Detroit’s hidden celebrity landmarks

By Layla McMurtrie on Fri, Nov 15, 2024 at 12:00 pm

Courtesy photo

Motor City Famous: Celebrity Homes, Gravesites & Little-Known Locales, a new book by Royal Oak-based author and creative director Steve Platto, is out now.

A treasure trove of metro Detroit’s untold stories is being uncovered in Motor City Famous: Celebrity Homes, Gravesites & Little-Known Locales, a new book by Royal Oak-based author and creative director Steve Platto.

Released this week, the book maps around 115 locations tied to iconic figures — from Hollywood stars like Lucille Ball to Detroit’s Motown royalty to athletes, directors, and more.

Platto’s journey began unexpectedly a little over a year ago while watching a Robin Williams documentary that mentioned the actor’s Detroit-area upbringing, a previously unknown fact to the author that instantly reignited his lifelong interest in pop culture and history.

“I thought, ‘Oh, well, I wonder where he lived,’” Platto says. “I started doing a little bit of research… and I found out [he lived in] a huge mansion that’s been torn down and there’s an office complex there. His family was pretty well off, and he lived there for most of his teenage life.”

After sharing his findings on Facebook, friends encouraged Platto to turn his discoveries into a book. Initially, he was unsure there were enough stories to fill one, but the author quickly found out that there are tons of famous figures tied to the city.

Previously, Platto has written children’s books, but Motor City Famous is his first project centered on Detroit history.

His research process involved a “Sherlock Holmes-esque deep dive” into census data, library archives, and old Detroit phone books to unearth hidden histories around the metro area.

“The more I went down the research rabbit hole, the more people I found,” he says. “It was really interesting to kind of go on this historical fact finding mission.”

One particularly interesting chapter details the homes of the hit Motown group the Supremes. When the group was gaining fame, Motown founder Berry Gordy sent an assistant to scout houses, which he presented to each member individually. Unknowingly, Diana Ross, Mary Wilson, and Florence Ballard each chose a house within two blocks of one another on Buena Vista Street.

Another chapter details Michael Jackson’s “grave” at Detroit’s Woodlawn Cemetery.

“When Michael Jackson died, there were all kinds of tributes put on the steps of the Motown Museum and it just flooded them,” Platto says. “After a period of time, they just didn’t know what to do with them. So, some people got together, and they got two crypts in Woodlawn Cemetery just below Ferndale and they put all this tribute material — from cards and stuffed animals and everything — in coffins and they buried it there.”

He adds, “There’s a headstone there that looks like what would be Michael Jackson’s grave site, but it’s not his grave site. It’s just kind of a tribute.”

The 115-location guide includes GPS coordinates for readers to follow along in person through Detroit and surrounding cities, alongside freshly taken photographs to bring each story to life.

For the author, Motor City Famous isn’t just a book — it’s a new way to celebrate Detroit culture.

“There’s so much talent that came out of Detroit,” Platto says. “We produced quite a high level of talent that you never thought would come from here… it’s another facet of Detroit that seemed to need to be uncovered. So hopefully, you know, this shines another good light on Detroit.”

The author is hosting upcoming book signings that include Paperback Writers Bookshop & Weirdsville Records in Mount Clemens from 5-9 p.m.on Friday, Nov. 22; Schueler’s Books in West Bloomfield from noon-2 p.m on Saturday, Nov. 30, and Dearborn Music from noon-2 p.m. on Saturday, Dec. 7.

Motor City Famous is available at local bookstores, on Amazon, and at Barnes & Noble.

Tags:

Scroll down to view images

Steve Platto

Harry Houdini

3977 Cass Ave., Detroit

“Across the street from the venerable dive bar The Old Miami is what’s left of the W.H. Hamilton & Company Funeral Home. This is where Harry Houdini’s body was taken after he died on Halloween 1926 in room 401 of Grace Hospital (located at the corner of Willis and John R. Streets, now demolished).”

1 of 16

Steve Platto

Chris Cornell

660 W. Baltimore St., Detroit

“On a raised platform in the back corner of Northern Lights Lounge sits a red leather booth. In the booth, on May 18, 2017, the lead singer of Soundgarden, Chris Cornell, sat with his bandmates. This was just prior to the band’s gig at the Fox Theatre, and the booth could very well be where Cornell had his last meal.”

2 of 16

Steve Platto

Lucille Ball

3738 Biddle Ave., Wyandotte

“In 1914, there was an apartment home here at 126 Biddle Avenue in Wyandotte (demolished in 1963, the address is now 3738 Biddle Avenue). The back apartment was rented for ten dollars a month to Henry and DeDe Ball and their daughter, Lucille. Yep, Lucille Ball lived here between the ages of about one and three, when her father moved them from Jamestown, New York, to Wyandotte so he could take a job with Bell Telephone Company.”

3 of 16

Steve Platto

Michael Jackson’s “Grave”

Woodlawn Cemetery, Detroit

“One of the more unusual Detroit celebrity sites is here at Woodlawn Cemetery; it’s the gravesite of Michael Jackson. Actually, he’s not buried here, but tributes marking his passing are.”

4 of 16

Steve Platto

Charles Lindbergh

1120 Forest Ave., Detroit

“If pioneering aviator Charles Lindbergh was alive today and able to fly over his birthplace, he’d look down and find the Freedom Place Apartments complex. He was born here on West Forest Avenue on February 4, 1902.”

5 of 16

Steve Platto

Francis Ford Coppola

17540 Kentucky St., Detroit

“This is where the family lived. Not that ‘family’ but the Coppola family. The family’s patriarch, Carmine, was the flautist, arranger and assistant orchestra director of the Ford Sunday Evening Hour, an ongoing radio concert series sponsored by Ford Motor Company.”

6 of 16

Steve Platto

Keegan-Michael Key

2430 Woodstock Dr., Highland Park

“Key was born in Southfield and adopted at birth by a couple who were both social workers. He was a student at Shrine High School and then went to the University of Detroit Mercy, where he got a rich theater experience and started his own improv group.”

7 of 16

Steve Platto

Ted Nugent

23251 Florence St., Detroit

“The Motor City Madman, Uncle Ted, Great Gonzo, Sweaty Teddy, Terrible Ted, the Whackmaster. They’re all nicknames for hard rocker Ted Nugent. And he’s also been called a few other names for his polarizing political and activist views. But whatever you call him, his birth certificate says his official name is Theodore Anthony Nugent, born here in Redford on December 13, 1948.”

8 of 16

Steve Platto

Gilda Radner

17330 Wildemere St., Detroit

“Here on Wildemere Street is the home of Gilda Radner, the very first cast member to be hired on Saturday Night Live. She grew up in this stately neighborhood and attended [what would later become] the private University Liggett School in Grosse Pointe Woods.”

9 of 16

Steve Platto

Eminem

19946 Dresden St., Detroit

“If you want to see prolific rapper Eminem’s childhood home today, you’ll have to look at the cover of 2000’s The Marshall Mathers LP. A fire destroyed the house in 2013, and it was later leveled.”

10 of 16

Steve Platto

Virginia Patton Moss

2205 Melrose Rd., Ann Arbor

“Ann Arbor is no Bedford Falls, but this is where you’ll find the former home of Virginia Patton Moss. And though you may not recognize her name, she herself said, ‘I’ve been in more homes than Santa Claus.’ That’s because she played George Bailey’s brother’s wife, Ruth, in the holiday classic It’s a Wonderful Life. And for her, it was a wonderful life.”

11 of 16

Steve Platto

Tom Selleck

10530 Lakepointe St., Detroit

“This may be the perfect house for Tom Selleck to show up at to try to peddle the reverse mortgages he hawked on TV. That’s because he lived here until the age of three.”

12 of 16

Steve Platto

John Hughes

743 Rivard Blvd., Grosse Pointe

“John Hughes wrote ‘Vacation ’58’ as a short story for National Lampoon magazine in 1979. This became the basis for the wildly popular National Lampoon’s Vacation movie and the Vacation sequels. In the short story, readers are along for the ride with the Griswold family, who lived at 74 Rivard Boulevard in Grosse Pointe, Michigan. Griswold paid homage to the downtown Detroit street of the same name. But there is no 74 Rivard Boulevard in Grosse Pointe. However, if you add a 3 to the end of the address and make it 743 Rivard, you’ll be at the boyhood home of John Hughes himself.”

13 of 16

Steve Platto

Robin Williams

Intersection of Woodward Ave. and Opdyke Rd., Bloomfield Hills

“Robin Williams was a long way from Ork when he lived here at Stoneycroft. That was the name of the Williams family’s forty-room mansion (with Robin occupying the entire third floor), which stood on seventy-two acres surrounded by a stone wall… In 1980, the mansion burned down, and the property was sold and developed as the Stoneridge Office Complex.”

14 of 16

Steve Platto

Jack Kerouac

1407 Somerset St., Grosse Pointe Park

“On August 14, 1944, Jack Kerouac and his girlfriend Edie Parker were awakened in their New York City apartment by a friend, Lucien Carr, who told Kerouac he had just murdered a man who’d made homosexual advances toward him. Shortly thereafter, Carr was arrested, and Kerouac was thrown in jail as a material witness. (Depending on the source, Kerouac either failed to report the crime or helped dispose of the killer’s Boy Scout knife.) To get released, Jack needed to post $500 bail, which he didn’t have, and his father refused to pay. Edie didn’t have it either, but her Grosse Pointe family did. However, her mother, Charlotte, told her that the only way they’d pay was if Jack and Edie made their relationship legitimate. So, they got married while Kerouac was still in jail, and he got the cash to get sprung. To pay it back, Jack said they’d move to Detroit, where he’d find a job. They lived in Charlotte’s home on Somerset Street (her parents had divorced) and he got a job at Fruchauf Trailer Company and Federal Mogul.”

15 of 16