The Public Interest

From CCNY to the White House

Colin L. Powell

Winter 1989

MY ODYSSEY began on a winter’s day in February 1954, when I entered City College at age 16 1/2--having just been graduated from Morris High School on Boston Road in the Bronx. I went to college for a single reason: my parents expected it. I don’t recall having had any great urge to get a higher education. I don’t even remember consciously thinking the matter through. I just recall that my parents expected it of me. And in those days when your parents expected something, it was what you had to do. In my family, especially, you did what your parents expected of you.

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