Our Pick
Posted on @rawstates
Altgeld Gardens and the toxic doughnut
1945
Chicago, Illinois
Zol87 from Chicago, Illinois, USA · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
The Chicago Housing Authority put up 1,498 units of two storey row houses here in 1944 and 1945 for Black war workers, on ground that had been used for industrial waste. Landfills, a sewage plant and steel and chemical works ringed the site, and the resident Hazel Johnson called the arrangement the toxic doughnut. She founded People for Community Recovery in 1979 and pushed the housing authority into dealing with contaminated water and asbestos. Barack Obama worked out of the area as a community organiser in the late 1980s.
That was 1 of the hidden places.
Location: approximate area
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