About Third Rail
 1.
The Creation of the Original Third Rail Site
2. Third Rail Receives Grant Award
3. New Developments, New Horizons
4. Barbara Barnard & David Winn
The Creation of the Original Third Rail Site:
In our original plans for Third Rail, in the Spring of 1997, we focused on
two themes particularly; we hoped to bring to the web site both the energy
and the sense of community that we have experienced and tried to help foster
in the undergraduate creative writing program here at Hunter College. The
 name Third Rail was first proposed by webmaster Garrett
Mok in a planning meeting in March 1997, with the idea that we wanted the energy of
Hunter's writing students to be evident on the site (hence the notion of the electricity
which runs through the third rail on the subway tracks and powers the train). We
equipped our site with a bulletin board (called Turnstile) to help foster communication
and exchange of work and ideas among our students. We also hoped it would help us
keep in touch with alumni, as they are able to post questions to us, keep us informed of
their activities, and access announcements of events taking place on campus.
The idea which would grow into the Third Rail website was born in the winter
of 1997, when Prof. David Winn of the Hunter College English Department saw
an announcement about new grant money available for collaborative projects
involving computer technology. He suggested a collaboration between himself,
 English Department colleague Barbara Barnard, undergraduate
Jeremy Herman, and (as a technical advisor) a former student Garrett Mok, who is also
publisher of The 12-Gauge Review (http://www.12gauge.com),
which is edited and published by Hunter students and alumni. David wanted to
collaborate on a proposal to compete for a Hunter College Presidential Grant for
Instructional Design/Instructional Computing. President David Caputo awarded us a
$5,000 grant (for computer equipment and student stipend) in the late spring of 1997, and
we began designing the site. The grant was in place in the early fall, and we
launched Third Rail in October 1997. These grants-conceived by President David
Caputo and funded by private sources-are designed to encourage collaboration between
faculty members and undergraduate students, and working with us on the project are Jeremy
Herman, currently Managing Editor of The Olivetree Review (http://sapientia.hunter.cuny.edu/~olivetre/),
and (our technical advisor) Garrett Mok, a former Hunter student who is also Third
Rail's webmaster and web designer. Garrett has done extraordinary service to
Third Rail, designing the original site for its Fall 1997 inauguration, completely
redesigning it in the summer of 1999, and  serving as Third Rail's
webmaster throughout its existence. Garrett Mok is also the founder of a web
development company, InGaugeMedia, LLC,
which focuses on e-commerce and new media. (info@ingaugemedia.com).
Third Rail Receives Grant Award:
On May 4, 2000, Third Rail was awarded another $5,000 Presidential Grant from Hunter
College to assist with the funding of our publication from May 2000 through August 2002.
These grants are made possible through the generous support of the Hunter College
Foundation. Our plans to expand and enhance the Third Rail site include streaming audio
and video of student and faculty readings, increasing our publication of student fiction,
seeking submissions of student poetry and literary nonfiction, and providing more links
for literary research, internship opportunities, writers’ conferences and graduate
school information. Hunter Senior Ian Berger (who has worked with Time, Inc., Walt Disney
Publishing, and others) will be employed under the grant this year, to work together with
webmaster Garrett Mok and IngaugeMedia on the technical enhancements and expansion of the
site. And we are working with Hunter’s OICIT (Office of Instructional Computing and
Instructional Technology) to explore possibilities for purchasing an improved server for
Third Rail.
New Developments, New Horizons:
Third Rail has just broadened its collaborative efforts by joining forces
with Professor Gregg Morris of the Film and Media Department at Hunter, who
 edits and publishes The
Word (http://theword.hunter.cuny.edu/),
a website publishing the work of Hunter College journalism students, and a sister site
which was also initially begun with a Presidential grant from President Caputo. The
Word has since received other grants, including a $10,000 grant from the Ethics and
Excellence in Journalism Foundation. The Word has earned a great deal of recognition
within and outside of CUNY for its excellence and innovation in showcasing the work of
Hunter's journalism students. Third Rail and The Word are collaborating to seek
submissions from Hunter undergraduates which would broaden our publishing efforts
jointly. We are seeking grant funds to pursue a joint project, publishing fiction,
poetry, literary nonfiction and journalistic works online.
And we have broadened our collaborative efforts even more through a
multimedia relationship with Prof. Jorge Fuentes of the Hunter College SEEK
Program. Prof. Fuentes produces a CUNY/TV program entitled "Hunter in the
Round," for which The Word and Third Rail will be producing a series of
shows. Prof. Gregg Morris of The Word has produced numerous shows with Prof. Fuentes
already, and Third Rail just had its first on-camera experience in
December 1999, when Gregg Morris, David Winn and Barbara Barnard appeared on "Hunter
in the Round" to talk about our collaboration. Most importantly, the show
featured two Hunter undergraduate writers-Gowan Campbell and Suheir Hammad (author of
Drops of the Story and Born Palestinian, Born Black)-who read original poems. Some
shows in the works will feature published and prize-winning alumni of the Hunter
undergraduate creative writing program, as well as the incisive reporting of Hunter
journalism students.
We will soon be adding a Poetry Page to Third Rail, and we hope to be
enjoying a substantial expansion of the site as our collaboration with The
Word develops. Please come back often to visit. Don't miss the outstanding
short stories on our Cool Stop pages, all produced by Hunter College fiction
writers in our undergraduate workshops.
Barbara Barnard and David Winn
Co-Editors and Co-Publishers of Third Rail
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