Although there are thousands of books set in New York City, just one definitively lays out how the modern city was shaped: “The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York” by Robert Caro.
“The Power Broker,” published 50 years ago, describes how unelected public servant Robert Moses secured more power and influence over the city’s development projects than any other official, including the various governors and mayors who came and went during his 44 years in power.
“The story of the city is very much the story of his own quest for power,” said Valerie Paley, senior vice president and director of the Patricia D. Klingenstein Library at the New York Historical Society.
The book has also taken on a life of its own as a status symbol and popular staple of many Zoom backgrounds.
“Reading ‘The Power Broker,’ even trying to read it or having it on your bedside table is a point of intellectual pride,” said Paley.
Caro spent seven years researching and writing the book. His process is on display at the New York Historical Society in a new exhibit titled “Robert Caro’s ‘The Power Broker’ at 50.”
The museum mines Caro’s archives to demonstrate how he turned handwritten notes, tally marks of cars entering Jones Beach, and transcripts of interviews into chapters in the text.
Paley spoke with WNYC’s Alison Stewart on a recent episode of “All Of It.” An edited version of their conversation is below.
Alison Stewart: After Caro gets a publishing deal to write “The Power Broker,” he sends Robert Moses a letter requesting his assistance in writing the biography. Moses did not respond well. Tell us a little bit about that interaction.
Valerie Paley: I think with the enthusiasm and naivete of a young beat reporter, Caro reaches out to Moses and says, “Hey, I have a contract to write your biography.” It’s a very pleasant and friendly letter.
Immediately, he gets a very terse response. Moses wants nothing to do with the project or with this young, unknown writer.
Unbeknownst to Caro, Moses is already doing research of his own into who this Robert Caro guy is, and then decides to double down and not, in fact, participate, which poses some complications for a researcher trying to do this work without the cooperation of the subject.
Did Moses respond directly to Caro, or did he have his people do it?
He had one of his people do it, but in fact, he was aware of what was going on. Ultimately, I think Robert Caro was able to see him and speak with him — until things spiraled in a different direction and he stopped speaking to Caro.
What’s interesting is how in his process, Robert Caro decides, “Well, let me make a family tree of people who have access to Moses.” None of the people in the inner circle would speak to Caro, but some in concentric, outer circles would. Ultimately, he worked his way into the center.
In the exhibit, you see this very interesting family tree in Caro’s handwriting. He’s marked it up, and slowly but surely finds his way into the inner circle and to Moses himself.
Why do you think it’s part of the exhibit?
It’s part of the exhibit partly because it shows the beginning of this colossal, monumental book and the research that went into it. It gives researchers as well as those who read the book a sense of what Robert Caro had to do to learn more about and create this multivalenced portrait of this man, Robert Moses.
It took Caro seven years to write “The Power Broker.” How long did he actually think it would take him when he began?
A year or so.
Really?
There was a great adversity, too, when he decided he needed to devote much more time to this project and — through great hardship — to sell his house so that he could have the funds to do this nonstop.
Then upon getting a contract, it took that much longer, but one can see not only the evidence of the book itself, the published book, but the evidence of the archive, how much time he spent making sure he got the story right and from many different points of view through the people he interviewed.
We got a text that says, “‘The Power Broker’ is like 1,000 pages long. It sits on my coffee table where it has been for almost 10 years. I’ve read the first four pages a handful of times.” It was actually supposed to be longer.
Yes. One-third of the manuscript was cut. In Lizzie Gottlieb’s wonderful documentary “Turn Every Page,” about the adventures of Robert Caro and Robert Gottlieb, her dad, we see the editorial process between Bob Caro and Bob Gottlieb and how they argue over every word, every sentence. A third of the book wound up on the so-called cutting room floor. Imagine that. Even longer book.
Certainly, reading “The Power Broker,” even trying to read it or having it on your bedside table, is a point of intellectual pride, I think, for many people. If you get through it, we do have a mug at the New York Historical Society that says, “I finished The Power Broker,” but I suppose you could cheat and buy the mug anyway.
What was Moses’ initial reaction to “The Power Broker”?
He was annoyed. [We’re on] public radio — I can’t say what he really was! He did respond to “The Power Broker” in a 23-page statement. It was 3,500 words.
“The Power Broker” was serialized in the New Yorker before the actual publication of the book on Sept. 16, 1974.
In late August of ’74, Moses made this public declaration of his displeasure with Caro’s work. At that point, the two men were no longer on speaking terms.
What we have in the exhibit is a copy of the statement that Caro clearly had printed out, and it bears Caro’s handwritten reactions, which perhaps is the closest thing to a conversation between them.
For example, what we’re showing in the exhibit is the part where Moses is saying, “I don’t understand what he means by ‘power broker.’”
Caro responds in a marginalia in his own handwriting, “If Mr. M tells me which of the two words ‘power broker’ he doesn’t understand, I will be glad to enlighten him.”
Them’s fighting words, and this is their argument, the discussion, but it had to end with this document. Two pages of the document are in the exhibition.
My favorite part of that document, he calls Robert Caro a “snooper.”
That’s right.
It’s so good. Before we go, I thought it was interesting that you had a TikTok that related to Robert Moses, that really showed how it could affect people today. Would you describe that for us real quick?
Yes. It’s a TikTok in which someone who read the book and learned that — certainly, Caro does level the criticism of Moses, that he was a racist — in the Harlem playground, he put little sculptures of monkeys in this playground in a racist way.
Shiloh Frederick, is able to, through her TikToks, get these monkeys, this decorative image on the gate removed. Whether you agree with this or not, the point is “The Power Broker” and Robert Caro’s narrative still inspires this kind of a passion about the city and inspires new generations to think about the legacy of Robert Moses and how the story of the city is very much the story of his own quest for power.
Final question: There were apparently chapters about Jane Jacobs in this book originally. Do we know what happened to them?
Everybody asks about that. Right now, the archive is just about ready for researchers to start plumbing. We have the complete Caro archive, which includes his work on Lyndon Johnson as well. It will be open to researchers starting on Sept. 16, which is the actual 50th anniversary of the publication of “The Power Broker.”
So far, we have not found those Jane Jacobs chapters. We have about 150 boxes of books, boxes of documents and other materials that came to us as part of this archive, and haven’t found them yet, but we’re still looking.
One thing we do have is a wonderful congratulatory letter from Jane Jacobs to Caro. They were very much kindred spirits. In it, she congratulates him for the compassion he has, and his curiosity and his hard work, and his good sense. We do have some evidence of Jane Jacobs’s reaction. We still have yet to find those Jane Jacobs chapters, which hopefully are not lost, but maybe they were lost on that cutting room floor.
“Robert Caro’s ‘The Power Broker’ at 50” is now on view at the New York Historical Society through Feb. 2, 2025.