♪ NARRATOR: Dearborn.

It sits right on the border of Detroit.

It's home to Ford Motor Company and the first Arab American majority city in the United States.

MAYOR HAMMOUD: My grandfather and my mom's family, they come over here in 1974.

At the time when the Lebanese Civil War was about to start but also for the opportunity at pursuing the American dream.

My mother was about four years old.

She came over here and obviously entered the school system at the time and for my grandfather just a regular laborer, while waiting for a job on the line found a job at a local bakery making fifty dollars a week and it was that that kind of held him over until he found a good paying job on the line.

Dearborn is home to about 110,000 people, the fastest growing city in Michigan according to the last decennial census, it's about twelve percent growth.

Fifty percent of the residents here are foreign born.

After the war in Iraq, you saw a large migration of Iraqi nationals to southeast Michigan, so we have a large Iraqi- American community.

With the civil strife that is persistent in Yemen you see a large Yemeni migration.

And within the Dearborn community in particular amongst the large Arab- American communities the largest I would say is the Lebanese and the Yemeni community, and then you kind of have the Iraqi community and then a scattering of Syrian, Palestinian, Jordanian going across the Middle East and North African border.

My father's story is slightly different, he came over here in the early 80s, born and raised in Saudi Arabia although Lebanese.

Ultimately my father for most of my young age was a trucker delivering the seats for the F-150.

The best truck in America.

I have to say that.

I also believe it because I drive one.

ANNOUNCER: Destination Detroit - This program was made possible in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, and viewers like you.

Thank you.

To learn more about this Detroit PBS series, visit Detroit PBS dot org slash Destination Detroit.

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