Content area
Full Text
DONALD TRUMP. SEE ALSO SIDEBAR: WORLD'S TALLEST ARGUMENT
Trump's Political Support - Donald Trump's contributions* to current members of the Board of Estimate, Jan. 1, 1981, to Dec. 31,
| 1986 NAME 1981 1982-84 1985-86 Total |
| Edward Koch $9,700 $42,200 $330 $52,230 |
| Andrew Stein 27,000 5,000 157,000 189,000 |
| Harrison Goldin 9,000 5,000 35,000 49,000 |
| Howard Golden 1,000 2,500 13,000 16,500 |
| Ralph Lamberti - - 1,000 1,000 |
| David Dinkins - - - - |
| Stanley Simon - - 1,000 1,000 |
| Claire Shulman - - 400 400 |
| TOTALS $46,700 $54,700 $207,730 $309,130 |
*Contributions include those made by Donald Trump, Fred Trump, the Trump Organization, Trump Management Inc. and other companies controlled by Trump. SOURCE: Office of New York State Sen. Franz Leichter
High above the old Penn Central rail yards, all alone on a Saturday afternoon in the summer of 1984, Donald Trump stood with his hands on his hips and looked down at an undeveloped chunk of Manhattan that belonged to another man.
Once it had been Trump's to buy, this 76-acre stretch of riverfront land marked by weeds, twisted track and the rusty silhouette of the elevated West Side Highway. But he had let his option lapse, and now an Argentinian developer named Francisco Macri was struggling to put luxury condominium towers on the site, despite community opposition and financial problems.
Trump was alone, but not unobserved. "It's a community with a million eyes," says Sally Goodgold, the epitome of the West Side's savvy citizen activism, when she recounts the story. Recognizing Trump from her moving car, Goodgold thought of the opening scene in Ayn Rand's "The Fountainhead," in which an arrogant young architect stares down into a canyon and dreams of the brutal skyscrapers he will wrest from its rock.
She almost drove into the river.
"I said to my husband, `I have a scoop,' " recalls Goodgold, past chairwoman of the Upper West Side's Community Board 7. " `Guess who's buying the old Penn Yards site from Macri?' "
Six months later, Goodgold's hunch proved right. Trump announced his purchase of the property, which runs from 59th Street to 72nd Street along the Hudson River, for $95 million. And in the fall of 1985 he unveiled his plans for a mammoth development there: Television City.