Henry Ford II vs. Harry Bennett and Lee Iacocca

Ford World Headquarters [the Glasshouse] in Dearborn, Michigan.

After Ford Motor Company (FoMoCo) president Edsel Ford died at the age of forty-nine from stomach cancer, his eighty-year-old father Henry reinstalled himself as company president. Despite surviving two strokes, the elder Ford was not comfortable with retirement or handing his company over to a successor.

With the help of FoMoCo's security and personnel director, Rasputin-like Harry Bennett, Henry Ford was able to maintain his weakened grip on the company that bore his name. Bennett was Henry's eyes and ears in the sprawling FoMoCo industrial complex. In the Medieval world, Bennett would have carried the title of Regent as he tried to maneuver himself into the top spot.

Although Harry Bennett never exercised any real administrative power at the company, other than that delegated to him personally by Henry Ford, now he was Ford's right hand man who took advantage of his declining and infirm boss to assume powers never delegated to him. 

This disturbed Henry's wife Clara and his daughter-in-law Eleanor, Edsel's widow, who feared a power play to wrestle the company away from the family at Henry's death. Clara and Eleanor believed Bennett helped destroy Edsel's health from constant torment, and Eleanor vowed she would not allow him to rob her son, Henry Ford II, of his birth right. Both women and all of Edsel's children held Bennett beneath contempt.

Late in July 1943, Henry Ford II was released from the United States Navy by President Franklin Roosevelt. He was made executive vice-president of the company on August 10, 1943. Harry Bennett and Henry Ford II begrudgingly co-existed until Eleanor gave her father-in-law an utimatum. Retire and install her eldest son as company president, or she would sell off her stock ending the family's total ownership of the corportation. The old man was befuddled and approaching death; he had no fight left in him. On September 21, 1945, FoMoCo's Board of Directors elected Henry Ford II as the company's third president.

Henry Ford II

The twenty-eight-year-old, new Ford president's first priority was to sever Harry Bennett from the company. After a heated exchange between the two men in Bennett's basement office in the Ford Administrative Building, Bennett was told to clean out his desk because his services were no longer required. The fifty-three-year-old pretender to the Ford throne retorted, "You're taking over a billion-dollar organization that you haven't contributed a goddamned thing to!" Bennett spent the rest of the afternoon burning his personal files before he left.

To avoid a protacted and ugly legal battle, Bennett was given a "no-show" position with the company at a nominal salary for eighteen months until he could get his thirty years in with the company. Then, he drew the standard retirement benefit of $424 per month. Upon leaving FoMoCo, Bennett remarked to the press, "I feel like I'm getting out of prison." Nobody felt sorry for him.

***

The inexperienced grandson of the company's founder brought in his brothers Benson and William Clay to help with the management of the world's largest industrial giant. To make their imprint on the company and impress the auto industry, the Ford brothers set their designers, engineers, and marketing men to the task of developing the car of the future with a nameplate to honor their late father called the Edsel.

In death as in life, Edsel Ford could not get a break. His name became synonymous with epic automotive failure. After that public humiliation, it was clear to Henry Ford II that the company needed reorganization.

In a November 11, 1960 press conference at FoMoCo's World Headquarters [the Glass House], Henry, the Second, now known informally as "the Deuce," announced that his company would undergo a reorganization. He was going to step down as president after only fifteen years holding that position and installed himself as chairman of the company's board of directors, as his grandfather Henry had done when he brought his son Edsel in as president in 1919.

Forty-four-year-old Robert S. McNamara was introduced as the corporation's new president. This marked the first time a non-Ford family member held that position. McNamara announced the formation of a separate Automotive Assembly Division to oversee the seventeen domestic Ford plants spread over twelve states to streamline management and improve production.

Named to head the division as vice-president and general manager was Lee Anthony Iacocca from Allentown, Pennsylvania. Iacocca announced that FoMoCo would be introducing new, fuel efficient compact models to compete with foreign imports and Chevrolet's popular Corvair Monza. His first success was the two-door Falcon Futura with contoured bucket seats, a center console, and carpeting. The Futura was powered by a lightweight, aluminum-alloy, four cylinder engine.

Lee Anthony Iacocca

Iacocca was a marketing and promotional expert. He pitched the Futura as the "compact cousin of the popular Thunderbird." Iacocca realized that to climb out of the industry-wide recession, FoMoCo needed to appeal to an emerging demographic--the female sector of young, independent women who were looking for a stylish, economical car that was easy to drive and park. 

Ford dealers were worried about depreciation and the trade-in value of economy cars. It was no secret that dealers made more profit on their high-end models like the Thunderbird and the Lincoln Continental. One argument against the shift to a compact line of cars was salesmen felt the smaller cars downgraded their image to their customers, and the smaller cars were not big enough to hold their sample and sales kits.

Always the promoter, Iacocca contended that their full-sized, luxury models were still available for status-conscious consumers and reminded them that FoMoCo built its reputation and legacy by providing low-cost transportation to the masses.

On April 21, 1961, Iacocca announced the huge success of 20,000 advance dealer orders for the upgraded Falcon Futura. Second quarter production increased by 51% which outran the industry average of 26%. That translated to 145,000 units built during the second quarter. FoMoCo plants were working three shifts to keep pace with orders. Iacocca's star began to rise.

Not content with being a one-hit wonder, Iacocca introduced the Ford Fairlane on August 25, 1961, as a mid-sized, economy car offering. Like the Falcon line, the Fairlane quickly found its audience helping FoMoCo break sales records. Overall Ford sales in 1961 reached their highest point since the Model T in 1925.

In April of 1964, Iacocca introduced the car that would enshrine him in the annals of automobile history--the Mustang. This time Iacocca targeted the enormous market of Baby Boomers, children born after World War II, who were entering the new car market for the first time; multiple-car families, a quickly growing demographic; and the increasing ranks of young, professional women. This was the right product at the right time. Mustang sales set a record pace of 152,000 units in the first five months of production.

Interest in the Mustang was so keen that crowds of people were drawn to FoMoCo showrooms across the country. Many car buyers walked out with the a new 1964 Thunderbird, whose sales rose 65% over the previous year. The Mustang had coattails.

Iacocca was clearly Ford's Golden Boy. Both Time magazine and Newsweek used his image for their cover stories on the Mustang miracle. It took some time to rise above the ranks, but on December 10, 1970, the Deuce promoted Iacocca to company president. 

Iacocca was a respected advertising man at heart who had no trouble talking before the press or pitching new ideas to his staff. His engineering team did preliminary planning and design work on two new products which Henry Ford II summarily shot down.

The relationship between him and Iacocca declined to the point that heated arguments broke out in the board room. Ford made it clear that it was his name on the building. On July 13, 1978, the Deuce dismissed Iacocca for the oblique reason that "sometimes you just don't like someone."

Iacocca was heavily courted by the Chrysler Corporation, which was struggling to survive for quite some time. They hired Iacocca as CEO [Chief Executive Officer] four months after he was fired from FoMoCo, making him the only man in history to lead two of Detroit's Big Three [GM, Ford, and Chrysler].

Iacocca lured several disgruntled Ford executives and engineers away from FoMoCo, along with his Mini-Max concept vehicle which the Deuce had rejected. It became reincarnated as the Dodge Caravan/Plymouth Voyager minivan which, along with the K-Car, saved Chrysler from bankrupcy, prompting the Deuce to remark, "Harry Bennett was the dirtiest, lousiest son-of-a-bitch I ever met in my life, except for Lee Iacocca." Nobody felt sorry for him.

The Tragedy of Edsel Ford 

The Spill the Honey Foundation and the Paintings of DeVon Cunningham

The Spill the Honey Foundation is an alliance of Jewish Americans and African Americans dedicated to using the arts to promote human dignity by advancing public awareness of the European Holocaust and American slavery. In addition, the group draws attention to contemporary social injustices and systemic oppression to advance cultural tolerance. They strive to spread dignity, goodness, and kindness among all people in a cross-generational effort to improve the DNA of the soul by countering racism and antisemitism.

This non-profit organization takes its name from the inspirational story of Eli Ayalon, a teenaged survivor of the Nazis. Forty years after maintaining his self-enforced silence after World War II, Ayalon shared the story of how his mother told him the family was going to be separated from the Warsaw Ghetto in Poland and send east to the concentration camps. She knew they would never see each another again.

Young Ayalon was allowed by the Nazis to leave the ghetto and return because he ran errands for their German oppressors. “When you leave tomorrow,” his mother told him, “never return. Never! Struggle to survive.”

His mother gave him a small, gauze-covered cup with some honey in it. “Eli,” she said, “honey sweetens the sting of hate. Close your eyes to see beyond the pain and suffering to celebrate the sweetness of life. Spill the honey.”

From this painful memory between a mother and son, Eli Ayalon went from being a survivor to becoming a messenger of hope. The Spill the Honey Foundation was inspired by the Jewish wisdom of Elizer Ayalon and the civil rights movement of Dr. Martin Luther King.

***

DeVon Cunningham and me in his art studio. [11/11/2021]

In 2018, the Spill the Honey Foundation under the direction of Dr. Sheri Rogers brought Detroit docuartist DeVon Cunningham on as art director to create a series of eighteen original paintings for display in each of the eighteen Holocaust museums nationwide.

The collection was scheduled originally for its debut at the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History in Detroit’s Cultural Center in 2020. But due to Covid restrictions, the debut exhibition was cancelled. Mr. Cunningham is working to reschedule the exhibition while the collection is still intact.

Many of Mr. Cunningham's Spill the Honey paintings contain the melding of the Christian crucifix and the Hebrew Star of David to symbolize the underlying ties of both religious traditions. The Spill the Honey Foundation is a model to show how different communities can find common goals and work together.

The shape of the hexagon appears in several paintings as a unifying image linking the concept of the honeycomb, the bees, and the honey of the natural world to the goals of the Spill the Honey Foundation, which are to spread peace, harmony and justice, using college student ambassadors to bring the movement to young people.

Reconciling the inequities of history will not happen without bearing witness to the documented truths of the past—the good, the bad, and the ugly. I believe we owe future generations that much.

Shared Legacies trailer 

The Tragedy of Edsel Ford - Death by a Thousand Cuts

Edsel Ford

Unlike Edsel Ford's children, Edsel was not born in the lap of luxury. His father and mother, Henry and Clara, lived on the cusp of poverty while Henry invested every spare cent he could earn at the Edison Illumination Company in Detroit to develop his horseless carriage made of four bicycle wheels, a carriage frame, a tiller steering lever, an upholstered bench seat, and a two-cylinder, four horsepower, chain driven engine. He called his contraption the Quadricycle.

On June 4th, 1896 at the age of thirty-two, Henry Ford took the first of many test drives. Although he had no memory of it, his four-year-old son Edsel took his first ride in a self-powered vehicle. Ford quit his job at Edison in 1899 to focus on building automobiles and formed the Detroit Automobile Company. Two years later [1901], he formed the Henry Ford Company, and two years after that, he founded the Ford Motor Company [1903]. While Henry struggled to dominate the early automobile business, he and Clara lived in twelve different places before he had Fair Lane manor built in 1913 through 1915. Edsel was in his early twenties when the mansion was completed.

Ford's original quadricycle

Although his parents doted on him, Edsel's home life was anything but stable. As a child, Edsel went to a private grammar school in Connecticut and then attended Detroit University School, a local private college preparatory school. The family company was the most stability Edsel had in his young life. He grew up with the Ford Motor Company (FoMoCo) and would hang around the design and pattern shops on his school vacations where he became acquainted with master model-maker and Ford engineer Charles "Cast Iron Charlie" Sorensen. Sorensen, who over the course of his forty-year career with Henry Ford and his company, would become young Edsel's lifelong friend and mentor.

Rather than take the next step into a university education, Edsel made the decision to enter the family business at age eighteen. I'm sure his father prompted him to make this decision. Henry Ford was a no-nonsense, self-made man who was distrustful of university educated types. All of the early, key people in the company had come up the hard way like Ford did. But rather than break Edsel in on the grimy foundry floor or the assembly line, Ford sent his son to work in the business end of the operation in financing. Edsel never dressed less than sartorial [well-tailored]. His personal taste in clothing was impeccable in stark contrast to those he worked with, but his work ethic and integrity soon won over most people.

In 1915, James Couzens resigned as secretary/treasurer of FoMoCo in protest of Henry Ford's public, pacifist statements and pro-German sentiments while on a European "peace ship" mission. Edsel was the heir apparent and succeeded Couzens becoming the company's first finance director--a title made especially for Edsel. His father did not like titles for his excutives and preferred they be called simply "Ford Men." Henry Ford felt he could utilize and control them better if there was ambiguity in the management ranks.

The company's great chain of being had room for only one person at the top--Henry Ford. Despite that, Henry stepped aside in 1919, and Edsel became the president of the company while Henry remained on his company's board of directors. The elder Ford held over 50% of the company's stock. That was his trump card. With his son, Henry began a secret project which resulted in the development of a small block V-8 engine and the Model A, which saved the company from bankrupcy and the General Motors Corporation whose Chevrolet division was eating away at FoMoCo's dominance in the low priced market.

Here is where the plot thickens: A year after Edsel's management promotion, he married Eleanor Lowthian Clay [19], a socialite who was the niece of J.L. Hudson, the department store founder. The newlyweds did not want to live at the Fair Lane manor with Edsel's parents. The elder Fords were crestfallen. They had Fair Lane built especially with the thought of keeping Edsel under their wing. The manor was built near the banks of the Rouge River with a built-in swimming pool, a game room, a bowling alley, a billiards room, a boathouse, and a riding stable all designed with their son in mind.

According to Charles Sorensen in his autobiography My Forty Years with Ford, "Father and mother wanted to keep their only son close to them and guide his every thought.... Like all normal young people, Edsel wanted to be on his own to see and experience the world." Important people began to admire and respect the young executive which rankled his father who was jealous of anyone who seemed to wield influence with his son. "Henry Ford's greatest failure was expecting his son to be like him," Sorensen wrote. "Edsel's greatest victory, despite all obstacles, was in being himself."

The Edsel Fords made their first home in Detroit's Indian Village neighborhood on Iroquois Street where all four of their children were born: Henry II [1917], Benson [1919], Josephine [1923], and William Clay [1925]. In 1929, the Edsel Fords moved to Gaukler Point in Grosse Pointe with 3,000 feet of shoreline on Lake St. Clair and a walled-off, massive estate. Grosse Pointe was where wealthy and influential Detroiters lived, some residents with ties to Ford's arch competitor General Motors.

Henry II [the Deuce], Benson, Josephine, William Clay

The Henry Fords were nonsmoking teetolalers who disapproved of rumors of Edsel's riotous living, like attending cocktail parties and joining a country club. Edsel was being surveilled by Harry Bennett's men. It was being reported that Edsel was being corrupted by alcohol. The Edsel Ford's always kept a fully stocked bar in their home, even during Prohibition. Henry was distrustful of Edsel's new friends in Grosse Pointe, but Edsel chose his own friends and adopted a modernist sensibility apart from the fundamentalism of his parents.

With the help of his wife Eleanor, Edsel educated himself in the arts and literature and became an art collector. In contrast, Henry Ford was raised a farm boy with a sixth grade, rural education who was fond of saying, "A Ford can take you anywhere, except into society." He was wrong. This was the beginning of a serious riff between Edsel and his father.

Henry Ford put his controversial henchman Harry Bennett on Edsel's neck to disabuse him of the notion that he was actually the president of FoMoCo. It was clear to everyone that Edsel wore the mantle, but his father was the power behind the throne. Edsel had the title but not the scepter that went with it. Sorensen noted that "Henry could not let go, and Edsel did not know how to take over."

Harry Bennett with Henry Ford

Edsel always deferred to his father's edicts and allowed him to trample on his dignity, first with the company and later by tampering with the private lives of Edsel's family and inlaws, usually through the efforts of Harry Bennett. The elder Ford was primarily responsible for crushing his son's spirit. Ford believed his son was weak, and he blamed himself for overprotecting Edsel with the "cushion of advantage." For the sake of the company, Henry felt he needed to toughen the boy up.

Of his many transgressions against his son, the elder Ford found fault with anything Edsel wanted to do to make FoMoCo more competitive. Edsel wanted to modernize the company with college-educated executives, but Henry would not stand for that. He wanted his executives to start at the bottom and work themselves up the corporate ladder.

In 1919, Henry Ford bought the Dearborn Independent newspaper. At his personal direction, Ford instructed his editor William Cameron and his FoMoCo administrative assistant Ernest Liebold to begin a journalist rampage against the Jews and the International Banking Conspiracy. Edsel had many Jewish friends and implored his father to shut down his antisemitic screed. To compound matters, Henry Ford required his dealers to include a copy of the newspaper in every new vehicle sold resulting in lost sales. American Jews would not be caught dead buying a Ford car.

In 1922, many of the articles were compiled into a book called The International Jew, which sold well in the United States and found an enthusiastic audience in Germany. Thirty-three-year-old German militant Adolf Hitler kept a well-read, dog-eared copy of the book on his desk and had a signed photo of Henry Ford on the wall of his office. After losing a very public and expensive lawsuit, Henry Ford was forced to shut down the paper in 1927, but the damage had been done, much to the personal embarrassment of Edsel and Eleanor.

Another tramatic event for FoMoCo was the Battle of the Overpass on May 26, 1937 between underworld thugs hired by Harry Bennett and the United Auto Workers (UAW), who were distributing pro-union literature on the Miller Road pedestrian bridge leading into the Rouge Plant. Detroit News photographer James J. Kilpatrick, snapped a few quick photos and jumped into a waiting car to avoid a beating and a busted up camera. The photos appeared in the evening edition of the Detroit News, and by morning, it was picked up nationally and internationally.

Edsel was struggling with his health and wanted the company to settle the contract which had already been settled at General Motors and Chrysler Corporation. Henry Ford wanted to dig in and bust more heads. He gave Harry Bennett free reign and unlimited funds to break the UAW, which Ford believed was communist-inspired socialism. Clara Ford summoned Charles Sorensen to Fair Lane to ask, "Who is this [Harry] Bennett, that has so much control of my husband?" She did not like what she heard from Sorensen.

Clara Ford threatened her husband Henry with divorce and selling off her FoMoCo stock if a contract settlement was not reached immediately. That got the old man's attention, but Edsel was in no condition to negotiate, so in a stroke of twisted irony, Ford had Harry Bennett represent the company and settle the contract.

Clara Bryant Ford

In another blunder of epic proportions, Henry Ford was awarded the Grand Cross of the German Eagle for his 50th birthday in 1936 as a token of Adolph Hitler's admiration. The medal made of gold was replete with four Nazi swastikas. Mindful of its propaganda value, Hitler's two German representatives stood on each side of Henry Ford with the medal hanging prominately around his neck and had a publicity photo taken. The photo appeared in newspapers worldwide. Ford appeared sympathetic with the Nazi cause in Europe, prompting many Americans to again question whose side Ford was on and consequently losing FoMoCo business. Edsel Ford pleaded with his father to denounce Hitler publicly, but he would not relent.

Edsel was friends with Democrat President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who Henry Ford despised as a socialist. When President Roosevelt asked Edsel Ford to get behind the World War II war effort, Edsel agreed to put the might of FoMoCo behind the war effort and vowed to do anything he could. Henry did everything he could to undermine the Willow Run bomber project fearing the government would take over his company, but after Hitler invaded Poland, Ford was forced to admit that Hitler was a dictator and enemy of the United States.

Along with plant manager Charles Sorensen and architect Albert Kahn, Edsel Ford dedicated the last years of his life to designing and constructing the largest bomber plant in the world which became the cornerstone of the United States' Arsenal of Democracy. The stress and strain of the job and the harassment by his father and Harry Bennett finally caught up with Edsel. In January of 1942, Edsel was operated on for stomach ulcers. The elder Ford believed his son only needed to "change his way of living." He thought his chiropractor could cure him. When surgeons opened Edsel up, they discovered incurable metastatic stomach cancer. Edsel Ford hung on for eighteen months but died at one-ten a.m. on May 26, 1943 from cancer and undulant fever brought on by drinking unpasteurized milk from Ford Farms.

B-24 Liberator Bomber

Although Edsel did not live to see the end of World War II, his boast of producing a complete B-24 bomber every hour was achieved. The Willow Run Bomber Plant and adjoining airport represent Edsel's greatest achievement against overwhelming odds where the stakes could not have been higher. His father's fame plateaued after the construction of the Rouge Plant; Edsel's fame rests squarely upon the miracle of the B-24 Bomber Plant. The elder Ford may have put America on wheels, but his son was instrumental in making the world safe for democracy and preserving the American way of life.

The Willow Run Story 

Haddon Sundblom, Santa Claus, and Playboy Magazine

Haddon Sundblom's first Santa image for Coca-Cola in 1931.

 

Haddon Sundblom is one of the most successful and influential American commercial artists of the twentieth century. It would be difficult to find anyone who isn't familiar with Sundblom's grandfatherly images of Santa painted for Coca-Cola between the years 1931-1964. The company still uses these images over the Christmas holiday. Sundblom did commercial art for Coke throughout his years with the company giving their product a wholesome American image.

In addition to his Coke account, Sundblom created commercial art and advertising for Ladies Home Journal, Cashmere Bouquet Soap, Cream of Wheat, and many other national brands. He illustrated the famous Quaker Oats man and the infamous Aunt Jemima--two of his national trademark creations. In the mid-1930s, Sundblom did pin-up art and glamour pieces for pulp magazine covers and promotional calendars which were popular through the 1950s.

Miss Sylvania - 1960

At the age of seventy-three, Sundblom came out of retirement for a commission that brought his art full circle. Playboy magazine asked Sundblom to paint the cover image for its December 1972 edition. He was able to merge his Santa imagery with his pin-up career in a painting he named Naughty Santa.

 The Coca-Cola Santa Story

White Castle Rules!

One of my guilty pleasures when flying into Detroit is stopping at the White Castle on Telegraph Road and Northline. My favorite item is the #2 combo--two double-cheese burgers and fries with a medium soft drink. The family-owned chain services the Midwest and Mid-Atlantic states, so most of the country is unaware of this delectable taste treat.

White Castle slider

Their signature product consists of a thin square of 100% ground beef with five steam holes punched into it. The patty is cooked on a bed of diced onions and topped with a steamed hamburger bun, dressed with dill pickles, mustard and ketchup, and served up in a cardboard sleeve. One food critic called it "French onion soup on a bun." To be honest, either you love them or you hate them.

Walter A. Anderson began his restaurant career working at food stands in Wichita, Kansas. In 1916, he bought an obsolete streetcar and converted it into a diner. He had opened two more diners by the time he met businessman Edgar Wolds "Billy" Ingram and co-founded the first White Castle restaurant on an original investment of $700 in 1921.

White Castle #1

Since the publication of The Jungle by Upton Sinclair in 1906 exposing the unsanitary practices of the meat packing industry in Chicago, Americans were reluctant to eat ground beef. Aware of this, the White Castle founders sought to change the public's perception by stressing cleanliness in their restaurants and high quality ingredients.

 

Their earliest buildings had white enameled brick exteriors and enameled steel counters. By the 1930s, the chain's restaurants were built with prefabricated white-porcelain enameled steel exteriors and outfitted with stainless steel counters. Buildings were designed so customers could see their food being prepared by employees who had to conform to a strict dress code. White Castle produced the first disposable paper hats, napkins, and cardboard sleeves to package their product.

Short-order cook Walter Anderson is credited with the invention of the hamburger bun and the assembly-line kitchen which replaced experienced cooks with employees who could operate the griddle with minimal training. Chain-wide standardization assured the same product and service at all their locations. Often imitated but never duplicated, numerous earlier competitors were unable to match White Castle's success.

The fast-food industry we take for granted today was unknown in America before the White Castle chain. Anderson and Ingram gave rise to the fast-food phenomenon. There was no infrastructure to support their business expansion, so Anderson and Ingram established centralized bakeries, meat suppliers, branded paper manufacturing, and warehouses to supply their system's needs.

In 1933, Anderson sold his half of the business to Billy Ingram. The following year, the company moved its corporate offices to Columbus, Ohio, the center of their distribution area. Ingram's business savvy is credited for the popularity of the hamburger in America.

Since the beginning, White Castle has been privately owned, and none of its restaurants are franchised. Founder Billy Ingram retired in 1958 as CEO, followed by his son E.W. Ingram Jr, and then his grandson E.W. Ingram III. In December 2015, Ingram III stepped down and his daughter Lisa Ingram became the fourth CEO of the company.

The Ingram family's refusal to franchise or take on debt throughout the company's existence has kept the chain relatively small with only about 420 outlets--all in the United States. By comparison, McDonald's has 36,000 outlets worldwide with 14,000 of those in the United States. In recent years, White Castle has been selling sliders at supermarkets nationwide.

On January 27, 2015, White Castle opened its first outlet in the western United States at the Casino Royale Hotel on the Las Vegas Strip--the chain's first expansion into a different state in fifty-six years. On its first day of business, the restaurant had to close for two hours to restock their depleted supplies. In its first twelve hours of operation, the store sold 4,000 sliders per hour. It appears that I'm not the only one who enjoys this guilty pleasure.

Delray, Detroit and O-So Pop: https://fornology.blogspot.com/2014/08/detroits-ghost-town-delray-and-o-so.html

The Elusive Purple Gang Audio Now Available

Rich Miller

At last, the audio of my latest true crime book The Elusive Purple Gang: Detroit's Kosher Nostra is available from Amazon, Audible.com, and iTunes. I wanted a professional voice artist, recording on professional recording equipment. My publisher Wheatmark Inc. recommended Rich Miller and arranged for him to make a demo recording of my first chapter. I liked it.

I met with Rich in Tucson, Arizona, and discovered he has an acting background ranging from Shakespeare to modern theater like Damn Yankees and August: Osage County. He has worked in theatrical sound design and done voice over work in television commercials.

Now, Rich operates his own recording studio and acts out stories in front of a microphone. He is the creator and host of a podcast named The Audiobook Speakeasy aimed at narrators, offering them content from audio coaches, sound engineers, casting directors, and contract specialists. 

I chose Rich to narrate The Elusive Purple Gang because I wanted someone who could read my book in a conversational tone to make the storytelling more engaging for the listener. Rich's subtle voice characterizations make listening a pleasure.

Elusive Purple Gang Audio Link 

Rich Voice Productions 

Detroit Time Capsule Anthology

After a decade writing 500 Fornology posts, I'm proud to announce the publication of my fifth book Detroit Time Capsule, which is a collection of seventy-five of my re-edited, best Detroit posts including significant historic moments, biographies of people who left their mark on the city, and memories of media personalities in the early days of Detroit television.

Detroit Time Capsule is a trip down memory lane, which should resonate with nostalgic Baby Boomers and contemporary Detroiters with a taste for learning their town's rich history and heritage.

This anthology makes a great holiday gift for readers who have an interest in easy to digest Detroit history. Most chapters are not tied by a narrative thread and can be read in three to five minutes.

And finally, I want to acknowledge Detroit/Ypsilanti photographer Chris Ahern for his striking photograph of the Monument to Joe Louis, aka The Fist (1986) by Robert Graham.

Detroit Time Capsule Amazon site