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#7 Ann Arbor Stories: The Legendary Weed Contest of 1975

The Legendary Weed Contest of 1975 wasn’t just any contest. It was more than just a sweepstakes where the grand prize winner received one full-scale pound of Columbian smoking marijuana. It was a statement. A call to revolution. A brilliant marketing plan hatched during a smoke-filled discussion among the braintrust of the Ann Arbor Sun, looking for a way to increase the paper’s circulation.

Music by Chris Bathgate

Further reading and photos from AADL's Old News:

Contest winners announced
Legendary Weed Contest of 1975 ad
Prosecutor's Effort Fails to Halt Pot Giveaway
Prosecutor in court to halt pot contest

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#6 Ann Arbor Stories: Ghost in the Attic

For a town as old as Ann Arbor, it has surprisingly few ghost stories. But in the late 1950s, the congregation of the First Methodist Church in Ann Arbor was pretty convinced they had a spirit on their hands. Caretakers sometimes heard footsteps late at night, but never spotted anyone in the church. Until the early morning hours of August 30, 1959, when they made a chilling discovery.

Music by People Get Ready

Further reading from AADL's Old News:
Initial Story
Bill of Health
Lim Gets Aid
Going Back to School
Graduating Saturday
Hit by Car
10-year retrospective
Retrospective after Cheng's Death

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#5 Ann Arbor Stories: Ann Arbor's Oldest Gay Bar

It started on April 30, 1949, when Cupid Bar rebranded itself as The Flame Bar, turning a popular downtown student watering hole into a slightly more popular downtown student watering hole. Almost 50 years later, The Flame would close, shuttering an Ann Arbor institution. It wasn’t Ann Arbor’s first gay bar, and certainly not its last, but The Flame played a major role in the lives of many among Ann Arbor’s LGBT community - for good and ill.

Music by Lightning Love

Further reading from AADL's Old News:
The Flame bar review
Death of Harvey Blanchard
The Flame Bought
The Flame Reopens on Liberty

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#4 Ann Arbor Stories: The Birth of Iggy Pop

Muskegon claims him because he was born there. Ypsi claims him because, for most of his childhood, he lived in a trailer park on the outskirts of town. But it’s Ann Arbor - along with cocaine, meth, acid, booze, pills, AND ambition - that deserve the credit for turning James Newell Osterberg into Iggy Pop.

Music by FAWNN

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#3 Ann Arbor Stories: Martian Madness

On the night of March 20,1966, Frank Mannor’s six dogs started barking like they’d never done before. He went outside to shut them up and that’s when he saw what he saw. Something flying through the night sky. At first it looked like a shooting star, then it slowed. It changed color. And it landed in the woods a few hundred yards from his Dexter farmhouse.

Music by Diego & The Dissidents and The Dead Bodies.

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#2 Ann Arbor Stories: Death of a Policeman

Crime was never a big problem in Ann Arbor in 1935. There were occasional break-ins, robberies, stolen vehicles, assaults, a riot or protest or two, but Prohibition was over and the gangsters and bootleggers had moved on. An Ann Arbor police officer had never been killed in the line of duty, nor even died from a horse, car, or motorcycle accident while on duty. Not even a random heart attack. Until March 21, 1935.

Music by Ben Benjamin, and Aeroc made possible by Gholicense. Additional music by Chris Bathgate.

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#1 Ann Arbor Stories: A Buck Twenty-Five

In 1824, John Allen of New York and Elisha Rumsey of Connecticut bought up 640 acres of prime Michigan land, paying $1.25 per acre. Those 640 acres, purchased in a tiny federal land office in Detroit, would become known as Ann Arbor. This is the story of the founding of Ann Arbor and how the town grew from its ragamuffin roots into what it has become today.

Music by Chris Bathgate