Introduction: Making Places,Shaping Cities—Narrating Spatial History in Three American Cities

Abstract

Powerful computing technologies and theoretical advances have empowered historians to follow the spatial turn in their work. Yet despite new technological and conceptual innovations, narrating spatial histories remains an ongoing challenge. The authors of three essays in this section apply spatial analysis in their narratives of politics, culture, and environmental change within three iconic U.S. cities—New York City, San Francisco, and Pittsburgh—from the eighteenth century to the late-twentieth century.