My mother-in-law grew up on Henry Street and her home missed the bulldozers, but her mother and grandmother moved to Fremont and the house where my partner grew up.
My partner's grandfather worked at the port and died young, part of the toll of years the diesel and bunker oil took from the people here.
Now we're back in Prescott and we learn the bits of the history and the ghosts. A neighbor across the street remembering my mother-in-law's hair. The unhoused people who grew up here and and were forced out by the greed of landlords.
There's talk of closing 980, the gash severing us all from Downtown, but people worry that the land won't be used to house the people displaced by 1960's urban planning, racism, and straight up greed.
I also feel for so many of the people who worked in and around the port. Many of them loved those jobs, but the jobs destroyed their bodies.
I hope this book will at least put some of those sacrifices in context and conversation with the broader world. People should at least know what forces were powering up this system and why it required such sacrifices from the people of West Oakland (and Long Beach and Newark and Tacoma and and and…)
Thank you for sharing this. Under the normal course of things, the land will just be used like all the other property, not to the benefit of the people who have lived and would live there. I do find hope in organizations like the East Bay Permanent Real Estate Co-Operative, and I hope that we can find more ways to completely reimagine how land works in cities.
I'm haunted by the place where my mother grew up the granddaughter of homesteaders on unceded Red Lake Reservation land and this so deeply spoke to me as I've spent the past ten years learning what history the place can teach me. Excellent commencement address.
Thank you, Jill. These histories are so tough and they mean so many different things to different people. I appreciate the dedication to knowing, which is such an important step.
It’s such the American way to Deny deny deny. But clearly many of us are well aware that what is done in darkness comes to light or shows up downstream or looks like red lining on a zoning map. Congratulations to you for this beautiful piece and congrats to all the budding earth scientists!
A lovely commencement address. Oakland has a hundred stories, and ghosts in a hundred places. My own focus is on what the Pacific Circuit (good concept) has done to Oakland's natural heritage. I admire your passion for this community of people that were trampled by the Circuit.
There was a part of me, Andrew, that began to wonder: should I be trying to apply some of these concepts to the landscapes of Oakland (and in a small whisper: by doing a PhD in geography?)… I can imagine some ways. Perhaps (perhaps!) more soonish
I grew up in Inwood, in upper Manhattan. Most of what I knew of its history came from plaque that supposedly marks where Peter Minuit "bought" Manhattan from the Lenape people. But after reading The Power Broker, I learned about what Robert Moses did to our neighborhood, and worse to a few adjacent neighborhoods, and it is indeed haunting.
We lived in the Grand Lake neighborhood for many years. I commuted to what we oldies called The City through what remained of the neighborhoods that haunt your powerful essay. Thank you for this beautiful piece. And let us all know when we can read your book!
My mother-in-law grew up on Henry Street and her home missed the bulldozers, but her mother and grandmother moved to Fremont and the house where my partner grew up.
My partner's grandfather worked at the port and died young, part of the toll of years the diesel and bunker oil took from the people here.
Now we're back in Prescott and we learn the bits of the history and the ghosts. A neighbor across the street remembering my mother-in-law's hair. The unhoused people who grew up here and and were forced out by the greed of landlords.
There's talk of closing 980, the gash severing us all from Downtown, but people worry that the land won't be used to house the people displaced by 1960's urban planning, racism, and straight up greed.
I also feel for so many of the people who worked in and around the port. Many of them loved those jobs, but the jobs destroyed their bodies.
I hope this book will at least put some of those sacrifices in context and conversation with the broader world. People should at least know what forces were powering up this system and why it required such sacrifices from the people of West Oakland (and Long Beach and Newark and Tacoma and and and…)
Have you read Christina Dunbar-Hester's _Oil Beach_, it covers the last 50 years of San Pablo Bay's history and how the Pacific Loop affects it? https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/O/bo185167017.html
Yes, I have this book! And we've corresponded a bit over the years. A great scholar!
Some thorough reporting on the current 980 conversation, its possibilities and its limits, and the folks who are trying to do it differently this time: https://oaklandside.org/2024/04/10/remove-oakland-freeway-i-980-racial-injustice-gentrification-community/
Thank you for sharing this. Under the normal course of things, the land will just be used like all the other property, not to the benefit of the people who have lived and would live there. I do find hope in organizations like the East Bay Permanent Real Estate Co-Operative, and I hope that we can find more ways to completely reimagine how land works in cities.
I'm haunted by the place where my mother grew up the granddaughter of homesteaders on unceded Red Lake Reservation land and this so deeply spoke to me as I've spent the past ten years learning what history the place can teach me. Excellent commencement address.
Thank you, Jill. These histories are so tough and they mean so many different things to different people. I appreciate the dedication to knowing, which is such an important step.
Luminous.
It’s such the American way to Deny deny deny. But clearly many of us are well aware that what is done in darkness comes to light or shows up downstream or looks like red lining on a zoning map. Congratulations to you for this beautiful piece and congrats to all the budding earth scientists!
A lovely commencement address. Oakland has a hundred stories, and ghosts in a hundred places. My own focus is on what the Pacific Circuit (good concept) has done to Oakland's natural heritage. I admire your passion for this community of people that were trampled by the Circuit.
There was a part of me, Andrew, that began to wonder: should I be trying to apply some of these concepts to the landscapes of Oakland (and in a small whisper: by doing a PhD in geography?)… I can imagine some ways. Perhaps (perhaps!) more soonish
This is so beautiful.
I grew up in Inwood, in upper Manhattan. Most of what I knew of its history came from plaque that supposedly marks where Peter Minuit "bought" Manhattan from the Lenape people. But after reading The Power Broker, I learned about what Robert Moses did to our neighborhood, and worse to a few adjacent neighborhoods, and it is indeed haunting.
amazingly good. thank you for this.
Thank you for this. Looking forward to the book.
We lived in the Grand Lake neighborhood for many years. I commuted to what we oldies called The City through what remained of the neighborhoods that haunt your powerful essay. Thank you for this beautiful piece. And let us all know when we can read your book!
March 2025! Which is suddenly not that far away