President Julie called our meeting to order at 12:32 by muting all participants and ringing her bell. Our invocation, given by Sandy Draggoo, acknowledged our uniqueness and differing perspectives, while calling on each of use to understand and embrace the perspectives of others. Our patriotic song was a recording of John Dale Smith playing “Our Country ‘Tis of Thee".
We had a number of visitors who were introduced by President Julie. They were:
• Brenda Geoghegan – guest of Sue Hansen
• Quincy McCullough – guest of Susan Angel
• Krista Stevens – who is pursuing membership and pronounced our meeting a ‘breath of fresh air’
• Kayla Green – whose application for membership is currently working its was through our process
• Lisa Fisher – who was visiting for the second time and is interested in membership
Diane Sanborn brought us the health of the club and let us know that Lolo Robison’s daughter Hannah was in a serious car accident in Colorado. Lolo flew there to be with her and appreciates all the prayers and support she is feeling from our members. (Update: Hannah has been released from ICU and is recovering at home. She does have some very serious injuries and her road to recovery will be long.)
Jenn Dubey spoke about our upcoming Paul Harris Campaign. This is the one annual appeal that goes directly to Rotary International and supports six causes:
• Promoting peace
• Fighting disease
• Providing clean water, sanitation and hygiene
• Supporting education
• Growing local economies
• Protecting the environment
Many of you may believe that we should support only local initiatives, but these Rotary programs support some of the most vulnerable communities in the world today. Our annual Paul Harris campaign will take place in April and more details will be available soon.
President Julie let us know that there will be a New Member Orientation taking place via Zoom on March 26th at 9am. If you have not already been contacted and would like to attend, please contact Courtney Millbrook.
Our special music for the day was suggested by our speaker and introduced by President Julie. Big Nick Nicholas was born in Lansing in 1922. In the early 40s, Nicholas worked in several well-known and important bands, including those led by Earl Hines and Tiny Bradshaw. He met and made a strong impression on a young John Coltrane, who immortalized Nicholas in his 1962 composition “Big Nick”. Big Nick did not record under his own name until 1983 and only made two albums in his life. The selection was very enjoyable and fit right in with today’s topic.
President Julie introduced Melanie Dart as our Chair of the Month, but handled the introduction of Bill Castanier herself since Melanie did not have a reliable internet connection. Bill is President of the Historical Society of Greater Lansing. Bill introduced Greta McHaney-Trice, a former teacher and Coordinator of the “Pave the Way” project.
The presentation was supposed to begin with a video but technical difficulties got in the way. You can see the video at https://www.dropbox.com/s/d9gee72u9at4u4n/I-496%20PROJECT%20%231-FINALredo.MP4.mp4?dl=0.
The expressway idea began as early as 1880 with the Good Roads Movement. In 1920, Robert Moses was building expressways in New York City to take weary workers to nearby beaches on the weekends. He met with resistance when he proposed a cross town expressway through the heart of Manhattan.
At the 1939 World’s Fair, General Motors presented its Futurama exhibit, which presented the idea of open roads, termed Magic Motorways, across the country. The effort was somewhat derailed during World War II, but President Eisenhower was quick to promote a plan after the war that envisioned a nationwide network of expressways that would provide for quick escape for cities in the event of a nuclear attack. This network of roadways would not only provide for civil defense, it would relieve congestion, add to convenience of motorists, and beautify cities by removing ghettos and slums.
In Lansing, a map of a proposed crosstown expressway was developed in 1956. The path of the new road went through neighborhoods that had been redlined under the federal program that identified neighborhoods that were considered to be the most dangerous. This program made it impossible to get loans in those areas and led to the designation of certain neighborhoods as being ‘colored only’, while others prohibited ‘colored’ residents.
The expressway was approved in October 1961. The plan was for an 8.9 mile stretch of roadway running east/west along the St Joe/Main Street corridor and a 2.1 mile connector to I-96.
Construction on I-496 began in 1963, and the expressway would ultimately dead-end 35 streets, create a myriad of one-way streets needed for on and off ramps, and determine future development. In the path of the proposed expressway were more than 800 homes and businesses that needed to be acquired through eminent domain, ceding the property to the state.
I-496 would be built in eight years, becoming the first expressway to use berms in place of concrete walls. Construction problems were insignificant when compared to the major problem of relocating residents to other neighborhoods, which was further complicated by racial segregation. A vast majority of the families were African American and had lived in the St Joseph-Main Street corridor for decades. Many had relocated to Lansing to take jobs with Oldsmobile and other auto-related businesses. Around the neighborhood had grown up a network of churches, small businesses, and social clubs that catered to African Americans.
Residents were given only 45 day notice that they would have to relocate. They were paid less than the fair market value of their homes. In addition, many were purchasing homes through land contracts. They payment for the homes went to the holder of the land contract rather than the buyer. Most were not in a position to fight for higher buyouts, and doing so would have pitted homeowners against General Motors, who favored the expressway and employed many of those who were displaced by the construction.
The “Pave the Way” project has interviewed over 100 people who were displaced by the construction to capture their experiences and document the effect on our community.
President Julie explained that our club makes a donation to our foundation to further the work of local organizations in our community in lieu of a speaker’s gift.
Our speaker next week will be Kris Rzepczynski, Senior Archivist with the Michigan History Center. The meeting was adjourned at 1:32.
Linda Lynch's email is: linda.j.lynch@gmail.com