"The Neighborhood Project": Martin Drive | Wrap Up

Listen: So our first week of the 2010 Neighborhood Project has come to end. And I have to say, while we've covered a lot of ground in first seven days, there's still a good deal of Martin Drive that's been left unexplored. Ideally, I could have walked house to house, getting thoughts and reflections and ideas from every part of the community, and then somehow turn that into a totally reflective collage of the neighborhood. But alas, time would never be so generous.

So, as a final tribute to Martin Drive, I'll leave you with some of the audio that I collected, but for one reason or another didn't get to edit. First, a piece that we aired, but I have yet to blog. Eric Mueller, a new resident of the neighborhood: When the neighbors first saw that a foreclosed home was being bought by an out-of-towner, they suspected that it might be somebody interested in fixing it up and renting it out. However, they managed to stumble into a best case scenario with Eric.

The Duncan family is a neighborhood's dream. Three siblings share a house in Martin Drive -- an MPS teacher, a Milwaukee Police Department policeman, and a student. Raymond, a teacher and an astonishing ball of energy, spends almost all of his other waking hours are devoted to making Martin Drive a better place. His home, which had once been a problem property for the neighborhood, is now a massive source of positive energy. Listen to an uncut interview with Raymond and his twin brother Joe: As I said, that interview was uncut -- if you listen carefully to this raw interview and some of the completed piece earlier in the week, you can piece together some of the production process.

Three more uncut interviews from Martin Drive neighbors. First, Lynn, who lives in her grandparents house and is a lifelong Martin Driver reflects a bit on the neighborhood: Next, Maggie tells us how she ended up finding Martin Drive and staying in the neighborhood since 1964: Finally, Angel, a neighbor who's been in Martin Drive since 1990 tells us why he came to the neighborhood: There were a number of other people and places that deserve attention in the neighborhood (I feel terrible that I never was able to put together a piece for Deja Vu, a wonderful and eclectic consignment shop on Vliet Street), but the Neighborhood Project moves forward to more stories of Milwaukee. Join us in week 2, as we explore Walker's Point!

Interested in Martin Drive? You can learn more about them on their Facebook neighborhood profile , and of course, you can always go and check it out for yourself !