CITIES: The New Newark

Newark is the place where the Pullman porter comes in to brush you off for New York.

— Old vaudeville joke In addition to being the butt of tired jokes, Newark (pop. 465.600) used to be a sprawling municipal Skid Row choking in its own web of rail lines, express high ways and traffic-snarled streets. The sun, rising above Manhattan’s skyscrapers ten miles away, glinted off broken bottles in the ring of slums pressing in on Newark’s business district. A daily flood of commuters poured in—doubling the population—then poured back into the suburbs. At night those who remained in the city saw the streets grow sullen and creepy.

Five years ago this industry-transportation hub of New Jersey threatened to spin out the best remaining elements in town. Newark’s long-entrenched, pie-splitting, five-commissioner government was whirling merrily along, copying notorious Jersey City in petty graft and inefficiency. In despair, big insurance companies (Newark is the U.S.’s second-largest insurance city) took out options on suburban sites, blueprinted plans to take their bulky payrolls out of the city. Then early in 1953, a handful of worried citizens, encouraged by the Newark News, sat down to map a counterattack against apathy and decay. Says President Robert Cowan of the National Newark & Essex Banking Co.: “Up until that time, it was always ‘nothing can be done.’ ” This time things were different.

First, Reform. Sparked by the News and able Lawyer Alan Lowenstein, the high-powered group of bankers, lawyers, publishers and insurance executives started a citywide drive for reform, accepted tough, intelligent Incumbent Commissioner Leo P. Carlin as their man. With widespread city support, the reformers swept out the “five mayors” in city hall, voted in a strong-mayor charter—and Mayor Leo Carlin, who tightened budget controls, stabilized tax rates and formed committees to tackle housing, parking and property improvement.

Reform begat renewal. Civic-minded Bruce Palmer, president of Mutual Benefit Life Insurance Co. announced that “thanks to the new climate.” his corporation was not only staying in the city, but would also build a $10 million home office in downtown Newark. Forty citizens from the rundown Clinton Hill area hustled off to Philadelphia to study rehabilitation projects; another group went to Pittsburgh to view the Golden Triangle. The Rutgers University law faculty pitched in to help on legal problems, and Newark businessmen volunteered staff services.

Then Rejuvenation. Last week, as Mutual Benefit dedicated its new white limestone building on Broad Street (and simultaneously announced plans for two more buildings totaling $9,000,000), citizens of the new Newark could give even New York the brushoff. Just down the street is a new $3,500,000 Y.M.C.A.-Y.W.C.A. Hard-hatted workers swung girders into place on a dozen downtown office buildings, and pile drivers slammed away on a $20 million Prudential Insurance center. The new $13 million Harrison S. Martland Medical Center, a city project, is already in operation. On plots newly reclaimed from the dank, swampy “Jersey meadows” and along adjacent shipping channels are new chemical plants and shiny transfer sheds. Thousands of slum dwellings have already been removed, and more are doomed as Mayor Carlin announced plans for converting 72 blighted acres in downtown Newark into a modern commercial center. The Port of New York Authority is spending $9,300,000 on a Port Newark marine terminal, and Rutgers University will build a $1,500,000 law center.

The city is still smog-bound and dirty. Suburbanites have yet to come back to town. Traffic still gets jammed. But most people agree with Mayor Carlin that Newark is on the move. “A few years ago,” says Newark Architect Howard Grad. “I wouldn’t have given 15¢ and a rusty collar button for this city. Now I’d never sell it short.”