Deirdre Mask > Quotes

“At trial, the judge ordered the jury to convict them, but the jury refused. The judge then locked up the entire jury for a time “without meat, drink, fire and tobacco.” When the jury delivered the same not guilty verdict for a fourth time, the judge left the bench but not before expressing his disgust with the Quakers, whom he called a “turbulent and inhumane sort of people.” “Till now I never understood the reason of the policy and prudence of the Spaniards, in suffering the inquisition among them,” the judge declared. “And certainly it will never be well with us, till something like unto the Spanish inquisition be in England.” But ultimately, the judge had to accept their verdict, and the case would become a foundational text for the right of a jury to make up its own mind, no matter the evidence against the accused.”
― Deirdre Mask, The Address Book: What Street Addresses Reveal About Identity, Race, Wealth, and Power

“in England in the 1700s, for example, 90 percent of men had one of only eight names: John, Edward, William, Henry, Charles, James, Richard, Robert.”
― Deirdre Mask, The Address Book: What Street Addresses Reveal About Identity, Race, Wealth, and Power

“Want to find your friends sitting under a tree for a picnic? Use a what3words address. Need to pin exactly where on a sidewalk you took that picture? Or find your Airbnb tree house in Costa Rica? What3words can help with that, too. The technology has more serious uses. The Rhino Refugee Camp in Uganda is using what3words to help people find their way to the camp’s churches, mosques, markets, and doctors’ office. The Mongolian postal service is using the addresses to send mail to nomadic families. And Dr. Louw now uses the three words to find patients in the townships of South Africa.”
― Deirdre Mask, The Address Book: What Street Addresses Reveal About Identity, Race, Wealth, and Power

“Most Europeans, for example, didn’t have permanent last names before the fourteenth century.”
― Deirdre Mask, The Address Book: What Street Addresses Reveal About Identity, Race, Wealth, and Power

“And many people without permanent homes are already working; in no state in America today can anyone afford a two-bedroom apartment on a minimum-wage salary.”
― Deirdre Mask, The Address Book: What Street Addresses Reveal About Identity, Race, Wealth, and Power

“The growth of the Civil War monuments peaked twice: first, in the early twentieth century, when Jim Crow laws were being made, and then again in the 1950s and ’60s when the laws were being challenged.”
― Deirdre Mask, The Address Book: What Street Addresses Reveal About Identity, Race, Wealth, and Power

“America lacked the hereditary aristocracy of Europe, so New York found itself creating its own elite criteria. Four hundred names, roughly the number of people who could reasonably fit in Caroline Astor's Fifth Avenue ballroom, defined the true upper crust of the city.”
― Deirdre Mask, The Address Book: What Street Addresses Reveal About Identity, Race, Wealth, and Power

“By definition, homeless people don't have homes. But an address is not a home. An address, today, is an identity; it's a way for society to check that you are not just a person but the person you say you are. In the modern world, in short, you are your address.”
― Deirdre Mask, The Address Book: What Street Addresses Reveal About Identity, Race, Wealth, and Power

“Finding people is a problem the Enlightenment was poised to solve,”
― Deirdre Mask, The Address Book: What Street Addresses Reveal About Identity, Race, Wealth, and Power

“Why would you put a statue of Robert E. Lee or Stonewall Jackson in 1948 in Baltimore?”
― Deirdre Mask, The Address Book: What Street Addresses Reveal About Identity, Race, Wealth, and Power

“But it was only in 2016 that it got street names:”
― Deirdre Mask, The Address Book: What Street Addresses Reveal About Identity, Race, Wealth, and Power

“barn, the Norwegian word for “child,” can’t be used in the Norwegian map because “barn” already appears in the English-language version.”
― Deirdre Mask, The Address Book: What Street Addresses Reveal about Identity, Race, Wealth and Power

“Trump unfurled a giant banner high on the side of his building, directly facing the rival building. "Your views aren't so great, are they? We have the real Central Park views and address. Best Wishes, The Donald." For perhaps the first and only time, the New Yorker printed the words: "Trump has a point.”
― Deirdre Mask, The Address Book: What Street Addresses Reveal About Identity, Race, Wealth, and Power

“The brain is just a lump of flesh and blood, and yet our memories feel like replayed movies, very graphic and dynamic.”
― Deirdre Mask, The Address Book: What Street Addresses Reveal About Identity, Race, Wealth, and Power