1. This article has been several years in the making. It began in a seminar on Albert Kahn taught by Claire Zimmerman at the University of Michigan and has been refined under her supervision. I am grateful for her consistent feedback and encouragement. Kent Kleinman and Jonathan Massey offered formative criticism on the initial research findings. Jennifer Gear, Elizabeth Keslacy, Michael McCullough, Michael G. Smith, and Lori Smithey generously reviewed early drafts. Francesco Marullo gave pointed comments on a condensed version at a symposium convened by Deirdre Hennebury at Lawrence Technological University. I am also thankful for the refinements and additional sources suggested by JSAH editor Keith Eggener and an anonymous reviewer. Finally, my thanks to the staff of the Bentley Historical Library, University of Michigan, for their assistance in conducting the research and compiling the illustrations.
2. GM's recognition of this “actual center” was prefigured by Edward H. Bennett's 1915 plan for Detroit. While it concentrated on parks development along the Detroit River, the plan also proposed a network of diagonal boulevards for congestion relief, forming a six-way intersection and monumental plaza at Woodward Avenue and Grand Boulevard. Bennett, however, did not foresee that commercial development would expand more than a mile from the Campus Martius. See Edward H. Bennett, Preliminary Plan of Detroit (Detroit: City Plan and Improvement Commission, 1915), plates IV, V, VI, X.
3. The district is said to have taken its name from New Center News, a newspaper originating in 1933 that mainly covered developments in the automotive industry, but the GM rental advertisement shows that use of the phrase began much earlier.
4. “Great General Motors Building Ready,” Detroit Free Press, 20 Mar. 1921, G8.
5. Francisco Mujica, History of the Skyscraper (Paris: Archaeology & Architecture Press, 1929), 60.