Burlesque legend Lottie Graves-Claiborne wowed 'em on several continents, sharing the stage with numerous worldwide stars. But throughout her celebrated 90 years, Lottie insisted on highlighting the art of the tease. This week's Detroit History Podcast focuses on a long life well-lived, and how Lottie the Body's discretion painted a fine line between exotic dancing and mere titillating display.

A historic cafe has morphed its way through generations of change, and still ... still ... there is the feather bowling. Feather bowling? Yes, feather bowling. One man, born in Detroit, found an important piece of his identity playing this unusual game of his forebears on the court at the Cadieux Cafe and he is an important reason the game appears secure in its Detroit home.

In 1952, famed historian David Maraniss's father, Elliott Maraniss, was fired by the Detroit Times, the city's Hearst daily newspaper. This happened on the very day congressional witch hunters showed up in the newsroom with a subpoena demanding he testify before the House Un-American Activities Committee. The family's ensuing odyssey in search of a normal life is the remarkable story told in David Maraniss's book, "A Good American Family." The younger Maraniss discusses the paranoia of the McCarthy era in this week's edition of the Detroit History Podcast. And we get help from former Channel 4 anchorman Mort Crim, who reads from a letter the elder Maraniss left behind about what it is to be an American.

Benny Evangelista found Detroit's near East Side fertile territory for dispensing pay-as-you-go insights into the lives of his working-class clientele. He was known in the neighborhood as a "divine prophet," which is how the banner headline of the Detroit Free Press described him after his decapitated body and the hacked remains of his wife and four children were discovered on a holiday morning on the eve of The Great Depression. Their massacre might be Detroit’s greatest unsolved murder mystery.

The magnet of good-paying factory jobs and the nurturing influence of an excellent public school music program helped make Detroit a hotbed of jazz and the hometown of many internationally famous musicians. This edition of Detroit History Podcast takes a look at when and how and why Detroit's music began to swing, and how generations of jazz stylists became an important cultural export. From the Graystone Ballroom to Miles Davis's rhythm section, and onward, Detroit has had a greater impact on America's native art form, jazz, than you might expect.

He came to Detroit as a high-school dropout raised in hardscrabble West Virginia. The career arc that followed -- from diemaker at Henry Ford's Ford Rouge Plant to confidant of American presidents -- marks Walter Reuther as a singular figure in in the U.S. labor movement. His vision of power-sharing and social progressivism drew the template for a blue-collar middle class. Even as technology has shrunk the workforce, and corruption allegations have stained a later generation of leaders, Reuther's place in American history is assured. This week's Detroit History Podcast traces the Reuther saga from his first days at the Rouge to a fateful plane crash near the northern Michigan recreational haven and training facility he envisioned for UAW members.

In the late 60s, a thunderously enduring upheaval occurred in the musical and cultural landscape. Young Americans, knowingly or not, were overdue for something other than Top 40 music and crewcuts. The Detroit radio station WABX, ignoring old norms of pop music content and airing songs that lasted seven minutes or more, was the crucible for what became known as "progressive rock" programming. Down the street, launched on an even smaller budget, a three-block stretch of Plum Street became Detroit's short-lived version of Haight-Ashbury. As the nation entered the 1970s, Detroit was already there. The Detroit History Podcast takes a look at the people who made it happen. 

If anybody was taking bets in the early 1960s, Coleman A. Young would have been a true longshot for getting himself elected to just about anything. He held any number of jobs from the late 1940s to the early 1960s, and ran unsuccessfully for public office on three occasions. But his fortunes changed. His dogged determination, refusal to bow to a House Un-American Activities Committee witch hunt, and a remarkable primary victory in 1973 made Detroit mayoral history. We explore his ride to the mayor’s office, with former Channel 2 reporter Al Allen, Detroit mayoral candidate John Mogk, and others.