A forgotten collection of New York students’ essays from the 1960s captures more than a thousand viewpoints on the city’s greatest challenges and opportunities. Now fully digitized and searchable, the “New York’s Future As I View It” essay contest from 1965 offers a unique snapshot of the history of the city’s future.
Teenagers in New York City opened their newspapers on the afternoon of February 15, 1965, to discover a bold-letter announcement:
“$9,200 IS WAITING TO BE WON in the big, exciting ‘NEW YORK’S FUTURE AS I VIEW IT’ Student Essay Contest.”
Sponsored by the World-Telegram & Sun newspaper and the Empire State Building, the contest was open to all high-school students who lived within a 50-mile radius of the landmark skyscraper on 34th Street.
“Our broad objective,” explained the contest organizer, “is to ensure that the young people growing up in our town do not become complacent about New York, never take its activities and cultural offerings for granted. We feel this essay contest is an ideal method of keeping this fact alive in the minds of those who are growing up here.”
Contest entry forms provided some research tips, encouraging authors to visit local libraries, or consult with their social studies teachers. Organizers had suggestions, too, for topics to cover. “Select any significant issue related to New York, and develop your own prizewinning essay,” they proposed. “Today, New York ranks as a world capital of commerce, culture and the United Nations. You can write on these and other facets of New York’s future . .. as you see them.”
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Listen here to an audio story about this project created by Columbia Journalism School students, Johnny Sturgeon and Dana Binfet:
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The contest period ran from mid-February to the end of March. As it happened, history crowded into those six weeks – beginning, on Feb. 17, with the assassination of Malcolm X. Before the deadline came, essay writers surveyed a city engaged in school boycotts for integrated education, a housing crisis, broad conversations about policing, debates over ethnic divisions and urban unrest, and innumerable headlines detailing attempts by the city’s recently re-elected mayor, Robert F. Wagner Jr., to come to grips with it all.
When the submission date came, more than a thousand essays were sent to the prize committee. As a body, the essays amounted to a stirring and often profound collection of views by adolescent authors about the most pressing topics of the day: racism, economic injustice, pollution, global conflict, and urban renewal.
On May 25, the three winning students were announced in a ceremony with Mayor Wagner on the Empire State Building observation deck. About a month later, contest officials contacted librarians at Columbia University. “It occurred to us,” they wrote, “that the essay entries – many of which are well written – might prove of interest for your archives collection. If so, we would be more than delighted to send them to you for storage or disposal at your discretion.” Donated to the Rare Book & Manuscript Library at Columbia University, they were placed in six archival boxes and sealed in plastic – where they remained for decades to come. The original essays are available in the reading room as the World Telegram and Sun Essay Contest papers.
The rediscovery and digitization of these essays offers students, teachers, researchers, and historians a unique opportunity to reconnect with the attitudes and concerns of an amazing group of young people living in – and documenting — a contentious and impactful moment in the history of New York. Most of all, these essays constitute a history of the future. Looking back at how a generation viewed their own future is a priceless historical opportunity to think about possibilities, opportunities, and roads not traveled.