Book Talk: Road to Nowhere

About the event:

In the mid-1950s, Baltimore’s Rosemont neighborhood was a vibrant Black middle-class community, rich with rowhouses, parks, shops, and professional offices. By 1957, a proposed East–West Expressway threatened to slice through the neighborhood. Though the highway was never built, its shadow gutted Rosemont’s economy and stability. Drawing on land records, oral histories, media accounts, and policy documents, Emily Lieb reveals how racist education, housing, and transportation policies—alongside blockbusting, redlining, and predatory lending—destroyed wealth and opportunity while residents fought to preserve their homes. This is both a cautionary tale of systemic injustice and a testament to community resilience.