Detroit

Detroit’s name is a leftover from the French: détroit, meaning “the strait,” for the river that runs between here and Windsor. Antoine de la Mothe Cadillac planted a fort on its bank in 1701, on land that had been an Indigenous crossroads — Anishinaabe, Ottawa, Potawatomi, Huron — for a very long time before that. It grew up as a fur-trading hub, became a key last stop on the Underground Railroad before the Civil War, and then the 20th century happened.

And what happened was cars. Henry Ford’s moving assembly line turned Detroit into the engine of America — the Big Three, the highest per-capita income in the country, 1.85 million people at its 1950 peak.

Then, a generation later, Berry Gordy borrowed $800 from his family, bought a little house on West Grand Boulevard, called it Hitsville U.S.A., and Motown poured out of it: the Supremes, Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye, Smokey Robinson, the Temptations. The city that built the Model T also built the soundtrack of a generation — and later invented techno, for good measure.

You know the hard middle of the story too: the decline, the white flight, 1967, and the 2013 bankruptcy that made global headlines. But here’s the thing about Detroit — it does not stay down. The downtown is humming again, the riverfront’s been reborn, the neighborhoods are buzzing, and in 2025 the city’s population grew for the second year running.

Detroiters have a word for the attitude that gets them through: you roll up your sleeves and you do it yourself. That spirit is the most Detroit thing there is — and it’s exactly why we wanted to point our fresh eyes right at the heart of it.

Where do you even start? Music alone gives you Berry Gordy, Diana Ross, Stevie Wonder, Smokey Robinson, Marvin Gaye, Aretha Franklin, the White Stripes, Madonna, and Eminem. Add boxing legend Joe Louis, comedian Lily Tomlin, and a roster of athletes, artists, and inventors too long to fit.

Detroit doesn’t just produce talent — it produces originals. The kind of people who go on to change whole art forms. There’s something in the water here, and it’s been flowing for a long time.