Do You Know That? USA: New York - Bronx

When you can hear the Bronx, most of us will imagine gray streets, cracked car wrecks, burning trash, graffiti and abandoned basketball courts. City within a city, situated in one of five districts of New York at the northern edge of the state, and as one not on the tip of the island has been since 60 years one of the harshest and most brutal places in the U.S. Crime = Bronx and Bronx = death, drugs and violence. Perhaps nowhere else in the states was not as many vehicles are stolen, raped and sold so many people so many drugs, as in this hotbed of evil. Especially the black background has the southern part - South Bronx.

History of the Bronx, as the northern periphery away from all the grandiose building skyscrapers and famous citizens, dates back to the period before World War II. At that time New York was destination for hundreds of thousands of mainly European immigrants who traveled here for the better from old war torn continent. Bronx became their new home. Was one of the strongest Irish, Italian community and the Jewish community. And the last one here in 1937 was the strongest. With more than 600 000 members amounted to almost 45% share of the population area. Originated many synagogues, but over time until the present day losing importance, as well as the Jewish community is now one-tenth compared to years of war.

At that time worked in the U.S. strongly controlled by the prohibition, thus prohibiting the manufacture, distribution and selling of alcohol on the 18th amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which originated at the instigation of world view that alcohol is a drug destroys human personality, relationships, families, and is the originator of all evil. Direct response to the alcohol ban has been enormous interest in the illegal trade of otherwise beloved whiskey. - Here I would like a little detour, because experts and fans of this drink will certainly notice the difference in name alone drink. In Scotland and Canada used the name of whiskey, for example, while American bourbon, the drink with a 50% share of corn whiskey is written. The real expert, in terms of illegal trade in this golden drink, was probably the most famous gangster Al Capone, but he worked mostly in Chicago, the city that crime in the Bronx with no rivals.

Prohibition thus gave rise to immigrant gangs of Irishman and Italians, who, however, after the end of World War II slowly shifted down to the more imposing of the city. Crowds were traveling in the opposite direction of African-Americans and Hispanics, for which it was peaceful in Harlem too quiet and boring and costly situation, and that is to say. Since the end of the 60th years, the Bronx district is experiencing a large sharp decline of quality of life, often associated with typical massive construction of prefabricated buildings that gave rise to ghettos in the relevant community and atmosphere of poverty, filth, fear and hopelessness. A wave of arson attacks, often as a pretext for insurance fraud plagued the Bronx after a 70th years. Many buildings were destroyed, countless cars and shops.

Since the early 90 years, however, wild reputation and the population gradually declined. Bronx has become a common settlement, but the taste of nasty and destruction persist. A foreigner has more or less the only reason to give to these lands, except that here a fan of baseball wandered New York Yenskees famous clubs who have their own shrine at the southern edge of the district in which lives and about 30% of families below the poverty line. Although there were added greenery and parks, colours and optimism, but the Bronx is still something in us inspires self-consciousness and resistance, perhaps wrongly, but it indicates to the future, which in turn gives the Bronx potential sites for the development of culture and a better life in general.

Unfortunately, our available video sources too gloomy atmosphere impure, so I recommend you to search for more images such as these in google pictures.

Text: Jan Chaloupka

Photo: Wikipedia Commons: P.Stanziola, J.Fekner, A.Tallam