“We Are the Only Wonderful Things”

2020 ◽  
pp. 269-314
Author(s):  
Melissa J. Homestead
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
World War ◽  
The Great Depression ◽  
Greenwich Village ◽  
Park Avenue ◽  
Living Together ◽  
Permanent Home ◽  
Desert Island ◽  
The City

After losing their Greenwich Village apartment in 1927, Cather and Lewis had no permanent home in New York City, living together instead at the Grosvenor Hotel when both were in the city. In 1932, they finally leased an apartment on Park Avenue. The first half of this chapter reconstructs their life together in the 1930s and 1940s living on Park Avenue and traveling to Europe and Mt. Desert Island in Maine. The chapter includes their responses to the Great Depression and World War II, the formation of new friendships and maintenance of old ones, the deeper intertwining of their families, and Cather’s declining health. After describing Cather’s death and burial, the second half of the chapter tells the story of Edith Lewis’s mourning for Cather in the years immediately after Cather’s death and her work as Cather’s literary executor.

When Tenants Claimed the City

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roberta Gold
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
Urban Communities ◽  
Urban Neighborhoods ◽  
World War ◽  
Racially Diverse ◽  
Postwar America ◽  
Living Together ◽  
The City

In postwar America, not everyone wanted to move out of the city and into the suburbs. For decades before World War II, New York's tenants had organized to secure renters' rights. After the war, tenant activists raised the stakes by challenging the newly dominant ideal of homeownership in racially segregated suburbs. They insisted that renters as well as owners had rights to stable, well-maintained homes, and they proposed that racially diverse urban communities held a right to remain in place—a right that outweighed owners' rights to raise rents, redevelop properties, or exclude tenants of color. Further, the activists asserted that women could participate fully in the political arenas where these matters were decided. Grounded in archival research and oral history, this book shows that New York City's tenant movement made a significant claim to citizenship rights that came to accrue, both ideologically and legally, to homeownership in postwar America. The book emphasizes the centrality of housing to the racial and class reorganization of the city after the war, the prominent role of women within the tenant movement, and their fostering of a concept of “urban community rights” grounded in their experience of living together in heterogeneous urban neighborhoods.

“A Time of Struggle”

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roberta Gold
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
New York City ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
Rent Control ◽  
Housing Crisis ◽  
World War ◽  
Housing Shortage ◽  
The Great Depression ◽  
The City ◽  
New Yorkers

This chapter examines the unprecedented housing crisis that erupted in New York City at the end of World War II. At the end of the war, New Yorkers faced their worst housing shortage ever. The housing supply that had already been inadequate for the city's population and contained many substandard tenements had fallen even further behind, as construction virtually ceased during the Great Depression and the war. Meanwhile, demand was rising. Even the worst slum apartments found a market among African Americans who were moving north and discovering that de facto segregation confined them to a few crowded neighborhoods. By 1950, census figures showed that the city required an additional 430,000 dwelling units to properly house its population. This chapter looks at the rise of tenant activists and how they addressed the housing crisis via grassroots mobilizations in concert with leftist and liberal organizations, allowing them not only to retain, but also to institutionalize, the signal achievements of rent control and public housing.

“The Child Is Never Basically Bad”

2019 ◽  
pp. 13-38
Author(s):  
Carl Suddler
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
New York City ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
York City ◽  
Juvenile Justice System ◽  
Youth Crime ◽  
World War ◽  
Criminal Behaviors ◽  
Depression Era ◽  
The City

This chapter focuses on the juvenile justice system and its related efforts to address youth crime in New York City before World War II. From the 1930s to the onset of the war, there was a nationwide tension about how to address crime. In New York City, this debate had racial, political, and social implications that persisted beyond the period. On one side, there were those, such as New York City mayor Fiorello La Guardia, who believed crime in the city was rampant and that an increased carceral sovereignty, including preventive policing, was critical to establish order. On the other side, there were those, such as Jane M. Bolin, who rejected such logic and aspired to advance a neo-Progressive rationale that emphasized the correction of social ills contributing to criminal behaviors—regardless of the numbers. This chapter provides a sketch of Harlem during the Depression era, with an emphasis on black youths and various crime-prevention effortsthey encountered.

Race Policy, Race Violence, and Race Reform in the U.S. Army During World War II

1996 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 130-167
Author(s):  
Daniel Kryder
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
Los Angeles ◽  
Historical Analysis ◽  
World War ◽  
National Unity ◽  
Black Soldiers ◽  
War Department ◽  
The One ◽  
The City

No ceremonies marked the fiftieth anniversary of the wartime riots in New York, Los Angeles, Beaumont, Detroit, and Mobile. American political culture, if not recent historical analysis, continues to associate “the Good War” with national unity rather than unrest. But race tension was palpable to contemporaries. For example, ten months prior to Pearl Harbor and six months before a deadly shoot-out between black soldiers and white military policemen occurred in Fayetteville, North Carolina, that town had already earned the nickname “Uncle Sam's Powder Keg.” Less than ten miles from the city lay Fort Bragg, the nation's largest army camp, and visitors sensed a “seething undercurrent” of race friction coursing through the camp and the city. Thousands of black artillery trainees visited the downtown area each week, drinking and milling about in the streets. Because very few establishments welcomed their business, there was little else for them to do. A cab driver, asked about the city's hostile mood, replied that “the trouble is not ‘Is there trouble,’ but ‘What kind of trouble is it going to be and when is it going to pop?’” Similar questions animate this research, which explores the relationship between the Second World War mobilization and War Department practices and policies, on the one hand, and racial confrontations and violence involving soldiers, on the other.

Remembering Joseph A. Pechman, 1918–1989

1990 ◽  
Vol 4 (4) ◽  
pp. 121-124
Author(s):  
Henry J Aaron
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
World War ◽  
Brookings Institution ◽  
City College ◽  
University Of Wisconsin ◽  
Before And After ◽  
The University ◽  
The City ◽  
Treasury Department

Joe Pechman joined the staff of the Brookings Institution in 1960. He graduated from the City College of New York in 1937 and the University of Wisconsin in 1942. During World War II, he worked in the war time Office of Price Administration and later served in the U.S. Army. After the war he worked in the Treasury Department, the staff of the Council of Economic Advisers, and the Committee for Economic Development, a policy-oriented organization sponsored by major businesses. Before and after coming to Brookings he taught at M.I.T., Yale, Stanford (twice), Georgetown, Dartmouth, and Williams College. He was a fellow at the Center for Advanced Studies in the Behavioral Sciences and at the Hoover Institution, both at Stanford University.

Reimagining Social Reform

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicholas K. Rademacher
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Social Justice ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
Social Reform ◽  
Medical Science ◽  
World War ◽  
Catholic Worker ◽  
Cultural Approach ◽  
The Great Depression ◽  
New Directions

Paul Hanly Furfey realigned his approach to social reform during and after his sabbatical in Germany, questioning now the efficacy of a purely scientific approach. Furfey’s scientific studies in Germany, the onset of the Great Depression and stirrings of World War II led Furfey to re-evaluate his hypotheses on social reform. His emphasis shifted to a supernatural perspective. Furfey’s progress from optimism in 1931 to a revised approach in 1935 can be traced across three benchmarks: first, his request to study medical science in Germany and his subsequent intellectual conversion while there; second, his report to the rector of CUA upon his return, a report in which Furfey frankly outlined the new directions in his outlook consequent to what he learned while abroad; and, third, his gravitation toward a more determinedly counter-cultural approach to social reform that was inspired, in part, by the Catholic Worker community in New York City. By 1935, Furfey was in the midst of blending these new insights into his already existing theoretical and practical frameworks for promoting social justice.

AN INTERVIEW WITH PAUL A. VOLCKER

2001 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
pp. 434-460 ◽  
Author(s):  
PERRY MEHRLING
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
Great Depression ◽  
Public Service ◽  
Federal Reserve ◽  
World View ◽  
Banking System ◽  
World War ◽  
The Great Depression ◽  
Rebuilding Effort

Paul A. Volcker has spent most of his life in public service, at the Treasury under President Kennedy (1962–1965) and then as Undersecretary for Monetary Affairs under President Nixon (1969–1974), as President of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York (1975–1979), and finally as Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System under both President Carter and President Reagan (1979–1987). Born in 1927, his world view was formed by childhood experience of the Great Depression and World War II, times of great national trial that led ultimately to recommitment and reconstruction. He went into public service in order to be a part of the rebuilding effort, but it was his fate instead to be involved mainly in managing pressures that would ultimately lead to the breakdown of the Bretton Woods system internationally and the Glass–Steagall banking system domestically. Consequently, there is some sadness today when he looks back on his career, but there is also a sense of accomplishment. In spite of everything, there was no depression and there was no world war. The possibility and hope for progress in years to come remains alive.The interview took place in Volcker's office at Rockefeller Center in New York City. His fourth-floor windows look out over the sunken plaza to the gold-leafed statue of Prometheus stealing fire from the gods, and then on farther to the elegant GE building, which is familiar to anyone who has visited New York. Over the front entrance it is just possible to see the inscription adapted from Isaiah 33:6, “Wisdom and Knowledge shall be the stability of thy times.” It strikes me as an appropriate inscription for the building, reminding one that this most beautiful complex was built in the years of the Great Depression. Today, with the forthcoming interview in mind, it reminds me also of the stakes involved in the conduct of monetary policy.

MARTIN GILBERT, Jerusalem in the Twentieth Century (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1996). Pp. 428. $16.95 paper.

2001 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
pp. 136-137
Author(s):  
PHILIP MATTAR
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
Past Century ◽  
World War ◽  
Oxford University ◽  
Winston Churchill ◽  
British Rule ◽  
Enormous Amount ◽  
The City ◽  
East Jerusalem

Much has been written about Jerusalem since the Madrid peace conference in 1991, most of it by partisans on both sides. Sir Martin Gilbert's work is one of the most entertaining, but least objective. Gilbert is a fellow of Merton College, Oxford University, and a biographer of Sir Winston Churchill and historian of World War II. He begins where his earlier volume, Jerusalem: Rebirth of a City, ended—around the turn of the 20th century. He starts his story with the last few years of Ottoman rule; dwells on British rule (1917–48) and the 1948 war; skims over the years between 1948 and 1967, especially the Jordanian rule of East Jerusalem; then gives a long account of the years after 1967. He ends his book with an endorsement of a plan to return part of East Jerusalem to the Palestinians. Gilbert is a master of the art of compressing an enormous amount of materials about the city's social, architectural, cultural, religious, and political history during the past century into a compelling and readable narrative. His book thus provides a panoramic account of the city, and, because he relies on newspapers, it has an eyewitness quality to it.

Strides Forward in Times of Crisis in the 1930s and 1940s

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julie A. Gallagher
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
Black Women ◽  
African American Women ◽  
Electoral Politics ◽  
World War ◽  
The Great Depression ◽  
Political Experience ◽  
Government Work ◽  
Economic Fairness

This chapter explores the strides African American women made in government work and electoral politics during the Great Depression and World War II. While the economic crisis wreaked havoc on Harlem, it also created the space for college-educated women to find employment in the city's New Deal agencies. In addition to gaining useful experience, these women now had access to potentially influential arenas from which to pursue their ideas about economic fairness, human rights, and civil equality. Yet other women turned to electoral politics during the 1930s and 1940s, and by the time the economy stabilized and World War II ended, black women in New York City had attained significant political experience.

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