ypsi~dixit

If you look closely at your photo of HB's boathouse, you will notice a tree growing out of the roof at the far left end. That tree is actually cement and is the chimney for the hearth in the boathouse.

Oh, I see it. That is wild. I regret the place is no longer abandoned, since I'm dying to explore it. I didn't get too close, since it's inhabited and all, but I wanted to see the lion-cages and the miniature village and everything else.

Is it just me, or is that right-side wall listing dangerously? Also, why was there a onetime hearth in Harry Bennett's boathouse? What need would there be for fire by the water? One wonders what went on here in years past.

The boat house was quite fancy at one time - if I remember right, it has a mural and a water fountain on the wall. The dock is concrete poured on railroad track, if memory serves. It's in pretty good shape considering it was probably built in the 20's or 30's and was left to rot.

I've crept around there many times and never had anyone hassle me, although a dog burst out of the underbrush one time and I gouged my flesh running through the thickets and into the river in a panic. When I waded around to the boathouse, my buddy was sitting on the dock petting the dog, a golden retriever.

I doubt you would get any grief if you docked and looked around a little bit. Check out the tunnel entrance in the boathouse

This is now on my list. I plan to creep closer next time and cautiously explore. I want to see the hearth and the other features of the site, without disturbing the occupants. A little bit.

I had to laugh at the image of your buddy petting the "ferocious" golden retriever, no disrespect intended.

The tiny village is to the left of the boathouse (when you're facing it)

Thank you, Walter. I hope to check it out, without disturbing the owners. Just want to see Bennett's fabulous castle grounds.

I think the way to do it would be to go in the early early morning. At any rate, I appreciate your tips.

yup, I felt like an ass running scared from what turned out to be the All American family dog

You might want to have a hearth in a boathouse because you might want to work on your boat all seasons -- especially if it's wooden, which means you basically have to work on it all year (sanding, scraping, sealing, repainting), except the couple months it's actually in the water.

That makes sense; sounds fairly labor-intensive, though, for what's supposed to be a leisure craft.

People who love wooden boats love them with a passion. Also, fiberglass wasn't always available.

Those are lovely crafts, full of soul. I particicularly like the elegant "Tendress."

I like Tendress, too. Astrid was designed by Joel White, E.B. White's son.

Astrid also has clean, elegant lines that you don't see on commercially made boats.

Today my neighbor caught the biggest walleye I ever seen come out of the Huron. In the froth of the Superior Rd dam. It was at least 24-30 inches. And a good five to seven pounds. I myself lost my needlenose pliers and had to perform delicate fish mouth surgery with my finger. All patients seemed to live. Note to self: Can't buy beer before noon on Sunday. Get some stocked in garage.

Sausageneck: that is amazing about the walleye. Did you see it at the river, or later at your neighbor's house (did he eat it)? Just curious.

That is too bad about the pliers. Wonder where they got to. Least you weren't dealing with a hookectomy on a pike.

I saw the photos of your recent visit to the old Bennett boathouse and thought perhaps I could add something to the discussion. I know the Bennett estate pretty well, as I’m writing a biography of Harry Bennett.
The boathouse was built in 1925, the same year the Bennetts moved into the castle. Bennett docked a fishing boat there in warm weather. In the winter, his family warmed themselves by the fire after they went ice skating on the river or sledding down a toboggan run from the top of the hill. Bennett, a trained artist, painted the mural of a Caribbean seascape. He also sculpted the concrete tree stump on the roof that hides the chimney. (At his winter home near Palm Springs, Calif., Bennett used concrete to sculpt a lifesize cactus around a chimney.)
The boathouse once contained an exit for Bennett’s escape tunnel; in fact, two of the tunnels terminated at the boat house. One tunnel came out through a trap door on the wooden boat dock. (The trap door was so well disguised that you could not tell it was there when it was shut.) The second river tunnel took a different route down the hill and came out inside the boathouse. Bennett sealed the two portals before he sold the castle in 1948. Today, there is no sign of them.
There isn’t much left of Bennett’s miniature village, either. The “duck village” has disappeared amid a jungle of trees and underbrush. After 55 Michigan winters, the buildings have fallen into a state of ruin. In Bennett’s day, the village was a child's dream world. The buildings housed Bennett’s flock of mallards, which got into the fenced enclosure by swimming from the Huron River into a stream that flowed through a fieldstone creek bed that's still there. Focal points were a 10 foot replica of the US Capitol rotunda, a church with a steeple and tiny stained glass windows, and a stone lighthouse with a revolving light. It sort of looked like a kitschy 1920s miniature golf course. Bennett built it as much for the enjoyment of his kids as for himself. He liked to drive down there after work and relax by feeding his ducks.
If you’re thinking about sight-seeing, bear in mind that the boathouse and the duck village are on private property. While the area may look deserted, it's not. It is someone’s back yard. Before you step ashore, ask yourself how you’d feel if you found an intruder prowling around your yard while your kids are playing outdoors?
I’d be glad to upload some pictures of the boathouse and duck village as they looked in Bennett’s day, if that would interest anyone.

Post away..

The Battle of the Overpass
In April, 1937, the Supreme Court upheld the validity of the Wagner Act, guaranteeing workers the rights to organize a union. Walter Reuther and other organizers saw their chance, and Ford would not be able to stop them. On May 26, 1937, they assembled a hundred leafletters, and invited over a hundred clergy, press and politicians, "So there won't be any trouble."

However, over 400 Ford Servicemen under Harry Bennett appeared as the leafleting began and proceeded to viciously beat the organizers, both men and women. One minister noted that the Dearborn police looked on as one woman was being beaten, and made no attempt to stop the carnage. Katherine "Bebe" Gelles, head of the Local 174 auxiliary, traded punches with a goon. The thugs went too far, commentators said. At least one organizer - JJ Kennedy - died of his wounds. Tony Marinovich suffered a fractured skull which he never fully recovered from. But the biggest mistake made by the company was beating up the press, including photographers from the Detroit News. Most of the film was seized by the thugs, but one photographer got away. Walter Reuther and Dick Frankensteen had their bloody faces broadcast around the world. The photographs told the story of what came to be called the Battle of the Overpass. Time's coverage was particularly graphic, and in response Ford withdrew all ads from Time, Life and Fortune for the next 70 weeks.

WJ Cameron, Henry Ford's assistant, reported on his Sunday radio broadcast that it was merely a case of Ford against the "Reds," and that this was no time to be "timid."

The Battle of the Overpass took its toll on Edsel - the relationship of Henry and his son Edsel never recovered. The organizers that were being beaten and murdered were intellectuals, idealists - the same sort of folks Edsel socialized with. Clara Ford sided with Edsel, but it was clear Henry was firm in his decision - Bennett, and no one else, would rule on all matters relating to labor at the Ford Motor Company.

Clara Ford had mutual friends with the Bradfords in Dr. Sladen, the head of the Henry Ford Hospital, and personal physician to the Ford family. In June, a month after the Battle of the Overpass, the Bradford's son Curtis graduated with a PhD from Yale University. The Bradfords were unable to get to New Haven, but Dr. Sladen attended and wrote them a letter, "The accomplishment that he has completed is worthy of the greatest praise, and I tried my best to represent the family in the amount of noise I made when his diploma was awarded." (Letter from Dr. Frank J. Sladen, Physician-in-Chief at the Henry Ford Hospital, to Mrs. Lewis Bradford, July 8, 1937).

Bennett's influence was 'baleful'

Founder's bodyguard led anti-union attacks and nearly became head of the company

By Francis X. Donnelly / The Detroit News

Historians say the nearly three decades between Harry Bennett's hiring and firing is a dark chapter in Ford's history.

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One of Harry Bennett's first jobs with Ford Motor Co. in 1916 was to protect the grandchildren of Henry Ford.

But when Henry Ford II took over the company from his grandfather in 1945, he fired Bennett and kept a handgun in his desk to protect himself from his old bodyguard.

The nearly three decades between Bennett's hiring and firing is one of the darker chapters of the automaker's century-long history, according to historians and Henry Ford biographers.

"He had a baleful influence on Ford Motor Co." said Bob Casey, transportation curator at the Henry Ford Museum. "His vision didn't extend much beyond what was good for Harry Bennett."

Bennett, a former boxer with ties to organized crime, is described by Ford biographers as a thug in a spotted bow tie. He developed a close relationship with Henry Ford that made Bennett one of the most powerful men in the auto industry.

As Ford's only close confidant, Bennett exerted nearly total control over the company in the 1930s and 1940s, and nearly took it over shortly before his ouster.

His legacy includes the company's violent relationship with organized labor during the 1930s, historians said.

The advent of the $5 work day in 1914 had made Ford a hero to the working class but, when unions tried to organize workers two decades later, they repeatedly faced company security men armed with pistols, whips and rubber hoses.

Bennett, who was as pugnacious in his personal life as in his professional one, directed the physical machinations of Ford Motor Co.'s security force. He had hand-picked many of them, scouring sports teams, boxing gyms and the underworld.

"Hank the Deuce," as Henry Ford II was known, and many others inside and out of Ford Motor Co. hated Bennett. But he had the confidence of the only person who mattered: Henry Ford.

Ford came to see Bennett as the son he wished he'd had, historians said. Ford found his own son, Edsel, far too genteel. He preferred the uncouth, street-wise Bennett and his stories of rabble-rousing. He liked Bennett's blind loyalty and ability to get things done.

Bennett often picked Ford up in the morning and took him home at night. They talked on the phone every day and drove around the Rouge plant together.

It was at Ford's direction that Bennett tried to prevent the unionization of Ford workers. It worked for a while. General Motors Corp. and Chrysler Corp. unionized first.

The violence reached a peak in 1937, wrote biographers Allan Nevins and Frank Ernest Hill in their book, "Ford: Decline and Rebirth."

In Kansas, police found a dozen shotguns, 14 revolvers and 60 other types of weapons with a 28-man Ford security team that was fighting union activity. In Dallas, where the automaker had an assembly plant, a Ford official estimated that 25 union activists were beaten during the summer of 1937. In Dearborn, Walter Reuther was among the union leaders bloodied by Ford thugs during the so-called Battle of the Overpass.

After years of terror, all of Ford's activities against unionization came to naught as the company signed its first contract with workers in 1941.

"He was a thug at heart," Casey said of Bennett. "He took great pride in his pugilistic skills and was happy to demonstrate them by beating a tattoo on your head."

Bennett eventually suffered an even larger failure at Ford than the union's victory.

By the 1940s, the elderly Henry Ford was strongly under Bennett's sway and changed his wiill to given Bennett control of the company for 10 years after Ford's death.

Henry Ford II, who had left the Navy to join the family business in 1945, was alarmed to learn about the secret agreement. He told John Bugas, a former FBI official who worked for Ford, that the Fords should sell their shares of the company and tell dealers not to be associated with the automaker anymore.

But Bugas instead met with Bennett, who lit the codicil to the will on fire, put the ashes in an envelope and told Bugas to give it to Ford, historians said.

Bennett later said the codicil wasn't legal because the elderly Ford had scribbled Bible verses and random notes on the piece of paper, raising questions about the soundness of his judgment.

Bennett still hoped that the elder Henry Ford would allow him to take over. But that effort was squashed by Henry's wife, Clara, and daughter-in-law, Eleanor, the widow of Ford's son, Edsel, who had died in 1943. The women threatened to sell their stock in the company if Bennett were made president.

Henry Ford agreed to let Henry Ford II take control of the company. Hank the Deuce's first order of business: Fire Bennett, the man who had protected him as a baby.

Thom: that is fascinating. Thank you for the information. Naturally I'd love to see photos of the boathouse in its heyday. If you like, they can be emailed to ypsidixit@gmail.com, and thank you for the offer.

Anonymous, thank you for the two very interesting stories about this thuggish man.

Out of the dozens of cameramen on the bridge, only a few escaped with their cameras undamaged and their plates intact. Detroit News photographer Scotty Kilpatrick was one of those. He slipped his glass photo plates recording the fight under the cushion in the rear seat of his car.

Battle of the Overpass.

Laura. I would love to have any pictures that you may have of Bennett's house or boathouse. I have a Ann Arbor newspaper story of the castle dated August 11,1974. I can't scan the whole thing but maybe could scan it in sections for the text and scan the pictures complete. Let me know if you would like them and thank you for any pictures you have.
Vince

Vince: Why, how nice of you to offer. Yes, let's swap! I do have some pictures--they're in my work email, though, so I can send 'em tomorrow. Thank you for offering the story--I look forward to reading it!