Flint Artifacts: 1977 Longfellow Yearbook

Remembering Flint and Elaine Daenzer

Lanny Hayes, far from Flint, after a recent hike in the Smoky Mountains

Flint Expatriate Lanny Hayes looks back on hometown and Christmas with his family.

Whenever I think of Flint, I think of Mom.

My grandparents moved to Flint from the farms around Bay City and Frankenmuth after the Great War. My Mom, Elaine Daenzer, was born in Flint in 1924 to Paul and Emma. They lived in a modest home on Clement Street around the corner from Longfellow Junior High [left].

My grandfather, a veteran who saw action in France, worked at Chevy in the Hole from 1923-50. Grandma worked for AC and Mom joined her there in 1945 and stayed for 20 years.

We lived in a little starter home on Winona Blvd before moving to 3201 Mackin Road in 1965. Dad worked for Buick, and Mom retired that year to spend more time with her little family.

Flint was in its glory. The economy was good and we lived the American dream. What a wonderful life it was. I went to St. Paul Lutheran School on Ballenger Highway. I think we saw every Disney movie ever made at the Capitol. There was the circus, ice capades, and swimming lessons at Central High pool. Friday night was shopping night with my grandparents. We lived from holiday to holiday because Mom loved them all and celebrated each one to the hilt. Christmas was the highlight and she went full bore. Thanks Mom.

She traveled all over the country and to Europe and thought Flint was the best place there ever was. She would have been broken hearted to see Flint become a punchline and a shell of its former self. Mom loved Flint. She was born there, lived her whole life there and died way too soon at the age of 45 after wasting away in McLaren hospital from cancer, leaving three devastated little children behind. Christmas is bittersweet now. I remember how much she loved it, and it hurts to think of all the ones we couldn’t share together.

I left for Florida in 1977 and haven't been back since. I don't know the Flint of boarded up houses; I only have the memories of how great it was to grow up there. After things started going bad and Flint was making national news for all the wrong reasons, I used to derisively tell people that Flint was a great place to be from...far from. Now 31 years have gone by and I would love to see the old town at least once more. Life is funny, like the weather ball it is always changing. I now live in East Tennessee after 28 years in Florida. However, one thing can’t change. I am from Flint, Michigan and will always be from Flint. I may be long gone but as long as I can remember Mom, Flint will be right next to her in my heart.

Milbourne Memories

Sarah Swart's old house on Milbourne Avenue.

Sarah Swart left Flint in 1982. She returned with her husband, Victor, this summer for a reunion of the Flint Academy classes of 1979 through 1988. She sent me notes and photos from her trip, including details of her visit to Hidden Park. I managed to lose the rest of the travelogue somewhere on my computer until today. So here are some more details of Sarah’s trip home.

"I used to live on Milbourne Avenue in the Summerfield Elementary neighborhood. My mother heard that our old house is now boarded up. I wanted to investigate, but I’d been told by a few people, including one at the dinner-dance the night before, that the area is now “rough” and I should be careful: Lock your doors, and don’t stop.

"Victor and I had breakfast kitty-corner from the Genesee Valley. That’s where I had my first job at B. Dalton Bookseller 29 years ago.
"All along Miller Road I was struck by how much has changed—and a few things that are still the same: Kmart, and the building that housed Moy Kong. The restaurant is out of business, but I still remember Moy Kong’s [Left] delicious cubes of pressed duck. After we turned left on Ballenger Highway, I saw Clyde Burtrum Furs, apparently open. It has no significance other than that it tickled an ancient memory — print advertising? Radio? In any case, I was glad that it’s still around. I got shots of McLaren Hospital and King Arthur’s Pasties.

"We turned right onto Flushing — noticing the absence of Paddy McGee’s and Sorrento’s (the latter of which we will see later, out on Pierson Road) and continued east to Chevrolet Avenue. In moments we were driving past the boarded-up Longfellow Middle School, where I spent some miserable time back in the day.
"I was in a history class there once and had a near-breakdown, standing up and screaming at all my classmates that I didn’t know what they were doing there if they were going to make it impossible for teachers to teach or anyone to learn. Whew.

"A left on Mackin and a right on Milbourne, and I am walking home from school again, nine-years old.

"Milbourne is still a lovely street, with trees arching overhead and nice houses, each well-designed and well-proportioned. Some are less well-maintained than others, but I get no sense of danger. Grant you, this perspective could be foolish, and it is about nine in the morning. I point out where the Haases used to live on Clement Street, and where the little girl who pulled out her own eyelashes would stay sometimes with her dad near Begole.
"Turning onto Copeman from Chevrolet, the first two houses on the left were boarded up, one on the inside [Left]. A few other homes were empty or seriously bedraggled. I tried without success to identify the house of a girl named Dawn, who used to play The Carpenters Greatest Hits over and over.

"Then we were at my old house. Although the porch roof was sad, with greenery growing from its sloped eaves, it was still the same house, somewhat funereal in atmosphere (always was) but also attractive in a quiet, stately way."