The Creative Destruction of Manhattan, 1900-1940

List of Illustrations
Acknowledgments
ONE: THE PROVISIONAL CITY
TWO: FIFTH AVENUE'S "RESTLESS RENEWALS"
Real Estate Development Along the "Spine of Gotham"
The "Via Appia of Opulence": Sources of Fifth Avenue's Development
"A Compelling Force": The Speculative Market in Space
Real Estate Stories
Protecting Property
Commerce without Commercialism: The Fifth Avenue Association and the "Conservation of the Avenue
Zoning the Avenue, Zoning New York
Conclusion: The Progress of Preservation
THREE: THE FOUL CORE OF NEW YORK
The Rise of Slum Clearance as Housing Reform
Jacob Riis and the "Leprous Houses" of Mulberry Bend
"New York's Real Napoleon III"
Decongestant: Embracing Slum Clearance in the 1920s and 1930s
Conclusion: "Cataclysmic" Reform
FOUR: PRICELESS
Historic Preservation and the Valuing of Space
"Sacred Stones": Early Preservation in New York
St. John's Chapel
"Life Thread" of the City
"Priceless"
FIVE: "A VANISHED CITY IS RESTORED"
Inventing and Displaying the Past at the Museum of the City of New York
New York's "Attic"
A "Visualized Biography"
Collecting and Selling a City
Conclusion: "New York's Memory"
SIX: USES OF THE AXE
Toward a Treeless New York
Natural New York
"A Bit of God's Country": Central Park Tree Battles
Tree Culture: The Decline and Rebirth of Street Trees
The Spirits of the Trees
SEVEN: PRO URBIS AMORE
I. N. Phelps Stokes and the Iconography of Manhattan Island
"Speaking of Old New York..."
Remembrance of Things New York: Producing the Iconography
Frozen City: Photography and Memory in the Iconography
Acquiring New York
A "Chaos of Memories"
EIGHT: LANDSCAPES OF MEMORY AND AMNESIA
Notes
Index