The Mail

Letters respond to Kelefa Sanneh’s article about Soul City and Black capitalism, Peter Schjeldahl’s essay about the joys of the Frick Collection, and Rivka Galchen’s personal history about her midtown neighborhood.

Building Black Capitalism

I read with interest Kelefa Sanneh’s piece about Soul City, its founder, Floyd McKissick, and Black capitalism, all of which are vital to understanding the story of the United States (“The Color of Money,” February 8th). I could not help but think about another chapter in the history of Black capitalism—the growth of the Greenwood neighborhood of Tulsa, Oklahoma. In spite of the ugly inequities of Jim Crow segregation, the neighborhood thrived, and, because of its affluence, became known as Black Wall Street. Then, starting on May 31, 1921, white mobs attacked Greenwood’s Black residents—resulting in, by some estimates, hundreds of casualties—and burned down more than a thousand homes and businesses. Within a decade of this tragedy, the people of Greenwood rebuilt their neighborhood, only to have an interstate highway cut through it in the nineteen-sixties. (In fact, the Interstate Highway System, a symbol of American commerce and progress, has damaged Black neighborhoods all over the U.S.) The loss of communities is just one of the challenges that Black Americans have faced as they have built their own form of capitalism.

Martijn Steger
Granville, Ohio

Who Was Cromwell?

In his lively tour of the Frick Collection, Peter Schjeldahl pauses at Hans Holbein’s portrait of Thomas Cromwell and muses that “he looks like a thug to me, sullen in profile” (The Art World, February 15th & 22nd). This observation is preceded by an apology to Hilary Mantel, Cromwell’s “novelistic defender.” Putting aside whether it was Mantel’s aim to defend such a complicated subject, those familiar with her Cromwell trilogy might recognize Schjeldahl’s sentiment: Mantel gives Cromwell a similar qualm when Holbein shows him the portrait. Cromwell thinks he looks like a murderer. His son, Gregory, replies, “Did you not know?”

David Cote
New York City

I Love New York

Rivka Galchen, in her beautiful piece about her midtown neighborhood, mentions a shelter at Port Authority, noting that it is no longer there (“Better Than a Balloon,” February 15th & 22nd). In the nineteen-nineties, as a member of the physician staff of St. Vincent Hospital’s Health Care for the Homeless program, I would attend to patients in that shelter. A social worker, a nurse, and I would address urgent issues, conduct physicals, and encourage our patients to visit the hospital clinic for more complex problems. The shelter’s guests were appreciative and often returned for care. On my way to the site, I passed through the neighborhood that Galchen describes, often buying a slice of pizza or a frozen yogurt. At the end of my shift, walking back to my apartment, on Twenty-second Street, I would stop in the small shops along Ninth Avenue. I felt anonymous there, but also at home.

Roberta Berrien
Dennis, Mass.

I enjoyed Galchen’s description of her New York City neighborhood. Fifty years ago, I moved with my wife from a then edgier Morningside Heights to a then even sleepier Norman, Oklahoma—the reverse of Galchen’s journey. In Norman, I was worried at night: we were isolated in our detached single-family ranch-style house, without the constant activity and the twenty-four-hour delis, newsstands, and Korean fruit markets that made upper Broadway feel alive and safe, even in the small hours of the morning.

Andy Magid
Norman, Okla.

Letters should be sent with the writer’s name, address, and daytime phone number via e-mail to themail@newyorker.com. Letters may be edited for length and clarity, and may be published in any medium. We regret that owing to the volume of correspondence we cannot reply to every letter.