We’ve been hanging around North America a bit longer than usual because our granddaughter, Lucy, was going to sing in Carnegie Hall with the Columbus, Ohio Children’s Choir ( known as the New World Singers). At the completion of our visit to Philadelphia, we traveled to New York by bus for a whopping twelve dollars for the two of us (“What a deal!”).
Covering 302.6 square miles, New York’s five boroughs make it the largest metropolitan area in the world by urban land mass, as well as the most populous city in America.
Prior to the arrival of the Europeans, this area was inhabited by the Algonquin Native Americans, including the Lenape. The first documentation of a visit by a European was in 1524 by Giovanni da Verrazano. By 1609, English explorer Henry Hudson traveled 150 miles up the Hudson River while searching for the Northwest passage to the Orient. Hudson claimed the area for the Dutch East India Company. Five years later, the Netherlands had claimed the whole area from Cape Cod to the Delaware Bay (naming it “New Netherlands”). It would be another ten years before the first permanent settlement was established (“New Amsterdam”). In 1626, Dutch Colonial Director-General Peter Minuit purchased the island of Manhattan from the Lenape for 60 Guilders - about $1000 (and not the legendary $24 worth of glass beads). To promote the growth of the new settlement, any Dutchman who brought at least 50 colonists to the area would receive a parcel of land. In 1647, Peter Stuyvesant became the last Director-General of New Netherlands and oversaw a four-fold growth in population. Stuyvesant surrendered the area, in 1664, to the English, who renamed it “New York” after the Duke of York (who later became King James II). During the Yellow Fever epidemics of the early 1700’s, New York lost about 10% of its population. By 1730, the city had grown into an important trade center, including slaves (one report said 42% of all New York households had slaves). During the lead up to the American Revolution, a group known as the “Sons of Liberty” skirmished with British troops garrisoned in New York (between 1765 and 1775). The Battle of Long Island in August of 1776 was the largest of the American Revolutionary War. The Americans lost and the British made New York their military and political base of operations in North America. When the war ended in 1783, the British evacuated from the city. Following this, the Congress of Confederation made New York the temporary capital of the United States (the last Capital under the Articles of Confederation and the first capital under the newly developed Constitution of the United States). Throughout the 19th century, the city blossomed as a trade center. With the completion of the Erie Canal in 1883, this Port on the Atlantic Ocean was connected to the agricultural markets of interior North America. The consolidation of the five boroughs in 1898 created the modern city of New York. Throughout the first half of the 20th century, New York became a world center for industry, commerce, and communication, establishing it as the most populous urbanized area in the world.
This famous picture entitled “Lunch Atop a Skyscraper” (depicting Irish Immigrants working on the 69th floor of Rockefeller Center) has a special relationship with us; the men on each end of this grouping are Lorraine’s great uncles (confirmed by a Public Broadcasting System documentary...