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Read Book the Power Broker Robert Moses and the Fall of New York THE POWER BROKER ROBERT MOSES AND THE FALL OF NEW YORK 1ST EDITION PDF, EPUB, EBOOK Robert A Caro | 9780394720241 | | | | | The Power Broker Robert Moses and the Fall of New York 1st edition PDF Book How did he build so many things, acquire so many titles, move so many people? He built hundreds of playgrounds in New York City, but only one in Harlem. Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. Ina, his wife and research assistant, sold the family home on Long Island and moved the Caros to an apartment in the Bronx where she had taken a teaching job, so that her husband could continue. This volume, perhaps Caro's masterpiece, as others have described it, is I believe first among equals among the greatest in my experience. He is currently at work on a fifth and final volume about Lyndon Johnson Hidden categories: All articles with dead external links Articles with dead external links from December Articles with short description Short description is different from Wikidata All articles with unsourced statements Articles with unsourced statements from April Articles with unsourced statements from June This is the 4th of his 5 published works that I have read and he is still my favorite non-fiction writer. How real a prospect were these, and what did the public fight look like? I love New York City, and the more I read of this masterpiece, the more I found myself needing to walk away from the book - sometimes for weeks at a time - to deal with the subject matter. It can be a drag. It deservedly won the author the Pullitzer for literature. Seller Inventory ABE Instead of giving you cold hard facts — the number of people, the number of apartments, the basic demographics — Caro devotes an entire chapter to one square mile slated to be destroyed. Indeed, no student of government can regard his education as complete until he has read it. Certainly he made terrible Want to Read Currently Reading Read. A majestic, even Shakespearean, drama about the interplay of power and personality. Moses was unjust, but he was efficient. Books portal New York City portal. This is how he built and dominated New York--before, finally, he was stripped of his reputation by the press and his power by Nelson Rockefeller. It changes the way you perceive the world. Title: power broker. I had a brief thrilling moment of maturity when I voted for the first time at This is definitely the greatest book that I have ever read. He built exclusively for the car-owning middle- class, draining resources away from public transportation, even encouraging subway fare-hikes to finance his projects. He was nonetheless a dictator who routinely destroyed neighbourhoods, regularly flouted the law, coerced politicians of both major parties, and ultimately left a legacy of social devastation which will last for decades if not centuries. Caro is masterful at simply telling the tale and letting the reader make the connections. Over decades of service, Moses reshaped New York both the city and the state and other public structures. I doubt that was the case. Moses thought that his legacy would speak for itself, that his works would guarantee him immortal gratitude. While the value of his legacy is at least debatable, the injustice of his tactics is not. Jul 27, Christopher Saunders rated it it was amazing Shelves: reads , favorites , pulitzer-prize- nonfiction. The Power Broker Robert Moses and the Fall of New York 1st edition Writer But if you are a history lover I highly recommend it. Feb 23, Aaron Million rated it really liked it Shelves: american-history , biography. Welcome back. Lest I expatiate on the subway any longer in a review of a book dealing mostly with roads and parks, I will try to get to the point: As much as I love the cheap and wide-ranging access of the tremendously flawed NYC subway system, I harbor an unusual wistfulness for its lost potential. Why is it not available on Kindle. Near fine in a near fine dust jacket. Money, intimidation, threats, lies and deceit get things done. Moses goes to Albany where he attains a talent for drafting legislation. Hard Cover. You want to learn everything you need to know about the semi-public, semi- private nature of City Authorities? Mayor, governors, and even the President of the United States were unable to uproot him from his throne. Moses was unjust, but he was efficient. These positions, thanks to his foresightful design, were immune to political review. Instead of building them along deserted areas with empty tenement buildings, of which, New York had more than a few, he chose to build them in thriving neighborhoods, effectively ousting tenants and turning the neighborhoods into dangerous ghettos. It extended to little things, too. Moses ages poorly, becoming a deaf old codger. There is something wrong with a man who did not care about other perspectives and philosophies, who never changed his mind or altered his opinions, wielding power for over four decades. Their shady dealings included claims of quid pro quo over land and development deals with one where Trump took a powerful role on a city council to make decisions to help Moses and Trump helped get Moses appointed as the president of the World's Fair. His attention to detail and nuance is acute. It unwrapped the Vietnam war in a way that had not been unwrapped for me until then, and Sheehan's story of his hero's personal struggles, his rise and fall is forever ingrained in me as a lesson in the interchange between man and war. The last part reminds me of the way Joe Paterno never could walk away from power and now is a pitiful character. Nobody gives you power charitably, you have to work hard to get it, and being nice does not fast track you to getting power; it makes you irrelevant quickly. He was chauffer driven all his life. All in all, he seems to have been an impressive but unpleasant man who had an extremely particular and narrow view of what was best for the world and pursued the reification of that view with boundless zeal and undaunted determination. It was unconscionable in a book clocking over pages. The book added fuel to the already strong fire of dislike surrounding Robert Moses in It's an elegantly written and enthralling work of art. If you are interested specifically in the history of NYC, then this is a necessity for understanding the growth and decay of the city in the 20th century. But Moses marched to his own drum. Moses was in power for so long essentially, ; officially, that he tangled with everyone who had a say in how NYC or the state of New York was run. This was no small thing, especially in , when this book was published. Jan 31, Porter Broyles rated it really liked it Shelves: pulitzer-winner , genre-biographies , pulitzer- reading-challenge. For example, Caro will devote an entire chapter to a single public works project, while excluding reference to all the other things going on at that time. More information about this seller Contact this seller 8. About this Item: Vintage, New York, Caro certainly did. Compounding his arrogance, Moses was an elitist and a racist. Categories : non-fiction books Alfred A. He used scare tactics to speed eviction of buildings, telling tenants that demolition was imminent and they needed to vacate immediately, when in reality demolition was months away. There is too much for the casual reader to digest in this, and likely any Caro book, biography. You want red tape? This is a college education in power corruption. Moses' downfall finally came in the sixties when Nelson Rockefeller became governor. And so, just as I mourn the lost potential of the New York City subway system, I also mourn the lost potential of so powerful and impressive an individual as was Robert Moses, who could have achieved so much good if only he were instructed or sympathetic to the needs of a modern, global city. Feb 19, Susan O rated it it was amazing Shelves: history-american , pulitzers-read , read , history-favorites , biography , box-1 , new-york-city , pulitzers-biography , robert-caro. Robert Moses saw these as threats to his power, so he ensured that NYC could not rely upon public transportation for example, he built overpasses too short to allow busses to pass through. I found this interesting. The Power Broker Robert Moses and the Fall of New York 1st edition Reviews Jacket design by Paul Bacon. If you are interested specifically in the history of NYC, then this is a necessity for understanding the growth and decay of the city in the 20th century. When Caro asked about splitting the book into two volumes, Gottlieb replied that he "might get people interested in Robert Moses once. Everything comes down to the personality of the man usually a man, then as now in charge, his philosophy, his force of will, his cunning, his intelligence, as well as the personality of the people he has to deal with. He never held his breath for more than a minute or invented a new fitness routine. Smith and Franklin D. He battles with mayors, governors, even President FDR, and is only taken down by Governor Nelson Rockefeller whose unique advantages included being of the family controlling Chase Manhattan Bank, which was the trustee for the Triborough bonds, and who manages to trick Moses into allowing his authority to be merged into a larger transit authority with no role for Moses.
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