The End of the Road in Michigan

Michigan women spent decades pressing for a voice at the ballot box. In 1912, a state suffrage amendment failed by just 760 votes. This episode follows Sojourner Truth, Mary T. Lathrop, Emily Burton Ketcham, Clara Arthur and Anna Howard Shaw through petitions, political setbacks and organizing across the state.

It also examines Gov. Albert E. Sleeper’s 1917 measure, which gave women a limited vote for president before the 19th Amendment set a national constitutional guarantee. In 1918, Michigan voters approved full state suffrage. A year later, the Legislature unanimously ratified the 19th Amendment. The long campaign—and the barriers that remained—reshaped voting rights in Michigan and across the nation.


The End of the Road in Michigan is a production of Thumbwind Publications

Detroit, 1933. A world-famous artist. An automobile empire. Twenty-seven murals that would ignite one of the city's fiercest cultural controversies.

When Mexican artist Diego Rivera arrived in Detroit in 1932, he came to paint the industrial might of America's Motor City. Funded by Edsel Ford, president of Ford Motor Co., Rivera's ambitious commission would transform the Detroit Institute of Arts into a monument to machinery, manufacturing and the workers who powered an industrial revolution.

But Rivera was no ordinary artist.

A controversial communist whose paintings celebrated working people, Rivera found himself at the center of a bitter public dispute. Religious leaders condemned his imagery. Newspaper editorials attacked his work as un-American. One city councilman wanted the paintings washed from the museum walls.

Yet Edsel Ford stood behind the artist.In this episode of End of the Road in Michigan, we return to Depression-era Detroit to tell the extraordinary story behind Rivera's Detroit Industry Murals.

From the roaring assembly lines of Ford's River Rouge complex to the towering walls of the Detroit Institute of Arts, we examine how Rivera created his 27-panel masterpiece, why it sparked outrage and how it became one of Michigan's most important works of public art.It is a story of wealth and labor, artistic freedom and political conflict, and a city confronting the meaning of industrial progress.

More than 90 years later, Rivera's murals still ask a powerful question: Who deserves the credit for building Detroit?

Join us for another compelling chapter of Michigan history on End of the Road in Michigan,

The End of the Road in Michigan is a production of Thumbwind Publications

Whitmore Lake: The Resort Town That Harvested Ice

In the early 1900s, Whitmore Lake, Michigan, was a thriving summer destination where passenger trains delivered vacationers to grand hotels, wooden swimming towers and lively dance halls. Visitors came from Detroit, Ann Arbor and other cities to escape the summer heat.

But when winter arrived, the lake became a very different place.Workers ventured onto the frozen surface to cut enormous blocks of natural ice, which were stored in massive icehouses and shipped by railroad. The same lake that attracted swimmers and sailboats during summer also supported a demanding winter industry.In this episode of The End of the Road in Michigan, we revisit Whitmore Lake's remarkable resort era.

We'll examine the grand Clifton House and Lake House hotels, the railroad connections that brought thousands of visitors, and the community's surprising ties to legendary University of Michigan football coach Fielding H. Yost.

We'll also explore the Roaring Twenties, when a popular dance pavilion drew college students, and trace the devastating fires that destroyed several of Whitmore Lake's most important historic buildings.

By the 1940s, changing travel habits, wartime employment and the automobile were reshaping the community. The grand hotels disappeared, but Whitmore Lake continued its transformation into a year-round hometown.

Join us for a journey through Michigan history, when the railroad brought summer vacationers, hotels filled the shoreline and a frozen lake provided a winter paycheck.

The End of the Road in Michigan shares the remarkable people, places and events that shaped the Great Lakes State.Do you remember old Whitmore Lake? Share your family's stories and memories.
#MichiganHistory #WhitmoreLake #MichiganPodcasts

The End of the Road in Michigan is a production of Thumbwind Publications

Before the Mackinac Bridge became Michigan’s most recognizable crossing, it was a proposal that repeatedly stalled. Engineers drew plans. Supporters pushed lawmakers. Financing fell through. Meanwhile, state ferries kept carrying motorists across the straits.

In this episode of The End of the Road in Michigan, follow the decades-long campaign to build the Mighty Mac—from early bridge proposals and the growing ferry fleet to Prentiss Brown’s determined push for financing. Then follow the crews who turned David Steinman’s design into a five-mile crossing above the water.

Drawing on historical records from the Mackinac Bridge Authority and Michigan’s history agencies, this episode examines the political setbacks, financial gamble and demanding construction behind the bridge’s opening on Nov. 1, 1957. It also remembers the five workers who died building it.

Listen to the story behind those familiar towers—and the people who made it possible for Michigan’s road to keep going.


The End of the Road in Michigan is a production of Thumbwind Publications

A car heads north from Toledo before dawn. Michigan State Troopers signal its driver to stop. Moments later, it strikes a log pulled across the highway. Officers find illegal liquor in the wreckage—but the Michigan Supreme Court will have something to say about their methods.

In this episode of End of the Road in Michigan, follow the Michigan State Police from its creation as a 300-man wartime force in 1917 through its transformation into a lasting police agency. Meet the mounted troopers, follow Prohibition enforcement along the Ohio border, and hear the story of Cpl. Sam Mapes, who refused a bootlegger’s bribe and paid with his life.

Drawing on court records, state histories and memorial accounts, this episode examines the danger, disputed authority and consequential decisions behind a familiar Michigan institution.

Listen to the story of the troopers who stayed after the war ended.

The End of the Road in Michigan is a production of Thumbwind Publications

In September 1925, Dr. Ossian Sweet moved his family into a brick house at 2905 Garland in a white Detroit neighborhood. The next evening, a crowd gathered, rocks struck the house and gunfire erupted from an upstairs window. One man was killed, another was wounded and all 11 people inside were arrested.

The resulting trials became a national test of race, self-defense and equal treatment under Michigan law. Backed by the NAACP, a legal team that included Detroit’s Black attorneys and famed courtroom lawyer Clarence Darrow argued that the Sweets had the same right to defend their home as any white family.

This episode follows the disputed events outside the house, the competing courtroom accounts and Judge Frank Murphy’s historic instructions to an all-white jury. It also addresses a fact the prosecution could never settle: Who fired the fatal shot?


The End of the Road in Michigan is a production of Thumbwind Publications

In 1837 and 1838, Michigan’s border towns became a key part of the Patriot War. Secret Hunters’ Lodges recruited supporters in Detroit, Port Huron, and nearby communities as Canadian rebels sought to renew their fight against British rule.

This episode follows the struggle over weapons at Fort Gratiot, the theft of hundreds of guns from a Detroit jail, and the Michigan militia’s guard duty at the Dearborn arsenal. It also traces the failed Patriot expedition aboard the schooner Ann and the armed crossing that ended in the Battle of Windsor on Dec. 4, 1838.

Michigan was officially at peace with Britain. But its rivers, roads, and towns became both routes for rebellion and lines the state had to defend.

The End of the Road in Michigan is a production of Thumbwind Publications

From 1928 to 1930, crews built a highway tunnel beneath the Detroit River using steel, concrete, dredging, and compressed-air excavation. One 500-ton tube nearly toppled when its timber supports failed.

The workers regrouped, lowered nine steel sections into a riverbed trench, joined them underwater and connected them to tunnel approaches on both shores. Hear how welders, tugboat crews, divers, and tunnel workers helped build the Detroit-Windsor Tunnel, which opened to traffic on Nov. 3, 1930.

The End of the Road in Michigan is a production of Thumbwind Publications

This episode includes AI-generated content.

Before Bissell became a household name, Anna Sutherland Bissell was selling carpet sweepers store by store in Grand Rapids. When fire destroyed the company’s factory, she helped secure the support needed to rebuild.

After her husband Melville died in 1889, Anna led the business through years of growth, defended its patents and carried its products into international markets.

This episode follows her path from saleswoman to company president and examines the woman often called America’s first female CEO—a later title for a role she held under another name. Her story also reaches beyond the factory, through her support for young people and immigrant women in Grand Rapids.

The End of the Road in Michigan is a production of Thumbwind Publications

Harriet Quimby was a Michigan-born journalist who became the first American woman to earn a pilot’s license. After 33 lessons at the Moisant Aviation School, she took on a greater test: a solo flight across the English Channel.

On April 16, 1912, Quimby flew a Blériot monoplane from England to France, using a compass when fog hid the coast. In her own articles, she described the training, the risks and the decisions behind the flight. This episode follows her path from reporter to aviator and revisits the crossing that made her an aviation pioneer.

The End of the Road in Michigan is a production of Thumbwind Publications