- [Will Glover] Just ahead on "One Detroit," a look at some of the people and places that have contributed to Detroit's rich history.

We'll take you to the long awaited ceremony honoring the city's historic Black Bottom neighborhood.

Also ahead, a celebration of Architect Albert Kahn's designs in Detroit.

Plus, we'll remember a radio legend who narrated the musical memories of many Detroiters.

And speaking of music, we'll look at the radio personalities who helped put Detroit rock station WRIF on the map.

It's all coming up next on "One Detroit."

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(bright music) - [Will Glover] On this week's "One Detroit," we're celebrating the rich history of Michigan's largest city.

Coming up, Albert Kahn's architectural firm in Detroit is still going strong after more than 125 years.

We'll take a look at the design history behind one of Detroit's most prolific architects.

Plus, we'll celebrate the life of disc jockey Robin Seymour.

He was one of the pioneers of Detroit rock and roll radio and was known as the DJ that launched 1,000 hits.

Also ahead, a walk down memory lane with 101 WRIF.

We'll look back at the interesting radio personalities and creative marketing campaigns that made WRIF a top Motor City rock station in Detroit.

But first up, a long-awaited honor for Detroit's Black Bottom neighborhood, a Michigan historical marker was installed in the area that was home to several prosperous African-American businesses and residents in the first half of the 20th century.

The neighborhood was demolished in the late 1950s and early 1960s to make way for Interstate-375 and the Lafayette Park Residential District.

One Detroit contributor, AJ Walker, was at the tribute.

(bright music) - Black Bottom was demolished, Black Bottom is gone, but its magic remains, its legacy remains.

And as Detroit shows the world its true resilience as a city, and we celebrate the future, we also celebrate the past beginning today, and in this moment of memorial and recognition so we never forget and always revere what was Black Bottom.

- [AJ] It was a moment that had been decades in the making, to remember a piece of Detroit's history, celebrating a marker that will forever memorialize the thriving, predominantly Black community that was Black Bottom.

- I wanna be clear.

Acre for acre, Black Bottom is the most culturally rich, historically significant area in Michigan's history, the whole state of Michigan, not just the city of Detroit.

It's everybody's history.

- All the seeds that was planted here in Black Bottom produced something that we bear witness to today.

You're all a part of the growth and development of those seeds that was placed here in Black Bottom.

- [AJ] People stood humbly, looking on as they witnessed firsthand a moment that meant so much to so many.

- I'm standing on behalf of the Michigan Historical Commission, also on behalf of the Michigan History Museum, and our parent agency, the Department of Natural Resources, for this important moment.

And honestly, I couldn't be more honored to have this as my assignment.

- Every long time family in the city has heard stories from their parents, their great grandparents, about Black Bottom, about Paradise Valley, about the history of this city and their family.

So much of what we have today came from this area.

- [AJ] But Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan acknowledges that all of the stories about Black Bottom weren't pleasant.

- And there is both good and bad history.

This area was wiped out, Black Bottom, largely so Lafayette Park could be built.

A couple years ago, I was very proud of the fact that the name of that mayor was taken off our convention center.

It's not a part of history that should be celebrated.

- [AJ] Ray Smith, one of the founders of The Black Bottom Group, says the process to get the marker started back in 2017, and it was not an easy one.

- The main thing was the research in terms of making sure we got all the correct information to reflect the truth of this area.

- [AJ] Their hard work paid off.

But the legacy of Black Bottom, a thriving financial mecca filled with pioneers of its time, is not only engraved on the marker, it's etched in the hearts of those like Barbara K. Hughes Smith and Sharon Sexton.

Both had family members who lived in Black Bottom.

- My ancestors were a part of Black Bottom, so I have a rich history of Detroiters.

And some even came through the underground railroad here.

- [AJ] We caught up with them outside of the celebration to hear more about their families in Black Bottom.

- This is my grandfather, Robert Isaac Greenidge, and he lived in Black Bottom and thrived there, and made many contributions as a medical doctor.

- Well, I don't need a marker (chuckles) to remind me that Black Bottom existed, but it's great that there is a marker that people can read, 'cause there are people who go by and read historical markers that it, you know, it's kind of like a post, "Okay.

We were here, we existed."

But what really got to me is the fact that the mayor of Detroit even admitted that Black Bottom existed because for so long, Black Bottom wasn't included in the maps of Detroit, was not even talked about among White people.

These are pictures of my family.

This is my father.

Like I said, he was the one who was born and raised in Black Bottom.

All these people lived in Black Bottom except for my brother.

(chuckles) He lived with us and we didn't live in Detroit at the time.

But all these individuals, they were all very successful at what they did.

- [AJ] As Sharon and Barbara swap stories about the proud heritage of their Black Bottom family, they take solace in knowing that as real as these photos are, now, so is the marker that commemorates Black Bottom.

- [Will Glover] Detroit has an amazing design heritage and the city's skyline reflects it.

The Fisher Building designed by Albert Kahn is one of these historic landmarks.

It's often described as Detroit's largest art object.

The famed architect's legacy is reflected at the Albert Kahn Associates architectural firm, which is still going strong after more than 125 years in the city.

"One Detroit" takes a look back at Albert Kahn's award-winning work in the story from a Detroit Public Television documentary titled "Detroit Designs the World."

(bright music) - In the teens, twenties and thirties, the Germans were devising this form follows function concept of universal space, exposing the frame of the building, and developing that kind of an architectural expression.

And really, while they were philosophizing about it, Albert Kahn was quietly building it.

(bright music) - I give Albert Kahn almost as much credit as Henry Ford for the mass production of the automobile.

Because if there wasn't a building design like this one with wide open spaces that could allow for an assembly line to be making cars, and buildings before this couldn't do that.

So this was groundbreaking, not just in the fact that the assembly line was here, but that it was a building that could handle the assembly line and allow for the assembly line to mass produce the automobile.

And so it was Albert Kahn and Henry Ford together that really put the world on wheels.

- [Narrator] Here's how they put them together at the Highland Park Plant.

(quirky music) - [Interviewee] I think he looked at the client's needs and the technology at the time and integrated that into a successful solution.

How can we build buildings that have a large floor plate, lots of open space, minimize the number of columns?

- [Narrator] A car comes off the end of the line every 10 seconds.

(quirky music) - Albert Kahn, together with his brothers, developed the system of the concrete construction of the automobile plants with the wide open floor plates and the concrete columns, leaving the exterior walls to be completely open, filled in with glass, which, 1903, that was very, very radical.

And it allowed the auto industries to have these very large factories to hold the weight of many, many automobiles.

It set the pace for how we look at modern architecture.

- People like Le Corbusier, Walter Gropius, they all wanted to see what these new modern factories were like, and then, it very much influenced their own work.

- We see them then going back to Europe, taking these tenants and developing it into modernism.

The idea of clean open floor plates, the idea of concrete construction or steel construction, the idea of curtain walls.

This had already been done here in Michigan.

- [Interviewee] The buildings that Kahn designed made a difference in the way that Henry Ford made cars.

- He also saw architecture in a way of craftsmanship, and American craft.

And in fact, designed the Fisher Building.

(bright music) - [Jeanette] The Fisher Building is one of the most jaw-dropping buildings in all of Detroit, and honestly, in all of the United States.

- [Alan] The Fisher Building sort of advanced the American tower.

They bring the artist into the process of construction of the building.

Many of the works of Kahn include artwork and sculpture, great grillages and handrails and guardrails, bronze work.

And that certainly, was something that Detroit contributed to.

- It literally is the beacon for this new center area.

(bright music) We're only just about three miles from downtown, but this was where General Motors built its empire.

Right across the street from the Fisher Building, we have the original General Motors headquarters, and then the Fisher brothers built this absolute beauty right here in 1928.

- And many of Khan's options for the Fisher Building were published at their time.

The Empire State Building was built a couple years after the Fisher Building, and very similar stepping form use of stone.

You can look at the detailing, you can look at the massing, and we have sketches of several of the options that Albert Kahn devised for the Fisher Building.

They're very similar to what was done with the Empire State Building.

(bright music) - [Will Glover] If you grew up in Detroit, chances are, you remember the name, Robin Seymour.

He was one of the most well known music DJs in the area beginning in the 1950s.

Seymour passed away a couple of years ago, but his role in Detroit broadcasting history will never be forgotten.

A Detroit Public Television documentary looked at Seymour's life and career.

(bright music) ♪ Roll over, Beethoven ♪ Dig me the rhythm and blues - [Robin] Oh, yeah.

That was a real mover.

Chuck Berry.

Hey, by the way, Chuck Berry is coming to the Riviera Theater in three weeks, tell you more about.

- He always had a youthful kind of verve.

He always sounded younger than he was.

And he was very, he had that effervescence to his voice.

He'll get you excited.

- [Robin] For the best in pop tune favorites.

- He could listen to a record and say, "This guy's gonna be great," or "This gal's gonna be great."

- I had a good music sense.

Let me put it to you that way.

- Now, he definitely had an ear.

Occasionally, he'd be wrong, but not very often.

- He always was good at picking out who was gonna be good and who wasn't.

But we always laughed because he couldn't have been that great because when he heard Elvis Presley, he said, "This guy's gonna bomb."

And so (laughs) that was not the case.

- I mean, the records we were playing, I mean, I'll give you an idea.

I don't even know what happened to him.

I remember playing a record by an artist called Bull Moose Jackson.

♪ I love you, yes I do - And probably the first record by a Black person that was ever played on a radio station in Detroit, other than, I think the only other station there was WJLB.

But I dug it.

It was a sound.

- He knew you liked the song.

It didn't matter, you know, what color their skin was to groove on the music.

- To be able to shift beyond what they were playing in those days, the Frank Sinatras and the Tony Bennetts.

And to move that into, it was called race music at the time, it was Black artists and they're on the radio.

Oh, my goodness.

This is unheard of.

- [Robin] Here's a young man having a ball, Little Willie John from our City of Wheels to do his big moving hit "Fever."

And I would go in to play a Johnny Cash.

And then (laughs) we play a Little Richard, nobody ever heard of him.

Dearborn Station playing Little Richard records.

- That was, during those times, kind of a bold move.

- So he was getting R&B in.

He was slipping it in before any other disc jockey in Detroit did.

♪ So hard to bear ♪ You give me fever - That was just a revolutionary thing to do, an incredible gift to listeners of Detroit.

It really started to become more and more common.

And as rock and roll came in, he was the guy.

♪ Through the night - Fred Knorr, he used to get a lot of flack when he'd go down to the DAC, the Detroit Athletic Club.

These guys will say, "Hey, I hear those Black records all the time that are being played on your station.

Now what's going on, Fred?"

He would come back to me and say, "Robin, could you sort of lighten up a little bit."

He didn't care, but he was a little bit, felt funny about that.

You know, these good old straight lace White dudes down at the DAC really tried to give him the knife.

Fred, to his feeling would say, "You know, this is making us money.

Obviously, this is what people wanna hear.

So go for it, kiddo, go for it."

♪ A wop bop a loo bop a lop bam boom ♪ - [Robin] That's one of today's top tunes, Little Richard and "Tutti Frutti."

- He felt real close to the audience.

So, you know, I also think that it was, he was one of the first guys to really want the opinion of the kids.

- [Robin] You know, every afternoon we take the flyer of the day, Robin's flyer of the day, we think is gonna go on and become a great, big hit.

"Why Do Fools Fall In Love?"

Kids would come up and sit there on the floor in the other studio and they'd dance and do their homework.

- You know the thing that Robin was able to do?

He was able to gain the trust of his audience.

♪ Why do fools fall in love - And that's a very hard thing to do and a very delicate thing to keep.

But once you get it, you can lead your audience to places that maybe they don't even wanna go, or they don't even know about.

- You pick out your own records.

You either stood or fell on what you could bring to the audience.

And I was young enough to be close enough to the teenage kids to still be thinking like them.

- [Will Glover] Detroit rock station WRIF is well known for a long history of innovative radio personalities and promotions.

One of the station's publicity campaigns involved a popular discount program at stores and venues around town.

One Detroit Senior Producer, Bill Kubota, and broadcaster, Erik Smith, looked back at the history of WRIF in the Detroit Public Television documentary "Detroit Remember When: Made In The Motor City."

(bright music) - [Erik] These days, we don't really give a second thought about all those loyalty programs.

You know, the cards you got in your wallet, those barcodes on your key chains.

(chuckles) Well, ideas like that have to start somewhere, right?

And maybe it was right here in Detroit.

So we'll begin the story, let's say around 1976.

- [Steve] Boogie man.

Well, you know, I just thought people would run and boogie and party.

- [Erik] That's when Detroit got its first wacky FM rock morning guy, the guy who did all those crazy voices that he made up in his head over at WABX.

- I stumbled on Steve Dahl at ABX, and he was doing something that nobody had ever done.

- I didn't wake up without listening to Steve Dahl.

You know, he was the one who started doing all those funny voices, doing all the funny skits.

- And the funny thing about Steve, he was doing these voices, right?

And you could tell it was Steve doing all the voices.

- [Erik] George Baier was just 20 years old, going to Wayne State and working at a gas station.

And well, he did some funny voices, too.

- [Recording Of George] Yoohoo, Olive.

I'm here to babysit Swee'Pea while you does the grocery shopping.

- [Erik] Soon Baier turned up on the air part-time with Dahl and talking like a pro wrestler at W4, another FM rock station.

- [George] That's right.

- [Steve] That's why they call you The Bruiser.

- [George] They don't call me The Bruiser for nothing.

I started doing Dick The Bruiser, because Steve needed a bodyguard in his radio world.

He is becoming so popular.

He needs a bodyguard.

Well, who's he gonna get for a bodyguard?

I know, Dick The Bruiser, he's a wrestler from Detroit.

"Well, what does he do?"

I don't know what he does, Steve, (mimics Bruiser) "but he talks like this."

- [Erik] Well, when Steve Dahl left for another job in Chicago, Jim Johnson stepped in playing straight man to Baier's characters and thus, became the famous JJ and the Morning Crew.

- I was from East Detroit, Jim was from Redford.

So why couldn't we talk to somebody who's listening from Taylor?

- [Jim] I'm sure they won't land on the freeway.

However, it's a very strange sight to be driving down the Chrysler Freeway, you look up on the horizon and there three UFOs.

So three UFOs reported so far at the Chrysler.

- And that was part of the success, was the Detroitness of the show.

- [Jim] This is Jackie Stewart for W4 Traffic.

- [Erik] It didn't take long for things to heat up.

In 1979, WRIF pulled out every stop in the books in the FM ratings war.

- Jim and George really started making it happen at W4.

And it became very, very clear to us that that was really the missing piece of the radio station.

I mean, we always had good morning shows, but we never really had that breakout show.

- [Erik] ABC actually owned WRIF at the time.

And well, they also just happened to own Channel 7 as well.

- [Fred] And if you remember the We Got Who You Wanted campaign, where they paired up Bill Bonds and John Kelly and Marilyn Turner.

- But then they decided, "Wait a minute, if it worked for our TV stations, why can't this work for our radio stations?"

- Really, in one day, we brought in Karen Savelly and we brought in JJ and the Morning Crew, which was really the big deal.

- [Erik] Ken Calvert and Steve Kostan joined the team and thus, began some very memorable promotions.

- [DJ] WRIF, it'll make you.

- It came out in the fall of 1979.

Everybody was talking about that.

It really had a big impact.

- They called the commercial "The Mouth."

- [DJ] Ooh, you have a remarkable mouth.

- WRIF is a remarkable radio station.

- [DJ] Baby.

- It probably was the best radio ad in the history of radio ads.

- [Erik] Meantime, over in Chicago, Steve Dahl was causing quite the stir blowing up a bunch of disco records at a baseball game.

- [Steve] I got the Bee Gees.

(crowd booing) - Disco had us running.

It looked like it was gonna take over the world and run the Aerosmiths and the Led Zeppelins right out of business.

It didn't happen, of course, but it just was the right thing at the right time.

And boy, it just took off.

- [Erik] With all that sudden disdain for disco, JJ and the Morning Crew started their own special club.

- You know, everybody steals promotions.

We thought this would be a good one to steal.

Here in Detroit, we've got at least one or two disco stations.

So why not go on the attack?

- Well, we gotta call it something.

Okay.

What are we gonna call?

Well, let's get Detroit in it.

Yeah, let's get Detroit, let's get rockers in it.

Detroit rockers that hate disco.

D-R-T-E, no, that doesn't sound like anything.

What are you gonna do?

- DREAD, it turned out to be.

Detroit Rockers.

- Engaged in the Abolition of.

- Disco.

I think Georgie came up with the card.

- Gotta have your card.

How can you be a card-carrying member if you don't have a card?

Yeah, Dick The Bruiser speaking.

- [Jim] Well, this is fair warning.

- [George] Fair warning?

- [Jim] Yeah.

This is the Disco Duck.

- [George] Disco Duck?

- [Jim] Yeah.

- [Erik] On morning radio, George Baier's Bruiser was taking on really a life of its own.

And soon, well, the real Dick Bruiser even came out to promote the station.

♪ We just fooling around ♪ No time for Bee Gees ♪ Or John Travolta ♪ We've had enough of that now - When we put together The Bruiser Band, which really turned out to be one of the greatest promotions ever.

♪ We get three-piece suits - [Erik] The Bruiser Band actually opened for a number of national acts with George Baier singing parody songs as, you know, The Bruiser.

- JJ and the Morning Crew, Jim and George were really, really driving the radio station.

And there's no doubt about it.

The credo of radio is "So goes your morning, so goes your radio station."

- [Erik] Meanwhile, those DREAD cards were such a hit, they were being upgraded to gold DREAD cards with actual serial numbers on 'em.

- Somebody came up with a genius idea.

I don't know who it was.

Why don't we combine this promotion with our advertisers and offer people, with these cards, discounts at various retailers around town.

- It was great.

You could go into Harmony House, which was the big record chain in those days, flash your WRIF gold card and they would knock a buck off any album.

And we had the, you know, gold DREAD card stickers accepted here.

- So that kind of evolved to Detroit Rockers Engaged in the Acquisition of Discounts.

- [Erik] Tens, maybe hundreds of thousands of those DREAD cards actually circulated throughout Metro Detroit.

Maybe there's one still in your wallet or one of your drawers somewhere, a reminder how a crazy radio promotion actually worked its way into our pocketbooks, and sure, into our hearts as well.

- [Will Glover] That will do it for this week's "One Detroit."

Thanks for joining us.

Make sure to come back for "One Detroit Arts and Culture" on Mondays at 7:30 PM.

Head to the "One Detroit" website for all the stories we're working on.

Follow us on social media and sign up for our weekly newsletter.

(bright music) - [Ad Voiceover] From Delta faucets to Behr paint, Masco Corporation is proud to deliver products that enhance the way consumers all over the world experience and enjoy their living spaces.

Masco.

Serving Michigan Communities since 1929.

- [Ad Voiceover] Support for this program is provided by: the Cynthia & Edsel Ford Fund for Journalism at Detroit Public TV, The Kresge Foundation.

- [Ad Voiceover] The DTE Foundation is a proud sponsor of Detroit Public TV.

Among the state's largest foundations committed to Michigan-focused giving, we support organizations that are doing exceptional work in our state.

Visit DTEFoundation.com to learn more.

- [Ad Voiceover] Business Leaders for Michigan, dedicated to making Michigan a top 10 state for jobs, personal income, and a healthy economy.

Nissan Foundation, and viewers like you.

(bright music)