Rivethead - Ben Hamper [48]
In an effort to find something to do while waiting out GM's dawdling, I decided to take up my old writing hobby. Each afternoon I'd plunk myself down in front of my mom's old Underwood typewriter and stare out the kitchen window ready to hatch some enormous tome that never came calling. I pecked away at everything from love poems to hate mail to haikus about spring. It all reeked and I knew it, but I banged away for lack of anything else to do.
This went on for a while until I stumbled onto an underground newspaper floating around town called the Flint Voice. I used to pick up a copy now and then up at the local liquor store. It was obvious that this rag was just some hippie relic patched together by a bunch of moaners desperately tryin’ to reinvent the sixties. They took themselves way too serious and none of them had any real flair for knockin’ out the printed word.
“In Times Such as These, We Need a Voice,” their cover motto hurrumphed. This statement wasn't totally unfounded. Flint was falling apart at the seams—economically, politically, racially. The major's office was a bunch of liars and cheats, the city's prosecuting attorney was up on charges of embezzlement and the police force were in the midst of their thunderous off-Broadway production of Danny Get Your Gun. In the late seventies and early eighties more people per capita were killed by police officers in Flint than in any other city in the country. Twenty-five percent of all gun-related deaths were done by cops. The boys were shootin’ from the hip, askin’ questions later and your odds were lookin’ especially lousy if you happened to be sportin’ an Afro. In times such as these we not only needed a “Voice,” we could have used a few thousand bulletproof vests.
The Flint Voice was the brainchild and squawkin’ brat of a long-haired live wire named Michael Moore. I was familiar with the guy. So was anyone in Flint who had one eye half open. Moore was constantly hurling himself into the midst of some trenchant uproar. You would see him on television, hear him raisin’ hell on the radio, read about him causin’ a ruckus down at a meeting of the City Council.
The underground paper biz was not the easiest boat to float, especially when half the town looked upon you as nothing more than a communist blowhard. In order to get his paper off the ground, Moor went delving for funds. Rather than appealing to the listless townsfolk, he attempted a crazier stunt. He latched on to an international recording artist and persuaded him to headline a steady stream of Flint Voice benefit concerts.
The recording star was the late Harry Chapin whose string of hits included “Taxi” and “Cat's in the Cradle.” Moore managed to weasel himself backstage at the Chapin concert in nearby Lansing. After the show was over, Moore went to Chapin's dressing room and knocked on the door. No response. Moore kept a knockin’. Finally, a security guard began hauling Moore away. The resulting fracas caused Chapin to open the door to check things out. That's when Michael Moore put his silver tongue into gear. Intrigued by his notions, Chapin invited the persistent hippie into his dressing room.
Moore must have delivered some kind of impassioned oracle for, soon enough, Chapin became a regular fixture around Flint. He performed no less than eleven benefit concerts for the Flint Voice. The total take from these concerts was in the half-million-dollar range. Moore took the money and bought a big old house in the neighboring community of Burton. He bought a typesetting computer, layout equipment, telephones, copy machines. He hired ad men, secretaries and found himself a printer. Michael Moore and Flint Voice were on their way.
Meanwhile, it was Harry at the auditorium. Harry at the luncheon club. Harry at the union