A long time ago, in a Detroit far, far away, the Tigers split a doubleheader with the Yankees. Tiger pitcher for the first game, Mickey Lolich, had just lost his 10th straight game, a club record. During the second game, left fielder Willie Horton hit a home run to help the Tigers beat the Yankees. Radio announcer Ernie Harwell had been instructed to say nothing about the thick, black smoke billowing north of iconic Tiger Stadium.

In the long, hot summer of 1967, a tinderbox had been constructed of police distrust by black citizens, unemployment woes, a war far away, agitators, and “politics out of doors,” as it was called a century earlier. A raid of an after-hours bar struck a match when more than 80 people attending a party celebrating the return of a couple of soldiers from Vietnam were arrested and someone threw a bottle at police, then a brick through a window. Hours after the early morning raid, some described a carnival atmosphere in the neighborhood. The pastor of a local church later recalled a scene of “…gleefulness in throwing stuff and getting stuff out of buildings,” first a clothing store in the neighborhood, later grocery and retail stores in other neighborhoods. The media didn’t want to incite a spread of the violence so nothing was reported, deliberately, at first. But the violence and looting by both black and white spread anyway. Aided by a hot windy day, Detroit was in flames.