High Hopes

Written for the 1959 Frank Capra film A Hole in the Head, “High Hopes” won Cahn and Van Heusen the Academy Award for Best Original Song — their second Oscar together. Sinatra performed it with child actor Eddie Hodges in the film, and the single reached #30 on the Billboard Hot 100.

The song took on a life beyond Hollywood when John F. Kennedy adopted a revised version as his 1960 presidential campaign song, with Cahn rewriting the lyrics specifically for the campaign — one of the more unusual chapters in the history of the Great American Songbook.