Elene Usdin first came to Detroit in 2014, for a show at the Museum of New Art (MONA). Since then, she has been compelled to return, taking portraits and meeting new people with each visit. In 2019, she was the inaugural artist-in-residence at Art in Woodbridge, with the mission to take a collective portrait of the arty and eclectic neighbourhood, positioned just adjacent to Wayne State University and the Midtown/Cass Corridor area. Some of the residents are transitional-students, artists, faculty - and others have been in Woodbridge for generations, making it one of Detroit's most diverse and eye-catching neighbourhoods, rich with public art and living history. Usdin's portraits reflect her ability to connect deeply with her subjects; each seems to capture a resident or environment within Woodbridge completely on their own terms. The artist shoots both analog film and digital; and for the second wave of wintertime photos, she worked with a special camera lent to her by Fuji Film. Usdin is an internationally-recognized working photographer, as well as an accomplished illustrator, and supplements her photographs with hand-drawn maps and notes on her Woodbridge experience. The book comes together as a unified and gorgeous look at a thriving Detroit neighbourhood, through the eyes of a foreign artist who already seems very much at home.

We Are Woodbridge (Title Not in Series)

Arts & Photography

Individual Artists

Wayne State University Press

Smith, Hinchman & Grylls: 125 Years of Architecture and Engineering, 1853-1978

Holleman, Thomas & Gallagher, James

Over the past forty years, since the enactment of Medicare and Medicaid, health care has been a hotly debated public policy issue. In the eyes of many, the U.S. health care system suffers from three major challenges: It does not cover and provide access to enough people, it functions inefficiently, and it could provide a better quality of care.

Taking Care of the Uninsured: A Path to Reform

Health, Fitness & Dieting

Smith, Lucille

Chesney, James D

Smitherman Jr., Herbert C

Taueg, Cynthia

Mach, Jennifer

Reference

The people of Detroit experienced the American revolutionary era in unique ways. More than any locale in North America, it was where French, British, American, and Native American cultures collided and melded during the second half of the eighteenth century. The British takeover of Detroit from the French in 1760 and Pontiac's War in 1763 brought revolutionary changes to the frontier town earlier than most places. Instability also lasted longer. The British did not relinquish control of its largest outpost on the Great Lakes until 1796-thirteen years after the United States won its independence. Ultimately, the American Revolution introduced international boundaries to a region where the Detroit River had always been a highway, not a border. The essays in this volume put a human face on this fascinating and fiery period of Detroit's past. Each provides a portrait into how an individual, family, or other group responded to and shaped the dramatic changes around them. Revolutionary Detroit witnessed murders, betrayals, hangings, shipwrecks, slavery, servitude, captive-taking, and more. The town serves as an ideal historical laboratory for analyzing military actions, shifting alliances, and cultural interactions on the frontier during a particularly volatile time.

Revolutionary Detroit: Portraits in Political and Cultural Change, 1760-1805

History

Detroit Historical Society

Americas

The Kwame Sutra is the definitive volume on the rise and fall of Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, told in his own words - including many he never expected the world to see. This slim but comprehensive volume recounts Kilpatrick's career and the text message scandal that drove him from office and is authored by the reporters who took Kilpatrick down. It includes previously unpublished text messages, comments as photos. The book uses Kilpatrick's own words to put the truth to the many lies he told, including sections in which Kilpatrick's public comments are juxtaposed with his contradictory private thoughts, captured in candid text messages typed by his own hands. Unlike many books that speculate on what its subject is thinking, for the first time ever the subject's own private text messages - including many sexually-explicit missives - reveal what is on the subject's mind. While The Kwame Sutra contains some salacious material, it is a fun but serious look back at the self-destructive career of a rising star who seemed headed for the White House, but instead ended up in the big house, sentenced to 28 years in federal prison for turning Detroit's city hall into the hub of a vast criminal enterprise that contributed to Detroit's status as the largest city in U.S. history to file for bankruptcy.

The Kwame Sutra: Musings on Lust, Life and Leadership, from Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick (Title Not in Series)

Biographies & Memoirs

Leaders & Notable People

Robert Wilbert's work has been collected by numerous institutions, including the Detroit Institute of Arts and several national corporations. Among his many commissions are the design of the 1987 U.S. postage stamp commemorating the state of Michigan's sesquicentennial, the official portrait of James Blanchard, governor of Michigan, and that of Irvin D. Reid, President of Wayne State University. Additionally, his thirty-eight years as a professor in the art department at Wayne State University and coordinator of the painting area were instrumental in bringing the program to prominence, locally and nationally. Wilbert nurtured generations of students who have gone on to successful national careers, contributing to the arts in very positive ways, as artists, writers, educators, curators, and art dealers. This volume traces Wilbert's career as an artist, teacher, mentor, and advocate for the arts in essays and interviews with the artist and various contributors close to him.
Robert Wilbert: Ennobling the Ordinary was conceived as a publication under the auspices of Detroit Focus, which has a thirty-two year history as a nonprofit artist organization in the greater Detroit area. The primary mission of Detroit Focus has always been to serve artists and educate the community. The organization has produced numerous art exhibitions, catalogues, public sculpture, and site-specific installations; it has also commissioned artwork and for fourteen years published The Detroit Focus Quarterly. Wilbert's values, attitudes, innate talent and intellect offer thoughtful building blocks for a career in the arts. Young artists seeking a place in the broad spectrum of the art world can gain much from this intimate study of an artist who deliberately chose to remain in the Detroit community.

Robert Wilbert: Ennobling the Ordinary

Detroit Focus

History & Criticism

Piers Gaveston is perhaps the most infamous royal favorite in English history. Elevated to the peerage as Earl of Cornwall by Edward II in 1307, he was an influential figure in the first years of the king's reign. Gaveston's brief but turbulent career culminated in his murder in 1312. Over the course of seven centuries, the image of Gaveston has been reduced to little more than a parody of the historical figure. He is commonly viewed as a sycophantic homosexual with a marked tendency towards avarice, nepotism, and excessive pride. As a result, it is difficult to assess Gaveston's impact on various aspects of Edward's reign, particularly the political developments. Using both documentary and narrative sources, J. S. Hamilton reconstructs an impartial account of Gaveston's life. He briefly traces the origins and activities of Gaveston's family in Gascony and in England and then chronicles Gaveston's public career. The examination of Gaveston's role in the early years of Edward's reign inevitably leads to broader questions of patronage, personality, and the nature of the baronial opposition to the crown. As a result, Hamilton adds a new dimension to a revisionist picture of Edward's troubled reign.

Piers Gaveston, Earl of Cornwall, 1307-1312

Hamilton, J. S.

Europe

Onions and Cucumbers and Plums: 46 Yiddish Poem in English (English and Yiddish Edition)

Betsky, Sarah, ed

Up and down the Great Lakes, wherever captains and seamen met, one of the chief topics of conversation is still the Great Storm-the worst disaster in Great Lakes history. By men of the Lakes, November 9, 1913 will always be remembered as Black Sunday, for it brought death to hundreds of their companions and destruction to scores of ships of the Lakes fleet. Each man who survived the Storm has a fascinating story to tell. Freshwater Fury is the first comprehensive history of the Great Storm. Author Frank Barcus, who has met and talked with many survivors during his trips on Lakes freighters over the past twenty years, presents here their vivid eye-witness accounts. The many drawings, maps, and diagrams executed by the author add pictorial interest to the story of this dramatic struggle between men and the elements.

Freshwater Fury: Yarns and Reminiscenes of the Greatest Storm in Inland Navigation

Six Essays By J. N. Spuhler, Ralph W. Gerard, S. L. Washburn, Charles F. Hockett, Harry F. Harlow, Marshall D. Sahlins, Leslie A. White.

Evolution of Man’s Capacity for Culture

SPUHLER, J.N., ARRANGER

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Books by Wayne State University Press