Two students’ presentation on the ‘Battle Of Blair Mountain,’ for the prompt “Revolution, Reaction, Reform in History.” (Photo: Jack Delaney.)
BY JACK DELANEY
PROSPECT HEIGHTS — For Brooklynites feeling pessimistic about the state of society, the quickest cure last weekend might have been a trip to the library.
On Sunday, March 1, nearly 500 students, parents, and volunteers from all five boroughs converged on the Central Library for New York City History Day, an annual competition where young New Yorkers — split into middle and high school divisions — show off the presentations and performances they’ve spent months preparing.
Inside the high-ceilinged lobby, teams of ones and twos stood dutifully in front of towering poster boards. This year’s theme was “Revolution, Reaction, Reform in History,” and their topics ran the gamut: A display on the Compton’s Cafeteria riot, a precursor to Stonewall in San Francisco, offered judges a tiny cup of tea. Another on the “Down to the Countryside” movement in China featured a fuzzy diorama of a farm. Elsewhere, a garlanded thesis on Hawaii’s annexation sat beside a deep dive on Barbie subtitled “Awakening the #GirlBoss.”
One of the most exhaustively researched presentations was by Tsz Lun Qin, who examined how NYC’s Metropolitan Board of Health “revolutionized public health management by establishing the nation’s first permanent, centralized sanitation authority.” She said she’d arrived at the idea after wondering how dirty the city was a hundred years ago.
Sonya Ochshorn coordinates the event for the Center for Brooklyn History, which assumed responsibility in 2021 after the Museum of the City of New York handed off the baton. “They get to choose their own topic, and so they can really dive into the thing that interests them,” said Ochshorn. “So if you’re a student who loves fashion, and you’re like, we never learn about fashion in school, this is their chance.”
Upstairs, parents Yusuf Cross and Alexia Infortunata watched as their daughter waited to perform. Her school in Staten Island placed second last year, so getting selected for the roster had been a competitive process in its own right. Then there were the lunch periods spent working, instead of hanging out with friends, and the rehearsals over Zoom in the final weeks.
“It’s phenomenal,” said Infortunata. “It teaches kids two things: public speaking and research. Plus setting themselves aside from the rest of their classmates and being so dedicated.”
NYC History Day is the regional contest for National History Day, which boasts 600,000 participants each year and which — contrary to its name — has become a global event.
For Ochshorn, the event is meant to leave an impact that transcends rankings and accolades: “How do we get students in Brooklyn and New York City as a whole into these archival spaces,” she wondered, “and show them that history isn’t just something in a book someone else wrote, history is all around us?”
Twelve NYC teams were national finalists, with a duo from PS49 in Queens landing in third for a piece on the Kent State Massacre. This year, the state competition will take place at SUNY Oneonta on Sunday, April 26.
