Jersey City, New Jersey is perhaps the archetype of the white ethnic manufacturing center that has run down at the heels. The second largest city in New Jersey, America's ninth largest state, Jersey City has been known for its shameless politicos and its position as the poor cousin to New York City, a thousand yards across the river. The Jersey City Government has in recent years done much to shed its unappetizing image: the political "machine" is out of power, the waterfront and housing stock are being rebuilt, and manufacturers are being lured back.

The majority of the city's quarter of a million people are white, of Irish, Italian, and Polish descent. About one fourth of the citizens are black and another fifth, and growing rapidly, are Asian and Hispanic. Seventeen percent are elderly, which ranks Jersey City as second, exceeded only by St. Petersburg,Florida, in its concentration of aging residents. The housing stock is old (three-fourths of the apartments were built before World War II) and thirty percent are sub-standard. But in recent years there has been a strong movement to regentrify communities.

This report is part of the collection of scanned historical documents available to the public.