Retrovision

This preserved home movie from 1946 touts our hometown as a 'Good Place To Live'. It still is.

Perhaps you used it as a landmark to figure out which entrance you came in, or maybe you and your hood rat friends hung out near it when you were teenagers.
Either way, you remembered the big circular sculpture that adorned the center of the Woodland Mall. It was taken out of the Mall on Sunday,…

There used to be a stock car racing track in Grand Rapids on the Northwest side near where the White Pine Trail starts along US 131. Here's some old 8mm film footage of some racing from 1951.

This 1910 promotional film touting the Grand Rapids area shows that while we've changed in some ways over the past 106 years, in others ways, we're still the same.

Remember the Top of the Rock on Alpine? Mr. Fables? Daryl Nathan?
All these memories are now wrapped up for you as a gift tees from our friend and '80s aficionado Jef Leppard. Now what are you waiting for?

I've argued the point here that 1984 may have been one of the greatest years for pop music in American history, and when compiling this list, it kind of confirms my point.
When songs like Night Ranger's 'Sister Christian', ZZ Top's 'Legs' and Scandal's 'The Warrior' can't even come close to cracking …

Pepsi Dance Trax was a teen dance show that aired early Sunday mornings on Fox-17 from late 1988 until early 1990.
Featuring local teenagers dancing and wearing the fashions and haircuts of the time (boy, did they!!), it was hosted by top 40 DJs from WGRD, WKLQ and 104.5 Sunny FM. The show was taped …

The Tumblr site FYGR stumbled across this wonderful postcard packet of Grand Rapids in the early '50s, featuring wonderful drawings of the steamboat on Reeds Lake and the bridge over the duck pond at the John Ball Park Zoo.
Enjoy this wonderful trip back in time.

Ah, yes. The dog days of summer
Growing up in a small suburb of Detroit in the '70s and '80s, the day would start with rolling out of bed on a muggy summer morning.
Our home back then didn’t have central air. So, the house was already getting warm with the morning sun, get to…

On this issue of Retro Jojo, I take a look back at the cold medicine aisle at the old mom and pop drug store growing up.
Sure, a lot of the things we took for a cold back then are now illegal (I'm lookin' at you, codeine), but they sure were effective.

James FitzPatrick's "Travel Talks" was a '40s short film series that played before feature films nationwide.
In "Roaming Through Michigan," FitzPatrick shares the wonders of Up North with the rest of the U.S.
In addition to showing off beautiful vistas in Northern Michigan from a s…

We can all cry if we want to.
The 1960s singing sensation Lesley Gore has died; she was 68 years old.
Despite being a non-smoker, her death was caused by lung cancer.