Tulip City Dispatch

It's been 3 weeks, loyal readers!  It's been a crazy 3 weeks.  I'll spare you the boring details, except to say that I'm officially on a totally new schedule and cannot devote my Mondays and Tuesdays to researching this blog anymore.  I really want to do my best to keep this up and active, as I'm immensely enjoying digging into Holland's seedy underbelly (but no, not really).  I don't feel right writing about racial injustices in Holland or Ottawa County, so I've been avoiding those topics (though I really, really want to see what I can turn up).  I'll get to those when I can fully research them, and when I feel comfortable with the amount of information that I will have absorbed. For now, I want to share some 1973 quadrant maps that I found online, ages ago, from the State of Michigan: The westermost shows Park, Port Sheldon, and Laketown Townships' the Holland State Park area along the lakeshore; the Waukazoo area; and most of Lake Macatawa.  C...

It's not my aim with this blog to make any political statements.  It's my aim to showcase unique bits of history around Holland and West Michigan.  Fact is, we're living through tremendously historical times.  While I'm feeling conflicted over covering current events and news, I also feel like it's important to address events that have happened over the past week: -On May 25, George Floyd was detained by Minneapolis, MN police and was held down with an officer kneeling on his neck until he died.  The officer and his 3 colleagues have been fired, and at least the offending officer has been charged.  This has led to protests and riots across the country, including right here in Grand Rapids, MI.  Most of the people arrested in Grand Rapids were non-residents, which lends credence to the rumor/theories that these protests across the nation were infiltrated by alt-right agent provocateurs with the explicit purpose of stirring up shit.  Journalistic note:...

The first headline in the May 27 issue of the Holland City News reads “All Arrangements For Decoration Day Are Completed.” Decoration Day, of course, being an old name for Memorial Day. There was a post on Twitter discussing that “Decoration Day” became “Memorial Day” shortly after the American Civil War. That's apparently not true , as the Holland City News still refers to it as Decoration Day as late as 1920. The article lays out a daily itinerary, detailing marching exercises from a few Veterans' groups, as well as a parade down 8th St beginning at 9am.  The second headline of note reads “Work Has Begun On $30,000 Theater.” John Raven and John Kramer, the article says, “are very busy these days putting up their new theater on River avenue across from Centennial Park.” This building, of course, is the Holland Park Theatre! I've been fortunate to help set up the venue for a concert, attend a concert, and have actually sang karaoke on stage. It's a fantastic, beloved ve...

Something not touched upon in my " Best Burger " article from January was a ubiquitous sandwich seen on the menu of many Michigan burger joints:  The Olive Burger.  It's pretty self-explanatory - a burger topped with olives, or an olive sauce.  Usually olives soaked in mayonnaise, and if it's served with cheese, it's swiss.  Incredibly salty and bland, no doubt, combining the worst in salted vegetables (in olives) with the most disappointing part of the Whopper (the mayo). Let's explore this abomination, and how it came to wreak havoc on restaurant menus across the state: Tom Rademacher of the Grand Rapids press, wrote an article in 2008 tracing the origins of the olive burger to 1929, at a Kewpee restaurant in Grand Rapids, MI.  Haley Hansen of the Lansing State Journal puts the roots of the olive burger at 1923, at a Kewpee in Flint .  In any case, two major Michigan newspapers put the roots of olive burgers at Kewpee Burgers in the 1920's. In Hansen...

Smack dab on the front page is the Holland Elks Club advertising a celebration for Flag Day, including participation from the local Boy Scouts, as well as a minstrel show.  Certainly not something I expected to read. Further down the page is an advertisement from The Huyser Company, of 61 East 8th St (currently the park next to Ferris Coffee) advertising "$6 to $9 Hats At $5."  I'm wearing a classic felt hat as I type this, so I'm definitely interested in that ad. Page 2 opens with a memorial to a group of soldiers who perished in a naval accident.  Sounds like a group of guys returned from the Spanish American War to take up sailing as a civilian job, then their steamer sank somewhere between New York and Key West. Page 3 is interesting, as it contains an article still pertinent today!  Downtown Holland has "Wheel Control Zones," with no wheeled vehicles allowed on sidewalks (including bikes, skateboards, and rollerblades).  14 people were cited, and 5 more...

Without further ado, the Tulip City Dispatch 2020 Tulip Time Photoblog!  I know the entire aim of this blog was to showcase Holland, Michigan outside of Tulip Time, but man, this year's gotten weird.  I'm happy to be physically able to get out on a bike and pedal around town, so here's some tidbits of our adventure!  Please, if you have any tips on photography and photo editing, let me know!  I'm going with an 8th-grade understanding of Photoshop software, and as such, have used little more than the stock filters and effects! Cappon House, Holland Michigan Park Theatre, one of the coolest music venues in Holland I busted out the ol' gradient mask for this shot of tulips on Tulip Lane, Washington St., Holland MI More tulips on Tulip Lane, this time with forced perspective The wonderful fountain at the southern end of Washington Square The businesses contained within Washington Square, Holland MI

I was helping a relative with some genealogy work, and found an interesting headline on a website: “Gitchel: The Ghost Town.” I've previously reported on Shackhuddle, the ghost town south of Hudsonville that , from what I can tell, got largely bulldozed to make way for the I-196 Ford Freeway in the 60's and 70's...but, that name “Gitchel” rung a faint bell at the back of my memory. I'd seen it before when researching this blog. I turned to some old sources, including Walter Romig's “Michigan Place Names” book, and found that, the post office at Gitchel operated from 1886 to 1902, which indicates that there was some sort of settlement in this unincorporated part of Jamestown Township. But, what else was there?  I took to the Google search engine, and found a couple of real estate listings, one for a brick farmhouse along 24th Ave. south of Jamestown, and the other actually listing the Gitchel schoolhouse on 24th at Adams St. I'd read one location of Gitchel b...