Thomas J. Campanella – författare

For as long as they have existed, cities have been destroyed--sacked, shaken, burnt, bombed, flooded, starved, irradiated, and pillaged--in almost every case they have risen again. Rarely in modern times has a city not been rebuilt following destruction, be it natural or man-made. The Resilient City explores urban disasters from around the globe and the ongoing restoration of urban life. It examines why cities are rebuilt, how a vision for the future gets incorporated into a new urban landscape, and how disasters have been interpreted and commemorated in built form. An international cast of historians, architects, and urban studies experts looks at a diverse group of cities that have suffered traumas, including: * the Oklahoma City bombing* Chicago's great fire of 1871* San Francisco's earthquake and fires of 1906* Washington's invasion by the British during the War of 1812* Berlin and Warsaw in World War II* Gernika's bombardment during the Spanish Civil War* Jerusalems rebuilding following centuries of destruction* Mexico City's 1985 earthquake* China's Tangshan earthquake* Tokyo's earthquake, fires, and WWII bombardment* Beirut in the 1990s wars* South Central Los Angeles following the Rodney King beatingIn so doing, they bring to light the experiences these resilient cities share, while underscoring that no two cities have recovered in the precisely the same way. This book will appeal to anyone interested in cities, among humankind's most durable artifacts and enduring forms of communal life.

The American elm, elegant and highly adaptable, was an essential feature of America’s cultural landscape for more than a century, forming great verdant parasols above—and giving its name to—streets all across the nation. The elm became a defining element in the spatial design of America’s villages, towns, and cities, first in New England, and—with the westward transit of Yankee culture—eventually throughout the United States. This fascinating and generously illustrated book traces the elm’s transformation from a fast-growing weed into a regional and national icon, and shows how Elm Street satisfied America’s quest for a pastoral urbanism imagined since the time of Jefferson.

An unprecedented history of Brooklyn, told through its places, buildings, and the people who made them, from the early seventeenth century to todayAmerica's most storied urban underdog, Brooklyn has become an internationally recognized brand in recent decades—celebrated and scorned as one of the hippest destinations in the world. In Brooklyn: The Once and Future City, Thomas J. Campanella unearths long-lost threads of the urban past, telling the rich history of the rise, fall, and reinvention of one of the world’s most resurgent cities.Spanning centuries and neighborhoods, Brooklyn-born Campanella recounts the creation of places familiar and long forgotten, both built and never realized, bringing to life the individuals whose dreams, visions, rackets, and schemes forged the city we know today. He takes us through Brooklyn’s history as homeland of the Leni Lenape and its transformation by Dutch colonists into a dense slaveholding region. We learn about English émigré Deborah Moody, whose town of Gravesend was the first founded by a woman in America. We see how wanderlusting Yale dropout Frederick Law Olmsted used Prospect Park to anchor an open space system that was to reach back to Manhattan. And we witness Brooklyn’s emergence as a playland of racetracks and amusement parks celebrated around the world.Campanella also describes Brooklyn’s outsized failures, from Samuel Friede’s bid to erect the world’s tallest building to the long struggle to make Jamaica Bay the world’s largest deepwater seaport, and the star-crossed urban renewal, public housing, and highway projects that battered the borough in the postwar era. Campanella reveals how this immigrant Promised Land drew millions, fell victim to its own social anxieties, and yet proved resilient enough to reawaken as a multicultural powerhouse and global symbol of urban vitality.

An unprecedented history of Brooklyn, told through its places, buildings, and the people who made them, from the early seventeenth century to todayAmerica's most storied urban underdog, Brooklyn has become an internationally recognized brand in recent decades—celebrated and scorned as one of the hippest destinations in the world. In Brooklyn: The Once and Future City, Thomas J. Campanella tells the rich history of the rise, fall, and reinvention of one of the world’s most resurgent cities. Brooklyn-born Campanella recounts the creation of places familiar and long forgotten, bringing to life the individuals whose dreams, visions, rackets, and schemes forged the city we know today. He reveals how this immigrant Promised Land drew millions, fell victim to its own social anxieties, and yet proved resilient enough to reawaken as a multicultural powerhouse and global symbol of urban vitality.