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American Council To Improve Our Neighborhoods
American Council to Improve Our Neighborhoods (ACTION) is the former name of a non-profit organization focused on housing, revitalization, and neighborhood renewal in the United States. ACTION was formed in the early 1950s. Downtown development, made possible at the expense of low-income neighborhoods, was becoming a political issue. In November 1954, the White House recommended creating a non-profit publicity and research organization to promote these policies. ACTION was then founded in a 15 November 1954 announcement by Dwight D. Eisenhower at the Mayflower Hotel. It featured prominent land developers on its board of directors including Andrew Heiskell of Time-Life and Richard King Mellon. The program was funded early with a $250,000 grant from the Ford Foundation. In 1955, ACTION released a 13-minute film promoting urban renewal viewed by 22 million people that year and 60 million by the end of 1958. The same year, former FHA employee and mortgage banker James Rouse became pre ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mayflower Hotel
The Mayflower Hotel is a historic hotel in downtown Washington, D.C., located on Connecticut Avenue NW. It is two blocks north of Farragut Square (one block north of the Farragut North Metro station). The hotel is managed by the Autograph Collection Hotels division of Marriott International. The Mayflower is the largest luxury hotel in the District of Columbia, the longest continuously operating hotel in the Washington D.C. area, and a rival of the nearby Willard InterContinental and Hay-Adams Hotels. The Mayflower is known as the "Grande Dame of Washington", the "Hotel of Presidents", and as the city's "Second Best Address" (the White House is the first)—the latter sobriquet attributed to President Harry S. Truman (a frequent guest at the hotel). It was also a charter member oHistoric Hotels of America the official program of the National Trust for Historic Preservation. Today it is a four-star hotel. History Construction, sale, and renaming The site on which the Mayfl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Andrew Heiskell
Andrew Heiskell (September 13, 1915 – July 6, 2003) was chairman and CEO of Time Inc. (1960–1980), and also known for his philanthropy, for organizations including the New York Public Library.Institute of International Education, 7 May 2003Andrew Heiskell, a Former Chairman of Time Inc. and a Civic Leader, Dies at 87 He was President of the Inter American Press Association (1961–1962). Biography Heiskell was born in Naples, the second child of American parents, Ann Moore Hubbard and Morgan Ott Heiskell, who had married in Wheeling, West Virginia and then moved to Capri. He spent his childhood abroad. In 1946, aged just 30, he was named publisher of ''Life''; later, as CEO, he had to close it down (in 1972). In 1974 he created ''People'', which rapidly became a great asset. The Institute of International Education's Andrew Heiskell Award is named for him. Heiskell donated funds to pay for the Arts Director position at the American Academy in Rome. Personal life He was ma ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Richard King Mellon
Richard King Mellon (June 19, 1899 – June 3, 1970), commonly known as R.K., was an American financier, general, and philanthropist from Ligonier, Pennsylvania, and part of the Mellon family. Biography The son of Richard B. Mellon, nephew of Andrew W. Mellon, and grandson of Thomas Mellon, he and his sister Sarah Mellon Scaife and cousins Paul Mellon and Ailsa Mellon-Bruce, were heirs to the Mellon fortune, which included major holdings in Mellon Bank, Gulf Oil, and Alcoa. In 1957, when ''Fortune'' prepared its first list of the wealthiest Americans, it estimated that the four cousins were all amongst the richest eight people in the United States, with fortunes of between $400 million and $700 million dollars each. R.K. Mellon served as president and chairman of Mellon Bank. He also served on the board of trustees of the University of Pittsburgh over a span of several decades and was a major benefactor to the university. Military service Mellon served in the United State ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ford Foundation
The Ford Foundation is an American private foundation with the stated goal of advancing human welfare. Created in 1936 by Edsel Ford and his father Henry Ford, it was originally funded by a US$25,000 gift from Edsel Ford. By 1947, after the death of the two founders, the foundation owned 90% of the non-voting shares of the Ford Motor Company. (The Ford family retained the voting shares.) Between 1955 and 1974, the foundation sold its Ford Motor Company holdings and now plays no role in the automobile company. Ahead of the foundation selling its Ford Motor Company holdings, in 1949, Henry Ford II created the , a separate corporate foundation that to this day serves as the philanthropic arm of the Ford Motor Company and is not associated with the foundation. The Ford Foundation makes grants through its headquarters and ten international field offices. For many years, the foundation's financial endowment was the largest private endowment in the world; it remains among the wealthie ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Federal Housing Administration
The Federal Housing Administration (FHA), also known as the Office of Housing within the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), is a United States government agency founded by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, created in part by the National Housing Act of 1934. The FHA insures mortgages made by private lenders for single-family properties, multifamily rental properties, hospitals, and residential care facilities. FHA mortgage insurance protects lenders against losses. If a property owner defaults on their mortgage, FHA pays a claim to the lender for the unpaid principal balance. Because lenders take on less risk, they are able to offer more mortgages. The goal of the organization is to facilitate access to affordable mortgage credit for low- and moderate-income and first-time homebuyers, for the construction of affordable and market rate rental properties, and for hospitals and residential care facilities in communities across the United States and its territ ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
James Rouse
James Wilson Rouse (April 26, 1914 – April 9, 1996) was an American businessman and founder of The Rouse Company. Rouse was a pioneering American real estate developer, urban planner, civic activist, and later, free enterprise-based philanthropist. He received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian award, for his lifetime achievements. Early life and education James "Jim" Rouse was born in Easton, Maryland, to Lydia Agnes (née Robinson) and Willard Goldsmith Rouse, a canned-foods broker. His father, a lawyer trained at Johns Hopkins University, once ran for state's attorney for Harford County. When he lost, the Rouse family moved from Bel Air, Maryland, to Easton. Rouse grew up in Easton (then population: 5,000) on a well-to-do street on the edge of town. He was taught at home by his mother until second grade when he transferred to a public school. In 1930, Rouse lost his father to bladder cancer, his mother to heart failure, and his childhood home to bank ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Baltimore Plan
The Baltimore Plan was an urban planning initiative to remove urban blight. History Prior to WWII, Baltimore had little housing codes with segregated services. The most notable early code was the 1910 J. Barry Mahool ordinance No. 610 prohibiting African-Americans from moving onto blocks where whites were the majority, and vice versa. In 1947, Baltimore created a housing court to enforce code laws. In 1949, Baltimore initiated the "Block One" program, which cleared a courtyard of 63 houses of fences and outdoor toilets, replacing the private property with an open paved public play area funded by code violations against building owners. This would evolve to the Baltimore Plan, heavily sponsored by the National Association of Home Builders as a method of revitalizing neighborhoods through private enterprise rather than government housing programs. In 1941 an independent private group called the Citizens Planning and Housing Association (CPHA) was formed with Morton Hans Froelicher, F ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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