We have a superb new issue, No. 14, that we just sent to press. Subscribe by this Friday, 9/4, and we will mail you a copy.
Architecture schools are starting up again, and we are still curious from readers to hear what that looks like - send us accounts.
Good news from the middle of the country - my wife, baby and mother-in-law just spent the weekend driving back from Kansas City to New York together. We stopped at Carmi Illinois, where the Carmi Chronicle reported that they had recently leased North America’s largest excavator (165 foot reach) to demolish their grain elevator (155 feet tall). We visited New Harmony Indiana where the gay proprietors of the Black Lodge Roasters reported the wedding business is keeping the town afloat - maybe Phillip Johnson had a pandemic in mind when he designed New Harmony’s roofless church. And even at a pitstop emblazoned ‘Ozarkland’ in the middle of Missouri, bearded swaggering cowboy hat wearing men were pulling on their masks before going inside.
Bad news from the middle of the country - I grew up learning about the redlining and covenants that still scar the neighborhoods of Kansas City today, but was embarrassed to have only recently learned about sundown laws:
James Loewen has documented how residents in small towns in Illinois, even in the late 20th century, excluded African-Americans. Their method was blunt: signs on roadsides threatened to kill black people present after dark. He began research into “sundown towns” in 1999 and expected to discover ten historical examples in the state. Instead by 2018 he described finding 507.
Link to the Economist article. A List. Carmi and New Harmony are both on there. Related: The dearth of Black farmers.
Connection to architecture? Planning and architecture go hand in hand with access to space. I think. If you would like to write about this, tell us (editor@nyra.nyc).
Finally, find below events this week - we are starting to include many that are not necessarily in New York, but are trying to keep all the times in EDT. if you would like to attend one and write it up, tell us that, too.
Monday.
8/31 | 5:30pm |Spitzer
Fall 2020 Sciame Series: Gerardo Caballero
Tuesday
9/01 | 1:00pm | Cooper Union
FALL 2020 ALL SCHOOL ASSEMBLY
Wednesday
9/02 | 3:00pm | Rice
Rice Noon Talk: Architecture: It is what it is, but it does not have to be with Anzilla Gilmore, Nicola Springer, Florence Tang, Laura Vargas
9/02 | 4:00pm | Berkeley
UNBULDING RACISM: THE FIERCE URGENCY OF NOW by DEANNA VAN BUREN
9/02 | 6:00pm | CFA
Residential Architecture Now: Mid-Hudson Valley
Friday
9/04 | 3:00pm | Spitzer
FOLIO: Journal of Contemporary African Architecture