Insight Philadelphia: Historical Essays Illustrated by Kenneth Finkel (review)

Insight Philadelphia: Historical Essays Illustrated by Kenneth Finkel provides a compelling and rich narrative of Philadelphia's past. Finkel incorporates a plethora of essays and photographs painting a vivid picture of the city's original ideals and identity, and how it reinvented itself over time. Each photograph captures more than just one moment in history; rather, it reflects the historical context and social process of Philadelphia. Kenneth Finkel masterfully connects past and present, revealing the historical essence, time, and place of the city. He argues that "these stories are meant to unlock layers of meaning, demonstrating through stories that place matters. This realization is a common phenomenon in Philadelphia History" (xi). Through extensive research and provocative writing, the author takes us on a captivating tour through Philadelphia's past.

Insight Philadelphia is comprised of ninety-five essays originating as blog posts written for PhillyHistory.com and offering interpretations of historical photographs in the Philadelphia city archives. The book is organized into eleven chapters covering a wide range of topics such as the urban design of Philadelphia's neighborhoods, innovation and industry, food, upheaval, and the arts, each with a series of intriguing anecdotes and images. Finkel carefully weaves each essay, utilizing a variety of primary and secondary sources—newspapers, biographies, Temple University Urban Archives and the City of Philadelphia Archives, letters, oral histories, real estate records, government records, academic journals, published books by renowned historians, and more. Each chapter highlights a larger theme connecting all to an intrinsic value and a belief inspired by the founder of Philadelphia, William Penn, and the Quakers.

Chapters 1 and 2, "Defining the City" and "The Neighborhoods," reveal the inception of Philadelphia through the fundamental Quaker notion of the "inner light." This "inner light" reflects the ideas of independence, equality, and community housed in one of the nation's most historic cities. The city of Philadelphia conveyed this sentiment through displaying electric lights along the streets, specifically Broad Street, one of the widest public avenues. Chapter 1 features a photograph of one of the largest public displays of light—the sesquicentennial bell constructed in 1926 at the center of Broad Street, south of Oregon Avenue. Oddly enough, Finkel does not mention what happened to the bell nor when it disappeared from existence. Independence and freedom also were exhibited through other displays such as the re-creation of the tower at Independence Hall with a clock in 1828, as time would change the lives of Americans and bring Philadelphia closer to a center of manufacturing and productivity. At the turn of the twentieth century, Finkel asserts, the rowhome really defined Philadelphia and refashioned the city "as a declaration of independence in brick and mortar" in which the masses of people could enjoy the opportunity of homeownership (15). As Philadelphia continued to grow and prosper, the clash of race and class and the redlining of the city's maps threatened its original mission as an "inner light" to all.

Chapters 3 and 4, "Architecture and Urban Design" and "Preservation and Stewardship," depict the continuity of Philadelphia's vision as a center for democracy, culture, and the arts. From the late eighteenth century through most of the nineteenth century, Greek and Roman architecture shaped the urban design of several buildings in Philadelphia. The author portrays this façade through major structures such as the Merchants Exchange Building, the Bank of Pennsylvania, the Walnut Bridge, and the Atlantic Refining Company Gas Station. Philadelphia emerged as the Athens of America as envisioned by Penn who "named his city in Greek. … Philadelphia would become the New World's center for democracy, arts, and learning" (88). The virtues of independence and liberty, manifested through Philadelphia's landscape, extended into the twentieth century with the birth of the grandiose Parkway. Finkel argues that the Parkway redefined Philadelphia connecting park and city and cultivating public purpose.

Chapters 5, 6, and 7, "Improvements," "Innovation and Industry," and "Food," highlight the industrial prosperity of Philadelphia...