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Legacies Project Oral History: Carolyn Houston
Carolyn Houston was born in 1925 and grew up in Lakewood, Ohio. She spent the majority of her working years as a homemaker and mother of four boys. During World War II she was a nurse’s aid, and she was a secretary in Stanford’s civil engineering department to support her husband’s graduate studies. Her children grew up near Dexter, Michigan. After she divorced her husband in 1980, Houston worked at Rackham as a secretary to the associate dean. She married Bill Houston and moved to Pittsburgh in the late 80s, but returned to Ann Arbor in 2001.
Carolyn Houston was interviewed as part of an internship at Applied Safety and Ergonomics in Ann Arbor in 2008 as part of the Legacies Project
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Legacies Project Oral History: Carl Guldberg
Carl Guldberg was born in 1917 and grew up in Suttons Bay, Michigan. He graduated from the College of Architecture and Design at the University of Michigan in 1940. He began his career as an aircraft draftsman in Baltimore, but soon returned to Michigan to marry his wife, Julie Hart. Guldberg was a draftsman for the Stinson Aircraft Company in Detroit during World War II. He ran his own advertising agency, Guldberg Advertising, for 35 years in Ann Arbor. He passed away on July 21, 2018.
Carl Guldberg was interviewed as part of an internship at Applied Safety and Ergonomicsin Ann Arbor in 2010 as part of the Legacies Project.
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Legacies Project Oral History: Benita Kaimowitz
Benita Kaimowitz was born in 1935 and grew up in Pascagoula, Mississippi, where her father ran a general store. When she was 11, her family moved to Nashville, Tennessee. After graduating from college at the University of Hawaii, she got her master’s at Sarah Lawrence College. Kaimowitz helped register voters in Louisiana as a volunteer for the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE). She was a teacher and a longtime employee of Borders Bookstore in Ann Arbor. She and her first husband Gabe lived in a collective house for over two decades.
Benita Kaimowitz was interviewed by students from Skyline High School in Ann Arbor as part of the Legacies Project.
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Legacies Project Oral History: Ben Helmke
Ben Helmke grew up on a farm in Pratt County, Kansas in the 1930s. He served as an organist in the Army chaplain’s office at Camp Schimmelpfennig (now Camp Sendai) in Japan. Helmke graduated from Hastings College and McCormick Seminary and got his masters in social work from the University of Michigan. He and his wife Polly raised three children and he started his own mental health clinic. Late in life, he came out as gay to his wife and children. He lived happily with his partner Len Quenon for 25 years.
Ben Helmke was interviewed by students from Skyline High School in Ann Arbor in 2016 as part of the Legacies Project.
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Legacies Project Oral History: Anna Noble
Anna Noble was born in the early 1920s and grew up in Pittsburgh with 11 siblings. She worked as a launderer as a young woman. She applied to several nursing schools, but faced discrimination due to segregation. She attended Mercy Douglass School of Nursing in Philadelphia, which was an all-Black nursing school. In 1950, Noble moved to Detroit to take a nursing position at Haynes Memorial Hospital. She became the director of nursing at DMC Harper University Hospital, where she worked for 23 years. Later in life, she volunteered at the Lula Belle Stewart Center, which offered parenting assistance to single mothers.
Anna Noble was interviewed in partnership with the Museum of African American History of Detroit and Y Arts Detroit in 2010 as part of the Legacies Project.
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Legacies Project Oral History: Alice Sano
Alice Sano was born in 1929 in Los Angeles, California. When the U.S. entered WWII, her family was forced to move to an internment camp along with other Japanese immigrants. Eventually her father secured a job teaching Japanese to army military intelligence students at the University of Michigan, and they moved to Ann Arbor. Sano majored in music theory and cello at the U-M School of Music, and dedicated her career to teaching music.
Alice Sane was interviewed by students from Skyline High School in Ann Arbor in 2018 as part of the Legacies Project.
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Legacies Project Oral History: Richard Nowland
Richard Nowland was born in Ann Arbor in 1932. He grew up on Eighth Street. He recalls family stories about Lower Town, including his Irish ancestor Andrew Nowland who settled in Ann Arbor in the 1820s. After serving as a social worker in the U.S. Army, Nowland returned to Michigan and got his master’s degree. He was a counselor at Washtenaw Community College and a principal at Clague Middle School for twenty years.
Richard Nowland was interviewed by students from Skyline High School in Ann Arbor in 2018 as part of the Legacies Project.
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Legacies Project Oral History: Shirley (Rusty) Schumacher
Shirley (Rusty) Schumacher was born in 1930 in Detroit. She remembers war bonds, scrap drives, and special manufacturing during World War II. She attended William and Mary College and received two master’s degrees in speech and education from the University of Michigan. Schumacher spent most of her career as a teacher at Clague Middle School. In 1985 she founded a student exchange program with Ann Arbor’s sister city, Hikone, Japan. She led a year-long stay there in 1992-93.
Shirley (Rusty) Schumacher was interviewed by students from Skyline High School in Ann Arbor in 2018 as part of the Legacies Project.
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Legacies Project Oral History: Alma Wheeler Smith
Alma Wheeler Smith was born in 1941. She recalls attending Civil Rights meetings in Ann Arbor with her parents. Her father Albert H. Wheeler was the first African American mayor of Ann Arbor (1975-78). Smith worked for nearly a decade as a TV producer before becoming a politician. Smith (D) served in the U.S. House of Representatives as part of the Michigan delegation from 2005-2010 representing the 54th District. Prior to her tenure in the U.S. House, Smith served in the Michigan Senate representing the 18th District from 1995-2002.
Alma Wheeler Smith was interviewed by students from Skyline High School in Ann Arbor in 2018 as part of the Legacies Project.
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Legacies Project Oral History: Ruth Zweifler
Ruth Zweifler was born 1929 in Palisades, New Jersey. She graduated from Bryn Mawr College, and converted from Judaism to Quakerism. Since the 1960s, she has been active in Civil Rights, anti-war, and anti-Zionist protests, including a sit-in at Ann Arbor City Hall protesting residential segregation. In 1975, Zweifler co-founded the Student Advocacy Center of Michigan, and she was Executive Director for nearly 30 years.
Ruth Zweifler was interviewed by students from Skyline High School in Ann Arbor in 2018 as part of the Legacies Project.