U-Matic

Mayor C.A.Y. Media Day #1 5-13-88
Mike Ilitch B-Day Greeting to Mayor Young

U-Matic S tape containing footage shot during the City of Detroit's Outstate Media Day on May 13, 1988 put on for reporters from across Michigan. In this tape of Mike Ilitch is filmed at Cobo Hall discussing his plans to renovate the Fox Theatre. He then records a message for Mayor Coleman A. Young's 70th birthday video. The video ends with a portion of the speech given by Mayor Coleman A. Young to reporters at the Hotel Pontchartrain. This speech is continued on tape 2015.009.043. Joyce Garrett introduces both speakers.

The tape begins with a clip of City of Detroit personnel director Joyce Garrett speaking at the podium during the Cobo Hall portion of the Outstate Media Day activities about Fox Theatre architect C. Howard Crane. She mentions the private preview of the Fox that was part of the reporters'' Itinerary.

Following a cut, Mike Ilitch appears at the same podium talking about the planned Fox Theatre renovation. One of the members of the press asks Ilitch about his earliest memory of the theater. He responds, that much like Briggs Stadium, it was skipping school to go there. He also responds to a question about the potential of Barry Gordy's involvement in the project. He responds that he hopes that could happen.

After another cut, Ilitch is framed in a close-up where he addresses the camera with several takes of a series of birthday messages to the mayor. In his message, he invokes the Speedway 79 gas station chain, and in reference to plans to rededicate the City-County Building to Young, jokes that he won't be renaming Little Caesar's after the mayor.

A brief shot follows of a close-up shot of a man's torso as he talks at a podium about cocaine.

Silent footage from an event held as part of Outstate Media Day on May 13, 1988, at the Hotel Pontchartrain then follows a brief gap in the tape. These shots include the hotel's staff, and guest conversing with each other. Among the guests is Mayor Coleman A. Young. During the sequence audio resumes, however it is faint. Joyce Garrett is filmed speaking at the room's podium, where she introduces Mayor Young, and talks about development between the Belle Isle Bridge and the Ambassador Bridge which occurred during his administration. She also reminisces about both an event at Detroit Institute of Arts where Henry Ford II praised Young's leadership and asked her why Young hasn't run for president, and an event at the Edsel Ford Estate where Young joked about Ford II's support of capital punishment.

After Garrett's introduction, Young is filmed approaching the podium from his table. Once at the podium, Young relays that on the way, Bob Talpert of the Detroit Free Press to him to "give us hell." He also jokes about fishing without a license in the river as a child. In his speech, he discusses efforts to build and rebuild the city, beginning on the river, then extending along major corridors into the neighborhoods. He then praises the spirt of the residents of the city and the state. He acknowledges the city's problems--unemployment, crime, and drugs. Just before the tape ends, he also contrasts the city to Los Angeles, stating that Detroit got its gang problem under control in 1977. The tape ends in the middle of Young's speech, but the recording is continued on tape 2015.009.043.

The recording is on a 3m MBU-18 U-Matic tape with a handwritten 3M label across its top. The tape is housed within a black plastic latching case with a matching label on its cover.