Some old movies

– photo by Mitch Waxman

Sometimes, a humble narrator needs to admit defeat, kick off his shoes (which are showing signs of having picked up some of that queer colour observed around the odd shimmerings of the Newtown Creek) and soak in some passive entertainment.

courtesy of the Prelinger archives at archive.org–

1940 ethnic New York–

Focusing in on the “new community” concept of the ethnic melting pot in 1940. This is Roosevelt era propaganda, incidentally. First push to what NewSpeak calls multiculturalism (not for it or against it, just what it is).

page link with info and multiple movie versions:

512k MP4 movie link

Unfit For the Living (ca. 1949)-

Robert Moses Propaganda, selling Public Housing as Panacea. Shows building of Alfred E. Smith Houses and makes the case for slum clearance with the promise of an ideal life in New York City Public Housing Projects.

page link with info and multiple movie versions:

512k MP4 movie link

Social Class in America (ca. 1957)-

One of the “nose on your face” third rail topics in American Politics, which is not discussed in a modern “identity politic” defined culture. Poor people have a whole lot more in common with each other as a social class than they do with their ethnic groups. Dividing the city into groups based on how they comb their hair is Tammany Hall at its finest, there’s only 2 groups- the bosses and everyone else.

page link with info and multiple movie versions:

512k MP4 movie link

Manhattan Waterfront (ca. 1937)-

Incredible infrastructure pornography for the tugboat and bridge fetishist crowd. Shots from Shore Road by Astoria Park of Hellgate and Triboro Bridges. Also, Manhattan waterfront shanty towns of indigent labor- not something that normally gets edited into the story of heroic modern New York.

page link with info and multiple movie versions:

512k MP4 movie link

One of the money shots in the film is contrasted by the photo below, shot in summer of 2009.

– photo by Mitch Waxman

Despotism (ca. 1946)-

A terrifying warning from “the greatest Generation” about how to determine how close to despotism your community is- which virtually predicts the modern United States after the first decade of the 21st century. Really, watch this one, scariest thing you’ll see today.

page link with info and multiple movie versions:

512k MP4 movie link

– photo by Mitch Waxman

and just as a note: December 18 is Robert Moses’s Birthday.