Decline and Rise in Crime
The decline of the South Ward began with the building of new suburban homes in the towns surrounding Trenton in the 1950s and 1960s. Many old factories closed and businesses left the area. Many cities experienced urban decay and a rise in crime, and Trenton did as well. In 1958, a young religious fanatic who grew up in a broken home stormed St. Joachim’s Church and shot three nuns, and then escaped out the back as police fired 1,000 rounds at shadows in the front window of the nunnery. Until the late 1960s crime was sporadic. A South Broad Street home was the site of three burglaries between 1966 and 1970. What made the robberies more interesting was that the building adjacent to them was the home of the Trenton Police Department. Obviously having a precinct next door did not discourage the thieves. However, South Trenton was for the most part unaffected by the Trenton Riots of 1968 while downtown was looted and burned.
Read more about this topic: South Trenton, New Jersey
Famous quotes containing the words decline, rise and/or crime:
“My opposition [to interviews] lies in the fact that offhand answers have little value or grace of expression, and that such oral give and take helps to perpetuate the decline of the English language.”
—James Thurber (1894–1961)
“Lift every voice and sing till earth and heaven ring,
ring with the harmonies of liberty.
Let our rejoicing rise high as the listening skies;
Let it resound loud as the rolling sea.”
—James Weldon Johnson (1871–1938)
“Crime is a fact of the human species, a fact of that specieas alone, but it is above all the secret aspect, impenetrable and hidden. Crime hides, and by far the most terrifying things are those which elude us.”
—Georges Bataille (1897–1962)