ABSTRACT
In 1963, Kenneth Clark reflected on the meaning Northside had for Harlem and its children. When Northside was organized in 1946, life in “Harlem was pretty desperate,” but in the intervening seventeen years, little progress had been made in the community as a whole. “I would like to believe that the existence of Northside Center did, in fact, make a difference in the lives of the majority of youngsters in this community, but I cannot tell you that for a very simple reason. I don’t believe it would be true.” Although Northside had improved “the lives of the majority of kids with whom it [had] come in contact,” it would take one Northside “every ten blocks” to have a serious impact. If Northside were going to change the dynamic of race and power in New York and Harlem and if it were going to establish an environment “consistent with human dignity,” it had to reach beyond its walls, beyond the clinical interventions with individual children. Northside had to “change or influence … society and community conditions which affect the lives of youth.” 1
