Monday, August 13, 2012
The story of one address: 631
This film is about the history of a particular house in Youngstown, Ohio. It's a micro example of a macro problem: widespread abandonment of properties while the economic landscape of the industrial Midwest contracts. This is just one story of one family and one house - how their histories intertwine.
I often think about the optimism of the era when my house was built - 1951. While it remains essentially the same structure as it was then, the world around it in someways would be unimaginable to its original inhabitants. Think about your house's history and its relation to the city's, the state's and the nation's. What stories like this one lurk around those 50 properties on the city's demolition list?
If you have ten minutes, please watch this movie. A house is more than a building, it is a home - many of them make up a community.