Jersey City, New Jersey has become Wall Street on the Hudson.
Also publishing businesses have settled in.
It's cool for professionals to commute to Manhattan from a studio apartment near iconic Journal Square. At 101 Newkirk Street, that 600 square feet will run them $1,850 a month, after putting down a $2,775 deposit.
Like so many urban areas such as Brooklyn, Jersey City has gentrified.
But its ethos of corruption hasn't gone poof. It is causing those born in that once first-stop for immigrants so much inconvenience.
Not that we don't understand why that is happening.
You bet, we vividly remember the absolute power of the Hague Machine. Frank Hague explicitly declared he was the law. He was. Violate that law and your cousin arriving from Italy may never land a job.
The underground economy likely generated more value than the one we learned about at Synder High School. Many residents patiently waited to buy X or Y until "the truck" came by with televisions and dresses.
Hustlers found "taking the number" a wonderful source of added income. That's how they could afford to send their children to Jersey City teachers' college, now a full-service university.
It could be primarily because of that embedded value system of "going around the law" that those born in Jersey City can't just apply at City Hall for a copy of our birth certificates. No, as the internet hammers, we have to enter the red-tape maze of sending in our request to the State of New Jersey, Department of Health, Vital Statistics.
Because of high demand and COVID, the process could take up to 12 weeks if it's a mail-in. Also add on how slow the United States Postal Service is.
On January 20, 2021, I sent along a certified packet to that Department of Health, with all the required documents and a check of $25 for two copies of my birth certificate.
Yesterday, the birth certificates arrived snail mail.
Meanwhile, the state of Arizona had only issued me the kind of driver's license which the federal government does not recognize for travel. No, I couldn't hop on a plane to attend a conference.
Unlike many other states and even the guards manning the border between the U.S. and Mexico, AZ wouldn't accept the birth certificate issued by the hospital. That was the Margaret Hague, which Frank had built to honor his mother Margaret and reinforce the power of his brand. It was post-World War II. Lots of babies were being born. That Baby Boomer generation would wind up sitting two to a desk at the Catholic grade schools. Catholicsm had been part of that power structure.
This birth-certificate ordeal reminded me that probably those born at the Margaret Hague will never be able to shake off that Jersey City was our hometown. And maybe we don't want to.
The socialization was unique. For instance, in 2005 - 2006, I covered a class action trial in Providence, Rhode Island. I was able to loop into the dynamics of the local and state politics. I understood.
Also, we were ahead of our time in having down cold that getting, holding and moving on to better work depended on whom you knew.
And higher education was sacred but don't get too big for your britchers. The sense of being less-than those in the NJ suburbs and Manhattan constituted the collective unconscious. I spotted that sense of deference in a former client's administrative assistant - Joan Avagliano. She had gotten her BA at the Jersey City-based St. Peter's College, now also a university.
Well, once I go through more red tape at the AZ DMV, I can travel. I can do dental tourism in Mexico. I can take a fresh look at Barcelona, Spain, where I once worked, for my travel blog.
But, what I can't do is go home again.
Jersey City's cost of living is beyond the reach of most of us beyond our peak earning years.
In addition, we would be a kind of public nuisance. The Professional Class in that city doesn't want to be annoyed with anecdotes of how it used to be. And that is my fascination: How it used to be. It really was that way.
Also, my "Jersey City accent" can label me as a throw-back to a period of time that the current power structure wants to forget. That's bad for property values.
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