oddmart

Salisbury, Rhodesia (now Harare, Zimbabwe), 21 August 1970, originally uploaded by allhails.

A couple weeks ago, I rode from Seattle to New York on Amtrak. One morning I awoke as the train shuddered to a stop in what turned out to be Toledo. The station there was unlike any I’d seen on the trip, as there were few great train stations built in this country during the 1950s. Toledo Union Terminal (now Martin Luther King Jr Plaza) was built in 1950, and in an architectural style more likely to be seen on a school (like my elementary) than a train station.

photo by Alan Loftis on MichiganRailroads.com.

photo by J/G on flickr.

photo by Enrico Webers on flickr.

photo by Patrick Rasenberg on flickr.

Asmara, the capital of Eritrea, is a remarkably well-preserved example of Modernist architecture. A colony of Italy from 1890 to 1941, Eritrea and its capital city were built up during the Fascist era as a base for greater colonization in Africa. Since World War II, Eritrea has struggled for independence (it was part of Ethopia from 1961 to 1991), leaving Asmara pickled in the brine of decades of conflict. Asmara: Africa’s Secret Modernist City shows a beautifully preserved and remarkably peaceful city, and details some of the city planning and unbuilt architecture during Mussolini’s reign.