Valparaiso is, in many ways, quintessential small town America. There s a town square with a courthouse. The downtown has pleasant shops with friendly proprietors, and the tree shaded streets that surround it are dotted with comfortable homes on uncrowded lots. It s a college town, which saves it from being provincial, but it is hardly multicultural. There are few Jews, even fewer blacks or Hispanics.
Crime rates are higher than they used to be, but lots of people still don t lock their doors.
Churches are everywhere and they re full on Sunday morning. People get genuinely excited about the fate of the high school athletic teams, especially it is after all Indiana the basketball team. The politics of the town are generally Republican, although for the past decade a distinctly moderate Democratic mayor has retained office because and this fits the small town pattern people like and trust him. I could go on, but you get the picture. Nothing in that picture applies to Manhattan.