We at The Metropole are excited to issue a call for our next theme month:
Cities at Play
We welcome submissions about any aspect of play, recreation, or leisure in the urban environment. How have cities uniquely shaped the way their inhabitants play, and how has play in turn shaped the built environment, the social dynamics, and the politics of cities? Please send pitches to themetropole@urbanhistory.org by Friday, March 20th. Full length drafts of accepted posts will be due April 17th, with publication on the blog occurring in May.
Posts should be between 1000 and 1500 words, excluding citations, and contain at least 2-3 captioned, cited images, with any needed permission secured by the author.
Authors of accepted posts will be paid $200.
Featured Image (at top): On a Play Street, N.Y., 1910. Bain News Service. Library of Congress.
The Metropole 
Pitch: Why Did Street Play Disappear from New York?
That question will be addressed by considering Geoffrey Canada’s Fist, Stick, Knife and Gun: A Personal History of Violence in America (1995)— a memoir of growing up in the South Bronx in the sixties.
At the very time when the street life of cities was being re-discovered and celebrated by Jane Jacobs, and on Sesame Street and Mr. Rodger’s Neighborhood, parents of kids inclined to play in the street were increasingly confining those kids to their apartment. Geoffrey Canada explains why –showing how the safety of street play ensured by an almost medieval ranking according to fighting ability was eroded by the increased ability of young, unskilled fighters to acquire guns.
I have dealt with this question in broader context in “The Street Life of Children in 20th Century New York ,” Streetnotes, (2015), 23-51 but believe a specific focus on Canada’s memoir is warranted especially because it invites a discussion of the disproportionate suffering endured by young Black men as a result of the widespread acquisition of guns in cities.
Thanks for considering this.
Jim Wunsch
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