 | Teardown: Memoir of a Vanishing City Subjects: Flint (Mich.) -- Social conditions; Flint (Mich.) -- Economic conditions; Plant shutdowns -- Michigan -- Flint; Urban renewal -- Michigan -- Flint; San Francisco-based journalist Young finds himself consumed with nostalgia for his hometown, the desperately impoverished "Vehicle City": Flint, Michigan. For two years he travels to Flint seeking an affordable house to purchase and getting a "crash course" on a "shrinking city caught up in a post-bubble economy." Young returns to the neighborhood he grew up in, Civic Park, where "blight was in abundant supply", and meets a preacher named Sherman McCathern who is intent on turning the community around. He discusses budget cuts with mayor Dayne Walling and speaks with county treasurer Dan Kildee about his controversial "shrinking-city concept" that involves leveling abandoned buildings in less populated neighborhoods in favor of more green space. Flint's myriad problems are on display, including real estate speculators turned slumlords, rampant arsons coupled with fire department layoffs, and high murder rates-including a racially motivated serial killer in 2010. Young also shares the history of Flint, from Jacob Smith's fur trading post to the establishment of General Motors and the Sit-Down Strike of 1936-7. Young shines a spotlight on a broken city and the efforts of those desperate to save it, but this is also the story of a man confronting a crisis of identity and finding hope where there seemed to be none. (July) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved. Young Gordon : Gordon Young grew up in Flint, Michigan, the birthplace of General Motors, where his accomplishments included learning to parallel park the family's massive Buick Electra 225. After reaching an uneasy truce with the nuns in the local Catholic school system, he went on to study journalism at the University of Missouri and English literature at the University of Nottingham. His work has appeared in the New York Times , Slate , Utne Reader , and numerous other publications. Young has published Flint Expatriates, a blog for the long-lost residents of the Vehicle City, since 2007. He is a senior lecturer in the Communication Department at Santa Clara University and lives in San Francisco. |
