The Official Blog of the Urban History Association
By Emily Lieb The story of twentieth-century Baltimore is the story of an expressway. Actually, it’s the story of the idea of an expressway, because most of the highways planned for Baltimore were never built. But the cat’s cradle of lines they made on planners’ maps changed the city all the same. They came close […]
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By Mary Rizzo It was intended to be the gala event of 1978. Under blazing Klieg lights, Al Pacino, in the midst of filming …And Justice for All, and Alan Alda, who had recently starred in The Seduction of Joe Tynan, would walk the red carpet, waving to adoring fans. John Waters, best known for […]
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By Will Cooley How did Baltimore earn the unfortunate nickname “Bulletmore”? Though many factors converged to produce high homicide rates, observers frequently overlook the law enforcement strategy of destabilizing drug trafficking organizations. In the United States as well as Central and South America, policymakers have directed agents to decapitate the “kingpins” of narcotics businesses through […]
Read MoreBy Dennis Patrick Halpin On June 2, 1885, Reverend Harvey Johnson called five of his fellow clergymen and close confidants —Ananias Brown, William Moncure Alexander, Patrick Henry Alexander, John Calvin Allen, and W. Charles Lawson—to his Baltimore home. During the previous year, Johnson had orchestrated challenges to public transportation segregation and Maryland’s prohibition on black […]
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By Matt Crenson In April, 2015, Freddie Gray died of a spinal cord injury while in the custody of Baltimore police officers. His was one more name on a national roster of unarmed black men who died that year at the hands of the police. On the day of Gray’s funeral, rioting broke out. Buildings […]
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Despite being one of the nation’s oldest cities, some might argue Baltimore crested in the popular mind during the early twenty-first century. Musically, Animal Collective, Dan Deacon and Beach House emerged to rave reviews. Tori Amos and Sisqo also hail from Charm City, as Complex magazine noted: “‘Caught A Lite Sneeze’ and ‘The Thong Song’ […]
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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 Matt Crenson Matt Crenson. Baltimore: A Political History. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 2017 The idea of writing Baltimore’s political history came to me by accident – an […]
Read MoreWith #UHA2018 in the books, it’s time to bid farewell to one of the driving forces of urban history and planning over these past two years, President Richard Harris, and his “dope orange sweater.” Thanks to Peter Suskind and Richard Harris for their stewardship of the UHA and #UHA2018. Plus Prof. Harris donned his dope […]
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It will be a gift in your life to clap loudly for your friends — melanie (@melanienewport) October 20, 2018 This tweet, for me, sums up the experience of #UHA2018. Throughout the conference I was repeatedly struck by the collegiality, generosity, and support that our association’s members showed to one another. I heard several […]
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In Michael Winterbottom’s 2002 film “24 Hour Party People,” then-television journalist and future Factory Records founder Tony Wilson (Steve Coogan) ventures out into the cool Manchester, England night one evening to take in a rock show. What he sees changes his life and those of millions of others forever. “In the fall of 1976, the […]
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