DETROIT: 1920's-1970's 

My Schwinn Orange Krate was stolen when we lived Detroit. My Grandma bought me new one. Thanks, Granny. Will always remember her Detroit home

Fantastic! I lived most of my life in the Detroit area. I remember many of these places. Thanks for doing this.

Still loving Detroit, I’ve been living in downtown Detroit since 2004, I just love it here in Lafayette Park, great neighbors, great housing ,tons to do in the city ,its really coming back lovely in the downtown and Midtown areas. Great bikeways and walkways along with entertainment, sports and restaurants, we even have plenty of shopping now too. Looking forward to a brighter future. A great city.

I have been in most of the skyscrapers in Detroit. What surprised me was the freight elevator in either the Fisher or Penobscot building. In the 90's it was still being operated by an operator and there was a special rod in case of emergency on the back wall that fit into a hole in the floor that would let you manually crank yourself to the next floor. Epic! The one place that I was happy that I was able to visit prior to its demise was the first Ford factory on Woodward where the Model T strip mall is now. Obviously Ford wasn't in there anymore, but the smell was legendary! Imagining the place busy with workers building the famous model T. As I got older I watched so many places destroyed and run down it really does hurt my heart. I'm disgusted with the leadership in Detroit and how much it has lost due to horrible politics and corruption. The people are awesome and wish them all well!

It’s depressing that what happened to Detroit to the pov of this footage happened. Other cities have made it. However is this the finest vintage footage compilation of Detroit I believe in existence and it is a treasure and I hope more Detroiters see it.

It was once a beautiful prosperous American city.....

🌉♥️ best city in the United States !!!!!! I never abandoned our detroit

I was born in Detroit in 1960...I went to BOB-LO Island on those same boats as a kid....wow..my grandfather worked at Ford Motor, built his house with his Brothers in 1941 at 8mile and Southfield...wow at 43:06 an Edsel car..at 48:22 a White Castle hamburger on the left...at 51:21 Wilt Chamberlain basketball player ,probably going into game in the early 60s..at 1:04:30 Southfield fwy to Northland shopping center..I went there regularly as a kid..at 1:08:42 the Ambassador Bridge to Windsor Canada, over the Detroit River

I enjoy watching the silent video the way it was suppose to be. Getting sound film as late as the 1970's was so expensive that most people could not afford it. I know because I was a young man at the time.

Bloody good footage. THANK YOU for bringing this together and posting it !

I love watching historical Detroit footage. It's like watching a memory that I've never had. I was born in '78. Crazy to think that the 1930's was only 40 years prior to '78. lol

Cool glimpse into the past. Gotta remember that most people were bad photographers back then, and when they were given a movie camera, they had no idea how to time a shot or what to aim it. So you get very rough footage. But still gives a great peek back in time, and it challenges you to play detective to place things on a map. For example: notice the couple @4:40. I discovered that they lived at 5938 Kensington between Chandler Park and Harper. You can see the house on Google street view.

I was born and raised in Southwest Michigan--Benton Harbor/Saint Joseph--in the 1960s and the funny thing is that I never even heard of Detroit until I was about 14. That is when I heard of Motown and that Motown was in a city named Detroit, which is in Michigan. That was news to me. Here we grow up with Chicago television and that is the only city we know about and make trips to on weekends. I am rather saddened that Detroit has fallen from what was once the wealthiest city in the US (and maybe the world, I hear).

The modern city without the automobile is not less modern, but better. Henry Ford, the Dodge Brothers, and other car magnates turned Detroit into an auto-dependent town before the 1920s were over and you can see it in the footage of Detroit center just drowning in cars and everybody engulfed in their choking fumes! 🤢

People dressed so beautifully back then. We all look like such slobs now compared to then.

Same Koenig Fuel and Supply concrete truck at different angles 3:57 then at 4:02 a Mack AC bulldog

I've been on the observation floor of the Penobscot building.

I wish I could have seen the street signs so I could have known where I was at..but this was actually good.

Looks like a happening place... seems to have a lot of potential...

Zero audio omg i cant take the silence

At the 30:15 mark they are showing really nice homes. People see these videos and wonder what happened to the neighborhoods. Well, these images of homes you see are at a time when there was major investment in the city. The homes were brand new in the 40s and 50s. I don't think Detroit has seen a building campaign for single family homes of that magnitude since. In fact, the city is demolishing homes at a faster rate than they are building.

It loses sound after about a minute

It's noticeable that at 8:04 ( eight minutes and 4 seconds) into the film there's flashing flames at the edges of scenes and not much clarity then it gets clear again...hum, anyone with half a brain knows why.

In those days you can tell the food was better. In all of these videos you hardly see any large folks.

People wore dressy clothes seemingly every day. Even in the Summer they walked around in dress shoes and long slacks. Those short sleeve dress shirts with the cigarette pockets are hideous

Ha we were not that quiet. Give us the NOISE. LOL SONGS OF YESTERDAY

Nice video...too bad the footage of the black people was so bad 🥺

Maybe in the future when the fresh water supply starts running low.

Multicultural in the 20s? African Americans were barely a single percentage point back then. Get your demographic history straight. Even by 1940 blacks were still less than 10%