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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany)

@urbanrenewal.bsky.social
1.2K followers 1.1K following 108 posts

Expect maps, renderings, appraisal photos, and stories about people who lost homes and businesses to redevelopment. (Guest appearances by The Monster Cat.) urbanrenewal.substack.com 98acresinalbany.wordpress.com

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Reposted by Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany)
Bruce Springsteen @brucespringsteen.net · 28/01/2026
I wrote this song on Saturday, recorded it yesterday and released it to you today in response to the state terror being visited on the city of Minneapolis. It’s dedicated to the people of Minneapolis, our innocent immigrant neighbors and in memory of Alex Pretti and Renee Good. Stay free
youtu.be
Bruce Springsteen - Streets Of Minneapolis (Official Audio)
YouTube video by Bruce Springsteen
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Reposted by Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany)
Michael Airhart (عارف) (ميخائيل ) @airhart.me · 15/07/2025
The Empire State Plaza in Albany, New York, is a celebration of space-age Brutalism. Functional but lifeless after 5, what might it look like with a wee little makeover? Let's dream! For example, this aerial concept opens up the complex's underground city to the sky with street-level retail.
A re-envisioned Empire State Plaza in Albany, New York. This depiction replaces the vast complex's outdoor reflecting pools with street-level retail and glass atriums leading into the underground city, or Concourse.
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David Hochfelder @dphochfelder.bsky.social · 05/03/2025
Rochester PBS covered our testimony to the NYS Reparations Commission: www.wxxinews.org/local-news/2...
wxxinews.org
State commission visits Rochester to ask residents what they think reparations might look like
During public remarks, speakers talked about their ancestry and African roots, their family histories, and proposed ideas for what reparations would look like.
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Reposted by Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany)
David Hochfelder @dphochfelder.bsky.social · 03/03/2025
Hi everyone! I'll be testifying before the NYS Reparations Commission on the history of urban renewal tomorrow around 5:00 PM. boxcast.tv/view/new-yor... Come for me, stay for the great Rochester presenters! Agenda is here: www.ny.gov/sites/defaul...
boxcast.tv
New York State Community Commission on Reparations Remedies Public Hearing: Memorial Art Gallery at the University of Rochester, March 4th 2025
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 03/03/2025
Tomorrow around 5:10pm, our David Hochfelder is scheduled to testify before the NYS Reparations Commission. Livestream here: boxcast.tv/view/new-yor...
boxcast.tv
New York State Community Commission on Reparations Remedies Public Hearing: Memorial Art Gallery at the University of Rochester, March 4th 2025
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Reposted by Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany)
David Rotenstein, Curator, Shrouded in Secrecy Archives @davidrotenstein.bsky.social · 19/01/2025
The first time that I saw this, I thought of the exercise in crass capitalism in Clarksdale, Mississippi: the Shack Up Inn.
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Reposted by Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany)
Urban History @urbanhistory.bsky.social · 15/01/2025
Want a *free* book? We have lots of great #urbanhistory books available to review 👇
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BuffaloResearch.com @buffaloresearch.com · 17/01/2025
My "Buffalonians Who Lost Property to the Kensington Expressway" blog post now has an alphabetical index of names & the option to download the original newspaper clippings as a single PDF. Scroll to the bottom. buffaloresearch.com/buffalonians... #Buffalo #UrbanHistory #urbanists 📜🗃️
buffaloresearch.com
Buffalonians Who Lost Their Homes and Businesses to the Kensington Expressway
Names and addresses of Buffalo property owners whose houses and other buildings were taken by eminent domain and demolished to build the Kensington Expressway.
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Reposted by Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany)
skippedhistory.bsky.social @skippedhistory.bsky.social · 03/01/2025
Our latest is up! Chronicling an institution formed after the Civil War—which then collapsed nine years later, with continued ramifications today. Cookie Monster and crypto bros also make important cameos. skippedhistory.substack.com/p/the-rise-a...
skippedhistory.substack.com
The Rise and Fall of the Freedman’s Bank
And the seeds of economic distrust, with Professor Justene Hill Edwards
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 22/12/2024
From @timesunion, another story about the lasting impact of property seizures and displacement
timesunion.com
The fraught history of Catskills water quenching New York City thirst
The uneasy relationship between upstate towns and NYC goes back more than a century and includes eminent domain, heavy engineering and hard compromise.
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 19/12/2024
Petitions, protests, and a mea culpa from the NYS DoT records at the NYS Archives.
urbanrenewal.substack.com
Urban Highways, Research, and Reparations
A year ago today, Gov.
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 19/12/2024
On the anniversary of the creation of the NYS Reparations Commission -- we discuss what we did and didn't find in the NYS DoT records.
urbanrenewal.substack.com
Urban Highways, Research, and Reparations
A year ago today, Gov.
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Reposted by Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany)
Levi Stahl @levistahl.bsky.social · 29/11/2023
The special flatbed car on the CTA holiday train that has Santa (a live person in costume) sitting on his sleigh.
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 17/12/2024
Just saw the CTA santa train! Tho waiting to head in the opposite direction, I probably would have climbed on had it stopped.
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 17/12/2024
We esrimate 2.5 - 3 m Americans were displaced for urban renewal and urban highways, 1950 - 1980. How many more housing, dams, state office complexes?
open.substack.com
Forcible Displacement (It's Not Just Urban Renewal)
We estimate that roughly 3 million Americans were displaced by federally-funded urban renewal and highway projects, 1950-1980. But because of the multiple laws and agencies involved, we haven’t (yet) ...
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 16/12/2024
Think Bailey has a chance?
Small and elderly calico cat sitting on her heating pad. (We keep the house cold in winter.) She still rules the roost.
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 15/12/2024
Lower Madison in Albany before the South Mall Arterial and 787 -- SRO hotels (Madison and Empress), restaurants (King's Cafe and Dongan St Lunch), bar (Sportsman's Club), 2 barbershops, shoe shine shop, a whole food distributor, a couple vacant storefronts. Bonus: ghost sign advertising paints.
Black and white photograph of Madison Avenue in Albany, 1962. Two men chat in front of an SRO hotel.
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Reposted by Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany)
Riley Champine @rileydchampine.com · 26/11/2024
Sanborn detail of Shreveport, LA 1963: Two annotations, "ALL BLDG'S IN THIS BLOCK REMOVED", record the destruction of a neighborhood in progress. This area, now beneath the interchange of I-20 and I-49, once contained over a hundred dwellings (marked "D" on the maps). It now has almost zero.
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Nick DeWolf Photo Archive @nickdewolfphoto.bsky.social · 07/08/2023
boston, massachusetts june 1960 west end demolition photograph by nick dewolf www.flickr.com/photos/dboo/50747840… © the Nick DeWolf Foundation Image-use requests are welcome via nickdewolfphotoarchive [at] gmail [dot] com #photography #film #blackandwhite #boston #westend #1960s
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Reposted by Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany)
Nick DeWolf Photo Archive @nickdewolfphoto.bsky.social · 04/12/2023
Boston, Massachusetts June 1959 West End Demolition Photograph by Nick DeWolf © the Nick DeWolf Foundation Image-use requests are welcome via nickdewolfphotoarchive [at] gmail [dot] com #Boston #Massachusetts #WestEnd #UrbanRenewal #demolition #buildings #1950s
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Reposted by Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany)
Alexandra Lange @langealexandra.bsky.social · 13/12/2024
Thanks @anjulierao.bsky.social @dwell.bsky.social for letting me answer the question: Should you turn a mall into housing? www.dwell.com/article/you-...
dwell.com
You Turned a Mall Into Housing?
As strange as a recent viral project in Milwaukee may seem, there’s a historical precedent for this kind of adaptive reuse—but that doesn’t mean it’s always done right.
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 13/12/2024
We found something unusual in Auburn @dphochfelder.bsky.social
urbanrenewal.substack.com
Auburn's Unusual Relocation Records
Auburn’s Urban Renewal Agency files are fantastic—complete, organized, and well maintained.
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 12/12/2024
Looking for something else altogether, I found photos of Rudolph Paul's model, re-envisioning Robert Moses's Lower Manhattan Expressway. Curiousity about the model led me to this excerpt from Sam Lubell and Greg Goldin's *Never Built New York* www.gothamcenter.org/blog/paul-ru...
Architectural modelMap
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Reposted by Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany)
Greg Jarrell @gregjarrell.com · 10/12/2024
Tonight, dozens of activists have shown up to advocate for the city of Charlotte about steps to prevent mass displacements. Currently, 2 complexes are being shuttered following years of trying to get landlords to comply with basic housing codes.
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 09/12/2024
Urban renewal led to the destruction of some of the nation's oldest buildings. But that doesn't mean renewal was necessarily antithetical preservationist goals. In many places, restoring historic structures was part of a plan to facilitate gentrification.
A 1970 black and white appraisal photo of 166 Montgomery St, a 3-story brick house. The house was seized by Newburgh Urban Renewal Agency.
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Reposted by Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany)
David Hochfelder @dphochfelder.bsky.social · 06/12/2024
Urban History Association 2025--Panel on US Urban Renewal and Gentrification I'm looking to put together a panel in the connections between urban renewal/redevelopment and gentrification in the US. If you are interested in helping create, joining, or chairing/commenting, I'd love to hear from you.
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 09/12/2024
Between boxes and strings, this is Bailey's favorite time of year.
Calico cat peering out of a cardboard box kitty fort.
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 09/12/2024
The Amsterdam (NY) Urban Renewal Agency records are currently stored in a carriage house behind City Hall.
urbanrenewal.substack.com
What We Found in an Amsterdam Carriage House
Amsterdam, NY, was the first location we (Dave and PhD student Jack Grobe) visited as part of a grant-funded project to inventory urban renewal records. What we found highlights both the large volume ...
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 08/12/2024
"The South End is changing, its skidrow diminishing as the old buildings are felled for urban renewal projects, and the men move on, or pass on." William Kennedy and Bernie Kolenberg, "They Ask Wine, a Place to Sleep...." @timesunion.com 7/7/64
Black and white photograph of the vacant lot behind what was once Landau's Corsette Shop on Pearl Street in Albany, September 1963. The lot is littered with refuse including a junked car. By the end of the year, the South Mall area would be cleared of businesses and residents. NYS Archives.
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 06/12/2024
William Kennedy's Pulitzer-prize winning novel, Ironweed, grew out of his reporting for @timesunion.com. With photographer Bernie Kolenber, his 1964 series, "The Shadow World," focused on "the way of life of men and women along the skid row of Albany's South End."
Black and white photograph of showing two businesses in Albany's South Mall redevelopment area, Felice Ucci's tavern and Willie Wilson's barbershop -- both in the area of the city known as "the gut." The empty building next door to the barbershop has been boarded up. New York State Archives.
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 04/12/2024
Postwar redevelopment projects destroyed many of the places where the poorest, most marginal people lived -- typically w/o building replacement housing for them. We don't know what happened to Palombi Hotel residents, but we do know many South Mall displacees lived in SROS and rooming houses.
A 1962 black and white photo of the Palombi Hotel's bar. A burly bartender stands behind the counter. The 3 visible customers are white, elderly, and wearing battered clothing. A New York State employee holds a sign with the building's address on it; he is part of a team sent to collect legal evidence for a dispute between the State and the building's owners. New York State Archives.This 1962 black and white photo of the Palombi Hotel shows a large room with many single, threadbare beds in it. There are hooks above the beds where tenants could hang their belongings. NYS Archives.
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 03/12/2024
@dphochfelder.bsky.social sampling gingerbread cider at Nine Pin in Albany. (Going for bronze-level 26er.)
History professor holds glass of cider in one hand gives thumbs up with other at Nine Pin Cider Tasting Room in Albany.
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Reposted by Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany)
Greg Jarrell @gregjarrell.com · 03/12/2024
"Advent always proceeds through wreckage. Some destruction is not merely death chasing death. Sometimes God clarifies, provokes, purifies, turns the world rightside-up again, even when the politics of domination threaten to collapse our neighborhoods, even our churches."
gregjarrell.substack.com
Advent Amid the Wreckage
Hope, but first destruction
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 12/11/2024
Handy ppt trick (courtesy @dphochfelder.bsky.social) -- end with cute cat photo.
Winsome calico cat sits in a box looking up at the photographer.
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 03/12/2024
Now for the dog lovers. We found this photo among a collection of prints focusing on the most rundown sections of the South Mall area in Albany. Photos such as this were used to justify redevelopment.
Black and white photo of a dog standing alone on a sidewalk outside a brick townhouse with a sign for Park Gift Shop, circa 1962. Another dog peers out of a basement window. NYS Archives.
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The Gray Sage @walterdgreason.bsky.social · 02/12/2024
Celebrating the Graphic History of Hip Hop! #cybermonday www.graphichistorycompany.com
graphichistorycompany.com
Home | Graphic History Company
Welcome to The Graphic History Company homepage.
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 02/12/2024
Here's a link to @dphochfelder.bsky.social's inventories of the renewal records we found in cities across New York State.
dropbox.com
Login - Dropbox
Login to Dropbox. Bring your photos, docs, and videos anywhere and keep your files safe.
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 02/12/2024
She's now too old (18, maybe 20) to jump up on my desk. But she caught a mouse last week.
Winsome cat (a calico) on desk.
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 02/12/2024
Want to research urban renewal in your hometown? Learn what our Dave Hochfelder found in municipal archives across New York State!
urbanrenewal.substack.com
Urban Renewal Records Around New York State
Introduction
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 26/11/2024
A Christmas skit with self-congratulatory lyrics by the real estate firm hired to empty and demolish Lincoln Square: "Tenants are living much closer to Paradise, Theatre, symphony, opera, ballet, Millions of lives will be filled with zest and spice...." urbanrenewal.substack.com/p/lincoln-ce...
urbanrenewal.substack.com
Lincoln Center Christmas Celebration, 1958 edition
Hoping to learn more about the people displaced by the Lincoln Square project, we searched the papers of John D.
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Hunter Walker @hunterw.bsky.social · 26/11/2024
🚨 MAJOR ALERT 🚨 The people wanted verification badges on Bluesky and @guan.dk and I have teamed up to bring you verification badges. Behold! It is the Official Verified Labeller! bsky.app/profile/veri...
bsky.app
2412758630
Reposted by Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany)
Greg Jarrell @gregjarrell.com · 25/11/2024
"Jarrell is an excellent storyteller, which makes this vital history a gripping narrative. Although the ending is essentially known from the outset, he keeps readers turning each page to see what is revealed next in the telling." www.christiancentury.org/books/what-w...
christiancentury.org
What White Christians did to Black Charlotte
Greg Jarrell explores how one congregation in his city took advantage of racist urban renewal...
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 25/11/2024
I'm testing out an Urban History feed -- bsky.app/profile/urba...
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 24/11/2024
A revealing Christmas skit by the firm hired by Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts to oversee relocation, site management, and demolition of Lincoln Square urbanrenewal.substack.com/p/lincoln-ce...
Cover image from “A Day at Lincoln Square,” a play by Charles D. Atkinson, illustrated by Midgette. The iconic design of Lincoln Center overshadows a family of six, bags packed and dog in tow, presumably on their way out. Braislin, Porter & Wheelock is printed on their bags. Rockefeller Archives.
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 23/11/2024
Any interest in figuring out how to create a custom Urban History feed? I've pinned the Urbanism+, What's History, and #History feeds. But I don't see a feed on the history of cities. Urban History can be such a fragmented field; it would be nice to connect. @urbanhistorya.bsky.social
Circa 1962 aerial photograph of downtown Albany, NY. It shows the area that will demolished for construction of the Empire State Plaza and South Mall Arterial. Courtesy John Mesick.
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David Hochfelder @dphochfelder.bsky.social · 22/11/2024
Urban History Association 2025--Panel on US Urban Renewal and Gentrification I'm looking to put together a panel in the connections between urban renewal/redevelopment and gentrification in the US. If you are interested in helping create, joining, or chairing/commenting, I'd love to hear from you.
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Mary Robinette Kowal @maryrobinettekowal.com · 20/11/2024
Let's talk about peeing in space. Several people, in response to my NY Times essay, have said that women couldn't go into space because we lacked the technology for them to pee in space. www.nytimes.com/2019/07/17/s...
nytimes.com
To Make It to the Moon, Women Have to Escape Earth’s Gender Bias (Published 2019)
The Apollo program was designed by men, for men. But NASA can learn from its failures as it aims to send women to the moon and beyond.
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 21/11/2024
A quote from the archives that stays with me: "Maybe what we are finally experiencing ... is a revolt of sorts against the highway program.... We would be less than candid if we didn’t acknowledge that a lot of this feeling has been generated by our past cavalier attitude....
An elevated highway arterial (the South Mall Arterial) leads into the Empire State Plaza in the city of Albany, NY. It dwarf all the surround structures save for the modernist capitol complex. (NYS Archives)
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Researching Urban Renewal (formerly 98 Acres in Albany) @urbanrenewal.bsky.social · 21/11/2024
From the papers of w/ J. D. Rockefeller 3rd -- correspondence w/ Robert Moses, the president of Columbia University, and real estate brokers about the type of neighbors befitting the new Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts -- particularly the area across Broadway visible from the plaza
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