Some great graffiti artists emerged in the '80s (Keith Haring and Jean-Michel Basquiat most famously), but a lot of the taggers in the '70s were more concerned with quantity than quality. (Image by Erik Calonius.)

Thanks to bungling by elected officials, New York City started to fall apart financially in the 1960s and it all came crashing down in the ’70s. Vandalism, crime and litter were only the most obvious signs of a city in decline, one that could no longer pay for its most basic services. Two years after this photo was taken, Gerald Ford told New York to “Drop Dead” (though he never really put it quite so harshly; the Daily News did), and we were left to fix our own problems. Ed Koch was far from perfect, but he was the first Mayor to begin cleaning up the mess, instituting bold quality-of-life measures. New subway cars were made with the type of surface that allowed city workers to quickly clean off graffiti paint, “litterpigs” were threatened with fines, pooper-scooper laws were passed and the renewal of Times Square took its first baby steps.