The Detroit News is one of the two major newspapers in the U.S. city of Detroit, Michigan. The paper began in 1873, when it rented space in the rival Free Press's building. The News absorbed the Detroit Tribune on February 1, 1919, the Detroit Journal on July 21, 1922, and on November 7, 1960, it bought and closed the faltering Detroit Times. However, it retained the Times' building which it used as a printing plant until 1967 when a new facility opened in Sterling Heights and it was demolished. The street in downtown Detroit where the Times building once stood is still called "Times Square." The Evening News Association, owner of The News, merged with Gannett in 1985.

The News claims to have been the first newspaper in the world to operate a radio station, station 8MK, which went on the air August 20, 1920. 8MK is now CBS-owned WWJ. In 1947, it established Michigan's first television station, WWJ-TV, now WDIV-TV.

In 1989, the paper entered into a 100-year joint operating agreement with the rival Free Press, combining business operations while keeping separate editorial staffs. The combined company is called the Detroit Newspaper Partnership. The Free Press moved into The News building in 1998 and until May 7, 2006, the two published a single joint weekend edition. Today The News, which has won three Pulitzer Prizes, is published Monday-Saturday, and has an editorial page in the Sunday Free Press.

Detroit ( /diˈtrɔɪt/) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan, and the seat of Wayne County. It is the major city among the primary cultural, financial, and transportation centers in the Metro Detroit area, a region of 5.2 million people, and serves as a major port on the Detroit River connecting the Great Lakes system to the Saint Lawrence Seaway. It was founded on July 24, 1701, by the French explorer, adventurer, and nobleman Antoine de la Mothe, sieur de Cadillac.

In 2010, the city had a population of 713,777 and ranked as the 18th most populous city in the United States. The name Detroit sometimes refers to the Metro Detroit area with a population of 4,296,250 for the six-county Metropolitan Statistical Area, the United States' eleventh-largest, and a population of 5,218,852 for the nine-county Combined Statistical Area as of the 2010 Census. The Detroit–Windsor area, a critical commercial link straddling the Canada–U.S. border, has a total population of about 5,700,000.

Known as the world's traditional automotive center, "Detroit" is a metonym for the American automobile industry and an important source of popular music legacies celebrated by the city's two familiar nicknames, the Motor City and Motown. Other nicknames arose in the 20th century, including City of Champions beginning in the 1930s for its successes in individual and team sport,The D, D-Town, Hockeytown (a trademark owned by the city's NHL club, the Red Wings), Rock City (after the Kiss song "Detroit Rock City"), and The 313 (its telephone area code) Detroit became known as the "great arsenal of democracy" for its support of the U.S. role among the Allied powers during World War II.

Mariska Hargitay ( /məˈrɪʃkə ˈhɑrɡɨteɪ/ mə-RISH-kə HAR-gi-tay; born Mariska Magdolna Hargitay; January 23, 1964) is an American actress, best known for her role as New York City sex crimes Detective Olivia Benson on the NBC television drama Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, a role that has earned her multiple awards and nominations, including an Emmy and Golden Globe.

The daughter of actress Jayne Mansfield and actor/bodybuilder Mickey Hargitay, Hargitay is a former beauty queen who made her film debut in the 1985 horror-comedy film Ghoulies, and her major television debut in the 1986 adventure drama series Downtown. She appeared in numerous roles in film and television shows throughout the late 1980s and 1990s before being cast as Olivia Benson, a role that led to her founding the Joyful Heart Foundation, which provides support to women who have been sexually abused.

Hargitay was born at St. John's Hospital in Los Angeles, California, the daughter of actress and 1950s-era sex symbol Jayne Mansfield. Her father was the Hungarian-born former Mr. Universe Mickey Hargitay. Her first and middle names are Hungarian and refer to Mary Magdalene (Mariska is a diminutive of Mary). Her family name means "of Hargita". Hargitay was raised Roman Catholic. She has two older brothers.