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119-497: In the mid-18th century, two descendants of New Amsterdam Dutch families, Johannes Coursen, and his wife, Gertrude Van Tuyle, arrived in the Fredon area. In 1763, Johannes Coursen purchased over 800 acres in the township. A log cabin was most likely the first building on the property. The Coursen mansion was built in 1805. It contained four rooms on the first floor with a chimney across the corner of two rooms. There were three bedrooms on

238-551: A Saw mill on East 74th Street and the East River, where a 13,710-meter (8.52 mi) long stream that began in the north of today's Central Park, which became known as the Saw Kill or Saw Kill Creek, emptied into the river. Later owners of the property George Elphinstone and Abraham Shotwell replaced the sawmill with a leather mill in 1677. The Saw Kill was later redirected into a culvert, arched over, and its trickling little stream

357-541: A bar association , but it fell apart in 1768 during the bitter political dispute between the factions based in the Delancey and Livingston families. A large fraction of the prominent lawyers were Loyalists; their clientele was often to royal authority or British merchants and financiers. They were not allowed to practice law unless they took a loyalty oath to the new United States of America. Many went to Britain or Canada (primarily to New Brunswick and Nova Scotia) after losing

476-445: A sawmill was located in the northern forest at what was later the corner of East 74th Street and Second Avenue , at which African slaves cut lumber. The New Amsterdam settlement had a population of approximately 270 people, including infants. In 1642 the new director Willem Kieft decided to build a stone church within the fort. The work was carried out by recent English immigrants, the brothers John and Richard Ogden. The church

595-628: A destructive storm surge to New York in the evening of October 29, 2012, flooding numerous streets, tunnels, and subway lines in Lower Manhattan. It flooded low-lying areas of Brooklyn, Queens, and Staten Island. Electrical power was lost in many parts of the city and its suburbs. Bill de Blasio became mayor in 2014. The city went into lockdown in March 2020 amidst the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic . As of December 2021 , New York City had experienced

714-491: A dose of Latin. Court proceedings became a baffling mystery to the ordinary layman. Lawyers became more specialized and built their reputation, and their fee schedule, on the basis of their reputation for success. But as their status, wealth and power rose, animosity grew even faster. By the 1750s and 1760s, there was a widespread attack ridiculing and demeaning the lawyers as pettifoggers (lawyers lacking sound legal skills). Their image and influence declined. The lawyers organized

833-537: A guide for organizing and gaining "Power to the People." By the 1970s the city had gained a reputation as a crime-ridden relic of history. In 1975, the city government avoided bankruptcy only through a federal loan and debt restructuring by the Municipal Assistance Corporation, headed by Felix Rohatyn . The city was also forced to accept increased financial scrutiny by an agency of New York State. In 1977,

952-527: A major seaport made it the prime target for British seizure in 1776. General George Washington lost a series of battles from which he narrowly escaped (with the notable exception of the Battle of Harlem Heights , his first victory of the war), and the British Army occupied New York and made it their base on the continent until late 1783, attracting Loyalist refugees. The city served as the national capital under

1071-770: A marshland swamp, with numerous streams and creeks throughout modern day Manhattan Island. The first human Inhabitants were by the Lenape people. These groups of culturally and linguistically related Native Americans traditionally spoke an Algonquian language now referred to as Unami . Early European settlers called bands of Lenape by the Unami place name for where they lived, such as " Raritan " in Staten Island and New Jersey , " Canarsee " in Brooklyn , and " Hackensack " in New Jersey across

1190-607: A mindset that resembles the American Dream were already present in the first few years of this colony. Writers like Russell Shorto argue that the large influence of New Amsterdam on the American psyche has largely been overlooked in the classic telling of American beginnings, because of animosity between the English victors and the conquered Dutch. The original 17th-century architecture of New Amsterdam has completely vanished (affected by

1309-518: A mixture of clay and sand. The fort also served as the center of trading activity. It contained a barracks, the church, a house for the West India Company director and a warehouse for the storage of company goods. Troops from the fort used the triangle between the Heerestraat and what came to be known as Whitehall Street for marching drills. Verhulst, with his council, was responsible for

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1428-461: A plan to construct an expressway through Lower Manhattan . After a short war boom, the Bronx declined from 1950 to 1985, going from predominantly moderate-income to mostly lower-income, with high rates of violent crime and poverty. The Bronx has experienced an economic and developmental resurgence starting in the late 1980s that continues into today. The transition away from the industrial base toward

1547-423: A post office and was the first postmaster. He added a first floor parlor and two more bedrooms upstairs as the family grew. After Isaac's death, the postmaster position was taken over by his son, William P. Coursen until 1881. The Coursen House was purchased by Fredon Township as part of developing the next door Lodestar Park. Keepers of Coursens Corners, was formed in 2001 to begin the restoration. The objective of

1666-542: A reservoir to supply the city for the first time. The Great Irish Famine (1845–1850) brought a large influx of Irish immigrants, and by 1850 the Irish comprised one quarter of the city's population. Government institutions, including the New York City Police Department and the public schools , were established in the 1840s and 1850s to respond to growing demands of residents. In 1831, New York University

1785-441: A service economy picked up speed, while the jobs in the large shipbuilding and garment industries declined sharply. The ports converted to container ships, costing many traditional jobs among longshoremen. Many large corporations moved their headquarters to the suburbs or to distant cities. At the same time, there was enormous growth in services, especially finance, education, medicine, tourism, communications and law. New York remained

1904-594: A set of documents that have survived from that period, untranslated. They are the administrative records of the colony, unreadable by most scholars. Since the 1970s, Charles Gehring of the New Netherland Institute has made it his life's work to translate this first-hand history of the Colony of New Netherland. The scholarly conclusion has largely been that the settlement of New Amsterdam is much more like current New York than previously thought. Cultural diversity and

2023-593: A squadron of ships from Zeeland. The commanders were Jacob Benckes (Koudum, 1637–1677) and Cornelis Evertsen de Jongste (Vlissingen, 1642–1706) under instruction of the States General of the Dutch Republic . Anthony Colve was installed as the first Dutch governor of the province. Previously there had only been West India Company Directors and a Director-General. Amidst the recapture, New York City would be again renamed, this time to New Orange . However, after

2142-413: A steady boom period during 1898–1929, with a population growth by a factor of six from 200,000 in 1900 to 1.3 million in 1930. The Great Depression created a surge of unemployment, especially among the working class, and a slow-down of growth. On June 15, 1904, over 1,000 people, mostly German immigrant women and children, were killed when the excursion steamship General Slocum caught fire and sank. It

2261-716: A voyage of 64 days. For a variety of reasons, primarily a shortage of supplies, Mayflower could not proceed to the Hudson River, and the colonists decided to settle near Cape Cod, establishing the Plymouth Colony . The mouth of the Hudson River was selected as the ideal place for initial settlement as it had easy access to the ocean while also securing an ice-free lifeline to the beaver trading post near present-day Albany. Here, Indigenous hunters supplied them with pelts in exchange for European-made trade goods and wampum , which

2380-464: A while, New York ranked as the most populous city in the world, overtaking London in 1925, which had reigned for a century. During the difficult years of the Great Depression, the reformer Fiorello La Guardia was elected as mayor, and Tammany Hall fell after eighty years of political dominance. Despite the effects of the Great Depression, some of the world's tallest skyscrapers were built during

2499-666: A world where the city remained Dutch until the Napoleonic Wars and retained its name also afterward. One of New York's Broadway theatres is the New Amsterdam Theatre . The name New Amsterdam is also written on the architrave situated on top of the row of columns in front of the Manhattan Municipal Building , commemorating the name of the Dutch colony. Although no architectural monuments or buildings have survived,

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2618-571: Is the city's worst maritime disaster. On March 25, 1911, the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire in Greenwich Village took the lives of 146 garment workers. In response, the city made great advancements in the fire department, building codes, and workplace regulations. Throughout the first half of the 20th century, the city became a world center for industry, commerce, and communication, marking its rising influence with such events as

2737-719: The Articles of Confederation from 1785 to 1789, and briefly served as the new nation's capital in 1789–90 under the United States Constitution . Under the new government, the city hosted the inauguration of George Washington as the first President of the United States, the drafting of the United States Bill of Rights , and the first Supreme Court of the United States . The opening of the Erie Canal New York and

2856-509: The Counts of Angoulême . The first recorded exploration by the Dutch of the area around what is now called New York Bay was in 1609 with the voyage of the ship Halve Maen (English: "Half Moon"), commanded by Henry Hudson in the service of the Dutch Republic, as the emissary of Maurice of Nassau, Prince of Orange and stadholder of Holland. Hudson named the river the Mauritius River. He

2975-692: The Dutch with the New Amsterdam Trail. The Dutch-American historian and journalist Hendrik Willem van Loon wrote in 1933 a work of alternative history entitled "If the Dutch Had Kept Nieuw Amsterdam" (in If, Or History Rewritten , edited by J. C. Squire , 1931, Simon & Schuster ). A similar theme, at greater length, was taken up by writer Elizabeth Bear , who published the " New Amsterdam " series of detective stories that take place in

3094-546: The Dutch West India Company to formulate a plan to protect the entrance to the Hudson River. In 1624, 30 families were sponsored by Dutch West India Company moving from Nut Island to Manhattan Island, where a citadel to contain Fort Amsterdam was being laid out by Cryn Frederickz van Lobbrecht at the direction of Willem Verhulst . By the end of 1625, the site had been staked out directly south of Bowling Green on

3213-629: The Erie Canal in 1825, which connected the Atlantic port to the vast agricultural markets of the Midwestern United States and Canada . By 1835, New York had surpassed Philadelphia as the largest city in the United States. New York grew as an economic center, first as a result of Alexander Hamilton 's policies and practices as the first Secretary of the Treasury . In 1842, water was piped from

3332-569: The Great Lakes , along with coastal traffic to lower New England, making the city the preeminent port on the Atlantic Ocean. The arrival of rail connections to the north and west in the 1840s and 1850s strengthened its central role. Beginning in the mid-19th century, waves of new immigrants arrived from Europe dramatically changing the composition of the city and serving as workers in the expanding industries. Modern New York traces its development to

3451-653: The Hudson River from Lower Manhattan . Some modern place names such as Raritan Bay and Canarsie are derived from Lenape names. Eastern Long Island neighbors were culturally and linguistically more closely related to the Mohegan - Pequot peoples of New England who spoke the Mohegan-Montauk-Narragansett language . These peoples made use of the abundant waterways in the New York region for fishing, hunting trips, trade, and occasionally war. Many paths created by

3570-505: The Hudson-Fulton Celebration of 1909. Interborough Rapid Transit (the first New York City Subway company) began operating in 1904, and the railroads operating out of Grand Central Terminal and Pennsylvania Station thrived. From 1918 to 1920, New York City was affected by the largest rent strike wave in its history. Somewhere between several tens of thousands and hundreds of thousands of tenants went on strike across

3689-626: The Meatpacking District and Chelsea (in Manhattan) and Williamsburg (in Brooklyn). New York's population reached an all-time high in the 2000 census ; according to census estimates since 2000, the city has continued to grow, including rapid growth in the most urbanized borough, Manhattan. During this period, New York City was a site of the September 11 attacks of 2001; 2,606 people who were in

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3808-561: The Nicasius de Sille List of 1660, which enumerates all the citizens of New Amsterdam and their addresses, it can be determined who resided in every house. The city map known as the Duke's Plan probably derived from the same 1660 census as the Castello Plan. The Duke's Plan includes two outlying areas of development on Manhattan along the top of the plan. The work was created for James (1633–1701),

3927-614: The Treaty of Westminster . The colony benefited from increased immigration from Europe and its population grew faster. The Bolting Act of 1678, whereby no mill outside the city was permitted to grind wheat or corn, boosted growth until its repeal in 1694, increasing the number of houses over the period from 384 to 983. In the context of the Glorious Revolution in England, Jacob Leisler led Leisler's Rebellion and effectively controlled

4046-662: The West , Atlanta dominated the South , Boston dominated New England ; Chicago dominated the Midwest United States . New York City dominated the entire nation in terms of communications, trade, finance, popular culture, and high culture. More than a fourth of the 300 largest corporations in 1920 were headquartered here. In 1898, the modern City of New York was formed with the consolidation of Brooklyn (until then an independent city), Manhattan , and outlying areas. Manhattan and

4165-502: The fires of 1776 and 1835 ), leaving only archaeological remnants. The original street plan of New Amsterdam has stayed largely intact, as have some houses outside Manhattan. The presentation of the legacy of the unique culture of 17th-century New Amsterdam remains a concern of preservationists and educators. In 2009 the National Park Service celebrated the 400th anniversary of Henry Hudson 's 1609 voyage on behalf of

4284-453: The wall of Wall Street , and neither the remainder of the island of Manhattan nor of wider New Netherland fell under its definition. In 1524, nearly a century before the arrival of the Dutch, the site that would later become New Amsterdam was named Nouvelle Angoulême by the Italian explorer Giovanni da Verrazzano , to commemorate his patron King Francis I of France , whose family consisted of

4403-563: The "legal and cultural DNA" of the Republic of the United Netherlands, including progressive values such as freedom of conscience and tolerance, which were foundational to the culture of early New Netherland. Compared to many parts of Europe at that time, New Netherland embraced a relatively progressive philosophy of inclusion, allowing various nationalities, religions, and races to coexist. The ideals of popular sovereignty and free trade formed

4522-405: The 1700s, New York was sometimes referred to as a breadbasket colony, because one of its major crops was wheat. New York colony also exported other goods included iron ore as a raw material and as manufactured goods such as tools, plows, nails and kitchen items such as kettles, pans and pots. Prior to the first human settlement, the area that eventually encompassed modern day New York was originally

4641-412: The 1740s, 20% of the residents of New York were slaves , totaling about 2,500 people. After a series of fires in 1741, the city panicked over rumors of its black population conspiring with some poor whites to burn the city . Historians believe their alarm was mostly fabrication and fear, but officials rounded up 31 black and 4 white people, who over a period of months were convicted of arson. Of these,

4760-527: The 1930s. Art Deco architecture —such as the iconic Chrysler Building , Empire State Building , and 30 Rockefeller Plaza — came to define the city's skyline. The construction of the Rockefeller Center occurred in the 1930s and was the largest-ever private development project at the time. Both before and especially after World War II, vast areas of the city were also reshaped by the construction of bridges, parks and parkways coordinated by Robert Moses ,

4879-534: The 1930s. Public-minded members of the merchant community pressed for a Central Park , which was opened to a design competition in 1857; it became the first landscape park in an American city. During the American Civil War (1861–1865), the city was affected by its history of strong commercial ties to the South ; before the war, half of its exports were related to cotton, including textiles from upstate mills. Together with its growing immigrant population, which

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4998-534: The 1990s. Neighborhood restoration projects funded by the city and state had very good effects for New York, especially Bedford-Stuyvesant , Harlem, and The Bronx. The city later resumed its social and economic recovery, bolstered by the influx of Asians, Latin Americans, and U.S. citizens, and by new crime-fighting techniques on the part of the New York Police Department . In 1989 , David Dinkins became

5117-510: The Bronx were established as two separate boroughs and joined with three other boroughs created from parts of adjacent counties to form the new municipal government originally called "Greater New York". The Borough of Brooklyn incorporated the independent City of Brooklyn, recently joined to Manhattan by the Brooklyn Bridge ; the Borough of Queens was created from western Queens County (with

5236-521: The Duke of York and Albany, after whom New York , New York City , and New York's Capital – Albany , were named just after the seizure of New Amsterdam by the English . After that provisional relinquishment of New Netherland, Stuyvesant reported to his superiors that he "had endeavored to promote the increase of population, agriculture and commerce...the flourishing condition which might have been more flourishing if

5355-525: The Duke, and Fort Orange was renamed " Fort Albany ". The war ended in a Dutch victory in 1667, but the colony remained under English rule as stipulated in the Treaty of Breda . During the Third Anglo-Dutch War , the Dutch briefly recaptured the city in 1673, renaming the city "New Orange", before permanently ceding the colony of New Netherland to England for what is now Suriname in November 1674 at

5474-455: The Dutch. After the seizure of the colony in 1664, the slave trade continued to be legal. In 1703, 42% of the New York households had slaves; they served as domestic servants and laborers but also became involved in skilled trades, shipping and other fields. Yet following reform in ethics according to American Enlightenment thought, by the 1770s slaves made up less than 25% of the population. By

5593-682: The English took over New Amsterdam and renamed it New York after the Duke of York (later James II & VII ). After the Second Anglo-Dutch War of 1665–67, England and the United Provinces of the Netherlands agreed to the status quo in the Treaty of Breda . The English kept the island of Manhattan, the Dutch giving up their claim to the town and the rest of the colony, while the English formally abandoned Surinam in South America, and

5712-720: The Englishman Henry Hudson , in the employ of the Dutch East India Company , sailed the Half Moon through the Narrows into Upper New York Bay. Like Christopher Columbus , Hudson was looking for a westerly passage to Asia . He never found one, but he did take note of the abundant beaver population. Beaver pelts were in fashion in Europe, fueling a lucrative business. Hudson's report on the regional beaver population served as

5831-651: The Italian Giovanni da Verrazzano in 1524. European settlement began with the Dutch in 1608 and New Amsterdam was founded in 1624. The " Sons of Liberty " campaigned against British authority in New York City , and the Stamp Act Congress of representatives from throughout the Thirteen Colonies met in the city in 1765 to organize resistance to Crown policies. The city's strategic location and status as

5950-410: The Munsee were fired upon as they were preparing to depart. This triggered attacks on Pavonia and Staten Island . Stuyvesant reported 28 farms destroyed, 40 deaths and 100 captives taken in what later became known as the Peach War . In 1661, the Communipaw ferry was founded and began a long history of trans-Hudson ferry and ultimately rail and road transportation. In 1664, Jan van Bonnel built

6069-510: The New World, were thoroughly documented in city maps . During the time of New Netherland's colonization, the Dutch were the pre-eminent cartographers in Europe. The delegated authority of the Dutch West India Company over New Netherland required maintaining sovereignty on behalf of the States General, generating cash flow through commercial enterprise for its shareholders, and funding the province's growth. Thus its directors regularly required that censuses be taken. These tools to measure and monitor

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6188-436: The archaeology of New York City. For instance, the Castello map aided the excavation of the Stadthuys ( City Hall ) of New Amsterdam in determining the exact location of the building. The maps enable a precise reconstruction of the town. Fort Amsterdam was located at the southernmost tip of the island of Manhattan, which today is surrounded by Bowling Green. The Battery is a reference to its battery of cannon. Broadway

6307-457: The attorneys. By the 1760s, the situation had dramatically changed. Lawyers were essential to the rapidly growing international trade, dealing with questions of partnerships, contracts, and insurance. The sums of money involved were large, and hiring an incompetent lawyer was a very expensive proposition. Lawyers were now professionally trained, and conversant in an extremely complex language that combined highly specific legal terms and motions with

6426-418: The backbone of this diverse society, setting it apart from other colonial powers. However, despite these advanced ideals, the colony also engaged in practices that reflected the broader colonial context, such as the mistreatment of Indigenous populations and the introduction of slavery in 1626. These actions show that while the early settlers were ahead of their time in embracing tolerance, they were also part of

6545-417: The bay. Historians estimate that at the time of European settlement, approximately 5,000 Lenape lived in 80 settlements around the region. The first European visitor to the area was Giovanni da Verrazzano , an Italian in command of the French ship La Dauphine in 1524. It is believed he sailed into Upper New York Bay , where he encountered native Lenape, returned through the Narrows , where he anchored

6664-409: The bottom quarter of Manhattan, known then as the Manhattoes , for 60 guilders ' worth of trade goods. Minuit conducted the transaction with the Canarse chief Seyseys, who was only too happy to accept valuable merchandise in exchange for an island that was actually mostly controlled by the Weckquaesgeeks. An official letter of November 7, 1626 in which Pieter Schagen informed the States General of

6783-499: The calculation is that the value of goods in the area would have been different from the value of those same goods in the developed market of the Netherlands. The Dutch introduced windmills first at Noten Eylandt for a sawmill, to exploit the stand of hardwoods found there. Later they exploited the hydropower of existing creeks by constructing mills at Turtle Bay (between present-day East 45th–48th Streets) and Montagne's Kill, later called Harlem Mill Creek (East 108th Street). In 1639

6902-420: The city and surrounding areas from 1689 to 1691, before being arrested and executed. In New York at first, legal practitioners were full-time businessmen and merchants, with no legal training, who had watched a few court proceedings, and mostly used their own common sense together with snippets they had picked up about English law . Court proceedings were quite informal, for the judges had no more training than

7021-498: The city executed 13 black people by burning them alive and hanged the remainder of those incriminated. In 1754, Columbia University was founded under charter by King George II as King's College in Lower Manhattan . The Stamp Act and other British measures fomented dissent, particularly among Sons of Liberty who maintained a long-running skirmish with locally stationed British troops over Liberty Poles from 1766 to 1776. The Stamp Act Congress met in New York City in 1765 in

7140-453: The city that day, as the last British forces left the city . Starting in 1785 the Congress met in the city of New York under the Articles of Confederation . In 1789, New York became the first national capital under the new Constitution . The Constitution also created the current Congress of the United States , and its first sitting was at Federal Hall on Wall Street. The first Supreme Court sat there. The United States Bill of Rights

7259-405: The city was struck by the New York City blackout of 1977 and serial slayings by the Son of Sam . Ed Koch became mayor in 1978. The 1980s began a rebirth of Wall Street , and the city reclaimed its role at the center of the worldwide financial industry. Unemployment and crime remained high, the latter reaching peak levels in some categories around the close of the decade and the beginning of

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7378-531: The city's first Black mayor. He came out of the Gang of Four . Rudy Giuliani became mayor in 1994. In the late 1990s, the city benefited from the nationwide fall of violent crime rates, the resurgence of the finance industry, and the growth of the " Silicon Alley ", during the dot com boom , one of the factors in a decade of booming real estate values. New York was also able to attract more business and convert abandoned industrialized neighborhoods into arts or attractive residential neighborhoods; examples include

7497-402: The city. A WW1 housing and coal shortage sparked the strikes. It became marked both by occasional violent scuffles and the Red Scare . It would lead to the passage of the first rent laws in the nation's history. The city was a destination for internal migrants as well as immigrants. Through 1940, New York was a major destination for African Americans during the Great Migration from

7616-400: The colonial government in New Netherland . The initial trading factory gave rise to the settlement around Fort Amsterdam . The fort was situated on the strategic southern tip of the island of Manhattan and was meant to defend the fur trade operations of the Dutch West India Company in the North River ( Hudson River ). In 1624, it became a provincial extension of the Dutch Republic and

7735-403: The colonial systems that perpetuated injustice and exploitation​. The WIC ordered engineer and surveyor Crijn Fredericxsz for the construction of Fort Amsterdam . A fortification was completed in 1626. The families were then dispersed to Fort Wilhelmus on Verhulsten Island ( Burlington Island ) in the South River (now the Delaware River ), to Kievitshoek (now Old Saybrook, Connecticut ) at

7854-432: The command of Col. Richard Nicolls sailed into New Amsterdam's harbor and demanded New Netherland 's surrender, as part of an effort by King Charles II 's brother James, Duke of York , the Lord High Admiral to provoke the Second Anglo-Dutch War . Two weeks later, Stuyvesant officially capitulated by signing Articles of Surrender and in June 1665, the town was reincorporated under English law and renamed "New York" after

7973-470: The consolidation of the five boroughs in 1898 and an economic and building boom following the Great Depression and World War II . Throughout its history, New York has served as a main port of entry for many immigrants , and its cultural and economic influence has made it one of the most important urban areas in the United States and the world. The economy in the 1700s was based on farming, local production, fur trading, and Atlantic jobs like shipbuilding. In

8092-413: The entire war. Consequently, the area also became the focal point for Washington's espionage and intelligence-gathering throughout the war. New York was greatly damaged twice by fires of suspicious origin, with the Loyalists and Patriots accusing each other of starting the conflagration. The city became the political and military center of operations for the British in North America for the remainder of

8211-470: The first Spanish Colony in the Americas. Allegedly of Portuguese and African descent, he arrived on Manhattan Island during the winter of 1613–1614 under the command of Thijs Volckenz Mossel captain of the Jonge Tobias , trapping beavers and trading with the local population as a representative of the Dutch East India Company. He is the first recorded non-Indigenous inhabitant of what would eventually become New York City. The territory of New Netherland

8330-421: The first organized resistance to British authority across the colonies. After the major defeat of the Continental Army in the Battle of Long Island in late 1776, General George Washington withdrew to Manhattan Island, but with the subsequent defeat at the Battle of Fort Washington the island was effectively left to the British. The city became a haven for loyalist refugees, becoming a British stronghold for

8449-424: The first stop for millions seeking a new and better life in the United States, a role acknowledged by the dedication of the Statue of Liberty in 1886. From 1890 to 1930, the largest cities, led by New York, were the focus of international attention. The skyscrapers and tourist attractions were widely publicized. Suburbs were emerging as bedroom communities for commuters to the central city. San Francisco dominated

8568-503: The greatest proponent of automobile-centered modernist urbanism in America. Returning World War II veterans and immigrants from Europe created a postwar economic boom. Demands for new housing were aided by the G.I. Bill for veterans, stimulating the development of huge suburban tracts in eastern Queens and Nassau County. The city was extensively photographed during the post–war years by photographer Todd Webb . New York emerged from

8687-620: The impetus for the founding of Dutch trading colonies in the New World . The beaver’s importance in New York’s history is reflected by its use on the city’s official seal. The first Dutch fur trading posts and settlements were in 1614 near present-day Albany, New York , the same year that New Netherland first appeared on maps. Only in May 1624 did the Dutch West India Company land a number of families at Noten Eylant (today's Governors Island ) off

8806-497: The indigenous peoples are now main thoroughfares, such as Broadway in Manhattan , the Bronx , and Westchester . The Lenape developed sophisticated techniques of hunting and managing their resources. By the time of the arrival of Europeans, they were cultivating fields of vegetation through the slash and burn technique, which extended the productive life of planted fields. They also harvested vast quantities of fish and shellfish from

8925-559: The island of Run in the East Indies to the Dutch, confirming their control of the valuable Spice Islands . The area occupied by New Amsterdam is now Lower Manhattan . The indigenous Munsee term for the southern tip of the island was Manhattoe , and variations of this name were also applied to the first Dutch settlement there. With the construction of Fort Amsterdam , the town also became variously known as "Amsterdam" or "New Amsterdam". New Amsterdam's city limits did not extend north of

9044-568: The largest city and largest metropolitan area in the United States, and continued as its largest financial, commercial, information, and cultural center. Like many major U.S. cities, New York suffered race riots, gang wars and some population decline in the late 1960s. Street activists and minority groups such as the Black Panthers and Young Lords organized rent strikes and garbage offensives, demanding improved city services for poor areas. They also set up free health clinics and other programs, as

9163-466: The law of the ship had applied. On May 20, 1624, the first settlers in New Netherland arrived on Noten Eylandt (Nut or Nutten Island, now Governors Island ) aboard the ship Nieu Nederlandt under the command of Cornelius Jacobsen May , who disembarked on the island with thirty families to take legal possession of the New Netherland territory. The landing on Governors Island in 1624 brought with it

9282-580: The legacy lived on in the form of Dutch Colonial Revival architecture . A number of structures in New York City were constructed in the 19th and 20th centuries in this style, such as Wallabout Market in Brooklyn, South William Street in Manhattan, West End Collegiate Church at West 77th Street, and others. New Angoul%C3%AAme The written history of New York City began with the first European explorer,

9401-553: The liberty of their consciences in religion", negotiated with the English by Peter Stuyvesant and his council.) Sometimes considered a dysfunctional trading post by the English who later acquired it from the Dutch, Russell Shorto , author of The Island at the Center of the World , suggests that the city left its cultural marks on later New York and, by extension, the United States as a whole. Major recent historical research has been based on

9520-571: The mouth of the Verse River (now the Connecticut River ) and further north at Fort Nassau on the Mauritius or North River (now the Hudson River ), near what is now Albany. A fort and sawmill were soon erected at Nut Island. The windmill was constructed by Franchoys Fezard and was taken apart for iron in 1648. The threat of attack from other European colonial powers prompted the directors of

9639-475: The newly discovered and mapped territory New Netherland for the first time. It also showed the first year-round trading presence in New Netherland, Fort Nassau , which would be replaced in 1624 by Fort Orange, which eventually grew into the town of Beverwijck , renamed Albany in 1664. Spanish trader Juan Rodriguez (rendered in Dutch as Jan Rodrigues), was born in the Captaincy General of Santo Domingo ,

9758-599: The night of April 17, and left to continue his voyage. He named the area New Angoulême ( La Nouvelle-Angoulême ) in honor of Francis I , King of France of the royal house of Valois-Angoulême and who had been Count of Angoulême from 1496 until his coronation in 1515. The name refers to the town of Angoulême , in the Charente département of France . For the next century, the area was occasionally visited by fur traders or explorers, such as by Esteban Gomez in 1525. European exploration continued on September 2, 1609, when

9877-517: The now afflicted inhabitants had been protected by a suitable garrison...and had been helped with the long sought for settlement of the boundary, or in default thereof had they been seconded with the oft besought reinforcement of men and ships against the continual troubles, threats, encroachments and invasions of the British neighbors and government of Hartford Colony, our too powerful enemies". The existence of these city maps has proven to be very useful in

9996-470: The original Dutch place names have been retained, most notably Flushing (after the Dutch town of Vlissingen ), Harlem (after Haarlem ), and Brooklyn (after Breukelen ). Few buildings, however, remain from the 17th century. The oldest recorded house still in existence in New York, the Pieter Claesen Wyckoff House in Brooklyn, dates from 1652. On August 27, 1664, four English frigates under

10115-540: The province's progress were accompanied by accurate maps and plans. These surveys, as well as grassroots activities to seek redress of grievances, account for the existence of some of the most important of the early documents. There is a particularly detailed city map called the Castello Plan produced in 1660. Virtually every structure in New Amsterdam at the time is believed to be represented, and by cross-referencing

10234-434: The purchase (by Peter Minuit ) of Manhattan ("'t eylant Manhettes", groot 11000 morgen ) from the "wilden" (wild ones). This area amounts to 94 square kilometres (36 sq mi). Schagen also mentioned the successful first harvest and the shipload of 7,246 beaver skins ( Nationaal Archief , The Hague ). For a transcription of the text, see Schagenbrief and Transcriptie Schagenbrief The deed itself has not survived, so

10353-470: The remnant established as Nassau County in 1899); and the Borough of Richmond contained all of Richmond County . Municipal governments contained within the boroughs were abolished, and the county governmental functions were absorbed by the city or each borough. In 1914, the New York State Legislature created Bronx County, making five counties coterminous with the five boroughs. The Bronx had

10472-408: The restoration was to create a museum in the house. 41°02′06″N 74°49′00″W  /  41.035098°N 74.816653°W  / 41.035098; -74.816653 New Amsterdam New Amsterdam ( Dutch : Nieuw Amsterdam , pronounced [ˌniu.ɑmstərˈdɑm] ) was a 17th-century Dutch settlement established at the southern tip of Manhattan Island that served as the seat of

10591-523: The rule of the Gilded Age barons. As the city's demographics temporarily stabilized, labor unionization helped the working class gain new protections and middle-class affluence, the city's government and infrastructure underwent a dramatic overhaul under Fiorello La Guardia , and his controversial parks commissioner, Robert Moses , ended the blight of many tenement areas, expanded new parks, remade streets, and restricted and reorganized zoning controls . For

10710-528: The rural American South. The Harlem Renaissance flourished during the 1920s and the era of Prohibition . New York's ever accelerating changes and rising crime and poverty rates were reduced after World War I disrupted trade routes, the Immigration Restriction Acts limited additional immigration after the war, and the Great Depression reduced the need for new labor. The combination ended

10829-449: The second floor. The kitchen, located on the southern end of the house, had a large bake oven to the right of the chimney. When Johannes Coursen died, his property was divided between his two sons. The Paulinskill Mill Farm went to Jacob Coursen and the four-corners land to John Coursen. In 1811, Colonel John's sons built and operated a blacksmith's shop, a tannery , a store, and later a tailor shop. His son, Isaac Coursen, established

10948-413: The selection of Manhattan as a permanent place of settlement and for situating Fort Amsterdam. He was replaced as the company director of New Netherland by Peter Minuit in 1626. According to the writer Nathaniel Benchley, to legally safeguard the settlers' investments, possessions and farms on Manhattan island, Minuit negotiated the "purchase" of Manhattan from a band of Canarse from Brooklyn who occupied

11067-484: The signing of the Treaty of Westminster in February 1674, both the Dutch territories were relinquished to the English. With the effective transfer of control on 10 November 1674 (N.S.), the names New Netherland and New Orange reverted to the English versions of "New York" and "New York City", respectively. Suriname became an official Dutch possession in return. The beginnings of New Amsterdam, unlike most other colonies in

11186-455: The site of the present U.S. Custom House . The Mohawk-Mahican War in the Hudson Valley led the company to relocate even more settlers to the vicinity of the new Fort Amsterdam. In the end, colonizing was a prohibitively expensive undertaking, only partly subsidized by the fur trade. This led to a scaling back of the original plans. By 1628, a smaller fort was constructed with walls containing

11305-592: The southern tip of Manhattan at the mouth of the North River (today's Hudson River). Soon thereafter, most likely in 1626, construction of Fort Amsterdam began. Later, the Dutch West Indies Company imported African slaves to serve as laborers; they were forced to build the wall that defended the town against English and Indian attacks. Early directors included Willem Verhulst and Peter Minuit . Willem Kieft became director in 1638 but five years later

11424-459: The specific details are unknown. A textual reference to the deed became the foundation for the legend that Minuit had purchased Manhattan from the Native Americans for twenty-four dollars' worth of trinkets and beads, the guilder rate at the time being about two and a half to a Spanish dollar . The price of 60 Dutch guilders in 1626 amounts to around $ 1,100 in 2012 dollars. Further complicating

11543-750: The summer of 1654 directly from Holland, with passports that gave them permission to trade in the colony. Then in early September, 23 Jewish refugees arrived from the Brazilian city of Recife , which had been conquered by the Portuguese in January 1654. The director-general of New Netherland, Peter Stuyvesant , sought to turn them away but was ultimately overruled by the directors of the Dutch West India Company in Amsterdam. Asser Levy , an Ashkenazi Jew who

11662-495: The towers and in the surrounding area were killed by a terrorist attack on the World Trade Center , an event considered highly traumatic for the city but which did not stop the city's rapid regrowth. On November 3, 2014, One World Trade Center opened on the site of the attack. Michael Bloomberg became mayor in 2002. The Occupy Wall Street protest movement happened in New York City in 2011. Hurricane Sandy brought

11781-501: The typical grid become enforced long after the town ceased to be Dutch. Most of the Financial District overlaps with New Amsterdam and has retained its original street layout. The 1625 date of the founding of New Amsterdam is now commemorated in the official Seal of New York City . (Formerly, the year on the seal was 1664, the year of the provisional Articles of Transfer, assuring New Netherlanders that they "shall keep and enjoy

11900-435: The valuable sugar plantations and factories captured by them that year on the coast of Surinam , giving them full control over the coast of what is now Guyana and Suriname . On 9 August 1673 ( N.S. ; 30 July 1673 (O.S.)), during the Third Anglo-Dutch War , the Dutch quickly but briefly retook the colony of New Netherland, which the English called "New York", with a combined fleet of a squadron of ships from Amsterdam and

12019-618: The war as the leading city of the world, with Wall Street leading the United States ascendancy. In 1951, the United Nations relocated from its first headquarters in Flushing Meadows Park , Queens, to the East Side of Manhattan . During the late 1960s, the views of real estate developer and city leader Robert Moses began to fall out of favor as the anti- urban renewal views of Jane Jacobs gained popularity. Citizen rebellion stopped

12138-488: The war. For the next century, various attempts were made, and failed, to build an effective organization of lawyers. Finally a Bar Association emerged in 1869 that proved successful and continues to operate. By 1700, the Lenape population of New York had diminished to 200. The Dutch West Indies Company transported African slaves to the post as trading laborers used to build the fort and stockade, and some gained freedom under

12257-561: The war. Continental Army officer Nathan Hale was hanged in Manhattan for espionage . In addition, the British began to hold the majority of captured American prisoners of war aboard prison ships in Wallabout Bay , across the East River in Brooklyn . More Americans lost their lives aboard these ships than died in all the battles of the war. The British occupation lasted until November 25, 1783. George Washington triumphantly returned to

12376-429: Was castoreum —the secretion of the animals' anal glands—which was used for its medicinal properties and for perfumes. The expeditions by Adriaen Block and Hendrick Christiaensen in 1611, 1612, 1613 and 1614, resulted in the surveying and charting of the region from the 38th parallel to the 45th parallel . On their 1614 map, which gave them a four-year trade monopoly under a patent of the States General , they named

12495-480: Was also covertly attempting to find the Northwest Passage for the Dutch East India Company . Instead, he brought back news about the possibility of exploitation of beaver by the Dutch who sent commercial, private missions to the area the following years. At the time, beaver pelts were highly prized in Europe, because the fur could be felted to make waterproof hats. A by-product of the trade in beaver pelts

12614-575: Was angry about conscription , sympathies among residents were divided for both the Union and Confederacy at the outbreak of war. Tensions related to the war culminated in the Draft Riots of 1863 led by Irish Catholics, who attacked black neighborhood and abolitionist homes. Many blacks left the city and moved to Brooklyn. After the Civil War, the rate of immigration from Europe grew steeply, and New York became

12733-446: Was called Arch Brook. On August 27, 1664, while England and the Dutch Republic were at peace, four English frigates sailed into New Amsterdam's harbor and demanded New Netherland's surrender, effecting the bloodless capture of New Amsterdam . On September 6, the local Dutch deciding not to offer resistance, Stuyvesant's lawyer Johannes de Decker and five other delegates signed the official Articles of Surrender of New Netherland . This

12852-453: Was designated as the capital of the province in 1625. New Amsterdam became a city when it received municipal rights on February 2, 1653. By 1655, the population of New Netherland had grown to 2,000 people, with 1,500 living in New Amsterdam. By 1664, the population of New Netherland had risen to almost 9,000 people, 2,500 of whom lived in New Amsterdam, 1,000 lived near Fort Orange , and the remainder in other towns and villages. In 1664,

12971-468: Was drafted and ratified there. George Washington was inaugurated at Federal Hall. New York remained the national capital until 1790, when the role was transferred to Philadelphia. During the 19th century, the city was transformed by immigration , a visionary development proposal called the Commissioners' Plan of 1811 which expanded the city street grid to encompass all of Manhattan, and the opening of

13090-516: Was embroiled in Kieft's War against the Native Americans. The Pavonia Massacre , across the Hudson River in present-day Jersey City , resulted in the death of 80 natives in February 1643. Following the massacre, Algonquian tribes joined forces and nearly defeated the Dutch. Holland sent additional forces to the aid of Kieft, leading to the overwhelming defeat of the Native Americans and a peace treaty on August 29, 1645. On May 27, 1647, Peter Stuyvesant

13209-663: Was finished in 1645 and stood until destroyed in the Slave Insurrection of 1741 . A pen-and-ink view of New Amsterdam, drawn on-the-spot and discovered in the map collection of the Austrian National Library in Vienna in 1991, provides a unique view of New Amsterdam as it appeared from Capske (small Cape) Rock in 1648. It was associated with Adriaen van der Donck 's Remonstrance of New Netherland , and may have inspired later views as by Claes Jansz. Visscher . Capske Rock

13328-484: Was founded by U.S. Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin as a non-denominal institution surrounding Washington Square Park. This period started with the 1855 inauguration of Fernando Wood as the first mayor from Tammany Hall . It was the political machine based among Irish Americans that controlled the local Democratic Party . It usually dominated local politics throughout this period and into

13447-624: Was inaugurated as director general upon his arrival and ruled as a member of the Dutch Reformed Church . The colony was granted self-government in 1652, and New Amsterdam was incorporated as a city on February 2, 1653. The first mayors ( burgemeesters ) of New Amsterdam, Arent van Hattem and Martin Cregier, were appointed in that year. By the early 1660s, the population consisted of approximately 1500 Europeans, only about half of whom were Dutch, and 375 Africans, 300 of whom were slaves. A few of

13566-461: Was one of the 23 refugees, eventually prospered and in 1661 became the first Jew to own a house in New Amsterdam, which also made him the first Jew known to have owned a house anywhere in North America. On September 15, 1655, New Amsterdam was occupied by several hundred Munsee , possibly in response to a Dutch colonist killing a woman stealing peaches from his orchard. No bloodshed occurred until

13685-524: Was originally a private, profit-making commercial enterprise focused on cementing alliances and conducting trade with the local Indigenous peoples. Surveying and exploration of the region was conducted as a prelude to an anticipated official settlement by the Dutch Republic, which occurred in 1624. In 1620 the Pilgrims attempted to sail to the Hudson River from England. However, Mayflower reached Cape Cod (now part of Massachusetts) on November 9, 1620, after

13804-581: Was situated in the water close to Manhattan between Manhattan and Noten Eylant, and signified the start of the East River roadstead. New Amsterdam received municipal rights by a charter from New Netherland Governor Peter Stuyvesant on February 2, 1653, thus becoming a city. Albany, then named Beverwyck , received its city rights in 1652. Nieuw Haarlem , now known as Harlem , was formally recognized in 1658. The first Dutch Jews known to have arrived in New Amsterdam arrived in 1654. First to arrive were Solomon Pietersen and Jacob Barsimson, who sailed during

13923-404: Was soon being made by the Dutch on Long Island . In 1621, the Dutch West India Company was founded. Between 1621 and 1623, orders were given to the private, commercial traders to vacate the territory, thus opening up the territory to Dutch settlers and company traders. It also allowed the laws and ordinances of the states of Holland to apply. Previously, during the private, commercial period, only

14042-522: Was swiftly followed by the Second Anglo-Dutch War , between England and the Dutch Republic . In June 1665, New Amsterdam was reincorporated under English law as New York City, named after the Duke of York (later King James II ). He was the brother of King Charles II , who had been granted the lands. In 1667, the Treaty of Breda ended the conflict in favor of the Dutch. The Dutch did not press their claims on New Netherland but did demand control over

14161-438: Was the main street that led out of town north towards Harlem. The town was surrounded to the north by a wall leading from the eastern to the western shore. Today, where the course of this city wall was, is Wall Street . Nearby, a canal which led from the harbor inland was filled in 1676, and is today Broad Street . The layout of the streets was winding, as in a European city. Only starting from Wall Street going toward uptown did

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