The Town That Won't Stop Burning

May 14, 2009 1:25 PM

The Town That Won't Stop Burning
A while back the Daily Beast contacted me, asking if I would work with them on a project about Coatesville, PA, a tiny, rough former steel city where 50 arson fires were set over the course of 15 months. This is the resulting article and video. I'm particularly proud of the video, don't skip it.
posted by The Straightener (7 comments total)

This project was posted to MetaFilter by filthy light thief on May 27, 2009: The Town That Won't Stop Burning

Hey, I've been to Coatesville! I was living and working (temporarily, thank fuck) in West Chester back in 2005, where I knew absolutely nobody, and was driving around because I had nothing better to do. There was some kind of street fair in Coatesville so I stopped and bought some tamales from a stand and to wander around for awhile. I remember being surprised (rightly or wrongly) to find a town with so much racial diversity right around what felt like the dividing line between suburban and rural Pennsylvania. It saddens me to read about these fires. Thanks for the article and video.
posted by dersins at 1:52 PM on May 14, 2009

Thaaaanks, man. Here's a bit of extra coverage that puts things in a little bigger perspective within the region.
posted by The Straightener at 7:05 PM on May 14, 2009

Excellent article and video. Thanks.
posted by Falconetti at 10:15 AM on May 15, 2009

Straightener's projects should automagically be posted to the Front Page of the Blue as a matter of course.

Best of Metafilter.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 9:02 AM on May 21, 2009

Really great stuff. The ice cream truck in the video was a pretty superb juxtaposition.
posted by jozzas at 10:32 AM on May 25, 2009

It's funny, I was shooting some more video with them in North Philly last week and the damn Mr. Softee truck kept circling around while we were doing this interview and then parked about ten feet away from us. The Daily Beast people wanted to stop shooting because they thought it felt contrived featuring the Mr. Softee truck in another video. I told them that if we're shooting out here in the summer they should get comfortable with the idea of the Softee truck as leit motif because you can't get away from the fucking thing between May and September!
posted by The Straightener at 11:31 AM on May 25, 2009

I live less than 15 minutes from Coatesville (Paradise, PA). It's "the town on the other side of the Wal-Mart". I had no idea things were so bleak.
posted by DWRoelands at 1:48 PM on May 26, 2009