Detroit Hotels

Pre 20th Century History
Lots of people know that Cadillacs come from Detroit. But what they probably don't know is that Detroit came from a Cadillac. Enterprising French trader and explorer Antoine de la Mothe Cadillac stumbled upon what is now Detroit in 1701, figuring it would make a good base from which to send furs to Canada. Cadillac named his new find Ville d'Etroit (City of the Strait) because the Detroit River connects Lake St Clair with Lake Erie, and from that point on the town grew steadily, using its river as an economic channel to the world.

Modern History
Detroit might have remained little more than a stomping ground for trader types had it not been for an ambitious industrialist named Henry Ford. Born on a farm in nearby Dearborn, Ford left for Detroit to establish the Ford Motor Company in 1903. Within five years he was mass producing cars and perfecting the assembly line. The assembly line inspired another Detroit innovation known as the United Auto Workers (UAW), who kicked off the industrial union movement from the 'Motor City'. Driven by the automobile's success, Detroit was the first city to have a paved concrete road (in 1909), the first to install a traffic light (in 1915) and the USA's first to have an urban freeway (in 1942). Pre-car, Detroit's proximity to Canada made it an important station along the Underground Railroad. This network of informal escape routes was used by abolitionists and African-American slaves who travelled from America's southern states, through the US north and into Canada. Said to have been in place as early as the colonial period, the height of Underground Railroad activity was between 1830 and 1865. The new arrivals brought with them the beginnings of jazz and blues music. From the late 1800s on, African-American musicians played an important role in Detroit's entertainment scene, and the city was the first to have an integrated musicians' union. Mississippi transplant John Lee Hooker recorded his first blues hits here in the 1940s. Hooker and his peers paved the way for Motown - the biggest American music phenomenon of the 20th century and African-American Detroit's ticket to the big leagues. But Detroit's prominence on the world music stage didn't prevent the city from imploding. While everyone was dancing in the streets, businesses - following Ford's earlier lead - started fleeing for the suburbs, and middle-class whites followed in painful numbers. Detroit lost nearly a million residents between the 1950s and 1980s and, as the auto industry downturned, hyper unemployment set in, disproportionately affecting African-American men. Along the way, bloody race riots in 1967 and a cruel recession during the 1970s were just a few of the nails in the coffin.

Recent History
The pickup in the American automobile manufacturing industry in the past decade has proven to be something of a boon for Detroit. It may never be able to match its glory days, but Motor City is on the upswing - blue-collar but rich in cultural output. Musically, the city's rock scene is spawning a string of bands as influential as the Motown studio was in the 1960s. The city's rich history, riverfront locale and considerable dedication to rejuvenation will really take hold of you, if given the chance.