What do you think your parents and community were likely to have expected from you in terms of your career?. What employment possibilities do you think would have been open to you?. Imagine you were a teenager around the time the promotional film was made (1965). How important were automotive industry jobs in the Detroit area in the 1970s? In more recent years?. Display the above graph of employment in the automotive industry in the Detroit area and discuss: Ask students why Berry Gordy might have been a Detroit “booster.” ( Note to instructor: Inform the students that the song was co-written by Gordy, the man behind Detroit’s Motown Records, home of the Supremes, Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye, and many more.)ģ. How does the song’s image of Detroit compare with the image presented by the promotional video?. Play the short clip of the 1984 song “ Hello, Detroit,” by Sammy Davis Jr., and discuss: What was the main industry in Detroit at this time? (The instructor may wish to refer students back to the narrator’s explanation at the beginning of the clip that Detroit “has put the world on wheels,” as well as to the shots of the headquarters of Chrysler, General Motors, and Ford.)Ģ. According to the video, what was the prosperity of Detroit built upon in the mid-1960s?. How does the video use music to create a particular impression about Detroit?. What image of the city does the video project? What words come to mind?. Play the short clip from the 1965 promotional video about the city of Detroit and discuss: Bands such as MC5 and the Stooges eschewed the feel-good music long associated with Detroit through the success of Motown, producing instead a hard-edged, proto-Punk sound that managed to address both the limitations of working-class life and the general frustrations of youth.ġ. 
But for many of the thousands of young people growing up in Detroit’s blue-collar neighborhoods, the city was less about progress and prosperity than the prospect of a life with few options beyond the monotony of a factory job.Īs happened in so many other contexts, the young people of Detroit in the postwar era turned to music to express their frustrations and to challenge society’s expectations for them. Home of the thriving American auto industry, Detroit and its legendary assembly lines reflected the nation’s command of industry and its international economic dominance. It was usually, were you gonna work the line, or were you gonna work in a tool and die shop, and how many fingers were you gonna lose by the end of your career?įew places represented the prosperity of the postwar United States and the allure of the American dream better than Detroit in the 1950s and early 60s. And really, when you grew up in Detroit in those areas, you had one of two ways to go. They were guys who lived in the disused parts of Detroit, the industrial parts. Promotional film for the city of Detroit, 1965 Detroit’s strategic location, its reservoir of know-how, its ability to deliver manpower, places it in the vanguard of choice spots in which to build, manufacture, and expand. Like a stout heart within the city is Detroit industry, the vital pulse beat of technology and resources, which has put the world on wheels.
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