The City

you you you a century or two ago we built our church and mark the commonality we raised the town of all necks so we could have our say about the taxes or whether we need another teacher for the school when Town Meeting comes around we know our rights and duties and no harm if we disagree in all that matters we neighbors hold together we work from Sun to dark if you can call just work a job that helps make a body feel at peace while doing or hum a bit with pleasure when it's done art isn't something foreign we look at in a showcase it's in the blankets that we've spun and woven right at home it's in the patchwork quilts owned by our daughters of a quilting bee for someone's bridal chest it's in the locks and hinges that the blacksmith's shapes it's in the baskets that are woven in the neighborhood to fit our household needs from marketing to mending when water wheels are better fitted to do the work than human hands we rigged up the machines to sort of wood or grind the corn for hominy grits and johnnycake a while ago that corn was on the stalk above the pumpkins ripe and yellow one night the neighbors met to shell the years together they did the job in no time so they could clear the old barn floor and choose their favorite partners for the dances there was lasting harmony between the soil and what we built or planted there we used our hands and mastered what we laid our hands on working and living we found a balance the town was us and we were part of it we never let our cities grow too big for us to manage we never pushed the open land too far away we on stirs took it in the haying field the mill the daily chores were teachers we old ones had good years of family life our own our children's mellow years before the ripe fruit fell as fruit will drop for windless autumn day and that was peace the seed was ready for the earth again ready to die ready once more to grow jeans inventions poem like out the pass get the quiet cities bring in the steam and steal the Iron Men the Giants open the throttle all aboard the promised land pillars of smoke by day pillars of fire by night pillars of progress machines to make machines production to expand production there's wooden wheat and kitchen sinks and calico already made in tons and carload Lots enough for ten thousand millions millions faster and faster better and better it don't make us any happier to know there's millions like us living here on top of it prisons where a guy sent up for crime can get a better place to live in than we can give our children smoke makes prosperity they tell you here smoke makes prosperity no matter if you choke on it we got to face life in these shacks and now he's gotta let our children take their chances here with rickets typhoid TB or worse they draw a blank the kids they have no business here there's no man's land this slagheap wasn't meant for them there's poison in the air we breathe there's poison in the river the fog and smoke below rise up in chokers don't tell us that this is the best that you can do in building cities who built this place what what is here and how do we get out again we're asking just asking we might as well stay in the mills and call that home but just as fit to live him remind the cold load the furnace roll the steel drive the rivets we lock the bolt on the assembly line lucky if we have the chance to keep the job from day to day from month to month the dirty work alone don't get us down we're not ashamed to handle coal and iron all the way from mine shafts to skyscrapers we turn out cars attractors were mighty proud of same as you but how does that make sense with this we never get the gritty feel out of our nose our eyes our lungs our guts we never get a chance to see how blue the sky can be unless the mills are all shut down smoke makes prosperity they say does this mean that there's no way out for us there must be something better why can't we have it a decent home all of the cloud get the big money you make a pile and raise a pile that makes another pile for you follow the cloud we've reached a million two million five million watch us grow going up its new it's automatic it dictates record seals sterilizers stamps and delivers in one operation without human hand what am I bid what am I offered sold who's next the people yes follow the crowd to the Empire City the wonder City the Windy City the fashion city the people yes the people very truly yours dr. Nichols dr. nickel first Leoben on second that rotate dr. Weaver crushed laying on here dirty we done with some white Russia oh you have arrived my chocolate more than anyone BT down Western internal hemorrhaging ruptured spleen type is blood put it in Syria yes Oh and Oh science takes flight at last for human goals this new age builds a better kind of city close to the soil once more as molded to our human wants as planes are shaped for speed new cities take form green cities they're built into the countryside they're ringed with trees and fields and Gardens new cities are not allowed to grow and overcrowd beyond the size that makes them fit for living in the new city is organized to make cooperation possible between machines and men and nature each has its place the Sun and air and open Green are part of the design safe streets and quiet neighborhoods are not just matters of good luck they're built into the pattern and built to stay there power flashes from pit heads or rapid streams across the region it flows from power houses to the sunlit factories and laboratories here science serves the worker and the work together making machines more automatic and the men who govern them more human factories are set apart from living quarters but close to rail and motor roads with space to spread about him light industries are near at hand the heavy ones are set apart people can even walk to work and have their lunch at home sometimes just like the kid this is no suburb where the lucky people play of living in the country this kind of City spells cooperation wherever doing things together means cheapness or efficiency or better living each house is grouped with other houses close to the school the public meeting hall the movies and the markets around these green communities a belt of public land preserves their shape forever the children need the earth for playing and growing bringing the city into the country bringing the parks and gardens back into the city never letting cities grow too big to manage never pushing the meadows fields and woods too far away this works as well for modern living as once it did in old New England towns you you you we live a decent kind of life we fathers have a little time to watch our kids and play with them they see us in the daytime the people who laid out this place didn't forget the air and Sun are what we need for growing whether it's flowers of babies just watch us grow the scales won't hold us soon you can't tell where the playing ends and where the work begins we mix them here we learn by living playground schools libraries are meant for everyone even the washing needles break a woman's back machines can take it and the wife needn't feel cooped up and lonely on washing day a little gossip for a friendly hand is good for the complexion the daily marketing is part of the fun in fact the markets just an annex to the kitchen another chance to chat about the children's measles or the weather or some new wrinkle in the diet that grandma never knew one thing is sure most of the greens brought in by truck from nearby farms each morning a fresh and crisp and haven't lost their flavor or their youth in this new scheme of things the school becomes the center and the focus of activities here boys and girls live and relay the life around them getting the measure of our bigger world and shaping it a new city and school and land in active partnership provide the raw materials for life and growth here boys and girls achieve a balanced personality ready to build and meet a many-sided world facing the good and bad choosing the best you take your choice each one is real each one is possible shall we sink deeper sink deeper in old grooves paying for blight with human misery or have we vision have we courage shall we build and rebuild our cities clean again close to the earth open to the sky can we afford a house a neighborhood a city as good as this for everyone maybe the question is can we afford all this disorder the hospitals the jail's Reformatory the wasted years of childhood these are future citizens voters lawmakers mothers fathers you take your choice each one is real each one is possible order has come order and life together we've got the skill we found the way we've built the cities all that we know about machines and soils and raw materials and human ways of living is waiting we can reproduce the pattern and better as a thousand times it's here the new city ready to serve a better age you and your children the choice is yours you Oh you you you

Channel: US National Archives

Views: 127,231

Rating: 4.7389474 out of 5

Keywords: US National Archives, NARA

Id: iGL1jZ4Zxv8

Length: 31min 40sec (1900 seconds)

Published: Thu May 05 2016