Detroit and Chicago

The media is full of reports about the bankruptcy of the City of Detroit. Incompetent leadership, corruption and a decline in the automotive industry are chief culprits.  It is a sad and sorry state of affairs.

And yet the Detroit metro area as a whole is healthy. Median household income is $49,000, only two thousand short of the median household income of metro Chicago. Detroit is ranked as number 17, not far behind the ranking of Chicago at number 12.

In Europe and Canada national or provincial government routinely merges local governments into metro government. If that was done in the United States a competent metro government that included the middle class would better manage their fiscal affairs. The older central city would not go bankrupt.

We should be working towards this solution.

12	Chicago–Gary–Kenosha, Illinois–Indiana–Wisconsin CMSA	9,157,540	$51,046
13	Bloomington–Normal, Illinois MSA CMSA	150,433	$50,795
14	Seattle–Tacoma–Bellevue, Washington CMSA	3,554,760	$50,733
15	New London–Norwich, Connecticut–Rhode Island and Providence Plantations MSA	293,566	$49,283
16	Madison, Wisconsin MSA	726,526	$49,223
17	Detroit–Ann Arbor–Flint, Michigan CMSA	5,456,428	$49,160

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Highest-income_metropolitan_statistical_areas_in_the_United_States

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Highest-income_metropolitan_statistical_areas_in_the_United_States

Memorial Day Parade Beverly, Morgan Park, Mount Greenwood

Fun to watch the Memorial Day Parade back in my old neighborhood in the south side of Chicago.

Video of the Start of the parade.

The parade kicked off from 110th and Longwood Drive and proceeded north. The Color Guard was from 2/24, the Marine Infantry Battalion on the west side of Chicago.  I marched in a parade on Longwood Drive leading a platoon of Marines in 1973.  I spotted my MPHS Russian teacher Miss Petrus. We were trained to greet her, so I belted out
Strastvooey te, Soyia Sergeevna, a kok vi pushaviatee!!

Soyia Sergeevna frantically looked around trying to find who was calling her, clearly one of her former students. But she did not see me and I had to keep marching in front of the platoon. Dosvedanya, Soyia Sergeevna.

Click to see the Video of The Jesse White Tumblers

The Model A Roadster above looks like the Model A Roadster I drove on Longwood Drive to MPHS in 65, although the one in the photo is in much better condition.

My Model A at modelahullinger.blogspot.com

Click for a Bagpipe Video

My personal favorite - this bus from Smith Village carried a number of World War II and Korean Veterans, including my father Clif Hullinger. 

Video Introductions of the Smith Village Veterans

More about Clif's service in North Africa and Italy at: 

hullingerwwII.blogspot.com

109thengineers34thdivision.blogspot.com

The group above are the Southsiders for Peace.  They were on the sidewalk and told us they had been prevented from marching in the parade

southsidersforpeace.org


The dance group below showing some energetic moves.

I'm getting in just under the wire here for this holiday-related blog,
which deals in part with the Memorial Day Parade down Longwood Drive.  I'd love to hear what memories of that event others have, to see how they do or don't jibe with my own.

Thanks to all who have served, and absolute gratitude to those who paid for our freedoms with their lives.

Taffy Cannon, June '66
Carlsbad, California

Click below to read a blog post written by Taffy about Decoration Day:

thaliapressauthors.wordpress.com/2014/05/26/decoration-day

Patrick Butler RIP

Patrick Butler - Teacher at Morgan Park

It is so nice that he attended MP’s class of 1962 50th Reunion.

Correspondence here is from two members of that class Lois Radakovtiz Lemon

and Barbara Stevenson Spencer (Tex) Bailey.

Thought I’d pass it on in case any of you remember.

The pictures are from their 50th reunion. Link to obituary also.

Nan Brennan

Begin forwarded message:

From: "Lois Lemon" 

Subject: Patrick Butler

Date: May 25, 2014 at 9:19:16 AM CDT

It is with a sad heart that I pass along the email I got from Barb Stevenson Bailey this morning…….

The pictures attachments were taken two years ago at our 50^th reunion. Wish there were more

Eternal Rest Grant to him O Lord….

Good morning everyone! I opened the Tribune this morning and found the obituary of Pat Butler. I went past his house the other day and thought,

I really ought to see how he is. For anyone interested in going, the wake is

Visitation: Tuesday May 27, 2014 at Curley funeral Home, 6116 West 111th St , Chicago Ridge. Its just east side of Ridgeland. 

Funeral:  Wednesday from Curley Funeral Home to St. Christina Church ,111th & Homan and Holy  Sepulcher Cemetery. 

What a great man with a wonderful sense of humor. I know how old he was , he still should have lived forever.  

http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/chicagotribune/obituary.aspx?n=patrick-butler&pid=171106885&fhid=16223).

 Please pass the word to anyone you think may want the information.

Have a happy Memorial Day ,thank God for our service men.!!

Love, Barb

Morgan Park Graduates on the Vietnam Memorial Wall

Morgan Park Alumni 

on the Vietnam Memorial Wall

Our thanks to all of our fallen High School Comrades

Jim Beck

Robert Maurice Cunningham

Larry Dart

Ricky Green

Sgt Holstein

Bruce Huff

Al McNabb

Mills Miller

Warren Muhr

Robert Nawrocki

William Newbold

William Lee Owen Jr

And thanks to all the ones we don't know about:

Click below for more info:

empehiheroes.blogspot.com

empehiveterans.blogspot.com

Memorial Day Parade

Steps off at 1030 am from 110th Longwood Drive

Proceeds north to Ridge Park

 More Information call BAPA

 

  

   

  

  

  

  

(Photos by Gloria Olsen Williams, Warren Smith)

 My father Clif Hullinger and many of his fellow WWII vets from the Smith Village will be riding in the parade  y 

Scientific Method - Piled Higher and Deeper

http://phdcomics.com/comics.php

Historic Changes in Farming - Less Land, Much More Productive

In 1790, 93% of the population of the United States was rural, most of them farmers. By 1990, only 200 years later, barely 2% of our population are farmers.
		The agriculture we have today in the United States is unique. No nation has ever had so few people actively farming. This is a profound social change that has isolated most people from rural life and from an appreciation of the complexities and uncertainties of food production. For the most part people take agricultural production for granted. Our society has had no experience with true food scarcity. Our supermarkets always have full shelves and food is cheap. Today we spend only 10 percent of our income on food. In 1950 we spent 22 percent of our income on food, and in 1935 a moderate income farm family in North Carolina spent 47% of their total living on food. In the past it took much more time and effort to obtain or produce food.
It surprises most people that under natural conditions the soils in North Carolina are too low in plant nutrients to sustain crop production. For most of our history we have practiced shifting cultivation. We have cut and burned the forest, grown crops for a few years until the fertility was exhausted, and abandoned the land. This was the system used by the American Indians, it was the system adopted by European settlers, and it is a system still used in much of the world today. It is often referred to it as "slash and burn" agriculture. Sustainable agriculture became possible only after commercial fertilizers were made available in the late 1800s.
Click to read the rest of the article http://www.ncagr.gov/stats/general/history.htm c

Negative Population Growth - The Organization

NPG is a national non-profit membership organization founded in 1972.  Its primary purpose is to educate the American public and elected officials regarding the damaging effects of overpopulation on our nation’s environment, resources, and quality of life.  NPG advocates a smaller, truly sustainable United States population accomplished through smaller families and lower, more traditional immigration levels.

Their goal is to slow, halt, and eventually reverse U.S. population growth – eventually stabilizing at a size that is sustainable over the long term.  The optimal population of approximately 150-200 million people (our nation’s size in 1970, which scientists agree was sustainable for our resources) will allow us to protect our fragile ecosystems, conserve our finite resources, and ensure a livable America for future generations.  

(To read a detailed explanation of NPG’s solutions, read Proposed National Population Policy or Our Vision.)

npg.org

________________________

I agree with their efforts.  I think the US would be a better if country if we slowly reduce our population. And the world would be much improved with a lower population.

I am a little surprised that people who purport to be environmentalists are not strongly supporting this effort. 

Sustainable Transportation

Are you getting maximum use of YOUR vehicle?  Sustainable Transportation

WELL... I THOUGHT I WAS, TILL NOW !!!

Downtown Sarasota - Ty Warner and Craig Hullinger

Nice new roundabout in beautiful downtown Sarasota.

Met with my friend Ty Warner today. We wandered around downtown Sarasota and admired recent civic improvements.

Ty grew up in Sarasota and is now the Director of the Northwest Indiana Regional Planning Commission.  He and I worked together at the Will County (Illinois) Planning Department.  It was good catching up and we enjoyed seeing the great improvements to downtown Sarasota.  

Ty's father is a citizen planner and a strong advocate for roundabouts.  Sarasota has constructed some very nice roundabouts and more are planned.

Nice coffee shops and restaurants - great streetscape.

Nice way finding signage downtown.

Two nice ponds in downtown.

A large number of interesting sculptures downtown.

Nice new urban building.

Ty at the Piano.  There are a number of pianos scattered about downtown where anyone can play. A very nice touch.

Video of a gentleman playing:

http://youtu.be/iR_iH1Nif9I

Ty Warner playing:

http://youtu.be/8BZexFMtMwM