Historian
To the specific faculty member at Taubman College who shall not be named, read this note before contacting me An essay written as a PhD student at the University of Michigan . Willow Pond at the Matthaei Botanical Gardens . “Do you know where some Indian relics for the walls might be secured?” Fielding H. Yost wrote in a 1933 letter.[1] Yost led the University of Michigan’s football team on a…
Based on my delegation visit to Cuba with two activist arts groups, Street Poets from Los Angeles and Solidarity Collective from Minnesota June 14 to 23, 2024 One of the joys of travel comes from the realization that: I have more to learn from others and from Cuba than they could possibly learn from me. I hope to return to the classroom this fall, and every fall thereafter, with these…
Speech given in July 2025, at the Newark City Council s monthly Hearing of the Citizens: . Link to full length recording of meeting (five hours) Attached sources: + Covanta s damage to Newark, a fact sheet Written 2025 by Myles Zhang + Contract between Covanta and New York City Signed 2012, result of OPRA request submitted to New York City Department of Sanitation + Transcription of Spoken…
Using the tools of historical cartography and geographic information systems (GIS), this time-lapse animation reconstructs the urban form of Istanbul during key periods of its millennium-long history. All of about 200 known and major archaeological sites are drawn in scaled plans and overlaid above the city s contemporary geography. The process reveals Istanbul as a city of layers, spanning three…
The work stoppage at Halo tower construction site points to why we need a different model of economic development. As also published by the local paper TAPinto . Jersey Digs and TAPinto reported last week that amid lawsuits and protests, work had stopped on the 38-floor Halo skyscraper in Newark. The developers claimed that their lender was unable to make good on the $90 million construction loan.…
Season 13, Episode 6 of the series Abandoned Engineering Streamed June 2024 in Britain, July 2024 in America A film crew visits and explores the decaying remains of old Essex County Jail in New Jersey, a facility that became a powder keg of injustice that was set to explode in the 1960s Newark rebellions. Learn more about this historic building in our digital exhibit and the oral history video…
A project by Gergely Baics, Meredith Linn, Leah Meisterlin, Myles Zhang In collaboration with the Central Park Conservancy and the Institute for the Exploration of Seneca Village History Email project authors . Awarded Winner of the Digital/Interactive Map category, 2024, in the 52nd Annual CaGIS Map Design Competition. Best Digital Project of 2024 by the Victorian Society New York. Winner of the…
. I made a map of each place where I lived an extended period of time: Newark, New York City, Oxford University, Columbia University, and now the University of Michigan. This map depicts almost every major landmark on the University s central campus and took about 300 hours to create over the past 18 months. Click the image for full resolution or scroll down for details. Medium: ink on paper with…
How the intersection of law and city planning exposes sex offenders to longer prison sentences Published to the AGORA: Issue 18, 2023-24 The Urban Planning and Design Journal at the University of Michigan . Abstract: Our nation’s laws for sex offenders, although designed to protect the public, often have the opposite effect: increasing the chance sex offenders will be re-arrested and re-convicted…
Presented March 5, 2024 at the Newark Public Library . . The world’s largest concentration of wealth is in the New York City metropolitan area, yet the region contains many under-resourced cities, including Newark. What historical factors created this division between low-income Newark and its wealthy neighbors along lines of race, housing, income and social class? The agents of change are more…