The Fifty-Year Experiment

Abstract

I moved from London to Coral Gables in Florida about fifty years ago—and, like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz, the world turned Technicolor. I arrived in a town developed by the great visionary George Merrick, a community that most would now call a Norman Rockwell fantasy. As a kid, I could ride my bike anywhere, school was a walk away, and all my friends were local. At age six, I had independence—no playdates or organized sports, just a friendly neighborhood of shady streets, corner shops, and play areas in every vacant lot. After school, we managed our own time, lived out our fantasies, and shaped our own social worlds. In the past fifty years, that has all changed. Both parents are out working, the local stores are gone, bike-safe streets are rare, and a foreboding fear of abduction has locked down every kid’s life.

Over the past fifty years the physical and social fabric of our lives has changed radically, and our kids’ lives are a profound reflection of that change.