We enjoyed the chapters about Detroit’s Olympic bid. The number of tourists and fame described was astounding and those in our group who were alive to see it feel it may have been a bit exaggerated. It does help explain the road in Dearborn called Rotunda, though. Speaking of being from here, many of us were surprised to hear about the Ford Rotunda.
For someone from another area, they’d likely get bogged down in the details and not want to continue. For someone from Detroit, the topic was engaging enough because we are around the thing he’s talking about. It was very well researched, maybe too much so. The best description of the book a member gave was “interesting and tedious.” The topics were interesting and Maraniss picked a good time in Detroit history to focus on. Many of our members remembered when Detroit’s offering of steady employment and strong industry was a draw and sense of price for the city. Seeing Detroit built up as this pillar of American modernity and progress just to know that it will be home to terrible race riots, high murder rates, government corruption, economic depression, and bankruptcy feels like watching a beautiful ship sink to the bottom of the ocean.
This thing is so wonderful and great and you’re looking at it thinking, “Wow! How incredible is this!” and the whole time, you know it’s going to sink because that’s history and you can’t change it. Our moderator likened it to watching the Titanic movie. We felt it implied that Detroit was no longer a great city, that it had lost that greatness. One issue some people had with the book was the title. I read Once in a Great City a couple of weeks ago and I’ll be posting about it again in a few weeks when author David Maraniss comes to speak in my area. I’m back to my book clubs! My class is over for the semester which means I’m free on Monday nights again and can join in on the discussions.
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