DAVID FAULK is a PhD candidate in Germanic studies at the University of Illinois at Chicago. He writes about Arab-German literature of migration and fools himself into thinking that after years of studying Arabic he actually knows the language.
KATHRYN FLINN is a plant ecologist and assistant professor of biology at Baldwin Wallace University in Berea, Ohio. Originally from Indiana, Pennsylvania, she earned a PhD in ecology and evolutionary biology from Cornell.
AARON FOLEY is the author of How to Live in Detroit Without Being a Jackass and editor of The Detroit Neighborhoods Guidebook. A Detroit native, he worked in journalism for ten years before leading a new neighborhood content site for the City of Detroit, where he currently works.
JIM GRIFFIOEN is a lawyer turned writer and photographer. His work has appeared in Harper’s, Vice, Time, Foam, The Baffler, Dwell, and many other publications. He has lived in Detroit since 2006.
BEN GWIN is the author of the novel Clean Time: The True Story of Ronald Reagan Middleton (Burrow Press, 2018). His work has appeared in The Normal School, Mary: A Journal of New Writing, Belt Magazine, and others. He lives in Pittsburgh with his daughter.
JEFF Z. KLEIN, born and raised in Buffalo, is a former editor and sportswriter at The New York Times and the Village Voice and the author of several books about hockey. Currently he writes and produces the “Niagara Frontier Heritage Moments” on WBFO radio. Klein lives in the Allentown section of Buffalo and in Manhattan.
JACQUELINE MARINO is an associate professor of journalism at Kent State University. She is the author of White Coats: Three Journeys Through an American Medical School and the co-editor of Car Bombs to Cookie Tables: The Youngstown Anthology.
LAYLA MEILLIER is currently graduating from Genesee Early College at the University of Michigan–Flint. She will transfer to New York University to study cinema and begin classes in the fall of 2017.
MARSHA MUSIC is a writer, poet, and self-described “Detroitist,” daughter of a pre-Motown record producer; she reflects on Detroit’s history and music in numerous books and periodicals, and on her eponymous blog. Ms. Music is a 2012 Kresge Literary Arts Fellow and 2015 Knight Arts Challenge winner, and a noted speaker, narrator, and storyteller featured in Detroit oral histories, podcasts, voiceovers and documentary films.
DAVE NEWMAN is the author of five books, most recently Please Don’t Shoot Anyone Tonight (Broken River Books, 2017). He lives in Trafford, Pennsylvania, the last town in the Electric Valley, with his wife, the writer Lori Jakiela, and their two children.
JASON SEGEDY is the director of planning and urban development for the City of Akron, Ohio. His passion is creating great places and spaces where residents can live, work, and play.
RYAN SCHNURR is a writer and photographer from northeast Indiana. He is the author of In the Watershed: A Journey Down the Maumee River.
AMANDA SHAFFER is a professional coach whose consulting practice serves mission-driven individuals and organizations across higher education and the social sector. Outside of work she is a volunteer with local and national nonprofits dedicated to advancing equity, inclusion, and social progress.
MARGARET SULLIVAN is the media columnist for The Washington Post. A native of Lackawanna, New York, she spent most of her career at the Buffalo News, where she became the first woman to hold the top editor’s position, one she held for thirteen years. She is a former public editor for The New York Times.
DR. HENRY LOUIS TAYLOR, JR. is a full professor in the Department of Urban and Regional Planning, as well as the founding director of the Center for Urban Studies at the University at Buffalo. A historian and urban planner, Taylor has authored numerous books, articles, and technical reports on issues relating to the black urban experience and social justice in the United States, Latin America, and the Caribbean. He has received numerous awards for his research and practical activities.
ANNE TRUBEK is the founder and director of Belt Publishing. She is the author of The History and Uncertain Future of Handwriting and A Skeptic’s Guide to Writers’ Houses, and the co-editor of Rust Belt Chic: The Cleveland Anthology.
CAROLYNE WHELAN is a freelance writer and poet with a special love for the intersection between nature and humanity. Her first book, The Glossary of Tania Aebi, was published by Finishing Line Press, and she is currently working on a manuscript about cycling from Canada to Mexico along the Great Divide Mountain Bike Route, listed as one of the hardest cycling routes in the world.
ERIC WOODYARD is an award-winning sports journalist working at MLive.com—The Flint Journal. He is a native of Flint and author of the novel Wasted. Woodyard has interviewed many notable celebrities such as LeBron James, Snoop Dogg, Russell Simmons, J. Cole, and Mike Tyson. He appeared on the ESPN’s E:60 and Outside the Lines in 2016. Ethan Woodyard is his only child.
Acknowledgments
Thanks to Stephen Morrison for seeing the potential in this book, and Pronoy Sarkar for his enthusiasm and insights.
Thanks to Martha Bayne, who edited the essays that originally appeared in Belt Magazine. Thanks to Scott Atkinson, who edited Happy Anyway: The Flint Anthology; Eric Boyd, editor of The Pittsburgh Anthology; Anna Clark, editor of A Detroit Anthology; Jody Kleinberg Biehl, editor of Right Here, Right Now: The Buffalo Anthology; Jacqueline Marino and Will Miller, editors of Car Bombs to Cookie Tables: The Youngstown Anthology; Jason Segedy, editor of The Akron Anthology; and Richey Piiparinen, co-editor of Rust Belt Chic: The Cleveland Anthology.
Neither Belt Magazine nor Belt Publishing would have been able to originally publish these essays without Nicole Boose, William Rickman, Karie Kirkpatrick, Michelle Blankenship, Meredith Pangrace, David Wilson, Aaron Foley, Anna Clark, Haley Stone, Matt Stansberry, Michael Jauchen, Jim Babcock, and the many generous members of Belt.
Notes
Introduction: Why the Rust Belt Matters (and What It Is)
1. http://beltmag.com/mapping-rust-belt
2. http://www.museumofthecity.org/project/the-deindustrialization-of-youngstown/
Will Blacks Rise or Be Forgotten in the New Buffalo?
1. http://www.thecyberhood.net/documents/papers/dawn.pdf
The Fauxtopias of Detroit’s Suburbs
1. Steven Watts, The People’s Tycoon: Henry Ford and the American Century
