The collection contains awards, audiocassettes, correspondence, copies of newspaper clippings, pamphlets, planners, maps, notebooks, photographs, and other materials related to Week’s journalism career and research about Northern Michigan. The majority of the Northern Michigan research materials are for Week’s book, Sleeping Bear, Yesterday and Today.
Materials about the Day family were organized into a separate collection, the Day Family Papers. Correspondence between Weeks and the members of the Day family are within this collection and the Day Family Papers. Researchers may also be interested in his books and the D. H. Day Family Papers, which are separately cataloged in the Clarke.
Biography:
George Weeks (1932-2018), was born in Traverse City, Michigan. Historian, journalist, and political employee, he attended Traverse City Schools and graduated from Michigan State University in 1954. He obtained an honorary Doctor of Letters from Central Michigan University in 1996.
Weeks began his career covering Michigan politics in 1954 for United Press International (UPI). He also served as UPI’s Detroit radio and news editor, foreign editor and diplomatic correspondent in Washington D.C., and Lansing bureau chief. He and Mollie surname unknown, a social worker, married in 1957 and had 2 children, Julie and Don.
When William Milliken became governor in 1969, Weeks left journalism to serve various roles in the Milliken administration including press secretary, member of special council, and chief of staff. When the Milliken administration ended in 1984, Weeks resumed his journalism career as a columnist for The Detroit News until retirement in 2006. In retirement, Weeks wrote for the Traverse City Record-Eagle. From 1993 to 2002, Weeks served on the Clarke Historical Library Board of Governors.
Weeks also wrote numerous books on Michigan politics and the history of northern Michigan including Stewards of the State: The Governors of Michigan, Mem-ka-weh: Dawning of the Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians, Sleeping Bear, Yesterday and Today, and Sleeping Bear: It’s Lore, Legends, and First People.
(This information is from the collection and obituaries for George and Mollie Weeks.)
