Flat Rock: A Photo Tour (Part One)

Evertime I have to go back, I keep saying that I shouldn’t have to go back again. Each time is a funeral, and I keep thinking that there is no one left in that place. Flat Rock isn't exactly a dead town, but it always feels like its breathing its last. It’s a depressing place to go in the first place, made more so by the sole reason I’ve gone there in the last few years. Even without the funerals, it would still be a depressing place, as I will now show you.

I keep saying I should take a camera and go down there, but no one in their right mind would go to Flat Rock. If you had something very precious, that everyone in the world was trying to steal from you, I’d suggest putting it in Flat Rock Michigan. Even if you told them you’d put it there, they wouldn’t believe that anything of value could be there and they wouldn’t want to go in there and get it even if they did. Flat Rock is not a place to go to, it’s a place to come from. My mother comes from there, and that’s why we have to keep going back.

So this time, because I knew we’d be there all day. I took a camera...

Let's go have a look.


I’m going to say straight out at the beginning, I’m not going to be fair to this place. It’s not all as bad as I’m going to show, but that’s not really the point. This is Flat Rock as I see it and how it affects me.


First shot, right out of the car. This is the parking lot of the funeral home.


And this is across the street. So far, not so bad. A little run down, but not any worse than any other small Mid-West town.


Of course, in many ways it is just a normal small Mid-West town, and how I hate living in the Mid-West and having to go to its small towns.

But soft, let us see what awaits us as we move through the town…



Okay, a hotel that is no longer in operation with a hand painted sign.


The Flat Rock Family Cafe seems to be doing okay. Hey, this Flat Rock actually seems like a nice place… at first.


Then you see the completely closed plaza. That whole strip mall is closed, all of it. There is nothing there now.


We’re still in town, it’s just an empty place.


Because I can only get about a thousand pictures on my three cards, I didn’t get every building that had gone out of business and thus had a huge “For Lease” sign on it.


Be very aware of these train tracks please. They’ll become important in a moment…


Another place that used to have something, but hasn’t for years. I know, because two years ago I wanted to get a few things at this place but it was gone and I had to hunt around for another shop.


With a little photo manipulation, you can see it used to be a Rite Aid.







“HEY WAIT!” I hear you cry, “Ever since those train tracks, you’ve been taking shots of far more scenic and picturesque Rockwood! Haven’t you?”

Well, yes, but in my defense, there isn’t actually a grocery store in Flat Rock anymore. The Food Mart is here in Rockwood and the freeway is right between the two towns AND my grandmother used to live on this side of town so this place is one of those spots of my youth. Also, when Mazda opened a plant in Flat Rock, they made a big national advertising campaign about it being the quintessential small American town and you can have a Mazda because Americans made it and all that. Only the place wasn’t considered quintessential enough to actually be in the commercial. Not a single frame of the commercials were actually shot in Flat Rock.


Rockwood has a water tower with their name on it, so you see how much classier they are.

From here on out, there will be only shots of Flat Rock, promise.