New York Intellect.

Economist (US), The, January, 1988

ALMOST from its beginnings, New York has spawned succeeding generations of intellectuals; they are virtually a separate class. In NEW YORK INTELLECT* Thomas Bender, a professor of history at New York University, sees New York city, or more accurately Manhattan, as the world's most modern and democratic metropolis; but he now regards it, sorrowfully, as a consumer rather than a generator of ideas.

New York's eminence was assured early. In the eighteenth century, although little more than a village, it was already influential in commerce and finance. A cadre of gentry hoped to promote New York to first place among the colonies' intellectual cities, and soon succeeded. They founded King's (later Columbia) College in the belief that scholarship was essential to...

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