This morning I stumbled upon an old New York Times article from August 7, 1983 called: The Empire and Ego of Donald Trump.

Here’s an excerpt you might find interesting:

The essence of entrepreneurial capitalism, real estate is a business with a tradition of high-rolling megalomania, of master builders striving to erect monuments to their visions. It is also typically dynastic, with businesses being transmitted from fathers to sons and grandsons, and carried on by siblings. In New York, the names of Tishman, Lefrak, Rudin, Fisher, Zeckendorf come to mind.

And now there is Trump, a name that has in the last few years become an internationally recognized symbol of New York City as mecca for the world’s super rich.

“Not many sons have been able to escape their fathers,” said Donald Trump, the president of the Trump Organization, by way of interpreting his accomplishments. Three of them, built since 1976, stand out amidst the crowded midtown landscape: the 68- story Trump Tower, with its six-story Atrium housing some of the world’s most elegant stores; the 1,400- room Grand Hyatt Hotel, and Trump Plaza, a $125 million cooperative apartment. And more is on the way.

“At 37, no one has done more than I in the last seven years,” Mr. Trump asserted.

As I read this, 3 things came to mind.

1) One could argue that, as real estate development institutionalizes, the megalomanic and dynastic nature of the business is being somewhat muted.

2) I hope we are well beyond the point where a “dynasty” has to be transmitted only through men. We are, right?

3) Trump sounded the same at 37.

Throughout history, real estate has been a tremendous source of wealth for a lot of people. Many family dynasties were created by accumulating property, holding it, and then riding the valuation wave.

Here in Toronto, there was the Reichmann family. At one point they had created the largest real estate company in the world (Olympia & York). But I’m not sure exactly how much of that wealth remains today following the company’s bankruptcy in the early 90s. That was a tough time in Toronto real estate.

In line with this, the NY Times recently published a fascinating account of the Wendel family in New York. In terms of how they conducted themselves, they were the polar opposite of some of today’s real estate families (i.e. Trump), but they certainly built an empire.

Here are two snippets from the NY Times:

In the early 20th century, the Wendels were perhaps the most powerful landlords in New York City, a dynasty with more than 150 properties in Manhattan worth over $1 billion in today’s dollars. The Wendels were the delight of the local papers, for, rich as they were, the family — six sisters and a brother, all unmarried — lived together in a shuttered mansion without electricity on the northwest corner of Fifth Avenue and 39th Street, and dressed in grim Victorian garb that had gone out of style half a century earlier. Tour buses regularly pulled up in front of “the House of Mystery.”

Alongside their austere lives, they also practiced a strict and disciplined approach to investing: 

Never mortgage a property; never sell anything; never pay for repairs; and never forget that Broadway moves uptown at a rate of 10 blocks a decade.

In fact, they were so draconian in their approach, that the sisters were supposedly prohibited from marrying. Unions were not allowed because that, according to the NY Times, “would disperse the accumulated property and put it under other names than Wendel.”

But in the end, this meant that the last Wendel – Ella, who died in 1931 – died alone and with no one to pass along the empire to. So instead it was distributed to various charities and the inevitable “cousins” that come out of the woodwork when a rich person passes.

I guess the moral of the story here is the old saying that you have to “give to receive.” From the sounds of it, the Wendel family didn’t like to do that.

Image from March 15, 1931 obituary

In light of my upcoming trip to Detroit, I thought I’d share a (photography) book that was recently recommended to me called The Ruins of Detroit. It’s by photographers Yves Marchand and Romain Meffre. You can check out some of the photos here.

The imagery is absolutely incredible and I really like their description of the project. Here’s a part of it:

"Detroit, industrial capital of the XXth Century, played a fundamental role shaping the modern world. The logic that created the city also destroyed it. Nowadays, unlike anywhere else, the city’s ruins are not isolated details in the urban environment. They have become a natural component of the landscape. Detroit presents all archetypal buildings of an American city in a state of mummification. Its splendid decaying monuments are, no less than the Pyramids of Egypt, the Coliseum of Rome, or the Acropolis in Athens, remnants of the passing of a great Empire."

I particularly like the last line: “…remnants of the passing of a great Empire.” When I look at their pictures, I like to try and imagine what those spaces would have been like teeming with people. Do you think anyone, at the time, could have possibly imagined that those good times were going to end? 

Clearly most did not, because look at the money that was spent on what are beautiful buildings. As derelict as those buildings are today, each one of them was presumably built with economics in mind. Developers were making money, tenants were paying rent and people were occupying the spaces. Now look at them.

There’s something really powerful about witnessing this kind of abandonment, particularly because it feels so recent. It’s one thing to look at relicts like the Coliseum and dismiss it as being eons ago. But this wasn’t that long ago. For me, it’s a stark reminder of how ephemeral things in life can be. Just because you’ve got it today doesn’t mean you’ll have it tomorrow.