New York Power Black Out, 1965, by Randy Summers

From MemoryArchive

Who: Over ten million people in the New York City area
When: November 9, 1965
Where: New York City
What: The Big Power Failure

It is now well over forty years ago, but I can still remember how one time in my college years, I quickly learned how vulnerable we are tied to things we take for granted. Back in 1965, the leading evening TV news was hosted by Chet Huntley and David Brinkley on NBC-TV. That fall the most common story was the continuing build-up of American troops in South Vietnam. The two newsmen signed off every night with Brinkley saying, "Good night, Chet," as Huntley said, "Good night, David," from the studio in Rockefeller Center in Manhattan New York. The theme music for the NBC news program was pretty and classy - literally - the music of the second movement of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony. Other news that fall was the Dodgers won the World Series, going seven games against the Minnesota Twins, with an veteran Dodger named Jim Gilliam, making a sparkling defensive play at third. A group of Boy Scouts got into the local New York news. They managed to clip the record for the shortest time elapsed to traverse the length of the entire New York City subway system, each rider using just a single subway token. For some years, the previous record had been held by a group of MIT students. A folk singer, with a memorable voice, named Barry McGuire had a smash hit on the Top 40 charts called, "The Eve of Destruction." And, who can forget Nancy Sinatra and "These Boots Are Made for Walking"?

Also that fall of '65, on the night of November the 9th, something else happened: the lights went out. It was a massive electrical power failure that blacked out New York City and the surrounding area. The nation's largest metropolis and one of the greatest cities in the world grappled with what to do, when just like that, the power goes out and everything goes to black. The story goes that a quick-thinking technician somewhere to the south, down around Maryland, threw a switch, or else the whole eastern seaboard of the country would have gone out, from Canada to Florida. I was out in Madison, New Jersey, a college student at Drew then, a little over an hour away from The City on the Erie-Lackawnna line. My landlady's husband was a young banker who worked for Manufacturers Hanover in Wall Street. No power for the trains that night. She knew he was stuck in The City.

As were a lot of people that cool November night. What to do? Well, one thing to reflect on how vulnerable we can be to things we take for granted. Another thing would be to catch up on your reading of vital statistics. As a matter of fact, another story goes that some 39 or 40 weeks after November 9, 1965, there was a big spike in births at New York City hospitals.

By Randy Summers