The Story behind "Hazeltuckey" (Detroit, Taylor: real estate, apartment complex, foreclosure)

[Northsider 248]

Hazel Park, a small city in just about the exact middle of the metropolitian area. No more than 17,000 people and 3 square miles, which is a good explanation as to why many people have never even been to the city. But after a hard, volatile history, one thing remains - a reputation.

This reputation is widely used on this forum, mostly by people who have not been to or lived in Hazel Park, and do not know the actual use of the term.




These are photographs of now non-existent blights in Hazel Park. Even though many were previously torn down, fixed up, or even in extremist moments burned down, a very few still existed, including these two, in 1960.

The "village" of Hazel Park was founded in the 1910s. Even with no actual incorporation, people still referred to it as a village. But what was Hazel Park? None more than America's trash basket. At that time it was a city of a very few thousand poor farmers from the south. There were very few businesses other than the local grocer's market and the town school. Most citizens made 50% under the modern poverty rate and even further so, very few spoke properly dictated northern English.

But in just a decade and a half, the population of the "village" exploded by over 700%. The population increase was caused by the Highland Park Ford Plant's establishment and brought over 10,000 blue collar workers to Hazel Park alone from places such as New York, Florida, California and the city of Detroit itself.

These people expected better lives, but just realized it was in the worst shape any city could be in. People who moved into the city began refferring to it as "Hazel[Ken]tucky" to describe the condition the city was in

That's when the group Hazel Park citizens commonly refer to as "Ralliers" or "Marchers" formed. Many clean-up rallies, marches, parades and things of the sort were held in Hazel Park in order to remove the problems from the 1930s to the 1960s. If it weren't for the efforts of 1953 Mayor Louis Elias and his successor; the project would have inevitably had to continue for several decades. A moderate amount of people left the city, disgruntled that they couldn't have their property in any way they wanted; but this only paved the way for the demolition of their old homes and the housing boom of the 1950s.

During this housing boom, hundreds of thousands of gallons of swamp water was drained and filled in with land. Most of the time only the surface water was drained, which is what causes problems with flooding of unsealed basements in the modern day

[Retroit]

Are you suggesting that Hazel Park was the first city to have the "-tuckey" designation attached to it?

[Remisc]

1. I laughed a little when I saw that the person who trashes Royal Oak on a daily base came to the defense of Hazel Park.

2. Hazel Park still has blight. IDK if that hotel is still standing, but that's the best-known example.

[Northsider 248]

Originally Posted by Retroit

Are you suggesting that Hazel Park was the first city to have the "-tuckey" designation attached to it?

It may have been. Hazel Park is one of the middle suburbs as far as the time that the city was originally established as a settlement goes. I'm just clarifying that this was a historical term and is now politically incorrect. Using terms like Taylortuckey, Madisontuckey, Lincolntuckey, etc. may be politically correct, but Hazeltuckey was a term coined during the 1920s/1930s.

Originally Posted by Remisc

1. I laughed a little when I saw that the person who trashes Royal Oak on a daily base came to the defense of Hazel Park.

2. Hazel Park still has blight. IDK if that hotel is still standing, but that's the best-known example.

1. I don't see how Royal Oak could be considered better in any way besides a portion of wealth distribution. Just because a place is wealthy does not mean it's a good community. It may work vice versa, but consider that many incomes for inner suburbs in Los Angeles - a place notorious for suburban ghettos - are often between $37,000 and $56,000. Just look at Torrance and Hollywood.

2. The hotel isn't still standing because it was blighted indeed. Hence why it was torn down. Hence why they're building a truely gigantic new CVS - not only to consolidate the two existing stores in the city, but to fill even further retail demand in "Hazeltuckey" - in the spot that the hotel was at. As for other blights, there are some boarded up homes [due to foreclosure, mind you. not vacancy] and a couple houses here and there around the neighborhoods with some worn siding or windows with chipped paint, but it isn't like full on uncut lawns, trashed siding, rusty cars kind of deal like I find quite a bit in Royal Oak.

[us66]

Speaking of cars on lawns in Royal Oak...


1324 West 13 Mile Rd, Royal Oak, MI, 48073 - MLS #210021598 - Single Family Home real estate - REALTOR.com®

[scolls]

In case you never been on 13 mile, it's a busy road and you can't park on it.

[djmilf]

Originally Posted by [JS]

As for other blights, there are some boarded up homes [due to foreclosure, mind you. not vacancy] and a couple houses here and there around the neighborhoods with some worn siding or windows with chipped paint, but it isn't like full on uncut lawns, trashed siding, rusty cars kind of deal like I find quite a bit in Royal Oak.

[JS], your admission that you're only 16 years old leads me to chalk up your persistence in this fiction as teen-age angst. I think that when you're in your 20's you will find that there's a lot to like about Royal Oak.

[mike0618]

burton has been called burtucky.. south side of flint is known as little kentucky.. i believe the meanings go back to the auto industry and the people from kentucky coming to those areas to work at the factories.

[us66]

Originally Posted by scolls

In case you never been on 13 mile, it's a busy road and you can't park on it.

I know that...there's been a lot of comments on here about cars on lawns in Royal Oak. Further east on 13 Mile (Fraser and Roseville) they used to park on their lawns also, before the road was widened to five lanes. The houses on the north side between Groesbeck and Gratiot lost a lot of front yard to that.

[Northsider 248]

Originally Posted by scolls

In case you never been on 13 mile, it's a busy road and you can't park on it.

But they have driveways they surely can park in. Off of the top of my head I can think of quite a few cars parked on lawns on other streets.

• The house in the real estate listing. I go by there often and there's usually never any car in the driveway, but the Grand Am is on the lawn. Occasionally it may be in the driveway, but not very frequently.
• A "doublewide duplex" on 14 Mile where there is often a newer Dodge Ram parked infront of the second unit from the street. There is infact a public parking lot behind it that is usually not occupied
• ^^ If you're having trouble finding this one, it's a block west of the apartment complex with the giant confederate flag hanging in the window of the closest apartment to the side-street
• A stucco-type ranch house on Normandy. Sometimes there is an early-90s BMW in the driveway but often times it is on the lawn parked diagonally.
• A brick-and-aluminum house at the intersection of Coolidge and Normandy. To the side of the house there is normally a red 1990s Mustang on a dirt patch of the lawn.
• ^^ Their neighbors in the grey brick house will also park their Jeep Grand Cherokee on the lawn, although they haven't done this very often after it sunk into the ground during a rainstorm and had to be towed out.
• Many houses on 14 mile between Rochester and the Madison Heights border
• A brick house at the intersection of Washington and Crooks, a maroon PT Cruiser often in the backyard.
• ^^ Down Washington from that there is some sort of SUV (I don't remember what kind) either to the side of the driveway of a brick house, or on the patch of grass inbetween the road and the sidewalk.
• A purple/blue Dodge Grand Caravan on the lawn of a small ranch house just north of Normandy on Crooks.
• Cars on the lawn between the street and the parking lot of a mechanic on 14 Mile near Delmere.
• ^^ A little bit down the road from there, there is a Lawn Maintenance Service with a blighted building complete with grafitti, boarded windows and, wouldn't you know it, a pair of pickup trucks on the lawn
• Various homes on Gardenia (not Catalpa)

If that doesn't prove my point, I'll make a little field trip down some side streets to get some pictures for you. And if I find some other redneck stuff going on (like pickup truck swimming pools, too bad I didn't have my camera last week), I'll make sure to let you know.

In Hazel Park I can only think of a few:

• The intersection of Merill and Meyers, a Brick tudor house on a double lot with either a Ford Focus or a newer Ford pickup truck on the lawn. Never both.
• A brick house on Elza with a short driveway, one car in the drive, one on the lawn.
• A small ranch on East Woodward Heights, sometimes a Harley-Davidson type motorcycle on the lawn near the front porch and sidewalk.

Fraser, I'm not so sure about. On the north side of Fraser I could see how that would play out. I probably will never see a day where there's a car on the lawn in southern Fraser. As for Roseville, I agree. It's probably even worse off there than in either Royal Oak or Hazel Park.