Contemporary-ness or Timeless-ness

Better in color or black & white? B&W adds a timelessness element to photos. They're kids in the photo, but perhaps they're grown ups now? Where as in color, I think of the kids as kids now.

While I'm editing, chugging along through the photos which are by default, color, I come across photos that make me think: Ooh, this will look good in B&W. Probably all photo editing programs have B&W conversion buttons. So, I convert to B&W, but it doesn't end there. I do additional tweaking - whitening the white and blackening of blacks to make the photo more contrasty. Otherwise, unless the subject is wearing white against a black background or vice versa, one winds up with a drab medium-grays picture.

I prefer this set of photos in B&W, because the set is more cohesive in B&W. Perhaps if the photos were separate, they'd be better in color.