Time for one last morning walking - in downtown Detroit (with the Guardian Building gleaming in the sun) and down to the river: the Detroit River is only about 28 miles long, running between Lake St Clair and Lake Erie, with Michigan one side, and - well, Canada the other. There was something faintly exciting (to me, anyway) about there being tunnels and bridges labeled To Canada - a sense of borderlands, however misplaced.
But not misplaced to those who had escaped enslavement, and who were waiting to cross the river ... there's an impressive memorial by Ed Dwight on the water's edge, looking out towards Canada. I hadn't known much about Dwight - only that he's a Black sculptor who's executed a lot of heroic sculptures, very many of them of lesser-known figures. I certainly hadn't known that he'd been a test pilot, and was training alongside other potential astronauts, and if it hadn't been for racism, would very likely have been the first Black person in space (when not selected, he soon afterwards left the military, and in his mid 40s, embarked on formal art training).
It's a monument that gives due weight to the participation of local Indigenous people in helping those who'd traveled on the Underground Railroad to cross the river - Detroit was a major hub for crossing over to Canada.
There is, apparently, another monument on the other side, but seeing that will have to wait until next time.
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