Michigan Today readers know what a talented writer we have in author/historian and Michigan alum James Tobin. In this collection of fascinating stories about U-M history, Tobin reveals his entanglement and profound affection for the University of Michigan, its complexity, and the role scholarship plays in society.

Before COVID-19, the college campus could be described as America’s ‘last idyll.’ Perhaps that is why so many mystery writers over time have set their tales of terror at a fictionalized University of Michigan.

In 1880, the parallel lives of a misguided scientist and U-M’s first Black female student revealed a contrast of white and Black, privilege and struggle, and more than anything words and actions.

It’s no secret U-M’s admissions process is rigorous. But could the modern-day applicant still pass muster by the founders’ original standards?

Meet the French missionary who helped found U-M. He owned the first printing press in Detroit, transformed 19th-century Michigan, and served in Congress.

Alumnae from the 1920s through the 1960s share tales of the ‘good old days,’ as current women describe their U-M experience.

By early 1962, the Twist was all the rage at Michigan, with events and contests galore. We tracked down U-M’s reigning king and queen.

When the beloved James B. Angell died in April 1916, all of Ann Arbor and much of Michigan mourned his loss.

In 1910, U-M students attended class in unventilated buildings; spit on the floors and sidewalks; and contracted tuberculosis in alarming numbers. Good times!