Looking Back: Stubborn ducks, rising housing costs, and movie protests in Charlevoix
CHARLEVOIX — This week, Looking Back will catch up on what happened in Charlevoix between mid-June and mid-September 1973. The regular format will begin again next week.
Charlevoix Courier, June 13, 1973, editor Bob Clock’s “Soup to Nuts” column: “For some reason, mama ducks think the carefully manicured grounds at the Lodge Motel (today’s Hotel Earl), make an ideal nesting site, despite the traffic on U.S. 31 which passes the front door. Last year one Mama Mallard insisted on parading her brood back and forth across the highway. Last week, an even more intrepid mother took her 12 ducklings downtown, but ran afoul of the bridge. She went into a tizzy when two of the little ones fell through the grating. A passing woman motorist noticed her predicament, stopped her car, picked up the mother duck, smoothed her ruffled feathers and carried her under the bridge to her lost young ones. Then she went back to the bridge and used her coat to shoo the remaining 10 ducklings back to their mother and their siblings under the bridge. We don’t know her name, but somebody upstairs keeps track of such kind deeds.
“Speaking of birds, the Rex Davises of E. Dixon-ave had an unusual experience with a pair of robins this spring. They insisted on building a nest on a light pole just outside the Davis’ door. The Davises tried to discourage them by removing their handiwork, but to no avail. A windstorm removed the nest, but it was soon rebuilt. A few weekends ago, the Davises were out of town. When they returned the nest had three eggs in it—along with a cellophane-wrapped cigar with a band reading: ‘It’s a girl.’”
In July, an article in the Detroit News by a John E. Peterson about Charlevoix’s high real estate values (average price of a house in Charlevoix then was $21,000) implied that we were snobs. On July 18, Clock wrote in his editorial “Are We Snobs?” that Peterson had misconstrued or deliberately misquoted those he had interviewed here, including Clock. Re: Tom Merta, then head of the Chamber of Commerce, a letter to the editor claimed that Peterson had Merta saying “That’s why we’re trying to encourage builders to develop units that will appeal to affluent people.” He also said Merta was “fast talking” and “employed by a group of local businessmen and land developers.”
Said Clock: “The whole tone of the article made it seem as though Charlevoix is out to attract the multi-millionaire—and no one else. There is room hereabouts for persons from all economic levels and all walks of life—although sheer economics does have something to say about who settles in the Charlevoix area.”
They should all be around to see what has happened in the 50 years since, with the average home price now around $340,000 and over 80 percent of our tax base currently funded by non-primary residential homesteads, otherwise known as “second homes.” One of our schools had to close because of the reduction in year-round population this economic twist has caused. Young people cannot afford land inside the city limits on which to raise their children. Even our latest ballot initiative is based upon what to do with vacated city property — keep it as an extension of another city park just across the street, or use the sale of the land for affordable housing. The debate regarding the latter will never end here because of our decades-old desirability, and the supply/demand marketplace speaks as it has always done, like it or not.
In mid-August came the remodeling of the old Palace movie theater into Cinema III (before it moved to Antrim Street), now renamed after its three owners, Tom Merta and cousins Sam and Bill Supernaw. To equal shock and delight, after the Aug. 1 opening “Poseidon Adventure” followed by “Soylent Green,” what should appear on the schedule but Marlon Brando’s X-rated “Last Tango in Paris,” the scandal of the year, itself to be followed by “The Sound of Music.” Oy. It was later slightly recut and toned down in the states to receive an NC-17 rating for broader distribution. But still.
Tongue-in-cheek, Bob Clock reviewed the situation and the movie on the Courier’s front page — totally in the best French he could muster.
“Tango une Succes Malgre Protestation (“Tango a success despite protests.” People were picketing on Bridge Street). One paragraph: “Et, si vous demandez de l’action, il y etait beaucoup hors au theatre a la Rue Pont ou presque 70 citoyens irrites marchait avec les signes pour protester la premier ‘X’ classe film en Charlevoix.” (“And, if you demand action, there were many outside the theater on Bridge Street where almost 70 angry citizens walked with signs protesting the first X-rated film in Charlevoix.”) Speaking for myself, I did buy a ticket to demonstrate how modern, with-it and cool I was, but committed the cardinal critical sin of finding the film so over-the-top boring and pretentious I fell asleep halfway through and had to be awakened when it was over. Never did find out how it ended."
So much for X-rating. The Charlevoix protests were reported in California newspapers.
And finally, also in mid August, Charlevoix was abuzz with several reports of UFO activity both over Lake Michigan and inland. Courier advertising manager Robert Young lived over in Vanderbilt, and claimed 27 people had seen these unexplained lights from his west-facing living room picture window. One person claimed a light had appeared to land in the vicinity of the Rod & Gun Club just north of town. The activity persisted for about a month, to be capped in the Sept. 12 issue of a report by a summer resident, who preferred to remain anonymous. She claimed that near the intersection of U.S. 31 North and the Boyne City Road, where the railroad tracks once crossed, a UFO came down so low over her car she thought it would hit her.
“Dazzling UFO Almost Landed on Her Car” was the front page headline. She had come into town to pick up her mail at the post office around midnight, and returned to be met by a “blinding light approaching from the north.” She accelerated, got away, and looked in her rear view mirror to see it disappear behind a clump of trees to the south. What she was able to describe was nine antennae on the craft. She and her husband had also witnessed a strange light in the sky moving from over Lake Charlevoix to Lake Michigan over the previous weeks, usually around 10 p.m. She never reported them for fear of ridicule until this incident changed her mind.
Bob Clock did say he respected her request for anonymity, and added, “We can only assure you that she is a mature, well-educated woman, scarcely given to flights of fancy.”
This article originally appeared on The Petoskey News-Review: Looking Back: Stubborn ducks, rising housing costs, and movie protests in Charlevoix
