Many American towns are littered with the debris of a prosperous past. Visitors today see the boarded-up houses that once protected families or the seedy high streets that once catered to a thriving town. These decaying or run-down buildings are the physical manifestations of something much deeper, something much more important and troubling: a town spirit that has fallen and can’t get it up. Listen closely and you can almost hear it: a ghost that walks among the living whispering “the future once happened here”.
Levittown, Pennsylvania, could have been one of those towns. Once economically reliant on five large manufacturers, the 55,000-person community could have fallen and stayed down when those employers left or downsized. But unlike other towns, Levittown got up. Today its houses are well-kept and protect new young families, and its high streets, though different, still cater to people with jobs and a future. If you didn’t know its history, you would think it was the sort of place that healthy countries always have – one that gives ordinary people comfort, hope, and community and that allows those with greater talents or ambition a start to achieve something more – and you’d be right.
I went to Levittown recently to discover why its residents, White and working-class for the most part, abandoned their long-time voting patterns to embrace Donald Trump. But I also went to find out why Levittown avoided the fate of countless communities who suffered from America’s de-industrialisation. What I found was something I did not expect. Levittown survived and renewed itself because of the spirit of its people.
Of course, that wasn’t the only thing that contributed to the town’s rebirth – private and public investment also played a role. Alberto,1 a sixty-ish college drop-out and community activist, for example, told me about how smart government had aided the town’s comeback. He told me about how the county and township governments cooperated to offer tax incentives for smaller companies that wanted to locate there. These entities also cooperated with state government to reposition a port once used by US Steel into a hub used by many businesses to ship or import what they build or use. Today, steel has been replaced by concrete and asphalt going out and sand coming in to be taken by truckers to the burgeoning oil and gas fracking fields in northern Pennsylvania’s Marcellus shale fields.
Levittown also bounced back because of shrewd decisions made by US Steel. “Once the old plant declined,” local politico Greg told me, “US Steel became a land developer because of all the property it owned.” With state and local help, the old steel plant became home to hundreds of small manufacturers, especially those involved in chemical production or refining. “Lots of tool and die shops here too,” Greg said as we drove past a couple of them. At its height the old US Steel plant employed 10,000 workers. Today, Greg says, the property provides over 7,000 jobs among over 100 different employers. These new jobs don’t pay as much as the old manufacturers, but they also don’t require a college education and, perhaps combined with a spouse’s earnings, provide a solid middle-class income.
Levittown’s location also helped. It sits only five minutes from two major thoroughfares, I-95 – America’s main north-south road on the East Coast – and Route 1, a significant local road. This doesn’t just attract small businesses: many independent truckers choose to live in Levittown, taking advantage of the affordable homes and easy access to the roads they earn their living on. Frequent rail service is available from local railroad stations for commuters heading into bigger cities. And as well as the local port, Philadelphia’s own port and international airport sit only 30 minutes away.
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