Vago: What kind of town is Three Rivers?

(Kelly Timmerman|Watershed Voice)

This column continues a series addressing the rapidity of change, and in considering how fast time can be over the course of history, it’s worth looking at what that means locally.

While we tend to be so used to what we’re seeing every day that massive change can be difficult to see, it takes place in Three Rivers in just the same way as it does in other places. Without even realizing it, we are witnesses to the ongoing evolution of our community’s character.

That raises a question: what kind of a town is Three Rivers? If you are from here, and you’re seated next to a stranger on a plane, how do you describe this place? You can, of course, talk about its size and its location: “oh, it’s a little town in farm country about 35 minutes south of Kalamazoo.”

But what about its character? What things make it alike with, or set it apart from, other places? Where does it fit into the catalog of typical small towns across the United States? What would you say defines the essence of Three Rivers and makes it what it is? To me, the answers to those questions have interrelated parts. There are some parts that are shifting and changing with time, and parts that are as solid and true today as they were when I was a kid.

The things that are changing are important. Nearly anyone old enough to remember the last time Main Street was the center of commerce can say they saw first-run movies in the Riviera Theatre before it was restored. I remember tagging along for shopping at Newberry’s department store, and I am certain that I had to be coaxed into a necktie or two from Falvey’s. 

Today, after a long period of closures and uncertainty, Main Street has been on a steady upward trend. Food and drink, arts, and specialized entertainment have carried the resurgence, with the support of a few good retail stores. It’s the same downtown as it was in 1985 or before, but it’s a whole new place.

The community itself is also evolving. Demographically, it is more diverse than at any point in its history. Although it doesn’t necessarily compare to a larger city, more people of more backgrounds, races, income levels, education, and religious and political views live here today than ever did in my lifetime. 

The economy and the employment market have diversified, too. The numbers of people working in healthcare, technology, and professional specialties have grown considerably, and Three Rivers’ retail presence is as large as ever through development on the U.S.-131 corridor.

Changes here have been rapid, even when they have seemed slow. In the average millennial’s lifetime in Three Rivers, the town has pushed its physical reach. The high school moved to the west side of town, Meijer, Wal-Mart, Home Depot, and Menards all opened, the Riviera closed and reopened, the Tamarac subdivision was built, and most recently, the Armstrong youth sports park opened. 

It isn’t just places that have changed. Some community organizations have, too. A good-sized collection of new churches has opened and grown rapidly in membership. The Huss School closed and reopened as a community center, driven by local people who believe in local investment. There is an African American community center here, and there are three different museums downtown. Two deal in history, and one in art. The library is on its way to joining them soon.

The things that have remained the same over time are also important. As it has been for generations, Three Rivers is a city of industry. My grandfather was a pharmacist downtown who lived mostly in the First and Third Districts (then called wards), but he was born in the Second Ward because the generations before him worked at the Eddy Paper plant at East Broadway and Third Streets. 

That plant operates today for International Paper. At plants stretched from north to south along the streets and railroad tracks, from American Axle, Armstrong, and Kadant to Metal Technologies and Clark Logistics, Three Rivers is in the business of producing and moving useful things. 

There has been some change. Some industries have closed, and Axle’s plant has changed hands at least twice. However, making things is still something that Three Rivers does a lot of. It still sets the character of the place and the identities of many who live here.

In fact, from sales and management teams to workers on the factory floor and in various other blue-collar trades, the jobs our fellow citizens do and have done for generations help define our character. They affect where we live, how we dress, what we eat, and our views on the world. But, that’s not all we are.

Three Rivers is also other things. For example, it is a farm town. This is a role it has played for even longer than it has been a factory town. The area’s first settlers from the east not only planted wheat and vegetables to sustain themselves, but soon took advantage of wide, flat spaces to begin growing food for the masses. 

Over time, that became specialized. Today, corn is a basic feature of the landscape, and few people here don’t have a friend or relative who didn’t de-tassel seed corn when they were young (if they didn’t do it themselves).

Three Rivers’ size has changed some over time, but it hasn’t changed so much that size doesn’t still define character in much the same way. It is still unusual not to see someone you know out shopping, driving around, or at the post office, usually several times a day or more. In fact, it is not unusual to know the people who work at the places you visit. I grew up in a big city. That doesn’t happen so much there. With comparatively little effort, people can know each other their entire lives in Three Rivers.

Amidst all that changing, and all that staying the same, something important is happening. Every day we are taking world events that will have major, permanent impacts on everyone and everything, and we are measuring them against the way they show up in our little town, and the experiences we have here. We’re deciding how relevant they are, and whether other people’s views on them seem to hold up. We’re shaping our own, local character and self-perception to fit and re-fit with the world in which it exists.

If we’re on that airplane and we want to say something about Three Rivers that will resonate with someone who has never heard of it, what will stick? What about our community and its changing character speaks to the rest of the world?

2020 has been an unusually calamitous year by most measures. In addition to events elsewhere in the world, like the Australian wildfires, there have been global events in which we have played a role locally. We know that there is a national recession taking place, and we can see that in local unemployment filings. Infection rates from a global pandemic are on the rise in our county. In May and June, citizens came out in support of racial justice movements around the country and around the world.

Participation in national and global events is not new for Three Rivers. Sometimes we have even contributed to the bigger picture. Troops from Three Rivers fought in the Union Army during the Civil War, and a monument in Bowman Park attests to that. Local families have sent sons and daughters to every conflict since then. 

Our most famous writer, Chet Shafer, documented small-town life for the masses from his experiences here in the early-mid 20th century. Sheffield Car Company, where Clark Logic is now located, built the pump-style railroad handcars that made for many an iconic television cartoon chase. When it belonged to General Motors, the plant that is now American Axle once bore the name Hydra-Matic, a pioneer in the development of the modern automatic transmission.

We’ve played our part in the national scene, and national and global events have affected us. They are part of the ever-evolving set of things that define Three Rivers’ character. We have a youth sports complex today because some of its advocates first saw a trend elsewhere that was national in scope, and then saw applicability here. 

As in many communities, a new project meant change. Advocates pushed, and that brought resistance. Few stories are more universal: there is always resistance to change, especially when that change is advocated by powerful people who may or may not take their positions and their wisdom for granted. 

You wouldn’t have to say much about it to convey to a stranger what happened. There are countless stories here and everywhere of people who had authority and will and made something happen, and the people who opposed it may or may not have been effective at getting themselves heard.

And yet, the sports complex is built, and it is open, and tournaments are happening there. Good or bad, it is now a feature of the landscape, and the things that happen there will have their own impact on the character of this place. Now, in addition to being a factory town and a farm town and an outdoor recreation town, Three Rivers is a league sports town, too.

Change can be hard. In fact, even some of the things that have been steady are not the same version of themselves today that they were a hundred years ago or even less, and that has sometimes been difficult for Three Rivers. It was once true that more of the factories in Three Rivers were locally owned than were not. Now the opposite is true, even if some of those companies today are good at establishing local connections and relationships, and even though making things is still part of the local identity.

Because changes keep happening, and we know they have by looking at our past, know it or not, and like it or not, Three Rivers will yet continue to become a different place over and over again. Bit by bit, it will change. Whether it comes from high authority or the multitudes of everyday people, change will happen. Whether it is difficult or easy, change will happen. 

Even some of the things that, at their core, seem to always be the same will evolve in their own way. Three Rivers will take on at least a few different, new personalities in most people’s lifetimes.

Which events, development, and changes here are you a part of personally? Which have you witnessed, and which have you talked about with your friends and relatives? How do they fit into a bigger picture? What makes them unique, and what makes them universal? How do they help define and change the character of this place? Are they good or bad?

Even if the things you love the most are still similar in essence, their context locally, nationally, and globally will be different, and in order to convey to a stranger what makes Three Rivers what it is, you’ll pause to think about what that means. Even if you don’t ever change your answer, change is happening everywhere, and that means that same stranger may see your answer differently in 30 years.

So, when that stranger says, “oh, Three Rivers? No, I’ve never heard of it,” what will you say? Chances are, you’ll find your answer to be a slowly moving target.

Dave Vago is a staff writer and columnist for Watershed Voice. A Philadelphia native with roots in Three Rivers, Vago is a planning consultant to history and community development organizations and is the former Executive Director of the Three Rivers DDA/Main Street program.