Historically Quirky
Harvard Square has always been the Ann Arbor of Cambridge; we remember often trying to decide where to get dinner while standing in the midst of seemingly endless blocks of overpriced restaurants, finally giving up and getting the next inbound train to Central. Now it has its very own historical preservation nannies, protesting against IHOP and trying to stop as many restaurants as possible from getting liquor licenses, writes Crimson columnist Margaret Rossman.
But somehow Rossman, who opposes the Harvard Square Defense Fund, sees A2 as some kind of argument for the society’s goals. “I grew up visiting Ann Arbor, Michigan, the quintessential college town, and its historically quirky character is a large reason for this designation. Certainly, an amount of historical preservation and protection is important to maintain a city’s identity in an ever-homogenous world.”
hunh? historical preservation? in ann arbor? never heard of it…
though I guess in terms of late-night eating places there’s at least the brown jug.
posted by Daniel O'Connell on April 11th, 2006 at 10:06 amThis is one thing I like about New York City. It seems like every coffee shop and cafe has a liquor license and serves bottled beer and wine. IMO it’d be a good thing for AA to have *more* liquor licenses, spread around the crowds, maybe make reduce food markups a little bit, too…
posted by Scott T. on April 11th, 2006 at 10:26 amok, i’m convinced. ann arbor IS overrated!
posted by rhümer maanger on April 11th, 2006 at 10:27 amI’d love to see the Fleetword serve beer myself, but the people who own bar licenses here have mucho bucks in ‘em, and they’re not about to dilute that value with competition. Plus I think the “tavern” licenses are a lot cheaper in NY.
posted by Michael McC. on April 11th, 2006 at 10:50 amI’d kill for an IHOP (24hr, of course) in downtown AA. . .
Although a beer serving Fleetwood would suffice. . .
Is the Fleetwood a part of AA’s “historically quirky character” that is need of “an amount of historical preservation and protection” ?
Or are we takling only about over-priced clapboard houses?
posted by bennyprofane on April 11th, 2006 at 10:59 amOf course it is! And so is every other building in downtown Ann Arbor, as long as it is not too new or not too tall.
posted by JCP2 on April 11th, 2006 at 12:15 pmEven the Jug has been cleaned up. When I started grad school it was a dirty little hole with underdressed waitresses and super-greasy food. Sort of like if Frank’s got a liquor license and stayed open late. Now the jug feels more like a meat-market club on Friday and Saturday night. Whenever I see the cordoned off line in front of the Jug I have to do a double take to be sure it’s really the same place.
posted by dcwp on April 11th, 2006 at 1:30 pmThe Fleetwood is a gem, and independent.
IHOP, on the other hand, is just another profit-driven franchise for people to fill themselves up with sugar-laden, institutionalized, cheap crap in an ugly-ass building.
I would join up with the preservationists, pitchfork in hand, if IHOP came to town.
Also, I boycott IHOP out of principle…they knocked down Little Harry’s (Civil War era building in downtown Detroit) to erect their monstrosity. Anita Baker’s husband was the culprit. They had to send in the bulldozers in the dead of night to get away with it. Classic Detroit development story.
posted by OFWinsurgent on April 11th, 2006 at 2:08 pmOh, and AAIO, when I lived in Boston, there was a great Chinese restaurant with really surly waiters near Harvard Yard…can’t remember the name of it, probably because they served something called a Scorpion Bowl there, which was pretty much a salad bowl full of liquor equipped with a couple of 2-foot long straws. It also had a cute little resevoir on the top for a pool of flaming 151 proof rum.
Their spring rolls were pretty good.
posted by OFWinsurgent on April 11th, 2006 at 2:16 pmOFW - your story about Little Harrys is interesting to me. I went to college in Lawrence, Kansas. During the Civil War, Bushwackers from Missouri had burned the city to the ground leaving only three major buildings. In my Junior year Borders Books came to town. Aside from putting the small local bookstores out fo business, they decided that the only place they could possibly build their cookie-cutter store was on the site of one of those three buildings - a livery I think. After much general outrage from the Lawrence preservation community, Borders was allowed to knock down all but the facade of the building and simply set a regular borders behind it. When I got to AA, I couldn’t stand Borders even though it’s a ‘local’ store and I’m still conflicted about shopping there.
posted by dcwp on April 11th, 2006 at 3:25 pmLawrence, Kansas, eh? If you ask me, the bushwackers should return as soon as possible!
posted by Willie on April 11th, 2006 at 3:43 pmBorders doesn’t “feel” local to me the way some other business do. Maybe because it’s so large in total, but there’s something about it that wanted to be a chain right from the start.
posted by Michael McC. on April 11th, 2006 at 3:43 pmWatch it Willie! Those Jayhawks might beak you.
posted by dcwp on April 11th, 2006 at 4:05 pmInsurgent, you did make me smile. If you want to avoid sugar-laden, institutionalized, cheap crap in an ugly building, the Fleetwood really is the obvious place to turn to.
posted by Nick on April 11th, 2006 at 6:39 pmTotally… independently owned, baby! It has character.
Hey, I’m not against cheap or even sugary food (per se), just against a fucking corporation spoonfeeding it to me.
posted by OFWinsurgent on April 11th, 2006 at 10:11 pmI could probably compose a more well-informed rant about IHOP than anyone else here, but I’ll only say that building one here might change Ann Arbor’s image as a college town. The over-60 crowd flocks to IHOP on senior discount night for the liver n’ onions special.
posted by former IHOP waitress on April 12th, 2006 at 3:43 pmbefore you begin, i am suitably embarrassed by my many grammatical and spelling errors as well as missing words. i’ve got an itchy submit finger.
posted by bennyprofane on April 12th, 2006 at 9:19 pm“can’t remember the name of it, probably because they served something called a Scorpion Bowl there, which was pretty much a salad bowl full of liquor equipped with a couple of 2-foot long straws. It also had a cute little resevoir on the top for a pool of flaming 151 proof rum.”
The Champion House does the same thing with their Volcano Bowl. Anyone know if they’re open again?
Benny— Sure, you can find shitty indies. But on average, independent businesses give back more to the community. Further, economics IS politics, and trying to seperate the two plays you into the hands of people who don’t want you to contemplate your consumption.
posted by js on April 12th, 2006 at 11:18 pmharvard square started all this?
i live near harvard square- was attracted to cambridge as an ann arbor-ite. . .. because it was like ann arbor BEFORE the gentrification came when i showed up. now harvard square looks alot like- BRIAR-HELL!! ALL these local businesses are GONE. Whenever a chain store opens, the landlords all raise up their rents EVEN MORE, because they figure they can get more high-paying chain stores in there. . . . … .the end result of this has been the destruction of really great places, followed by empty storefronts that STAY empty for a year or more. The worst was the 30-some year old amazing music store that went under for an adidas store. That then went under for FOUR YEARS, and the place lay empty. Now they’v ere-opened. Lot sof obnoxious little harvard kids go in there and buy $200 tennis shoes. And thats whats left.
the cheap, good beehive diner has been replaced with something that costs three times as much and tastes even WORSE(than cheap diner food, picture it). And the Tasty- which was like a little fleetwood- was overrun for a Sunglass Hut and an Abercrombie and Fitch. The bookshops have dropped like flies- which has endangered our Michigan Theater-esque place, because sine there’s almost no bookstores, watchers of art-house films don’t frequent the area as much anymore. The coffee shops have almost ALL turned into starbucks, and the interesting people who used to be draped all over everything have been replaced by trustfund babies and yuppies and teh absolute WORST sort. No one comes to harvard square anymore and WANTS to be there– its gone from being Overrated to being Overrun.
Sure, ann arbor is a frustrating place- but you’ll be sorry sorry SORRY if it REALLY gets run the REST of the way over by CHAIN STORES, man, believe me. whatever your philosophy about profits and peoples’ motivations might be, how wil you feel when you try and go to the fleetwood and there’s nothign but a dunkin donuts there with a “limit seating to 20 minutes sign” as its onyl decoration? I mean, it looked pretty bad when i went there last- but at least there’s still a FEW things left– harvard square is KA-PUT. Of all the MYRIAD places I used to go there, there are FOUR left. FOUR. A comics place, a record store, a cafe, and a tobaccanist– EVERYTHING else is GONE . . . . . take a lesson. . . .historical societies can be good if they aren’t run by YUPPIES. . . . .
posted by katt on April 13th, 2006 at 1:38 amQuestion to katt: Are the Harvard Square buildings the same? It sounds like the old, local businesses are being replaced in the same storefront by chains. I don’t think a historical society could affect that.
The Pretzel Bell building is still there, but Pretzel Bell isn’t. It got replaced with Grandma Lee’s, which got replaced with Champion House.
A historical society could potentially stop the Fleetwood from getting torn down for expensive condos, which would only be used by a few people. Or a Dunkin Donuts. But if someone wanted to turn it into an expensive restaurant based on a diner theme, what could be done? (Or would you want a historical society that powerful?)
posted by A Different Jon on April 13th, 2006 at 6:05 amRight, historical designation (not “society”) could prevent the demolition of the Fleetwood’s building, but it would never have the power to save the Fleetwood as a business.
Notice, e.g., the former-1920s-gas-station-now-massage-studio at the northwest corner of First and Huron. That building would be long gone without the historic district ordinance, but the use has obviously changed.
posted by Larry Kestenbaum on April 13th, 2006 at 7:56 amAn IHOP within walking distance of downtown Boston and Cambridge closed, and when this happened, I regarded it as a sad event of how the area was becoming yuppified. Quite honestly, I’d welcome an IHOP to Harvard Square, as it would return some of the grittiness to the neighborhood.
““can’t remember the name of it, probably because they served something called a Scorpion Bowl there”
You’re thinking of the “Hong Kong.” It’s still there. They still have Scorpion Bowls.
posted by Constantine on April 13th, 2006 at 8:02 amLarry is correct about the historic gas station…Burger King wanted a drive-thru there. It was roundly defeated. For a long time it was a flower place, but has now morphed into a massage studio.
Ah yes, the Hong Kong…do they still have a strict limit on Scorpion Bowl’s per table?
Constantine, I understand your arguement about wanting to keep the downtown “gritty,” but IHOP?
posted by OFWinsurgent on April 13th, 2006 at 8:41 amThe Burger King was going to go where Kleinschmidt’s old building is, at the corner of Huron and Ashley where the Ashley Terrace is scheduled to go up. Probably there are people deeply regretting that they thwarted a (what now must seem lovely) one story Burger King only to have an eleven story building rammed down their throats. “Oh why, oh why can’t we just keep our abandoned building and decrepit free parking lot forever? And the lovely overgrown hedge where all the little chirpy birdies live! Why do the profiteers never think of the birdies?”
And I’d rather have an Adidas store than a free-trade ethnic art gallery chain. Or Ritters. Or Smoothie King. Or Great Wraps. Or Noodles and Co. At least I can conceive of a universe in which I might wear a pair of adidas.
posted by Parking Structure Dude! on April 13th, 2006 at 9:27 amwith a little imagination, psd, you might be able to conceive of a universe in which you can enjoy a smoothie from smoothie king … i did …
zomfgptui!!!!!! shows how wrong i can be!
posted by peter honeyman on April 13th, 2006 at 10:03 amSorry, but the imagination is currently all tied up with visualizing world peace and questioning authority, not to mention trying to develop a paradigm for the coming hemp-based economy.
posted by Parking Structure Dude! on April 13th, 2006 at 10:17 amI’m all for 11-storey buildings, just not IHOP or Burger King.
posted by OFWinsurgent on April 13th, 2006 at 11:51 amWhat about an 11-story building with reasonably affordable housing units and a franchised business occupying a portion of the retail space?
posted by JCP2 on April 13th, 2006 at 12:33 pmOnly if the business sells scented candles and artisanal cheese, man.
posted by Dave on April 13th, 2006 at 1:48 pmMmmmm… Artisanal cheese scented candles…
posted by FAA on April 13th, 2006 at 3:41 pmand lots and lots of tea tree oil.
posted by OFWinsurgent on April 13th, 2006 at 4:21 pmSo it’s pretty clear that this blog’s content comes from a google news search for the words: ann arbor.
Not very clever.
posted by This Blog is Overrated on April 14th, 2006 at 2:14 amI should add that dropping the H-Bomb in a blog posting is ever so cheesy. Maybe if you had gotten into Harvard for grad school you wouldn’t be so bitter about Ann Arbor. Get a life please.
posted by This Blog is Overrated on April 14th, 2006 at 2:15 amYeah, AAiO! If you hate Ann Arbor so much, why don’t you leave?!
posted by Dale on April 14th, 2006 at 8:02 amHeh. I think TBIO is under the impression that I went to Harvard, rather than just going over there to buy records at Newbury Comics.
posted by ann arbor is overrated on April 14th, 2006 at 9:02 am“H-Bomb”…wow, that’s almost as cheesy as “the Deuce”
posted by OFWinsurgent on April 14th, 2006 at 10:14 amBy the way, sometimes I also do an advanced news search of news stories containing “Ann Arbor” over the last day without the words “Ann Arbor News.” It’s a lot more subtle than you think.
posted by ann arbor is overrated on April 14th, 2006 at 11:41 amhow does an adidas store relate to a free trade store? one sells $150 sneakers made by thirteen year olds for 10 cents working a twelve hour day, the other sells $200 bedroom slippers made by grown-ups for $2 working an eight hour day– and NEITHER as anywhere NEAR as good as the music shop that used to be there. Do you wanna spend $150 on sneakers that’ll break and wera out and only cost asfew cents to make, or on something worthwhile like books or music or an instrument that’ll last you for as long as you live?
constantine– sure, i agree about that IHOP actualy– but man, do you remember Jonny’s ALl Night?? It got turned into some YUPPIE FISHY JOINT(but okay, this is off-topic though, since its in massachusetts)
hey there this blog is overrated– i HAD to leave ann arbor, because it got way too EXPENSIVE– I MISS what it USED to be like– BEFORE it was over-rated. I also miss what Cambridge used to be like before the rents QUINTUPLED . . .. and substitutions for these places are not exactly springing up all over the map. franchise stores spur on this process. When there are lots of them jockying for space, it means landlords are alot less willing to charge reasonable rents, or give a local person a chance at runnign their own business. . . . . and of course i really hate having to be anywhere near teh sorts of folks i continuously see shopping at starbucks, abercrombie, gap, and so forth.
posted by katt on April 15th, 2006 at 10:32 pmi miss the nostalgia i used to feel for ann arbor before it was overrated.
posted by peter honeyman on April 17th, 2006 at 4:06 amI miss the old Ann Arbor also. Most of the prices have gone out of site.
Did anyone know that an IHOP is going up in the outskirts of Ann Arbor? It will be in the Meijer parking lot on Carpenter.
posted by indoorrick on November 21st, 2007 at 10:51 am