The Pruitt-Igoe Myth: An Urban History dir. by Chad Freidrichs (review)

In the middle of St. Louis, Missouri, just over two miles northwest of the Gateway Arch, is a vast and vacant fifty-seven-acre woodland. Oak and hickory trees are slowly reclaiming ground and overtaking the scant remains of thirty-three eleven-story apartment buildings, which once comprised the Pruitt-Igoe public housing complex. Completed in the mid-1950s before construction of the Arch even began, Pruitt-Igoe was one of the largest low-income public housing projects in the country. For nearly a decade, the complex distinguished the city’s skyline and received initial praise for its innovative modernist architecture that incorporated the planning principles of Le Corbusier’s Radiant City. Yet just eighteen years after residents moved in, state and federal authorities demolished the towers with explosives and abandoned the site.

What caused this monumental failure in mid-century urban planning and public housing? This critical question is at the center of Chad Freidrichs’ 2011 documentary, The Pruitt-Igoe Myth: An Urban History. Previous answers pointed to the alleged shortcomings of the modernist architecture, the welfare state, or even the residents themselves—all telling the story of a project doomed to fail from the start. But the documentary, true to its name, argues that these old explanations create a dangerous illusion that obscures the historical context for the development’s decline. Instead, Freidrichs situates the story of Pruitt-Igoe within the context of the radical post-World War II transformation of the American city. From this comprehensive perspective, the story of Pruitt-Igoe is one in which post-war industrial decline and suburbanization collided with a misguided public housing program, contradictory federal housing policies, and racial segregation to create an atmosphere that proved too much for this large and vulnerable public housing complex in northern St. Louis.

The documentary contends that three systemic and interconnected issues account for Pruitt-Igoe’s demise. First, it finds fault with the laws that built and maintained the complex. Pruitt-Igoe was a product of the 1949 Public Housing Act, passed to address mounting problems in urban ghettos by providing safer houses and eliminating profiteering landlords. When it first opened, residents dreamt that Pruitt-Igoe could be a “poor man’s penthouse,” offering beds for all family members, privacy, and healthier living conditions. However, as the film maintains, it was a naïve legislative assumption that better housing alone could fix the broad societal problems that gave rise to the ghettos in the first place. Further, former residents assert that one of the main reasons Pruitt-Igoe fell was the failure of authorities to plan for the future and secure funds for maintaining the large and cutting-edge complex.

Second, the economy essentially abandoned Pruitt-Igoe. After World War II, midwestern cities like St. Louis were flooded with poorer tenant farmers from the South, where mechanization in agriculture displaced laborers. When these migrants arrived, the middle class exodus to the suburbs was nearly complete. Ironically, the same act that made Pruitt-Igoe possible also fueled this suburbanization via expanded Federal Housing Administration (fha) loans that made houses on the city’s periphery more affordable. The film makes it clear that suburbanization was problematic because it caused the de-population and de-capitalization of midwestern urban centers, where public housing initiatives were underway and premised upon continued urban growth, demands for high density living, and available jobs—all trends that did not materialize.

Third, segregation and racism effectively eliminated any meaningful opportunities remaining for the residents of Pruitt-Igoe. From the beginning, authorities planned to officially segregate the complex and use public housing as a tool to prevent what was termed “negro de-concentration.” When Pruitt-Igoe opened, though, the Supreme Court’s decision that same year in Brown v. Board of Education (1954) required a change of plans, but white residents simply left, which resulted in de facto segregation. Moreover, white public housing authorities attempted to control the predominantly African American inhabitants with moralistic rules, such as restricting adult...