Toledo, Ohio: A History in Architecture (Images of America: Ohio)

Rating:
Summary: If these walls could talk...
Review: ...this is what they'd say. At least if interpreted by someone with a consumate knowledge of Toledo history, like the author. Beginning with the city's origins as a transportation nexus in the canal and railroad eras, continuing through its emergence as a manufacturing hub at the dawn of the automobile age, and ending with the Postwar struggle against economic decline, this three-book series lets pictures tell the story. Each volume has hundreds of photos with captions that concisely describe this vanished world with fascinating anecdotes and occasional dry wit.

Rating:
Summary: Way back then
Review: The "Images of America" series vary quite a lot in quality, and this is one of the good ones. At one time, Toledo was pretty representative of 2nd ranking cities in America, in architecture as in other ways. As anyone who lives there or has had the misfortune to visit it knows, it is now one of the grungiest cities in America, the geographic incarnation of obese, emphysemic, morose, ignorant America. Check out the downtown these days, and you'll see something reminiscent of Newark New Jersey at its nadir. Buildings crumbling, gang graffiti on the walls, junk in the streets, shabby library, the works. Good art museum, though, for some reason.
Check out this collection of postcards, you'll see that even a dump like Toledo once had a money grubbing middle class and a few hot shots that felt the need to thump their chest architecturally, and saw fit to do it in public rather than in a private dwelling, which seems to be the norm these days.
"Tempora mutantur, et Toledo mutantur in illis" [sed non renascit sicut Cleveland].