A Planned Community Built on a Solid Foundation...of Crime?




A serene, quiet, safe, modern, perfect example of WHITE COLLAR CRIME? "Another Planned Community" by Robert J. Schmertz. In addition to owning the Boston Celtics and the Portland Trail Blazers, Schmertz founded Leisure Technology, a developer of retirement communities. In 1975, Schmertz was indicted by a New Jersey grand jury on bribery charges. He was accused of bribing a local Mayor for favorable real estate deals. Schmertz pled innocent to the charges, but In July of that year he died. Leisure Technology would become a major developer of retirement communities, but would go bankrupt in 1991. I do not know if these models were ever built ... actually make that "Robilt...Homes of Guaranteed Quality".

Trio of Advertising post cards, c. 1970. Collection Jim Linderman

3 comments:

  1. I can tell you for sure these models were indeed built. And there were about 4 others as well. You can find them in the Brookwood Developments in Jackson NJ. Brookwood was divided into 4 very large sections and were not all necessarily connected together. How do I know this, I grew up there. Several thousand houses were built. And they were of decent quality.

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  2. I too, grew up in Brookwood....Brookwood 4 to be exact. Although the homes are over 40 years old, Brookwood still looks good, and the homes are still standing. Our house was a ranch style introduced later after these brochures were released.

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  3. trying to get history of the brookwood projects i grew up in brookwood 3 very difficult to get infro

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