Gotham At War: A History of New York City from1933 to 1945, Wallace - B

          This is the third and final book in the Gotham series covering the history of the city from 1625 until 1945. It is a portrayal of the New York as it reached its place as the capital of the world.
          There were many in pre-war New York who were inclined to wish well those who would eventually go to war with America. The Irish were indifferent to Britain’s plight and cheered Ireland’s neutrality. Although a minority, many German-Americans supported the new regime and even built Hitler Youth Camps on Long Island and in New Jersey. Until the war actually broke out, Italian-Americans were enraptured by Mussolini.
          The city’s largest ethnic group, its 1,785,000 Jews, vigorously tried to bring Hitler’s atrocities to the country’s attention and worked tirelessly to bring Jews to America. The city was also home to many pacifist organizations that represented all of the major Protestant denominations.
          One New Yorker who knew exactly where he stood—in total opposition to Hitler and fully behind Britain—was Franklin Delano Roosevelt. He spent the late 1930s devising ways to help Britain, initiated Lend-Lease, and met Churchill to sign the Atlantic Pact. He worked to build up our military and reminded the U.S. that the Atlantic could not protect us from aggressive German conduct. He solicited the support of magazine and newspaper journalists, particularly in New York, to counter the opinions of the America First movement in the heartland. It was also necessary to overcome big business’s enthusiasm for trade with Germany. Just about every international firm, including GE, GM, Ford, Dow, the oil companies, and many more, did business in Germany. Sullivan & Cromwell even had an office in Berlin. Leading the way toward a rethinking of German policy among the elites was the Council on Foreign Relations. After the 1940 election, the New Dealers and the Wall Street elites—long political opponents—began to come together to create the governmental-business juggernaut that would propel America’s massive industrial capacity to victory.
          The Port of New York became the great embarkation point for ships loaded with materials to help the Allies. Thus, the city was the first part of America to become involved in the war, as those convoys and ships were under U-boat attack. The Brooklyn Navy Yard was working non-stop to build warships, as was the Todd Shipyards. Under La Guardia’s direction, the city built up its Civil Defense capabilities. War became a reality on December 7, 1941, bringing the U-boats to America's coast. One submarine even surfaced just off Coney Island. In 1942, the submariners of Germany participated in what they called “the Great Turkey Shoot” on the eastern seaboard. They just sat offshore and torpedoed innumerable ships backlit against the shoreline. America eventually pushed them east and won the Battle of the Atlantic. Over the four years of war, three million troops shipped out from New York, and 21,459 freighters sailed through the Narrows. The city was home to thousands of small specialist firms that manufactured everything from submarine periscopes to the Norden bombsight. Its universities were on the leading edge of radar development, and two Columbia émigrés, Enrico Fermi and Leo Szilard, researched nuclear fission and convinced Albert Einstein to introduce the topic to FDR.
          The income tax financed approximately half of the war’s cost, and the rest was covered by the issuance of war bonds. Wall Street was miffed to be excluded from the process. Treasury Secretary Morgenthau recruited Madison Avenue to help, and they came up with the ingenious idea of purchasing bonds through payroll deduction. The New York-based Office of War Information encouraged Tin Pan Alley to come up with something comparable to “Over There.” The best the Brill Building could produce was “The Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy of Company B” and “Don’t Sit Under the Apple Tree (With Anyone Else But Me).” Broadway, however, managed to create a revolutionary new musical—Oklahoma!—which ran for five years, ten times longer than any previous musical. With half a million city men in uniform, women filled most of the white-collar jobs in the city and also became welders, pipefitters, and riveters.
          For the 20% of the city that was Jewish, the war was an unfolding nightmare. They were aware of the genocide happening in Europe but could do nothing about it. The State Department was historically anti-Semitic, and Roosevelt, the consummate politician, knew he did not have the votes to change the immigration laws. Virtually no Protestant or Catholic newspaper reported on the Holocaust.
          With millions passing through the largest city in the world, New York truly became the city that never sleeps. Times Square was packed twenty-four hours a day. Venereal disease skyrocketed as sex, both straight and gay, was readily available. The nightclubs, bars, and theaters were packed. The Stork Club hosted not only Frank Sinatra and Walter Winchell but also a recuperating Lt. Jack Kennedy. NBC and CBS prospered as they provided up-to-date war news for the insatiable public. New York even replaced an occupied Paris as the home of couture.
          Led by Mayor La Guardia and Robert Moses, New York began to focus on providing jobs and housing for returning vets. The NYC Housing Authority planned public housing, while the private sector built Stuyvesant Town and began to plan Levittown. Moses was ready for parks, bridges, highways, and a new airport in Queens. The postwar years would alter forever the landscape of the city.
          The New Dealers and the corporate “dollar-a-year men,” the Wall Street Warriors, were headed for a collision over whether the government or the private sector would dominate the economy. The first skirmish went to the New Dealers when FDR defeated Dewey in 1944. As for the world itself, the New York elites were focused on free trade, as all agreed that the interwar tariffs had greatly contributed to global instability. America was unanimous in its opposition to Europe’s colonies and hoped those empires would be dismantled. New York’s China Lobby was instrumental in repealing the Chinese Exclusion Act and began the drumroll of defeating the Communist Party in China’s civil war. Almost all supported FDR’s plans for a United Nations.
         For Americans, the war was bookended by two days everyone would remember for a lifetime: the Day of Infamy and the president’s death on April 12. New York was shocked and mourned its hometown hero. Less than a month later, 500,000 celebrated V-E Day in Times Square. A month after that, four million lined the streets of the city for a ticker-tape parade for Ike. On August 14, the Empire of Japan surrendered. One of the major topics in the immediate aftermath of the war was the decision on the location of the UN headquarters. The Soviet Union vetoed San Francisco, and Britain encouraged it to be on America’s eastern seaboard. Moses offered Flushing Meadow Park, but it looked like Philadelphia’s prize to lose. A week before it was to be finalized, real estate developer Bill Zeckendorf called Mayor O’Dwyer to propose the 17 acres he owned on the East River. The mayor got in touch with the Rockefellers, who offered to pay $8.5 million for the land and give it to the UN, which accepted immediately. Zeckendorf said to his wife, “We have just moved the capital of the world.”
          This is a very long and all-encompassing book that I had some trouble reading. It seemed to jump all over the place. Nonetheless, it is a beautiful homage to the city that was number one in America—and at times the world—in just about every imaginable arena. That greatness is further embellished by the fact that it was the generation America admires the most that accomplished it. Once again, kudos to the Greatest.