Heroin and Chocolate City: Black Community Responses to Drug Addiction in the Nation’s Capital, 1967-1973

January 24, 2024.Reading time 54 minutes.

By Ryan Reft “The cost to the community of drug-related crime is staggering,” Chief Judge of the District of Columbia Court of General Sessions Harold H. Greene asserted to the United States Senate in June of 1970. Accepting more “conservative estimates,” Greene suggested that 10,000 addicts resided in the District of Columbia, spending “$40 to […]

The Metropole Bookshelf: Becky Nicolaides and “The New Suburbia”

January 9, 2024.Reading time 21 minutes.

The Metropole Bookshelf is an opportunity for authors of forthcoming or recently published books to let the UHA community know about their new work in the field. By Becky Nicolaides The seed for my book The New Suburbia: How Diversity Remade Suburban Life in Los Angeles After 1945 (Oxford University Press, 2024) was planted years […]

Interstate Lovesong: How Popular and Official Narratives Have Obscured the Damaging Impact of the Interstate Highway System

January 3, 2024.Reading time 13 minutes.

By Ryan Reft Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg has decried the racist history of the US Interstate Highway System, which obliterated many thriving Black and Brown communities. And earlier this year, Buttigieg announced new efforts at the US Department of Transportation to address that problematic legacy, dedicating $1 billion to “reconnect cities and neighborhoods racially segregated […]