04/25/18

The Moses Bomb

  Although they were classmates at the Bureau of Municipal Research’s pioneering Training School for Public Service in 1916, Luther Gulick and Robert Moses scarcely saw eye to eye. Moses was too much of a loner and far too ambitious to collaborate with the likes of a master government tactician like Gulick. No wonder Gulick […]

06/5/17

BUSMAN’S HOLIDAY, 1914

  Say you’re a hardworking member of the New York Bureau of Municipal Research 103 years ago. You’re ready for a summer vacation. What do you do to take a break from work? Naturally, you work. Sure, you’re away to have fun. But don’t forget to take the opportunity to “broaden your civic outlook.” One […]

08/10/16

How NYC became…NYC!

One of the most amazing things about our historic collections in the Baruch College Library Archives is how they surprisingly intersect. Our distinguished namesake, financier Bernard Baruch, https://www.baruch.cuny.edu/library/alumni/online_exhibits/digital/2008/bernard/exhibit1.html turned out to have worked with reformer extraordinaire Luther Gulick in FDR’s wartime councils. Bernard Baruch rubbed shoulders with Edward L. Bernays, the wily father of public […]

11/23/15

Gotham Gridlock — Then and Now

Traffic congestion has been driving New Yorkers crazy since forever. Like all the city’s biggest problems, it was quickly handed off to New York’s Finest. In the late 1800’s, well before the automobile, the enfabled Broadway Squad of police officers– six-footers chosen for their brawn and good looks, to appeal to the ladies — was […]