M ichael
Guido swept into office with a
campaign pamphlet you can easily describe as race-baiting, and he died this
week with his photo on the walls of hundreds of Arab-American-owned businesses
across Dearborn.
He was a good
guy, a good man and a great mayor, and to me, the best thing you can say about
him is this: He grew.
Guido, 52, spent 20 years in
charge of Dearborn
and was still on the job when he lost his bout with cancer. In that time, as
his hairline receded and his waistline shrank, his grasp of the world around
him expanded.
"Let's Talk
About City Parks," said the title of that 1985 brochure, "and the
'Arab Problem.'" Dearborn
was overwhelmingly white and darned proud of it, and he played to the crowd.
But it's hard to feel threatened -- or to be a threat -- when you're shaking
hands and cutting ribbons among neighbors who want the same fundamental things
you do.
Dearborn says goodbye
Now one-third of Dearborn is Arab
American, some 80 nationalities are represented there, and Guido had become not only the people's mayor but the
peoples' mayor. He'll lie in state from 3-9 p.m. today at Sacred Heart Parish
Hall, 22495 Garrison St.,
with the funeral mass at 10:30 a.m. Saturday at Sacred Heart Parish, and you
can bet it won't just be whites who are weeping.
In a little-known
historical note, there also will be mourners who know him by a name slightly
different than Michael GUY-doh.
When Guido won his first city council race in 1977, his
unofficial headquarters was the coat-check room at a Detroit disco called Uncle Sam's. He was a
part-time DJ there, his friend and former boss Rob Bennett told me last year,
as well as the singer for a wedding band called the Goldtones.
Uncle Sam's sat
near the Dearborn line, "and we'd make
announcements over the P.A. system," Bennett said: "If you're a Dearborn resident, stop
by for pencils and campaign buttons."
Until Guido ran for office, Bennett said, he had always
called himself Michael GWEE-doh.
By either
pronunciation, he'll be sorely missed.