Teaching Resources
Waste Disposal in New York City - Introduction
Tara Hickman, The LaGuardia and Wagner Archives
The La Guardia and Wagner Archives, located in room E-238, collect, maintain, and preserve primary materials documenting the social and political history of New York City. In addition to serving an array of researchers, the La Guardia and Wagner Archives produces public programs and materials exploring that history.
In 2004, the Archives published 20,000 copies of the 4th/5th grade curriculum, "City Government and You: Keeping New York City Streets Clean since the 1800s." Many of the lessons in this curriculum and the City Council documents enclosed look at themes of An Inconvenient Truth on the local level.
The Archives creates curricula that use primary source documents to encourage students to think like historians. Though the curricula were developed for 4th/5th, 7th/8th and 11th grade students, some of the materials and activities may be adapted for teaching college level courses. The Archives’ curricula are available in downloadable form from our website: http://www.laguardiawagnerarchive.lagcc.cuny.edu/defaultc.htm
The "Keeping New York City Streets Clean since the 1800s" documents look at New York City’s endless problem: what to do with garbage. The first lesson looks at the effects of garbage on public health. It is an excellent critical thinking lesson that includes map and graph analysis. The second lesson includes primary source letters from New Yorkers in the 1890s protesting the smell of rotting garbage from Rikers Island. I suggest comparing and contrasting these letters with contemporary letters from the Concerned Citizens of Greenpoint regarding similar issues concerning the Newtown Creek oil spill. The original oil spill happened in 1978, yet is still making headlines today after a new report filed by the federal Environmental Proection Agency found the residents of Greenpoint still breathing in hazardous waste. PBS has also provided an excellent documentary on the oil spill to provide the visual effects of this disaster.
The third lesson has to do with the problem of dumping garbage into the ocean, and the United States government’s responsibility to stop it. Lastly, the curriculum comes full circle: what should New York City do with garbage? The case cited is the Fresh Kills Landfill, which is a great reading comprehension lesson using newspaper articles from 1938.
Other documents you will find on this website are City Council local laws having to do with air pollution, fuel, clean water, and recycling, as well as environmental health risks the neighborhood of Greenpoint, Brooklyn has faced over the years.
I hope you find these documents helpful. If you have any further inquires, or would like to conduct research at the La Guardia and Wagner Archives, please contact:
Tara J. Hickman
Educational Associate
Adjunct Professor
(718) 482-5065
Thickman@lagcc.cuny.edu
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