Flint Photos: Durant

Special thanks to Grumkin for this shot of the nearly restored Durant Hotel. This is kind of hard to believe. It looks almost perfect.

Flint Photos: Hubbard's

Special thanks to Tom Pohrt for this great shot of Brush Alley.

Michigan-Ohio State: Tinkering with a Classic

College football will do just about anything to make even more money, including destroy the Michigan-Ohio state end-of-the-season rivalry game. With two divisions and a championship game likely in the Big Ten, Jim Litke of AP reflects on the unappealing future of the big game:

The most likely realignment scenario involves putting the historic rivals in different divisions, then having them play in the middle of the regular season rather than at the end. That way, if they meet in the championship game, it won't feel as much like a rematch.

Never mind that few championship games are as memorable as even the clunkers Michigan and Ohio State have played over the years. When pressed, most coaches would concede they view championship games as necessary evils; they're the price a team pays so that its conference keeps a seat at the table for the Bowl Championship Series postseason galas.

But no one ever looked at Michigan-Ohio State that way. The lore that grew up around the game was testimony to that. Play it twice a year, even if the second time is for the league championship, and plenty of the air leaks out of both

Say Ya to Da Lions, Eh

Cross a yooper with a Lions fan and you've got yourself a strange combination.

Doug Farrar of Yahoo Sports reports:

As Detroit Lions head coach Jim Schwartz broke his team's 2010 training camp on Wednesday, he had a special guest in-house -- Joe Paquette Jr., a 63-year-old man from Michigan's Upper Peninsula, who walked over 400 miles to attend a team practice. The long hike -- 425 miles in 18 days -- had something strong behind it.

Flint Photos by Austin McLogan

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A series of Flint buildings shot by Austin McLogan. Anything look familiar?

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The Detroit News Says Former Flintoid Tom Gores Is Considering Purchasing the Detroit Pistons

The Detroit News is reporting that billionaire Flint native Tom Gores is the leading candidate to purchase the Detroit Pistons.

Gores was profiled by the San Diego Reader last year after he purchased the San Diego Union-Tribune. The article devotes a lot of ink to Tom Joubran, the man who was instrumental in bringing Gores to Flint and mentored him as he grew up in the Vehicle City.

Matt Potter reports:

In a March 19 story announcing its takeover by Platinum Equity, the Union-Tribune reported that Gores had “immigrated to America with his Greek family when he was 5 and eventually became a U.S. citizen.” But there is more to the story of Tom Gores and his large, extended family.

He was mentored through childhood, adolescence, and college by Tom Joubran, who became a grocer after arriving in this country and battled years of ethnic bias and criminal charges that he attributes to jealousy and discrimination because he came from the Middle East.

It was Joubran who sponsored the 1969 immigration of the Gores family, including his sister Marie, from Nazareth to Flint, where many members of the Joubran family live.

“I’m so glad I brought them in here,” Joubran said last week. “I provided them a house to live. They worked for me, and I paid them money.”

Tom Gores “was the carry-out boy in my grocery store and was in the produce department,” Joubran told the Flint Journal in 2007. “The apron he wore was bigger than him. He was very small for his age.… But look at him today. I’m so proud of him and all of his brothers and sisters. They were all dynamic kids. I knew they were going to be something from the day they came in.”

Dan Shriner, a former reporter for the Flint Journal, recalls that photos of the Gores brothers lined the walls of Joubran’s office, including one of Tom’s older brother Alec standing with Bill and Hillary Clinton. Joubran spoke with pride of how he had mentored the brothers in the promised land of America.

“I do know that he’s extremely proud of them,” says Shriner. “They’re in touch often. They really stay in touch. I don’t know about what, but they are in touch with great regularity.”

The Real Estate School of Writing

1610 W. Jackson Avenue hanging tough, despite it all.

It takes a special talent to create compelling real estate copy. The highly specialized genre requires the writer to seamlessly mix legally required disclosures about a property's flaws with ebullient and frequently exaggerated claims that quickly forge an emotional connection with potential buyers. It's kind of like writing a profile for an online dating service — not that I'd know anything about that — except you have to mention things like plumbing and delinquent property taxes. Like satire and clever limericks, it's not easy to pull off. Especially when it comes to Flint.

Take this eBay offering — "Charming 2 BR House in Flint MI, Good Area for family" — for a classic Civic Park home at 1610 W. Jackson Avenue.(Disclosure: I once hauled ass through the backyard of this house approximately 35 years ago after an unfortunate misunderstanding involving snowballs and a motorist who clearly didn't have a sense of humor.) Let's set aside the obvious big-picture discussion of whether Flint, in its present state, is indeed a "good area" for families and get right into some of the classic elements of real estate writing skillfully employed in this listing.

Bad News First: Some things are simply impossible to nuance, and it's best to just get it over with: "Unfortunately, thieves have entered the property and taken the furnace, hot water service, kitchen sink, and fittings."

Turn That Frown Upside Down: But it's always best to quickly counter this potentially negative information with something positive: "Luckily the property has poly water pipes and they are still all there. The ducting for the furnace is still in place, and the only damage done to the property is to the door knob and door jamb of the side door, minor damage to the bathroom wall and mud trampled over the carpets. The front, side and rear doors are all new aluminum clad security doors and all have been secured. The carpets, although soiled, are still in excellent condition and will clean up well. The house is currently winterized." (Note: This may be one of the rare instances when the use of cheapo polybutylene plumbing paid off; if the owner had used copper, it would be long gone by now.)

Get Inside Their Head: Anticipate potential buyers questions and concerns and reassure them. For example, people might be wondering why the seller is willing to part with this fantastic property for under $2,000 on eBay: "I cannot undertake repairs as I live too far away. This is the ONLY reason I’m selling it." Note the use of ALL CAPS for emphasis, which enhances the believability of the claim. It also distracts the customer from asking the obvious question: Why do you live so far away from Flint if the city is as wonderful as you claim?

Aspirational Thinking: Prompt the potential buyer to start imagining the fun projects they could undertake once they own the property. "Don’t be put off by the external color of the house. It’s only a coat of paint from being stunning."

Get Back to Nature: Take advantage of natural attributes that have an emotional appeal and are difficult to steal while hinting at the long-term potential of the property: "There is a large shade tree in the back yard and room for a garage."

Avoid Too Much Information: Finally, real estate writers know that while they shouldn't actively deceive, there's no law that says you have to provide every piece of pertinent information: "The home's location provides convenient access to schools, parks and churches. Civic Park elementary school is just a block from the home, and there are 7 schools all within a mile of the home...For golfers, Mott Park Municipal Golf Course is less than 2 miles away." In other words, there's no need to reveal that some of those schools, including Civic Park, are no longer open. And duffers will just have to find out for themselves that Mott Golf Course has fallen victim to budget cuts, although it's still a great spot to practice shots from very deep rough. Keep in mind the copy never claims these facilities are open, only that they exist.

With less than two days before the auction closes, the house has 36 bids. The current high bid is $1,336.

Flint Photos: Police Headquarters in the 1950s

(Please excuse the photographer's cropping marks.)

Flint Formal Wear

Patty Warner has some great Flint merchandise available at CafePress. Go here.

Foote-ing the Bill for "Alleged"

Many Flintoids were disappointed that "Semi-Pro," which was shot primarily in Flint, didn't have much footage of Vehicle City. And despite starring Will Ferrell and Woody Harrelson, it didn't have much humor, either, although that bear rasslin' scene was pretty good.

It may be even harder to spot Flint in "Alleged," the historical drama about the Scopes Monkey Trial starring Fred Thompson and Brian Denehy that was filmed in the city last year. That's because the movie doesn't even have a distributor despite the big name actors in it. So it won't be screening at major theaters anytime soon. It will probably have to make the rounds at festivals in hopes of landing a distributor.

So how do you finance a relatively expensive film with no distributor in place? Beata Mostafavi of The Flint Journal explains:

The film, directed by Tommy Hines and written by East Lansing native Fred Foote, is financed by a nonprofit foundation operated by Foote's family that supports Christian-based artistic and educational endeavors. And the film, which counters Stanley Kramer's classic, "Inherit the Wind" (1960, with Spencer Tracy, Fredric March and Gene Kelly), has gotten a buzz for having a Christian slant.