Saving America's Cities

by Lizabeth Cohen

    43. Collins, interview by de Varon, Tape 31, October 27, 1977, 9–10; also see Martin Nolan, “Ex-Mayor Collins Dead at 76, Fought to Restore City’s Pride, Image,” BG, November 24, 1995.

    44. On the history of the Coordinating Committee, or Vault: Mark I. Gelfand, Trustee for a City: Ralph Lowell of Boston (Boston: Northeastern University Press, 1998), 268–73; Boston Urban Study Group, Who Rules Boston?, 14, 36–37.

    45. Scagnoli, interview, 22.

    46. A 3 percent sales tax finally passed in 1966, after an expensive lobbying campaign financed by the Vault; Gelfand, Trustee for a City, 272. In 1967, the state increased the income tax and began covering the welfare costs of cities and towns; Collins, interview by de Varon, Tape 13, March 28, 1977, 3, 8. Collins also won back the authority to appoint the city’s police commissioner and control that department’s budget in 1962.

    47. “State vs. the City: The Painful Politics of Obstruction,” AF 120 (June 1964): 107.

    48. “The Inaugural Address of Mayor Collins,” CR, January 9, 1960; “Business Leaders Hail Collins’ Program for Hub,” BG, January 5, 1960.

    49. Quotes from “The New Boston: Men, Projects, and an End to Despair,” AF 120 (June 1964): 82; lack of confidence quote from Logue, “Boston, 1960–1967—Seven Years of Plenty,” 82.

    50. Logue to Catherine Bauer Wurster, June 13, 1960, Papers of Catherine Bauer Wurster, 1931–1964, Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley, Box 21, Folder 21.

    51. Logue, “The Boston Story,” 49v7.

    52. “The New Boston: Men, Projects, and an End to Despair”; McQuade, “Boston: What Can a Sick City Do?,” 136.

    53. Many individuals, including Logue, took credit for devising the legislative strategy that made the Prudential Center possible; see Logue, “The Boston Story,” 20v7–25v7; Waterhouse, “‘Through the Ordinary Operations of Private Enterprise,’” 18–20; Daniel Golden and David Mehegan, “Changing the Heart of the City,” BG, September 18, 1983; McQuade, “Boston: What Can a Sick City Do?,” 135; Rubin, Insuring the City, 124–26.

    54. Logue, interview by Lawrence Kennedy, November 23, 1987, Boston, MA, notes, 2.

    55. When Logue, to his surprise, earned automatic tenure after five years of city service, he delivered a letter of resignation to Collins to file and use whenever he wished: Logue to Joseph Dunlea, City Clerk, October 19, 1965, and Logue to Mayor John Collins, October 19, 1965, EJL, Series 6, Box 149, Folder 400; Logue to Rt. Rev. Msgr. Francis J. Lally, October 19, 1965, EJL, Series 6, Box 150, Folder 424.

    56. Logue, “The Boston Story,” 42v7.

    57. Logue, “Boston, 1960–1967—Seven Years of Plenty,” 91.

    58. Ken Hartnett, “A Conversation with Monsignor Francis J. Lally,” BM, October 1984.

    59. O’Connor, Building a New Boston, 197; on the job offer from the Kennedy administration, Logue, “Boston, 1960–1967—Seven Years of Plenty,” 91. Logue’s struggles with the BRA board over a year’s time were documented blow-by-blow in BG; for the highpoints, see “New Haven Expert Offered $30,000 to Head Hub Renewal,” January 28, 1960; “A Key to Boston’s Future,” January 29, 1960; “Key Problems Dog Logue on Boston Redevelopment,” April 28, 1960; “B.R.A. Calls Logue to Face Quiz Today,” October 20, 1960; “Top Renewal Post After 90-Day Test Offered to Logue,” October 21, 1960; “Renewal Wins—Logue Stays, Gains Full Power on 3–2 Vote; Accepts an Indefinite Term,” January 25, 1961; “Collins’ Renewal Program Wins Hub Authority Vote,” January 26, 1961.

    60. Telegram from Carl Koch, Concord, MA, January 24, 1961, to Logue, EJL, Series 6, Box 150, Folder 420. Logue’s files are filled with letters of support sent to him and to the BRA board from ministers, social service workers, business leaders, architects, neighborhood activists, and others; see EJL, Series 6, Box 148, Folders 374 and 375. The BG and BH also editorialized in his favor.

    61. Melnea A. Cass to Mr. Joseph Lund, with copies sent to five other BRA board members, January 24, 1961; Francis G. Reith to Boston Redevelopment Authority, January 21, 1961, EJL, Series 6, Box 148, Folder 375. Also Russ Lopez, Boston 1945–2015 (Boston: Shawmut Peninsula Press, 2017), 83, on support of Cass and the Snowdens.

    62. On the rally outside the BRA, see “Boston Bar Group Insists Logue’s Plan Is Legal,” BG, January 25, 1961.

    63. Michael Liuzzi, “Heavy Seas Subside for Logue,” CSM, January 25, 1961; also see similar statement in “Turning Point for a City, 9:30 a.m. Today—73 Tremont Street,” BG, January 25, 1961.

    64. “I wanted no part of that project” in Logue, “A Boston Story,” 42. For more on the tensions between Logue and Simonian, and Simonian’s suit, see “Kane Simonian v. Boston Redevelopment Authority and Another,” Suffolk, April 5, 1961–May 5, 1961, Massachusetts Report, Decisions of the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, February 1961–June 1961 (Boston: University Press of Cambridge, 1962): 573–86; “Simonian Airs Charges on Logue in High Court,” BG, April 5, 1961; “Simonian Suit to Oust Logue Is Dismissed,” BG, May 5, 1961. For insights into this stormy relationship: Paul McCann, interview by Lizabeth Cohen, June 1, 2007, Boston, MA; and John “Jack” Reardon, interview by Lizabeth Cohen, February 17, 2010, Cambridge, MA. Controversy swelled around Simonian to the end. He finally retired at age eighty with a pension and a three-year renewable consulting contract that paid him more than his former salary, to the outrage of critics; Adrian Walker, “‘Retirement’ Sweet for Power Broker; Pension, Fee, Exceed Previous Pay at BRA,” BG, February 28, 1994. Rappaport was likewise delighted to avoid more testy interactions with Logue; Jerome Lyle Rappaport, interview by Lizabeth Cohen, September 17, 2007, Boston, MA.

    65. Ryan, interview; Arnone, “Redevelopment in Boston,” 95, noted that Logue often presented the BRA board with faits accomplis when major decisions were involved.

    66. Quoted in Daniel Pool, Politics in New Boston, 1960–1970: A Study of Mayoral Policy Making (Waltham, MA: Brandeis University Press, 1974), 84, cited in Rose, “Civic War,” 170.

    67. Logue, “The Boston Story,” 53–54v7.

    68. See the Tavern Club website; Anthony Pangaro, interview by Lizabeth Cohen, June 24, 2009, Boston, MA. Many of the people in Logue’s circle were Tavern Club members, including the Globe reporter Martin Nolan and the BRA board chair, Monsignor Frank Lally.

    69. Quoted in Jim Vrabel, When in Boston: A Time Line and Almanac (Boston: Northeastern University Press, 2004), 322.

    70. Cleveland Amory, The Proper Bostonians (New York: Dutton, 1947), 354. Many observers commented on the insularity of the Boston elite. For example, John Zuccotti noted that when he graduated from Yale Law School in 1963, “it was said that you could not be a successful lawyer in Boston unless you had been born there or gone to school there.” John Zuccotti, interview by Lizabeth Cohen, December 10, 2007, New York, NY.

    71. Robert Campbell, interview by Lizabeth Cohen, June 18, 2009, Cambridge, MA; Margaret Logue, email message to author, April 28, 2011; Logue, “The Boston Story,” 37v7; Herbert Gleason, interview by Lizabeth Cohen, May 30, 2007, Cambridge, MA; also see Bowler Fitzgibbons, interview; Robert Hazan, interview by Lizabeth Cohen, June 14, 2007, New York, NY; Ellen Logue, interview.

    72. Logue, “The Boston Story,” 36v7.

    73. Huxtable, “Renewal in Boston: Good and Bad.”

    74. Robert C. Weaver to Logue, September 30, 1960, EJL, Series 6, Box 151, Folder 457; Arthur Reilly, interview by Lizabeth Cohen, June 25, 2009, Brookline, MA.

    75. Examples of the personal antagonisms displayed by city council members, particularly Foley and Craven, abound: “Foley, McCloskey Spar with Logue,” BG, March 17, 1961; “Young Old Pol William Foley,” AF 120 (June 1964): 86; Robert B. Kenney, “Political Circuit, Mrs. Craven Slapped,” BG, March 26, 1964; “Boston Makes a Comeback,” US News; Irene Saint, “The Changing Face of Boston,” BH, Nov
ember 28, 1965; “Bold Boston Gladiator—Ed Logue,” Life; “Exhibit 199, Minority Report of Councilor Katherine Craven, Member of the Committee on Urban Renewal,” November 29, 1966, Federal Role in Urban Affairs (Senator Abraham Ribicoff’s Subcommittee on Executive Reorganization of Senate Committee on Government Operations, November–December 1966), 2876; Kirsten A. Petersen, Carol Hardy-Fanta, and Karla Armenoff, “‘As Tough as It Gets’: Women in Boston Politics, 1921–2004,” Publications from the Center for Women in Politics and Public Policy (McCormick Graduate School, University of Massachusetts Boston) (2005): 10–11. Also see minutes of almost any city council meeting when BRA business was discussed.

    76. Lavinia M. Underwood to Logue, November 17, 1966, EJL, Series 6, Box 151, Folder 455; for others, see Lois Henderson Bayliss to Logue, January 25, 1966, EJL, Series 6, Box 149, Folder 388; Peter W. Beacham to Logue, August 23, 1963, EJL, Series 6, Box 149, Folder 388; Kevin M. Flatley to Logue, August 1965, EJL, Series 6, Box 149, Folder 403.

    77. Logue, “The Boston Story,” 45–48v7. Many observers agreed that the Feds needed an urban renewal success: Frank Del Vecchio, “Topical Notes,” November 18, 2006, prepared for interview November 27, 2006, 8; Robert Litke, interview by Lizabeth Cohen, May 25, 2006, Somerset, NJ; Langley Carleton Keyes, Jr., interview by Lizabeth Cohen, May 30, 2007, Cambridge, MA.

    78. John Stainton, interview by Lizabeth Cohen, May 30, 2007, Jamaica Plain, MA; Logue, interview, Jones, Tape 1: v–vi.

    79. “The New Boston: Men, Projects and an End to Despair,” 82; Associate Professor Joseph L. Bower and John W. Rosenblum (research assistant), “Harvard Business School Case on the Boston Redevelopment Authority,” 1969, State Library of Massachusetts, State House, Boston, sets the number of staff at “more than 500” in August 1967, 12, 14; Logue recalled it numbering “about 550” when he left in the summer of 1967; Logue, interview, Steen, March 3, 1986, Lincoln, MA, 35.

    80. Anthony Yudis, “B.R.A. Reports ‘Seven-Year Progress,’” BG, August 11, 1967; Litke, interview; Arnone, “Redevelopment in Boston,” 75, 238; minority staff members in visible positions included Reginald Griffith, Denis Blackett, and Tunney Lee.

    81. Esther Maletz Stone, email message to author, July 16, 2015.

    82. MLogue, interview.

    83. Arnone, “Redevelopment in Boston,” 75.

    84. McQuade, “Boston: What Can a Sick City Do?,” 132, 169; also Frederick Salvucci, interview by Lizabeth Cohen, June 16, 2009, Cambridge, MA; Del Vecchio, “Topical Notes,” 3, 5.

    85. Reilly, interview.

    86. Michael D. Appleby, “Logue’s Record in Boston: An Analysis of His Renewal and Planning Activities, with a Foreword and Summary by Herbert J. Gans for the Steering Committee, Council for New York Housing and Planning Policy, Funded by the Normal Foundation, May 1966,” EJL, 2002 Accession, Box 22, Folder “Logue’s Record in Boston by Michael Appleby,” 11.

    87. Reginald Griffith, interview by Lizabeth Cohen, April 7, 2010, Washington, DC; Frank Del Vecchio, email message to author, July 23, 2006; Ted Liebman, interview by Lizabeth Cohen, October 15, 2006, New York, NY.

    88. Stainton, interview.

    89. Arnone, “Redevelopment in Boston,” 194–97; Nathan Leventhal, “Citizen Participation in Urban Renewal,” Columbia Law Review 66, no. 3 (March 1966): 578–79; Appleby, “Logue’s Record in Boston,” 11–12; Del Vecchio, interview.

    90. “What’s Happening to Proper Old Boston?,” 78. Logue explains “planning with people” in “Logue on Boston: ‘Never Satisfied,’” CSM, April 20, 1962.

    91. Del Vecchio, “Topical Notes,” 5.

    92. Margaret Logue, email message to author, March 21, 2011. The BG reporter Martin Nolan also recalled how much Logue loved Beacon Hill and the “walkable city” it was a part of; Martin Nolan, interview by Lizabeth Cohen, May 24, 2007, Cambridge, MA.

    93. Logue, interview by Kennedy, 2. Logue discussed Collins’s strengths on many occasions; see for example, Logue, “Boston, 1960–1967—Seven Years of Plenty,” 83.

    94. Arnone, “Redevelopment in Boston,” 143.

    95. Collins, interview by de Varon, March 24, 1977, 26; Del Vecchio, City Streets, 136. Many others confirmed Collins’s surveillance of Logue’s activities: Gleason, interview; Scagnoli, interview; Bowler Fitzgibbons, interview; Ryan, interview; Arnone, “Redevelopment in Boston,” 94, 142–43.

    96. Langley Carleton Keyes, Jr., The Rehabilitation Planning Game: A Study in the Diversity of Neighborhood (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1969), 29. Also see McQuade, “Boston: What Can a Sick City Do?,” 137. To criticism that he was trying to do too much at once, Logue replied, “I thought it was the only way to get momentum going”; Linda Corman, “Former BRA Head Takes Another Look at the City He Helped Plan,” Banker and Tradesman, October 21, 1987, 87.

    97. Huxtable, “Renewal in Boston: Good and Bad.” This discussion of ABCD is based on the following sources: Stephan Thernstrom, Poverty, Planning, and Politics in the New Boston: The Origins of ABCD (New York: Basic Books, 1969); Peter Marris and Martin Rein, Dilemmas of Social Reform: Poverty and Community Action in the United States (New York: Atherton Press, 1967), 124–26, 181–83; Robert Halpern, Rebuilding the Inner City: A History of Neighborhood Initiatives to Address Poverty in the United States (New York: Columbia University Press, 1995), 98–100; Leventhal, “Citizen Participation in Urban Renewal,” 556–58; Robert C. Hayden and Ann Withorn, eds., Changing Lives, Changing Communities: Oral Histories from Action for Boston Community Development (Boston: Action for Community Development and the University of Massachusetts, 2002); and primary documents in Action for Community Development Grant Files, Ford Foundation Grant #0620457, Microfilm Reels 2, 633–34, Ford Foundation Records, Rockefeller Archive Center, Sleepy Hollow, NY (hereafter Ford); Paul Ylvisaker Papers, Harvard University Archives, Cambridge, MA, Boxes 19 and 27; Mel King, interview by Lizabeth Cohen, June 17, 2009, Boston, MA; Scagnoli, interview.

    98. “Energetic Reformer: Joseph Slavet,” AF 120 (June 1964): 83–84.

    99. Slavet, interview.

  100. Slavet, interview.

  101. Clifford J. Campbell, Consultant, Department of City Planning, City of Chicago, to Paul N. Ylvisaker, Director of Public Affairs Program, Ford Foundation, February 5, 1963, Ford, 7.

  102. Clifford J. Campbell to Paul N. Ylvisaker, May 2, 1964, Ford, 8–10.

  103. Marris and Rein, Dilemmas of Social Reform, 125–26.

  104. U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, “Profile of a City—Boston,” 8–9.

  105. Paul Ylvisaker to Michael Phillips, September 11, 1973, provided to me by daughter Elizabeth Ylvisaker.

  106. Boston Redevelopment Authority, 1965/1975 General Plan for the City of Boston and the Regional Core (Boston: Boston Redevelopment Authority, 1965), cover letter, passim, but 58–59 in particular; Keith Morgan, “City of Ideas: Structure and Scale in the Boston General Plan,” in Heroic: Concrete Architecture and the New Boston, ed. Mark Pasnik, Michael Kubo, and Chris Grimley (New York: Monacelli Press, 2015), 62–77; Golden and Mehegan, “Changing the Heart of the City”; Saint, “What Makes Logue Tick,” BH; McQuade, “Boston: What Can a Sick City Do?,” 137; U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, “Profile of a City—Boston,” 4, 14. Mayor Collins also sought metropolitan solutions to the city’s economic woes; see “Remarks of John Frederick Collins, Facing Up to the State’s Financial Commitments,” February 27, 1968, in Proceedings of the 1966–67 and 1967–68 Series of Citizen Seminars on the Fiscal, Economic, and Political Problem of Boston and the Metropolitan Community (Chestnut Hill, MA: Boston College, 1968).

  107. “Testimony of Mr. Edward J. Logue, Administrator, Boston Redevelopment Authority, Boston, Massachusetts,” Hearing Before the United States Commission on Civil Rights: Hearing Held in Boston, Massachusetts, October 4–5, 1966, 234–51; “Statement of Edward J. Logue, Administr
ator, Boston Redevelopment Authority,” Federal Role in Urban Affairs (Senator Abraham Ribicoff’s Subcommittee on Executive Reorganization of Senate Committee on Government Operations, November–December 1966), Logue testimony, December 12, 1966, 2804–6, 2819.

  108. “Meet Boston’s Mr. Urban Renewal,” CSM; Logue, interview by Franziska Porges Hosken, 1971, audiotape, Rotch Architecture and Design Library, MIT.

  109. Logue testimony, Hearing Before the United States Commission on Civil Rights in Boston, 236, 240; also see on Logue’s busing proposal: John Chaffee, Jr., “‘Scatteration’ Wins Support,” BH, September 5, 1965; “Urges Suburb Schooling for Slum Children,” CT, April 27, 1965; Logue, op-ed, BG (adapted from a speech given at MIT), May 2, 1983; Ronald P. Formisano, Boston Against Busing: Race, Class, and Ethnicity in the 1960s and 1970s (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1991), 229–30, 307n15; Lily Geismer, Don’t Blame Us: Suburban Liberals and the Transformation of the Democratic Party (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2015), 79–95.