Residents were transported back in time to the roaring 1920s during a presentation by the Detroit Historical Society last Monday night at the Oxford Public Library.

Attendees learned about the surge of immigrants Detroit experienced from the 1840s through the start of the 1900s.

In 1865, the city had 80,000 residents. By 1930, Detroit had mushroomed into the fourth largest city in the U.S. with a population of 1.5 million.

The 1920s brought cultural icons to the city like the Ford building, Orchestra Hall, General Motors and The Guardian Building.

Lumber, copper and iron were the city’s top-three natural resources and Michigan’s Great Lakes allowed for abundant shipbuilding and other business ventures throughout the state.

Capital investment in Detroit was booming, with homes lining Woodward Ave., Jefferson Ave., Fort St., Brush Park and Cass Ave.

Prohibition brought a surge of business to the city, as well as organized crime as the demand for alcohol boomed.

Car assembly lines were humming, and so was the pipeline that shipped liquor from Canada to America by way of the Detroit River. Between these two growing industries, opportunity within Detroit was there for the grabbing.

Oxford residents learned this and more throughout the presentation, which was narrated by Detroit Historical Society Manager of School Programs Bree Boettner.

Since the 20th century carried with it an abundant growth for Motor City, Boettner said she hoped her presentation would remind Oxford residents of Detroit’s often-forgotten potential.

“We want to remind people that Detroit actually had a heyday. I think a lot of people, especially in the younger generations, see Detroit as ‘down on its luck,’ so to speak. But it had a glory time. We were a magnificent place… That’s an idea that we like to (communicate) to all generations because that’s something we’d like to see again,” said Boettner.

“Detroit’s in its next renaissance and (we want to) bring those innovators and dreamers back and show them that history repeats itself. If it’s already been, why can’t it be again?”

To learn more about the history of Detroit, Oxford residents can visit the Detroit Historical Museum (5401 Woodward Ave., Detroit) or the Dossin Great Lakes Museum (100 Strand Drive, Belle Isle).

Admission to both museums is free.

To learn more about the Detroit Historical Society and its museums, visit www.detroithistorical.org.