Kids from the past had a vision of today
Wednesday March 10 2010
ROCKET-POWERED Jet packs, time travel and holidays to the moon. These are some of the fancies that children of the 1980s may have had about life in 2010.
A local arts group called 'Bray Community Arts,' ran an essay competition in 1987 around the schools of Bray with the theme '2010 – a futuristic perspective.'
An article appeared in the Bray people on January 30, 1987 and was unearthed recently by Wolfe tone man Thomas Kane. 'I wonder who won the prize?' remarked Thomas.
Over 20 years ago, hundreds of local school children were invited to put pen to paper and write 2,010 words on the topic.
The project was the idea of group member, Jimmy Kelly, who explained that their aim was to stimulate imaginative thinking amongst local youngsters.
'How will we dress, how will we deal with illness, education, religion and what type of transport will we have?' said Jimmy, on the type of thing the children would write about.
'What about life expectancy, what will space flight be like and will there be close encounters of the third kind? Will anybody still have jobs and what kind? Will Dail Eireann still exist and in what form?'
Prizes included a £100 voucher for club travel, a £25 book token sponsored by the arts group and a £10 book token from the Bray Book Shop.
Jimmy told the Bray People at the time that the competition would be judged 'primarily on the scale of imagination applied.'
Winning entries were published in Artbeat, the Bray Community Arts Group magazine.
Anyone who has a copy of the magazine, or recalls entering the competition, can get in touch with the paper on mary.fogarty@peoplenews.ie or (01) 2867989.
