowl on a league. Within a year, he bowled his first perfect 300 game, he was hooked on bowling and became instrumental in popularizing what was once a pastime into a professional sport.

After Wolf completed his Ford apprentiship, he was hired in 1934 to work in Chrysler Corporation's engineering department. By World War II, he rose through the ranks to become a superintendent at the Chrysler tank plant in Warren, Michigan, where he supervised 450 employees. While at Chrysler, Wolf was captain of the Tank Arsenal team in their company's ten-team bowling league. Other team names were Dodge Main, Super-finishers, and De Soto Engineers, etc. 

Fred also bowled on a the Stroh's Keglers team in the industrial league where he was their strongest bowler. On April 29, 1941, he won the individual competition in Detroit's American Bowling Conference out of a field of 32 of the city's top bowlers. He bowled 647 [three game total] while the next best competitor totaled 619. Fred clearly had found his groove.

***

On August 14, 1944, at the age of thirty-four, Wolf hurt his back playing softball which forced him to retire from the semi-professional bowling circuit. He was made manager of the Stroh's Keglers and introduced the bowlers over the public address system and reported scores. Norman White of radio station WJR asked Fred if he ever thought about doing a bowling show on radio. "What would it take?" Fred asked. White answered, "Get a guest, write an interview. Write the whole show--opening and closing--but leave two spots for commercials."

While recuperating from his back injury at home, Fred was listening to the World Series on the radio and wondered outloud to his wife Emily if a bowling tournament could be broadcast the same way. "Why not?" Emily answered. 

Fred shopped the idea around to Detroit radio stations before finally being accepted by WXYZ-Radio beginning his long broadcast career. His first weekly show was named The Ten Pin Talker. It was only fifteen minutes long, sponsored by E&B breweries. Wolf reported bowling scores from around Detroit and profiled top bowlers. Broadcasting opened up the bowling and the professional sports world for him.

Radio's The Ten Pin Talker led four years later to television's Make It and Take It, a program where local bowlers would try to make some of bowling's most difficult combinations for cash. Following the success of that program, WXYZ gave Wolf a bowling series called Bowling Champions in 1950. Wolf began live, lane-side broadcasting which became popular locally.

Championship Bowling title card

In 1956, the American Broadcasting Company, WXYZ's parent company, asked Wolf if he would like to announce a coast-to-coast program called Championship Bowling for ABC Sports. That program began a twelve-year national run which did much to popularize bowling nationwide and advance the sport.

In the early days of television, bowling was a winter sport, so the WXYZ station manager asked if Wolf could report on something besides bowling. Soon, he was reading baseball scores, announcing boxing and wrestling matches, commentating at golf tournaments, and hosting the popular Hot Rod Races from the Motor City Speedway where midget race cars competed in 25 lap races, and as an added bonus, there was a demolition derby event which Detroiters took an instant liking to.

Demolition Derby Carnage

While Fred Wolf was pioneering television sports programming, he was also a WXYZ-Radio morning deejay beginning in 1950 until 1965. His show was broadcast from 6 until 9 am every weekday morning. WXYZ-Radio originally broadcast from the Mendelssohn Mansion on East Jefferson Avenue. 

To gin up interest in his early, music radio program, Wolf asked the station manager if he could have an eight-by-ten foot broadcast booth built three feet off the ground in front of the mansion. He also wanted it to have large windows on three sides so motorists and pedestrians could see him spin records. It was a quirky idea, but the mini radio studio was paid for in radio endorsements for Peterson glass and Chaplow Lumber Company, so the project was given the go-ahead. 

Fred christened the booth "Wolf's Wacky Wigloo." It became an overnight sensation drawing in 35% of the morning radio audience. People drove by the Wigloo on their way to work and honked. Wolf told a reporter for the Detroit Free Press, "I like broadcasing from the Wigloo. I can see my listeners drive or walk by. It is more interesting than working in an enclosed studio."

WXYZ had outgrown its downtown studios and urban renewal was about to decimate the Black Bottom area where the studio was located. The station decided to build something they called Broadcast House in Southfield, Michigan. The radio station was slated to move into their new digs in June 1959. Wolf realized he was losing his Wacky Wigloo in the demolition process. On a personal note, he did not want to drive to Southfield from Grosse Pointe Woods. He would have to get up at 3:00 am to make it to work.

As he had done with the original Wigloo, Wolf came up with an original idea. He asked McDonald Trailer Sales if they could modify a thirty-foot trailer and replace the back end with glass on three sides. The station would install the turntables and other broadcasting equipment to make the trailer into a mobile radio studio. 

The cost of the trailer would be paid for with radio endorsements. WXYZ management was skeptical but approved the project on the strength of Wolf's popularity and his success bringing in new sponsors and advertising dollars.

Fred Wolf and his Wandering Wigloo.

The first stop for the newly rechristened Wandering Wigloo was the University of Detroit campus on the corner of Livernois and McNichols. Wolf pulled up at various familiar locations around town like the State Fair Grounds, City Hall, Detroit Institute of Arts, the Detoit Zoo, and private businesses, especially car dealerships. The Wandering Wigloo would broadcast from businesses for a week if they bought 5 spots a day of targeted advertising for 26 weeks. The Wandering Wigloo soon proved its worth.

The promotion was so successful that radio stations from around the country sent their people to Detroit to witness this public relations innovation. WXYZ soon built a second trailer for deejay Paul Winter, a third trailer was located in Dearborn, and a permanent broadcast booth was installed at the Sears Shopping Center in suburban Lincoln Park. Radio engineers were doing remote broadcasts from 6 am until 10 pm everyday. 

Everything was fine until a change of management tightened up their radio broadcasting programming. In short, the dee jays were to talk less, run jingle advertisements, and play music taken from a Top 40 play list. This was the radio industry's response to payola scandals in the music recording and broadcast business in the late 1950s. "Pay for Play" was illegal, and the play lists were the only way radio stations could insure against it. AM radio became repetitive and boring.

Wolf, who was generally a team player, let management know he was displeased. "I play happy music for my morning listeners as they get ready for work. I refuse to play rock & roll." Music trends had changed and his show's ratings dropped.

Wolf decided to retire from his morning radio show in August 1965, but Fred was too valuable to WXYZ to let him go, so he was bumped up to Vice President of Public Relations and official Channel 7 spokesperson. Wolf continued to do special broadcasts like the annual Port Huron to Mackinac Island Gold Cup Races and the Buick Open Golf Tournament.

***

In 1978, a stroke partially paralyzed Wolf and left him unable to speak, though he continued swimming using only one arm. At the age of ninety on August 7, 2000, Fred died in his Grosse Pointe Woods home of complications from a second stroke with his wife Emily by his side. The Wolfs were childless. Fred had a private funeral service and was buried in Roseland Park in Berkley, Michigan.

Emily Rybacki Wolf followed her husband to the grave two years later. At her husband's death, Emily said of him, "Fred was a very upright, kind man and a natural athlete." She must have been a remarkably supportive wife for her ambitious husband who worked long, irregular hours with a punishing broadcast schedule. Whatever they endured together over the years, they were married for sixty-five years. 

Fred Wolf produced over 800 local bowling shows on WXYZ radio and television, including 272 hours of announcing nationwide on ABC's Championship Bowling series. Wolf was a championship bowler in his own right and was inducted into the American Bowling Congress Hall of Fame, the Michigan State Bowling Association Hall of Fame, the Greater Detroit Bowling Hall of Fame, and he served as president of the Detroit Sports Broadcasters Association.

A full accounting of Fred Wolf's awards and honors are too numerous to list here, but one stands out in particular. Fred held the American Bowling Congress' record for the most years between his first 300 game and his second in 1975--forty-four years. I am sure that factoid was a source of merriment at Fred's induction to their Hall of Fame. Fred was a bowling champion to be sure, but there have been many bowling champions before and since. Fred was one of a kind.

Shock Theater and Mr. X

The Coca-Cola Santa Story

Santa's origin can be traced back to ancient Germanic folklore and the Norse god Odin. The modern character of Santa was embraced by America with the December 23, 1823 publication of Clement Clarke Moore's 56 line poem "A Visit from St. Nicholas," better known as "Twas the Night Before Christmas." Here is Moore's description of the jolly fatman:

 

As I drew in my head, and was turning around,
Down the chimney St. Nicholas came with a bound.
He was dressed all in fur, from his head to his foot,
And his clothes were all tarnished with ashes and soot;
A bundle of Toys he had flung on his back,
And he looked like a pedler just opening his pack.
His eyes—how they twinkled! his dimples how merry!
His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry!
His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow
And the beard of his chin was as white as the snow;
The stump of a pipe he held tight in his teeth,
And the smoke it encircled his head like a wreath;
He had a broad face and a little round belly,
That shook when he laughed, like a bowlful of jelly.
He was chubby and plump, a right jolly old elf,
And I laughed when I saw him, in spite of myself

 

Bavarian immigrant Thomas Nast became America's first political cartoonist. He is responsible for creating the American image of Santa Claus on January 3, 1863, for the illustrated magazine Harper's Weekly. In an wooden engraving named "Santa Claus in Camp," the mythic figure is presenting gifts to Union soldiers during the Civil War while wearing a costume patterned with patriotic stars and stripes. Santa manipulates a Jefferson Davis toy [effigy] dancing on the end of a string.

 

In 1881, Nast created the first of many Santa images based on the description in Clement's narrative poem. These illustrations were without the political and military context of his earlier work. With thirty-three Santa illustrations to his credit, Nast immortalized the figure of Santa Claus we are familiar with today.

Muskegon born Michigan artist Haddon Sundblom painted the iconic image we now recognize as the modern Santa Claus, for the Coca-Cola company from 1931 until 1964. His friend was the original model for his Santa paintings. It is believed Sundblom made $1,000 for his first commission, good money during the Depression era.

 

 

Haddon Sundblom at work.

 

Sundblom's Santa images have appeared in Coke's print advertising, store displays, billboards, posters, calendars, and on television commercials. He helped make Santa the most recognizable and successful pitchman in advertising history.

 

Haddon Sundblom, Santa, and Playboy Magazine 

Detroit's Greektown Stella - Iconic Homeless Woman Remembered

Photo taken of Stella Paris by a Detroit Policeman

I hadn't seen or heard of Greektown Stella for several decades, then several days ago, I found out that she had died almost seven years earlier on January 16th, 2011. When I saw her photograph on a recent Facebook post on the Old Delray/Old Detroit site, I knew that face and suddenly felt very sad. Whenever I go to a Greek restaurant or see the film Zorba, the Greek, I privately think of the crazy old Greek woman who patrolled the dimly lit Greektown neighborhood in Detroit from the late1960s until the early 1990s.

Stella was a modern day Cassandra that nobody wanted to listen to. Over forty years ago, whenever my friends and I would go to Greektown for dinner or shop at Trappers' Alley, Stella was often ranting something in Greek or broken English at the top of her lungs at all hours of the night. Stella's piercing voice would echo off the brick buildings. She was impossible to ignore. Because she was a permanent fixture on Monroe Street, we quipped that she was being paid by the restaurant owners to provide local color for the Greek neighborhood.

Several newspaper accounts at the time of her death list Stella Paris' age at ninety-five or older. No birth certificate, citizenship, or immigration documentation exists for her, so she was denied public assistance. Stella is believed to have been born on the Greek island of Samos.

Doug Guthrie, writing for The Detroit News on January 21, 2011, discovered that "(Stella) had come to this country in 1938 through an arranged marriage to restaurant owner John Perris. She raised three sons and never wanted to learn English (but she spoke broken English of necessity). Stella was four feet, ten inches tall and very trim. She passed away from a heart condition. Stella's body was laid out at Annunciation Greek Orthodox Cathedral on East Lafayette Blvd.

In life, Stella suffered from mental illness and the scourge of schizophrenia. She had family who tried to take her in, but she wanted to be in Greektown where she felt comfortable, even when sleeping outside contending with the weather and other aggressive street people. She carried a nightstick for her protection, given to her by the police at the12th precinct downtown. "The Greek community took care of her by giving her food, shelter, and love," said Frank Becsi. "Stella is buried at Woodmere Cemetery."

"Stella was a blessing to me," says Shelley Rigney, someone who remembers her fondly. "I was young and she would always tell the 'Wolf' types not to bother me because my Momma knew Jack Tocco (Detroit Mafia Don) & my Pappa was a big crazy Irishman & I was the only baby girl in a house full of Big Boys. She would laugh and tell me, 'Ya justa keep walkin'. Don't you let any of that Trash even stick to your shoe.' God bless her sweet soul & kind heart... I still have ribbons and all the things she gave me."

Stella led the hard life of a homeless street person. Even when she was in her fifties, she looked much older than she was. A retired Detroit policeman who wishes not to be identified walked the Greektown beat for years. He tells a more sobering, less romantic story of Stella's street life.

"(Stella) claimed to be some sort of Greek princess, or that her late husband was the king of Greece, or some similar story.... She would hear voices and stand on the street corner and yell at the voices... you could hear her half a mile away on a calm day.

"She was your basic homeless bag lady, and unfortunately, her mind was not all there.... Stella's favorite motel was police headquarters at 1300 Beaubien, just up the street from Greektown. Some (of the officers) took her in as a mascot, providing her with some old marksmanship badges, chevrons, and a nightstick (billy club) that she carried faithfully....

Stella on the street.

"I do know that many of the merchants in Greektown took pity on her regularly and provided her with food as needed. As I said, (Stella) was an icon. Actually, she was a perfect representative of so many mentally challenged people in the United States today."

Detroit policewoman Cynthia Hill said, "From our perspective, she never meant any harm. When I was working as a teenage police cadet, I noticed the officers let her sleep in the basement (of police headquarters) and bathe in our sinks in the women's restroom on the first floor. At first, she scared me. They told me, 'It's just Stella.' Later when I became an officer, I would see her on the street and feel the same way."

News of his mother's death came as a surprise to her seventy-year-old son, Anthony Perris of Livonia. He told The Detroit News that her life began on the streets when she was in her fifties. "The family assumed she had died fifteen years ago when she disappeared from Greektown," Perris said. "We didn't know that she had been ordered by a judge into an assisted care facility because she was brandishing a knife."

Stella Paris spent the last years of her life peacefully at the East Grand Nursing Home on East Grand Blvd. At the time, the facility desperately searched for any relative who could shed light on her immigration status. Because of the common misspelling of her real last name, the Perris family was never notified. Stella was indigent, so the nursing home took her under its protective care. But when Stella needed heart surgery, they were simply not in any position to pay for her hospital bills.

We have all seen homeless people in our communities. Some do their best to be unobtrusive or obsequious, while others rant and rave, wrestling with their personal demons. They are all desperate people living a tooth and nail existence. In our several encounters with Greektown Stella, my wife and I tried our best to avoid and not engage her in conversation because we didn't know what to expect. I regret that decision now.

Shelley Rigney laments, "Stella was a woman who was tossed aside by many, but she still managed to survive somehow. Now I wish I would have taken time for her. She had a lot to say and teach others."

Finding out about Greektown Stella's death brought it all back to me. Rather than our scorn and apathy, these people need acts of kindness and generosity, not only during the holiday season but throughout the entire year.

More on Stella can be found in this link: http://www.mlive.com/news/detroit/index.ssf/2010/01/greektown_stella_shouts_no_mor.html  

 

Stella's Funeral Service 

Victorian Theater and The Limelight

In the Victorian period, the expression in the limelight meant the most desirable acting area on the stage, front and center. Today, the expression simply means someone is getting public recognition and acclaim.

The limelight effect was discovered by Goldsmith Gurney in the 1820s based on his work with an oxy-hydrogen blowpipe. Scottish inventor, Thomas Drummond (1797-1840), built a working model of the calcium light in 1826 for use in the surveying profession.

The calcium light was created by super heating a cylinder of quicklime (calcium oxide) with an oxy-hydrogen flame that gives off a bright light with a greenish tint.

Eleven years later, the term limelight was coined to describe a form of stage illumination first used in 1837 for a public performance at the Covent Garden Theatre in London. 

By the 1860s, this new technology of stage lighting was in wide use in theaters and dance halls around the world. It was a great improvement over the previous method of stage lighting, candle powered footlights placed along the stage apron. 

Limelight lanterns could also be placed along the front of the lower balcony for general stage illumination providing more natural light than footlights alone. 

A lighthouse-like lens (Fresnel lens) was developed that could direct and focus concentrated light on the stage to spotlight a solo performance. Actors and performers must have felt they were living in the heyday of the theater.

The term green room has been used since the Victoria period to describe the waiting area performers use before going on stage. Theater lore has it that actors would sit in a room lit by limelight to allow their eyes to adjust to the harsh stage lighting, preventing squinting during their stage entrances.

Although the electric light replaced limelight in theaters by the end of the nineteenth century, the term limelight still exists in show business, as does the term green room.

Today, the green room is used by celebrities before they appear on talk shows, but it is not usually painted green. The room still performs a similar function as in the Victorian age--to prepare a performer to go on stage.

Michigan Homegrown Terrorism of the 1930s--The Black Legion

I like to think I am well-versed in Michigan and Detroit history, but it wasn't until I recently read Tom Stanton's Terror in the City of Champions that I learned of the Black Legion, a splinter group of the Ku Klux Klan. The original group called the Black Guard was founded in the mid-1920's as a security force for Ohio Klan officers, many of whom held public office.

After being kicked out of the Klan for establishing a fiefdom, Dr. Billy Shephard from Lima, Ohio further radicalized the group. They became known as the Black Legion, an even more ruthless and reckless organization than the Klan. In 1931, a Michigan regiment was established by Arthur Lupp of Highland Park.

From there, Virgil "Bert" Effinger began to reorganize the group throughout the Midwest and became the group's spokesperson. Every new member had to repeat an oath "In the name of God and the Devil." They were given a .38 caliber bullet cartridge and told another one had their name on it if they violated their vow of secrecy.

Some people were tricked into joining by friends or family and soon discovered they were in over their heads. High-ranking officers wore black capes with gold trim and brandished weapons openly. The legion expanded aggressively through deception, threats, and brutality. Beatings and torture were used to keep errant members in line.

Policemen display captured Black Legion vestments and the tools of their trade.

The Black Legion boasted having over one million members nationwide. At its height in Michigan, there were 5 brigades, 16 regiments, 64 battalions, and 256 companies. Law enforcement estimated membership at 20,000 to 30,000 statewide. The Detroit area had 10,000 members. Michigan State Police investigator Ira Holloway Marmon discovered Black Legion strongholds in Highland Park, Ecorse, Wyandotte, Lincoln Park, Saline, Monroe, Irish Hills, Pontiac, Flint, Saginaw, and of course, Detroit. Indiana, Illinois, and Ohio also had active chapters.

Their members were primarily angry, white, Anglo-Saxon males who were transplants from the South during the boom years of the auto industry in what history marks as the Great Migration. Whites and Blacks with little or no industrial skills flooded into Detroit heeding Henry Ford's clarion call, "Jobs at $5 a day." Competition for work was fierce in the 1920s, but during the Great Depression, people were killed over jobs.

The Legion was frustrated by the economic and social instability of the 1930s. They felt alienated by Detroit's industrial landscape. One of their core beliefs was that Anglo-Saxon Protestants were being pushed aside in America because foreigners (Catholic and Jewish immigrants) and Blacks were taking their jobs they believed they were entitled to.

1937 Movie Lobby Card

Being in the Legion made members feel connected with something larger than themselves. Membership for many people increased their self-esteem and sense of white supremacy. They absolutely believed race mixing was destabilizing the American way of life leading to social degeneracy.

Legionnaires widened the scope of their wrath to include terrorizing and murdering welfare recipients, labor union organizers, and political opponents. Probably more than anything else, the Black Legion hated socialists and communists. The legionnaires were a homegrown, right-wing, secret terrorist society.

Using fronts like the Wayne County Rifle and Pistol Club (members honed their shooting skills in the club's backroom firing range) and the Wolverine Republican Club (where thinly disguised rallies and gatherings were staged), Legion-approved speakers would rail against their perceived enemies and rally the faithful. New recruits would hear lengthy diatribes whipping the crowd to a frenzy of hatred.

The Legion provided easy answers to the complex questions of their day. One of their political fliers read, "We will fight political Romanism (Catholics), Judaism (Jews), Communism (Socialists), and all 'isms' which our forefathers came to this country to avoid," all the while wrapping themselves in the American flag and patriotism. 

Charles Poole

Works Progress organizer Charles Poole (22- year-old Catholic) was shot five times at point blank range in Dearborn Township on May 13th, 1936. A number of key Legion members were arrested and convicted.

Investigators uncovered the organization's propaganda, their enrollment records, some Black Legion robes and hoods including the tools of their trade--guns, bludgeons, blackjacks, and whips. Dayton Dean was convicted of being the trigger-man in Poole's death. Once on the stand, Dean sang like a canary.

For more details on the Black Legion, view this link: http://www.veteranstoday.com/2012/11/28/history-the-black-legion-where-vets-and-the-klan-met/

In 1937, Warner Bros. Pictures made a movie about the Black Legion starring Humphrey Bogart. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0027367/

Ford Tri-Motor Pioneers Commercial Flight

Restored Ford Tri-Motor

In today's jetsetter world, commercial air travel is taken for granted by most people, but in the 1920s the aeronautics industry had to prove itself safe before Americans felt confident enough to board an airplane and leave terra firma. It was not until Henry Ford bought the Stout Metal Airplane Company in 1924 from designer and engineer William Bushnell that public confidence in air travel rose because of Ford's strong reputation for reliability in the automobile business.

Bushnell designed a three-engined transport plane based on an all-metal Dutch plane developed by the Fokker Aircraft Corporation (Fokker F.VII). While waiting to participate in an air show at the newly constructed Ford Airport in Dearborn, Michigan, the innovative Dutch plane was stored in a Ford hanger. Ford engineers surreptitiously measured its dimensions and plagiarized the design.

Ford Motor Company (FoMoCo) created a new aircraft division and kept Bushnell on as the president of Production in 1925. At a press conference, Henry Ford proclaimed "The first thing that must be done with aerial navigation is to make it fool-proof.... What Ford Motor Company means to do is prove whether commercial air travel can be done safely and profitably."

The plane was introduced for limited excursion service as the Ford Tri-Motor in 1926. Soon, the plane became popularly known as the Tin Goose or the Flying Washboard. Only one-hundred and ninety-nine were ever produced.

Ford Airport with Henry Ford Museum in the background.

The airplane's body was clad in corrugated aluminum alloy for lightweight strength, which regrettably resulted in air drag reducing the plane's overall performance. The original Tri-Motor was powered by three 200 hp Wright engines but was upgraded to 235 hp Wright engines, and upgraded again with 300 hp radial engines. The propellers were two-bladed with a fixed pitch. The maximum air speed of 132 mph was increased to 150 mph depending on the equipped engine. The plane had a low stall speed of 57 mph. The Tri-Motor could safely reach a height of 16,500 feet with a range of 500 miles.

The Ford Tri-Motor was a combination of old and new technologies. As was common in early wooden and canvas airplanes, the engine gauges were mounted onto the engine struts outside the cockpit, and the rudder and wing flaps were controlled by steel cables mounted on the exterior of the airplane. The plane soon developed a reputation for ruggedness and versatility. It could be fitted with skis or pontoons for snow and water takeoffs and landings. The seats also could be removed to carry freight.

External cables controlling wing flaps and tail rudder.

The Ford Tri-Motor pioneered two-way, air-to-ground radio communication with their planes while in flight. Once the Department of Commerce Aeronautics Branch developed the Beacon Navigation System, a continuous radar signal was broadcast from fixed beacon locations across the country. Navigators were able to determine a plane's relative bearings by radio impulse without visual sightings, helping pilots guide their planes to their next destination.

Ford Tri-Motors were equipped with avionics that helped establish air corridors and domestic routes coast-to-coast making reliable commercial flight possible. Pan American Airlines scheduled the first international flights with service from Key West to Havana, Cuba in 1927 using Ford Tri-Motors.

Transcontinental Air Transport pioneered the first coast-to-coast service from New York to California. Initially, passengers would fly during the day and take sleeper trains at night. The first commercial planes carried a crew of three (pilot, co-pilot/navigator, and a stewardess) serving eight or nine passengers. By August 1929, the planes had a passenger capacity of twelve which reduced leg room but increased profitability.

Admiral Richard E. Byrd and supply crew-1929.

To promote air travel and the reliability of air service, Henry Ford's son Edsel financed Admiral Richard E. Byrd's flight over the South Pole to the tune of $100,000. On November 29, 1929, Byrd became the first person to fly over both poles, creating more than $100,000 worth of domestic and international publicity for the Ford Tri-Motor. Byrd left the plane in Antarctica but upon Edsel Ford's request, he retrieved the plane in 1935 and had it shipped to Dearborn, Michigan for display in the Henry Ford Museum.

The Ford Tri-Motor became the workhorse for United States and international airlines. Known as the first luxury airliner, it redefined world travel marking the beginning of global, commercial flight. American Airlines, Grand Canyon Airlines, Pan American, Transcontinental Airlines, Trans World Airlines, United Airlines, and smaller carriers flew Ford Tri-Motors. A round trip excursion ticket from Ford Airport in Dearborn to the Kentucky Derby in 1929 cost $122 with one stop for fuel in Cincinnati.

Typical excursion advertisement to promote air travel.

The aircraft industry underwent rapid development in the 1930s when a new generation of vastly superior planes like Boeing's 247 and the Douglas DC-2 began to dominate the commercial aviation market. The Tri-Motor had declining sales during the Great Depression and was losing money, so FoMoCo closed its airplane division on June 7, 1933. The company chose to concentrate on its core business--automobiles. On a human level, the death of Henry Ford's personal pilot Harry J. Brooks during a test flight made Ford lose interest in aviation.

Originally designed as a civil airplane, the Ford Tri-Motor saw military service in World War II in the United States Army Air Force. It is believed only eight of these classic planes are airworthy today. In popular culture, it was a Ford Tri-Motor that appeared in the film Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom leap-frogging across the map.

Ford's Willow Run B-24 Bomber Plant

Remembering Detroit's Qwikee Donut and Coffee Shops

A young, optimistic Russian blacksmith named John Weise migrated to Detroit in the late 1920s, just in time for the Great Depression. Its stranglehold on manufacturing hit the automotive blue collar workforce particularly hard. Nobody was hiring blacksmiths.

Weise struggled but found work where and when he could, learning English as he went along. By 1938, Weise decided to take a risk and go into business for himself. He borrowed some money, bought some equipment, and went into the doughnut and coffee shop business which would eventually make him a wealthy man. 

Weise named his new business The New Era as an optimistic gesture for shaking off the bad luck he had experienced in America during his first decade here. His first retail shop was on Bates St. at Cadillac Square. Because of the war in Europe, Detroit factories and businesses were once again bustling with activity. His foresight paid off. The shop was packed from its opening day with customers lining up outside for a quick and inexpensive breakfast.

In 1942, Weise partnered up with Frank Reed and together they opened a second, larger operation in the lobby of the Hammond Building. Both of the shops were branded as Qwikee Donut and Coffee Shop. The new name with its quirky spelling was an effective marketing detail emphasizing their speed and convenience. Their trademark name on their bright, neon signage lit up even the grayest, bone-chilling Detroit mornings.

High-rise office workers soon discovered they could pop in and out in minutes for hot coffee and warm donuts. Downtown shoppers found a convenient place in the shopping loop to take a break and grab a quick bite with some fresh brewed coffee. Qwikee hot chocolate with whipped cream was a favorite with kids in the winter.

"Get Your Daily Dozen" was their slogan.

Space was limited in the early shops and restaurant seating took up too much space. The pace of life downtown quickened when the United States entered World War Two. Frank Reed had the idea to install stand-up counters along the walls for their busy customers. Daily editions of the Detroit News, the Free Press, and the Times were enclosed behind glass cases mounted across the walls for the convenience of customers who preferred to stand, slam down a quick cup of coffee and a doughnut, read the headlines, and dash off to work. Reed's second location served 5,000 to 6,000 customers daily.

With the demolition of the Hammond Building in 1956, Weise and Reed opened another larger shop on Grand River Boulevard at State Street. Soon other shops opened. There was one at 222 W. Congress St., one in the Guardian Building, one in the Fisher Building, and the largest shop at State and Griswold St. At that location, sandwiches and warm lunch plates were dispensed with self-service automat machines. Hot dishes with gravy like meatloaf, roasted chicken, and roast beef were popular menu items.

Qwikee Donut expanded their menu to include sandwiches and soups and adopted a cafeteria-style format. At the height of their popularity, Qwikee Donuts numbered five or six locations in the downtown loop serving 20,000 dozen donuts a week. The Grand River Avenue location became a hangout for generations of Cass Tech and other students looking for a warm, dry, convenient place to wait for the bus home which might take over an hour. Since it was after the lunch rush, the owners welcomed their steady business. Better to have customers than an empty shop.

The local doughnut chain became famous for their large, warm, and delicious donuts. You could get them plain, powder-sugared, cinnamon-sugared, iced with chocolate, vanilla, cherry, or orange frosting. Others were glazed and dipped in chopped nuts. They also served jelly and custard-filled doughnuts. Custard-filled were only served in the winter because the summer heat was too dangerous. The filling might spoil and make people sick.

Qwikee Donuts also served sandwiches and soups. Bean and pea soups were popular in the winter, and lighter soups like French onion were served in the summer. Chicken noodle and chili were year-round favorites. All soups were served in crockery bowls. Food was served on plates, and the utensils were stainless steel--never plastic. Sandwiches were traditional and served on sliced white or whole wheat bread from the nearby Wonder Bread bakery. Peanut butter & jelly, egg or tuna salad, and ham, turkey or roast beef with cheese were the standard sandwiches.

Weise and Reed together may have helped revolutionize the fast food business. Their most notable neon marquee sign was mechanical and one of the top three greatest signs in Detroit behind the Vernor's Sign on Woodward and the red and yellow neon, pulsating Flame Show Bar entrance in Paradise Valley. The Qwikee Donut sign had a hand dunking a doughnut into a simulated, steaming cup of coffee, all outlined in neon. That doughnut went up and down all day and never got soggy! The bright sign, co-mingled with the smell of warm doughnuts and freshly brewed coffee, was irresistible.

Original Quikee Donut owner John Weise.

When the Detroit Free Press interviewed John Weise in 1959, he said, "An office boy or girl can come into (our shops) and pick up a dozen cups of coffee and a bag of doughnuts for the entire office staff and be back (to work) before the boss (realizes they are gone)." 

John Weise and his partner Frank Reed parlayed their original shops into a million-dollar enterprise that became part of the fabric of downtown Detroit's daily life for decades. When Frank Reed suffered his first heart attack in 1956, he sold his interests in the company to his partner Weise. 

Sometime in the 1960s, Weise sold his interest in Quikee Donuts to Joe Hermann and Sons who were in the baking business. Thereafter, he retired. With the decline of downtown business activity in the seventies and eighties, and the loss of downtown shoppers to suburban shopping centers, Qwikee Donuts downtown went quietly out of business in the mid-1980s.

I was told by former Quikee Cafeteria employee, Chris Bosley, that the Hermann family, Albert, his wife Judy, and his sons Rick, Scott, and daughter Shelley, took their company with their new branding to the suburb of Southfield in the late 70s or early 80s.

They closed their downtown operations but kept the commissary on Grand River Avenue open to supply their cafeterias with fresh made doughnuts, soups, and sandwiches which they delivered daily to their various locations. The cafeterias were popular and stayed in business until the early 2000s when Albert retired and sold off the business.

***

Founder John Weise died at the age of fifty-three on Monday, October 3, 1966, leaving behind his wife Gilda, his sister, three daughters, and three grandchildren. Mr. Weise is buried in White Chapel Memorial Park Cemetery in Troy, Michigan.

Co-founder Frank Reed suffered a heart attack aboard the ocean liner Queen Elizabeth II en route to Great Britain to begin a European tour. Mr. Reed died August 16, 1979 at the age of seventy-seven leaving behind his wife Hazelle, two brothers, and a sister. He is buried in Palm Beach, Florida.

White Castle Rules

Samuel Zug - The Man Behind the Island

Samuel Zug

Samuel Zug is thought by some people to have been an industrialist, but that couldn't be further from the truth. He was a devout Presbyterian who took an interest in politics and human rights.

In 1836 at the tender age of twenty-years-old, Samuel Zug came to Detroit, Michigan from Cumberland County, Pennsylvania. Using money he saved as a bookkeeper in the Pittsburgh area, he went into the furniture making business with Marcus Stevenson, a Detroit investor.  

The prospect of endless stands of pine, oak and maple trees as raw material, and convenient access to Eastern markets by way of the Detroit River for their finished products made Detroit an ideal place for a young man to make his fortune. 

But in 1859 after twenty-three years in the furniture business, his partnership with Stevenson was dissolved leaving Samuel Zug a wealthy man to pursue real estate and political ambitions.

In 1859 (or 1876 depending on which source you choose), Samuel Zug purchased 325 acres of land along the Detroit River from Michigan's second Territorial governor, General Lewis B. Cass. Over 250 acres of the parcel was marshland with a sulfur spring bubbling up 1,200 barrels of mineral water a day.

The marshy peninsula of land was a part of Ecorse Township before it became the city of River Rouge. In unrecorded time, the land was rumored to be an ancient burial site for a number of native American tribes known to inhabit the area.

Samuel Zug and his wife Anna built a home on the island, but after ten years they decided that the marshland and natural sulfur spring on the site proved too much for them to endure. The Zugs surrendered the land to the red fox, water fowl, muskrats, and mosquitoes. The croaking frogs and singing insects were left to serenade the damp night air because the island was virtually uninhabitable.

In 1888, Samuel Zug authorized the River Rouge River Improvement Company to cut a small canal at the south end of his land. Known by locals as Mud Run, it was dredged out sixty feet wide and eight feet deep. 

Short Cut Canal at bottom of map was Mud Run.

The Zug family peninsula became a man-made island overnight separating it from the north end of Ecorse Township. The channel improved the flow of the Rouge River into the Detroit River, but it did little to circulate water around the newly formed island, leaving a slow-moving backwater.

On December 26, 1889, Samuel Zug died leaving his holdings to his wife, Anne, who died on June 10th,1891. It has been reported wrongly that Mr. Zug died in 1896. My source for the correct date of Zug's death comes from his tombstone in Detroit's Elmwood Cemetery.

The Zug heirs sold the island for $300,000 to George Brady and Charles Noble, who wanted to use the site for an industrial dumping ground. The island was diked with interlocking steel panels and back-filled with construction rubble and dredging waste to raise the ground above the water table and reclaim the land from its natural state.

Heavy industry was about to move onto the island but Mr. Zug never lived to see it. The island's namesake was "Waiting for the Coming of Our Lord" as the inscription on his grave marker proclaims.

In addition to being a bookkeeper and the owner of a successful furniture manufacturing company, Samuel Zug also is credited with being one of the founding members of the Republican Party, which was considered to be the progressive party of the day. Their first official meeting took place on July 6, 1854, in Jackson, Michigan.

The Republicans were an abolitionist party that came to national attention when they won 33% of the presidential vote from the Democrats and the Whigs in 1856. Four years later in 1860, they broke through the two-party system and elected Abraham Lincoln to the White House.

Samuel Zug was an anti-slavery advocate long before Lincoln was elected and The Civil War began. He bought and set aside a parcel of land for refugee slaves in the city of Amherstburg, Ontario, Canada, a destination of the Underground Railroad. What other support he gave to the Abolitionist Movement is shrouded in the dim history of time and whispers of the unrecorded past.

At the time of his death, Samuel Zug was unaware of the mighty industrial complex his soggy marshland would become. He would never know the history Zug Island would make possible or the long-term environmental impact the steel industry would have on the area and its people.

In Detroit's Elmwood Cemetery

Zug Island closes its steel-making operations in April, 2020.            

Detroit's Speedboat Champion Gar Wood

Garfield "Gar" Wood

One of the least remembered Detroit sports celebrities is speedboat champion Garfield "Gar" Authur Wood. He was known as the "Grey Fox of Algonac" by many in the speedboat racing world. He was the first person to go over 100 mph on the water. Gar Wood won five straight powerboat Gold Cup races between 1917 and 1921. He won the British International Trophy for Motorboats known as the Harmsworth Trophy nine times and retired from speedboat racing in 1933 to concentrate on business concerns.

Gar Wood was born in Mapleton, Iowa on December 4, 1880. His father was a patriotic Civil War veteran and named Gar after the current president James A. Garfield and his vice-president Chester Arthur. Gar was the third of twelve children. As a growing boy, Gar assisted his father who was a ferryboat operator on Lake Osakia in Minnesota. It is here where he learned his love of boating and developed his mechanical skill for inventing devices to solve mechanical problems.

Without any formal engineering training, Gar Wood invented the hydraulic lift for the titling beds of coal trucks in 1911 at the age of thirty-one. In addition to the dump truck, his company developed the self-packing garbage truck familiar in every corner of this country. In all, Gar Wood held over thirty United States patents making him a multi-millionaire by the age of forty.

Gar Wood and his eight brothers established the Wood Hoist Company which soon became Garwood Industries. Alongside industrial giants like Ford, Dodge, and Chalmers, the family built an industrial empire around the hydraulic lift which enabled Gar to pursue his love of speedboat racing.

In 1916, Gar Wood purchased his first motorboat naming it Miss Detroit. The following year he put a Curtiss "12" airplane engine in a speedboat against the advice of everyone and won the 15th Annual Gold Cup Race on the Detroit River. Fours years later, he set a new water speed record of 74.87 mph. In the next twelve years, he and his racing team built ten Miss America's and broke the water speed record five more times raising the speed to 124.86 mph on the St. Clair River in 1932.

Miss America X was the last of Gar Wood's racing boats. The $600,000 speed boat was powered by four 1800 horsepower, twelve cylinder Packard engines run in tandem in a double-hulled boat. The boat's stringers were made of top quality spruce with the rest of the boat made of mahogany. This was the first boat to go over two miles a minute using 10 gallons of fuel per mile when full open. After Wood won the international Harmsworth Trophy in 1932 and 1933, he retired from racing leaving his son to carry on the family tradition. Gar Wood did more to develop the American speedboat sport than anybody.

In the 1930s, Garwood Industries built a new boat plant in Marysville, Michigan capable of producing 1,200 quality custom boats a year. Their two basic commercial models were a 28' runabout and a 22' runabout. In all, the factory produced 10,000 boats before the company converted over to the war effort during World War II. The company had extensive military contracts for military hoists, hydraulic units, dump trucks, tow trucks, and transport trucks. After the war, Garwood Industries quit boat production in 1947.

In his later years, Wood worked on a commercially feasible, battery-powered electric automobile. His electric car used eight 12-volt lead batteries connected in a series to power two specially designed 90-volt, 2 hp DC motors. The top speed was 52 mph and cost about twenty cents to recharge the batteries. The car was named the Gar Wood Super Electric Model A and was featured in the July 1967 issue of Popular Mechanics.

Garfield Arthur Wood died from stomach cancer at the age of ninety on June 19, 1971 and was buried in Algonac, Michigan. Upon his death, Detroit News reporter George Van wrote, "To the public, he was Tom Swift, Jules Verne, and Frank Merriwell, with a little bit of Horatio Alger thrown in."

A short clip of Miss America X and Gar Wood in action winning the Harmsworth Trophy in 1932.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CMlahrYMF74

Bill Bonds and WXYZ Channel 7 Action News

Bill Bonds WXYZ-TV Ratings Leader

 

 

 

"It's hard being Bill Bonds. You can't even imagine."--Bill Bonds

No other Detroit television news celebrity had more written about his every move and misstep than Detroit-born William Duane Bonds, better known as Bill Bonds. He was usually the number one news anchor in the Detroit media market for most of the 1970s, 1980s, and into the mid-1990s. Every point in the Arbitron and Neilsen rating television system translates into how many viewers a show attracts measured against its competition. Millions of dollars of advertising revenue is at stake. Over the years, Bonds was a cash cow for WXYZ-TV.

Bonds had a serious demeanor and expressive face on camera. A lowered eyebrow or a furrowed forehead spoke volumes about how Bill personally felt about the story he was reporting. What made Bonds literally stand out more on the screen than his cross town competition was he wanted to appear as big as possible for the home audience. His face and shoulders, including his fabled toupees, filled most of the screen. When he looked into the camera, viewers felt like he was looking back at them. 

After a Detroit Free Press reader poll in 1973 voted Bonds Detroit's Number One celebrity, Free Press staff writer Gary Blonston damned him with faint praise, "Bonds might not be the best newsman in town or even the best voice, but he certainly is the best theater in town. That explains much of why so many people are buying Bonds. He seems to be frequently overplaying the part of a television anchorman, except he really is one."

Over the years, Bonds had a love/hate relationship with the local press. Afterall, the free publicity is what kept his name in the news. Bonds has been described as flamboyant, pompous, arrogant, opinionated, insufferable, tart-tongued, and hot-tempered. Bonds has also earned himself many names like the Babe Ruth of Bombast, the Mad Prophet of the Airwaves, Emperor Bonds, Mr. News Christ, Billzilla, Infotainer, helmet head, scalp-weasel, rogue journalist, and the Sun King of Detroit News.

***

Billy Bonds was born in Detroit in the middle of a Michigan winter on February 23, 1932 during the depths of the Great Depression. He was the second of six children of Richard Bonds and Katherine Collins. What we know of Bill's childhood comes mostly from Bonds himself in a newspaper interview he did with Free Press feature writer Patty LaNoue Stearns in December of 1992 when he was sixty years old.

"I had a marvelous, loving childhood, thanks to my mother, Katherine, a bright caring Catholic homemaker. But I came from a very, very alcoholic family. My Scotts-Irish father was aggressive and domineering. My older brother Dick had a privileged relationship with him."

Bonds went on to describe an incident when he was in the first grade. "My dog got out and was hit by a car. My dad didn't want it in the house, so he put it on the porch in the dead of winter, and it froze to death. In the morning, he told me to throw the dog in the garbage. I was angry at my dad and with shovel in hand, I told him 'It's my dog. I'm going to bury it!' Standing up to my father empowered me and I liked it." This episode may be responsible for Bill's lifelong defiance of authority which marked much of his career.

Bonds grew up to be a rebellious student who was bored with his parochial education. He was encouraged to leave Catholic Central High school, then Royal Oak Shrine, followed by Berkley High School, and finally he dropped out of Royal Oak High School to join the United States Air Force and serve in Korea. While serving his country, Bonds passed his high school equalivancy test. When his enlistment was up, he used his G.I. Bill benefit to enroll at the University of Detroit, majored in political science, and graduated in 1960.

***

Bill Bonds' first broadcasting job was in Albion, Michigan at WALM-AM. He was paid one dollar an hour as a field reporter. From that modest beginning, Bonds followed opportunity and the road back home to Detroit to work at several local AM radio stations before landing a job in 1964 as on-air talent at the WXYZ-TV Channel 7 news department.

 

Within a year, Bonds was given an anchor position on a program that bore his name--Bill Bonds News. The fifteen minute color broadcast covered news, sports, and weather at 6:30 PM and 11:00PM. During the Detroit Riots of July 1967, the Channel 7 coverage was far superior to Channel 4 or Channel 2's coverage. 

Detroit Free Press media reporter Bettelou Peterson lauded the WXYZ-TV news team for their in-the-field coverage, "(They) outdistanced the other stations as the best TV news reporting in Detroit. Bonds' face was particularly expressive as he came back on camera after watching film clips that were broadcast as fast as the film could be developed and sent to the newsroom in real time, each time delivering a small editorial reflecting his feelings." During that terrible week, Metropolitan Detroiters were riveted to their televisions. Bill Bonds became a certified news celebrity.

In 1970, an anchor position opened up at KABC-TV in Los Angeles. Sensing this was a good career move, Bonds interviewed for the position and was hired. He worked there for two years before returning to Detroit. For some reason, the Bonds magic did not work in California's largest media market.

While in tinsel town, Bonds landed bit parts in two Hollywood productions. First in the TV show It Takes a Thief with Robert Wagner in 1970 and the following year in Escape from Planet of the Apes. In both instances, he played a TV news reporter which was not much of a stretch for him. Bonds was released from his KABC-TV contact in February 1971. He did not do well in the Los Angeles ratings and the station decided to go in a different direction.

Two months later, Bonds returned to WXYZ-TV Channel 7. In an interview with Detroit Free Press gossip columnist Bob Talbert, Bonds revealed what his problem in Los Angeles was, "They wanted happy news with the anchors laughing it up. I believe news should be serious and informative. Yakety-yak happy talk on camera did not come easy for me."

In the two years since Bonds had jumped ship, Channel 7 news ratings faltered. WXYZ station manager Donald F. Keck lauded Bonds for his "performance and personal involvement in the Detoit community. Bill's presence will greatly enhance our overall news image and competitive position in our market." Keck noted that WXYZ-TV's news approach will shift from a "light" news style used by their competitors in favor of a more "hard-hitting" approach.

In his gossip column, Bob Talbert broke down Bonds contract for his readers, "Bill Bonds landed a $50,000 a year contact for anchoring their 6:00 PM and 11:00 PM newscasts. His primary responsibility is to boost WXYZ-TV's ratings."

***

With Bonds' return to WXYZ-TV, the station aggressively expanded its news department to make it more competitive in their television news market. Their news programs were expanded and renamed Channel 7 Action News and given a new on-screen look. The musical introduction was the same news theme that the ABC network used in its four other mega media markets: New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Chicago.

The music was an expanded version of a brief melody taken from the movie score of Cool Hand Luke written by Lalo Schifrin for the famous tar-spreading scene. The musical interlude had a teletype-sounding melody that commanded viewers' attention. Following the lead-in, Bonds welcomed his audience and began reading the teleprompter. WXYZ's ratings began to slowly rise.

Channel 7 raided on-air talent from Detroit's other news organizations. From Channel 2, they lured Marilyn Turner to do the weather segment, and to balance Bonds' hard edge, amicable John Kelly was brought in to co-anchor the newsdesk. For sports, Dave Diles continued his segment until he decided to leave the station over a personal issue. That left an opening for Channel 7 to bring in Al Ackerman from Channel 4, who had just been fired for editorializing on the air, something Channel 7 encouraged. The advertising department began running ads proclaiming "We Got Who You Wanted." Their persistence paid off. Within two years, Channel 7 Action News was the top-rated news station in Detroit.

 ***

Bill Bonds' triumphant return to his hometown was marred by an incident which foreshadowed what would ultimately end his career. Early Sunday morning on November 18, 1973, Bonds, his brother, and their wives were returning home after dining at a West Bloomfield restaurant. Bonds (41) told police that his car was sideswiped by Kenneth Moody (18) of Milford, Michigan, before Bonds' car lost control and went into a ditch. Bonds yelled at Moody and a fistfight ensued. Neither Bonds nor Moody, a student at Michigan State University, filed assault charges. Moody received a ticket for reckless driving. Bonds called a tow truck.

WXYZ-TV spokesperson told the press that Bonds was "a little shook up, and he aches a little, but other than that, he is fine." Bonds was sidelined from his anchorman position for a week to recover from the beating he took. He was taken to William Beaumont Hospital where he was treated for bruises, a swollen eye, and a possible hairline fracture of his cheekbone.

In January 1974, WNBC-TV in New York was shopping for a new anchorman. WXYZ offered Bonds a $75,000 contract to keep him in Detroit. Afterward, the Action News team scored their highest ratings to date, but to his station's chagrin, Bonds was arrested in West Bloomfield Township for drunk driving, littering, and driving without a license on May 5, 1974.

After a patrolman witnessed Bonds throwing a paper cup from his car into the street, he was stopped. Corporal Dan Pitsos determined that Bonds was drinking in his car and drunk. When asked Bonds to show his driver's license, he could not produce it. Bonds was taken to the Oakland County Jail in Pontiac and was held for six hours until his wife Joanne posted a $100 bond.

Bonds was charged with drunk driving and littering, but the charge of failing to carry his license was dropped. WXYZ-TV spokesperson Phil Nye refused to say whether the station would take disciplinary action against Bonds if convicted. Reaction from viewers about Bonds was mostly supportive and favorable.

Bonds pleaded guilty on October 8, 1974 to a reduced charge of driving with visibility impaired "due to the consumption of intoxicating liquor." He was ordered to enroll in Oakland County's Alcohol-Highway Safety Program. Under the reduced charge, the conviction would remain on Bond's driving record for seven years rather than life, and he received four bad-driving points instead of six. Bonds also had to surrender his license plates for thirty days. Because he refused to take a police breathalyzer test, his driving privilege was suspended for ninety days. 

WXYZ-TV general manager Jim Osborne announced that because this was Bonds' first offense, the station planned no disciplinary action, but in January 1975, Jac LeGoff from Channel 2 News jumped stations and slid into Bonds' primetime co-anchor spot at 6:00 PM, cutting Bonds back to the 7:00 PM and 11:00 PM News. 

By the end of the month, Bonds suffered a mild heart attack while on a business trip to Ft. Lauderdale, Florida. Only the week before, he had recovered from the flu at Bennett Community Hospital. Bonds took a leave of absence to recover his health and returned to Channel 7 on May 5, 1975 to anchor the 7:00 PM news, again just in time for the May ratings sweep.

On June 12, 1975, Bonds announced that he was moving to WABC-TV in New York City at the end of August, for a salary reported to be somewhere between $120,000 to $150,000. But only eleven months after taking the WABC anchor job, Bonds returned to Detroit and was glad to be back. The New York City media market was so huge that Bonds made little more than a blip in the ratings, so his contract was not renewed. Bonds returned to the WXYZ-TV Action News Team to co-anchor with John Kelly.

***

Bonds was at the top of his game. His agent negotiated a multiyear contract which began at the $200,000 mark. Bonds was the highest paid newsanchor in town. Despite his tarnished history at Channel 7 for excessive absences from the newsroom and bad publicity for two alcohol-related incidents, Bonds remained the number one anchorperson in the Detroit media market.

In the Detroit Free Press' annual readers' poll taken in September of 1981 for Detroit's most popular local anchorperson, Bonds netted 1,929 votes of over 7,000 ballots cast. Mort Crim of Channel 4 was in second place with 676 fewer votes. No other Detroit anchorperson could come close to Bonds popularity with the general public.

When Bonds withdrew from the local Emmy Awards competition in 1980, he called the awards "ludicrous, insulting, and a sham." Bonds was the only news celebrity to publicly withdraw from the televised event. He told WXYZ-TV vice president and general manager Jeanne Findlater, "I am not going to play the part of an Eight Mile Road whore because of the pimping that's going on for these little statuettes."

Bonds pointed out that unqualified people outside the television news community (actors, sports celebrities, advertisers, and academics) chose the nominees, and a Channel 2 executive was chairman of the nominating committee. Channel 2 received 37 nominations, Channel 7 received 19, and Channel 2 received just 16. There was a clear conflict of interest.

After the televised event, The Detroit Chapter of the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences announced that the Detroit Emmy Awards would no longer be broadcast because of public controversy and bad ratings. Such was Bill Bonds' influence over the local media scene.

But Bonds was about to be brought low with the death of his oldest daughter. On December 16, 1981, tragedy struck the Bonds' family when Joan Patricia Bonds (18), home for winter break from Michigan State University, was killed in a head-on collision with another car on a winding stretch of Commerce Road in Orchard Lake. Her Volkswagen Rabbit was hit by a Mercury driven by Russell William Brown (34), when it was believed his car crossed the center lane. Brown suffered a concussion and was treated at Osteopathic Hospital and released. Both cars were totalled.

The Orchard Lake Police investigation revealed that both Joan Patricia Bonds and Russell William Brown were legally drunk when the accident occured. Brown's blood alcohol level was 0.19 and Joan Bonds' blood alcohol level was 0.17. In Michigan, a person is legally drunk with a level of 0.10. Drunken driving was a misdemeanor carrying a maximum penalty of 90 days in county jail and/or a $500 fine. Brown was charged with the head-on crash. 

Bill Bonds was off the air for almost three weeks after the death of his daughter before returning to anchor Channel 7's 6:00 PM broadcast. At the end of the hour-long newscast, Bonds, holding back tears, thanked the many viewers who had called or written to express their condolences.

Bonds' health began to deteriorate in 1982. He complained his back and legs began to give him problems and sidelined him from December until February. WXYZ-TV spokesperson told the press that Bonds was on special assignment to downplay his absence.

On October 15, 1983, Bonds (50) collapsed in Metro Airport just before his scheduled flight to Tokyo to cover Mayor Coleman Young's tour of Japan. He complained about acute stomach pains and difficulty standing up and was taken to Wayne County General Hospital and held for tests and observation for several days. He missed his trip. Ruth Whitmore, spokesperson for Channel 7 said, "(Bill) needs rest. We won't push him to travel." Medical tests indicated that doctors found no heart damage. Bonds returned to the news desk the following Wednesday.

On Friday, February 3, 1984, Bonds was hospitalized for exhaustion. His physican said his patient was suffering from persistent problems with his lower legs. Numerous station sources believed Bonds' recent round of health problems were the result of grief over the death of his daughter. Others believed  he was being treated for drug and alcohol dependency. After a month of recuperating, Bonds returned to the anchor desk. 

Ten months later, Bonds' wife Joanne Sipsock (47) filed for divorce. They were married for 24 years and had four children: Joan [deceased in 1981], John, and twin daughters Krissy and Mary. By all accounts, it was a messy divorce. Some unspecified time later, Bonds announced that he had a "significant other" named Karen Field, who was a manufacturer's sales representative. His health and general disposition improved.

***

Bill Bonds' most notorious moment to date of his broadcasting career happened on Friday, July 14, 1989. At the end of his 11 PM broadcast where he was noticeably slurring his words, Bonds challenged Mayor Coleman Young to a charity boxing match to benefit the Detroit Public Schools athletic program. He proposed a one-round showdown at the Palace of Auburn Hills on August 11th during halftime at the Detroit Pistons' charity all-star exhibition game.

Mayor Coleman Young and Bill Bonds eating coneys downtown.

Bonds suggested that both he and Mayor Young put up $10,000 each to donate, along with the proceeds of the exhibition basketball game, to help restore varsity sports in Detroit.

Local media wags dubbed the fight "The Showdown in Motown" and "Malice at the Palace." One reporter wrote,"This is a way for Bill Bonds and Detroit Mayor Coleman Young to settle the accumulation of small but distracting grievances between them."

Then, Bonds was absent without official leave from his Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday night broadcasts. Station manager Tom Griesdorn arranged an impromptu news conference on Thursday to end speculation. "Bill called me earlier today and asked for some time off, vacation and personal leave, and we granted that request." 

Griesdorn refused to comment on the barage of questions that followed. Usually, he answered "No comment!" or "That's none of your business." The entire incident was a public relations disaster for Channel 7.

Some Channel 7 staffers, pleading for anonymity, leaked the news that Bonds asked the station for help and some time off to enter an unidentified medical facility for an unspecified treatment. Three weeks later, Griesdorn confirmed WXYZ-TV's worst-kept secret, "Bill Bonds revealed that he has a problem with alcoholism, and he has checked himself into a California clinic for treatment."

After drying out, Bonds returned to the newsdesk in August. At the end of his 6 PM newscast, he confessed publicly that he was an alcoholic, but a sober one ready to do the news once more. Maybe this time he would win his battle over the bottle. For now, he would have to be satisfied with winning over the hearts of many Detroiters, who were all too familiar with alcohol addiction in their families.

***

In 1991, WXYZ-TV signed Bonds to a long term contract (5 to 7 years) for a million dollars a year prompting many people to wonder why he was worth so much considering his checkered history at the station. The answer was simple. Advertising rates were dependent on ratings achieved. Bonds was a ratings generator for the station for most of his long career. He appeared twice daily anchoring the news, he hosted prime time specials, anchored local election coverage, and made countless public appearances for the station. Being number one in his media market for twenty consecutive years earned Bonds the nickname "The Million Dollar Man."

Always impeccably dressed on camera, Bill often wore Levis or shorts at the newsdesk.

Bonds kept his nose clean until an incident in April 1994 when his briefcase did not make it through security screening at Metro Airport. A pair of brass knuckles was detected at the inspection checkpoint. Although possessing a weapon was illegal in Michigan, the Wayne County Assistant Prosecutor said he determined there was "No criminal intent in this case. The brass knuckles were accidently possessed."

Bonds told authorities "I own four briefcases and grabbed the wrong one. Someone gave the brass knuckles to me as a gag-gift at work. I threw them in a briefcase and forgot about them." The knucks and the briefcase were turned over to airport police to be destroyed.

Once again, Bonds' celebrity status saved him considerable legal fallout, and he was able to catch his flight to New York City. Critics familiar with Bonds' background wondered, "How many bites at the apple can one person take?" Detroiters were about to find out.

***

On Sunday, August 7, 1994, Bonds was arrested on suspicion of drunk driving following a twenty-mile pursuit. A 1991, teal-blue Jaguar XJS was veering erratically on northbound Southfield Freeway. A driver called 911 and reported the incident. The sportscar swerved west onto I-696 before exiting at Orchard Lake Road. At a red light, a red Ferrari pulled up next to the Jag and revved its engine. Both cars peeled their tires when the light turned green, the Ferrari pulled out in front leaving the Jag fishtailing in its dust.

Another witness called 911 reporting that he saw Bill Bonds pull into a gas station to fuel up. On the way out of the station, Bonds smacked his car into a lamppost and then verred onto Indian Trail coming within inches of colliding with another car. As Bonds turned west down Commerce Road, five police cars closed in on him. It was soon discovered that the Jag did not belong to Bonds. It was a Channel 7 company car that he was joyriding in.

The Orchard Lake Police used video and audiotape to record Bonds as he performed a sobriety test while seated in the car. He declined a breathalyzer test and a standing sobriety test, citing neurological problems from an unspecified orthopedic condition--an excuse he had used successfully before.

Police later obtained blood samples after the arrest which showed Bonds' blood alcohol was 0.21%--twice the legal limit. He was jailed for twelve hours until his second wife Karen posted bail. If convicted, he faced six months in jail, a $500 fine, a suspended license for six months, and community service. Two days later, Free Press reporter Susan Ager wrote, "Bonds is captivating because he is an exquisitely flamboyant failure at self-improvement."

This incident threatened to end Bonds' reign at the summit of Detroit television news. Station manager Tom Griesdorn announced to the press that Bonds "asked for and was granted a personal leave of absence, the duration of which will be determined by the outcome of the allegations." Bonds remained in seclusion at his Union Lake home.

On August 11, 1994, Bonds was suspended from WXYZ-TV by Griesdorn pending "successful completion of alcohol treatment in Atlanta at Talbott-Marsh Recovery Center until his health is up to speed. The station wishes Bill Bonds every success as he sets about combating his addiction to alcohol once and for all." This was Bonds' third attempt at alcohol rehabilitation.

On December 2, 1994, Bonds pleaded guilty to a reduced charge of driving with an unlawful blood alcohol level; the driving under the influence charge was dismissed. His sentence included 12 months of supervised suspension with a 270-day license suspension, continued outpatient alcoholism treatment, a $1,115 fine exclusive of court costs, and attendance three times a week at Alcohol Anonymous meetings. If he did not comply with all stipulations of his sentencing, he would be jailed for 90 days.

On January 11, 1995, WXYZ-TV fired Bonds. "We've simply decided to hold our head high and face the future without Bill Bonds," said General Manager Griesdorn. "This is not a personal decision but simply a judgement about what is best for the station's long-term interest." Bill Bonds' long career with WXYZ-TV was over. Despite attempts to regain his footing at other Detroit media outlets, the old magic was gone. He was reduced to being a pitchman for Turf Builders and Gardiner-White Furniture.

A collage of photos from Bill Bonds' funeral.

On December 13, 2014, Bill Bonds died of a heart attack at St. Joseph Mercy Hospital in Pontiac, Michigan at the age of eighty-two. His visitation was on December 18th at Lynch & Sons Funeral Home in Clawson, with a funeral mass held at Holy Name Catholic Church in Birmingham the next day.

Despite Bonds' human failings, many thousands of working-class Detroiters admired him for his pluck, bluntness, and tenacity. He will be remembered for his on-air swagger, piercing gaze, defense of the underdog, and his authoritative delivery of the news.

John Bonds speaks at his father's memorial service

Diana Lewis--Detroit Icon