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Manhattan
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History
Colonial
The area that is now Manhattan was long inhabited by the Lenape. In 1524, Lenape in canoes met Giovanni da Verrazzano, the first European explorer to pass New York Harbor, although he did not enter the harbor past the Narrows. It was not until the voyage of Henry Hudson, an Englishman who worked for the Dutch East India Company, that the area was mapped. Hudson came across Manhattan Island and the native people living there on September 11, 1609, and continued up the river that bears his name, the Hudson River, until he arrived at the site of present day Albany.
A permanent European presence in New Netherland began in 1624 with the founding of a Dutch fur trading settlement on Governors Island. In 1625 construction was started on a citadel and a Fort Amsterdam on Manhattan Island, later called New Amsterdam (Nieuw Amsterdam).
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Timeline
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1524 Giovanni da Verrazzano is the first European to sight the island of Manhattan, the future New York City.
1613 Adriaen Block's ship ''Tyger'' is destroyed by fire, forcing him and his crew to spend the winter on Manhattan.
1625 New Netherlands director Wilhem Verhulst commissions the construction of Fort Amsterdam on the southern tip of Manhattan.
1626 Peter Minuit, director of the New Netherland colony, begins a policy of "purchasing" Manhattan from the Lenape.
1626 The Dutch settle Manhattan, founding the town of New Amsterdam. The town would transform into a piece of what is now New York City.
1776 American Revolutionary War: British land on Manhattan at Kip's Bay.
1874 founding of a Young Men's Hebrew Association in Manhattan which still operates today as the 92nd Street Y
1898 New York City annexes land from surrounding counties, creating the City of Greater New York. The city is geographically divided into five boroughs: Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, The Bronx, and Staten Island.
1900 New York City Mayor Van Wyck breaks ground for a new underground "Rapid Transit Railroad" that would link Manhattan and Brooklyn.
1928 At Park Central Hotel in Manhattan, Arnold Rothstein, New York City's most notorious gambler, is shot to death over a poker game.
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Encyclopedia
History
Colonial
The area that is now Manhattan was long inhabited by the Lenape. In 1524, Lenape in canoes met Giovanni da Verrazzano, the first European explorer to pass New York Harbor, although he did not enter the harbor past the Narrows. It was not until the voyage of Henry Hudson, an Englishman who worked for the Dutch East India Company, that the area was mapped. Hudson came across Manhattan Island and the native people living there on September 11, 1609, and continued up the river that bears his name, the Hudson River, until he arrived at the site of present day Albany.
A permanent European presence in New Netherland began in 1624 with the founding of a Dutch fur trading settlement on Governors Island. In 1625 construction was started on a citadel and a Fort Amsterdam on Manhattan Island, later called New Amsterdam (Nieuw Amsterdam). Manhattan Island was chosen as the site of Fort Amsterdam, a citadel for the protection of the new arrivals; its 1625 establishment is recognized as the birth date of New York City. In 1626, Peter Minuit acquired Manhattan from native people in exchange for trade goods, often said to be worth $24.
In 1647, Peter Stuyvesant was appointed as the last Dutch Director General of the colony. New Amsterdam was formally incorporated as a city on February 2, 1653. In 1664, the British conquered New Netherland and renamed it "New York" after the English Duke of York and Albany. Stuyvesant and his council negotiated 24 articles of provisional transfer with the British which sought to guarantee New Netherlanders liberties, including freedom of religion, under British rule.
American Revolution and the early United States
Manhattan was at the heart of the New York Campaign, a series of major battles in the early American Revolutionary War. The Continental Army was forced to abandon Manhattan after the disastrous Battle of Fort Washington on November 16, 1776. The city became the British political and military center of operations in North America for the remainder of the war. Manhattan was greatly damaged by the Great Fire of New York during the British military rule that followed. British occupation lasted until November 25, 1783, when George Washington returned to Manhattan, as the last British forces left the city.
From January 11, 1785 to Autumn 1788, New York City was the fifth of five capitals under the Articles of Confederation, with the Continental Congress residing at New York City Hall then at Fraunces Tavern. New York was the first capital under the newly enacted Constitution of the United States, from March 4, 1789 to August 12, 1790 at Federal Hall.
19th century growthNew York grew as an economic center, first as a result of Alexander Hamilton's policies and practices as the first Secretary of the Treasury and, later, with the opening of the Erie Canal in 1825, which connected the Atlantic port to the vast agricultural markets of the Midwestern United States and Canada. By 1810, New York City had surpassed Philadelphia as the largest city in the United States.
Tammany Hall, a Democratic Party political machine, began to grow in influence with the support of many of the immigrant Irish, culminating in the election of the first Tammany mayor, Fernando Wood, in 1854. Tammany Hall dominated local politics for decades. Central Park, which opened to the public in 1858, became the first landscaped park in an American city and the nation's first public park.
During the American Civil War, the city's strong commercial ties to the South, its growing immigrant population (prior to then largely from Germany and Ireland), anger about conscription and resentment at those who could afford to pay $300 to avoid service, led to resentment against Lincoln's war policies, culminating in the three-day long New York Draft Riots of July 1863, one of the worst incidents of civil disorder in American history, with an estimated 119 participants and passersby massacred.
After the Civil War, the rate of immigration from Europe grew steeply, and New York became 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 on October 28, 1886, a gift from the people of France. The new European immigration brought further social upheaval. In a city of tenements packed with poorly paid laborers from dozens of nations, the city was a hotbed of revolution, syndicalism, racketeering, and unionization.
In 1883, the opening of the Brooklyn Bridge established a surface connection across the East River. In 1874, the western portion of the present Bronx County was transferred to New York County, and in 1895 the remainder of the present Bronx County was annexed. The City of Greater New York was formed in 1898, with Manhattan and the Bronx, though still one county, established as two separate boroughs. On January 1, 1914, the New York State Legislature created Bronx County, and New York County was reduced to its present boundaries.
The 20th century
The construction of the New York City Subway, first opened in 1904, helped bind the new city together, as did additional bridges to Brooklyn. In the 1920s, Manhattan saw the increasing influx of Blacks as part of the Great Migration from the American South, and the Harlem Renaissance, part of a larger boom time in the Prohibition era that saw dueling skyscrapers in the skyline. New York City became the most populous city in the world in 1925, overtaking London, which had reigned for a century.
On March 25, 1911, the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire in Greenwich Village took the lives of 146 garment workers, which would eventually lead to great improvements in the city's fire department, building codes, and workplace regulations.
The period between the World Wars saw the election of reformist mayor Fiorello La Guardia and the fall of Tammany Hall after eighty years of political dominance. As the city's demographics stabilized, labor unionization brought new protections and affluence to the working class, the city's government and infrastructure underwent a dramatic overhaul under La Guardia. Despite the effects of the Great Depression, the 1930s saw the building of some of the world's tallest skyscrapers, including numerous Art Deco masterpieces that are still part of the city's skyline today.
Returning World War II veterans and immigrants from Europe created a postwar economic boom and led to the development of huge housing developments, targeted at returning veterans, including Peter Cooper Village—Stuyvesant Town which opened in 1947. In 1951, the United Nations relocated from its first headquarters in Queens, to the East Side of Manhattan.
Like many major U.S. cities, New York suffered race riots and population and industrial decline in the 1960s. By the 1970s, the city had gained a reputation as a graffiti-covered, crime-ridden relic of history. In 1975, the city government faced imminent bankruptcy, and its appeals for assistance were initially rejected, summarized by the classic October 30, 1975 New York Daily News headline as "Ford to City: Drop Dead". The fate was avoided through a federal loan and debt restructuring, and the city was forced to accept increased financial scrutiny by New York State.
The 1980s saw a rebirth of Wall Street, and the city reclaimed its role at the center of the world-wide financial industry. The 1980s also saw Manhattan at the heart of the AIDS crisis, with Greenwich Village at its epicenter. Gay Men's Health Crisis (GMHC) and AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP) were founded to advocate on behalf of those stricken with the disease.
Starting in the 1990s, crime rates dropped drastically and the outflow of population turned around, as the city once again became the destination not only of immigrants from around the world, but of many U.S. citizens seeking a cosmopolitan lifestyle.
Modern New York City is familiar to many people around the globe thanks to its popularity as a setting for films and television series. Notable television examples include such award-winning shows as Friends, 30 Rock, Seinfeld, NYPD Blue, Law & Order, Will & Grace, Spin City, Gossip Girl and Sex and the City. Notable film examples include Miracle on 34th Street, Ghostbusters, , Cloverfield, which specifically takes place in Manhattan, and many of Woody Allen's films, such as Annie Hall, Bananas, and Manhattan.
Geography
Manhattan Island is bounded by the Hudson River to the west and the East River to the east. To the north, the Harlem River divides Manhattan from The Bronx and the mainland United States. Several small islands are also part of the borough of Manhattan, including Randall's Island, Ward's Island, and Roosevelt Island in the East River, and Governors Island and Liberty Island to the south in New York Harbor. Manhattan Island is 22.7 square miles (58.8 km²) in area, 13.4 miles (21.6 km) long and 2.3 miles (3.7 km) wide, at its widest (near 14th Street). New York County as a whole covers a total area of 33.77 square miles (87.46 km²), of which 22.96 square miles (59.47 km²) are land and 10.81 square miles (28.00 km²) are water.
One Manhattan neighborhood is actually contiguous with The Bronx. Marble Hill at one time was part of Manhattan Island, but the Harlem River Ship Canal, dug in 1895 to improve navigation on the Harlem River, separated it from the remainder of Manhattan as an island between the Bronx and the remainder of Manhattan. Before World War I, the section of the original Harlem River channel separating Marble Hill from The Bronx was filled in, and Marble Hill became part of the mainland.
Marble Hill is one example of how Manhattan's land has been considerably altered by human intervention. The borough has seen substantial land reclamation along its waterfronts since Dutch colonial times, and much of the natural variation in topography has been evened out.
Early in the nineteenth century, landfill was used to expand Lower Manhattan from the natural Hudson shoreline at Greenwich Street to West Street. When building the World Trade Center, 1.2 million cubic yards (917,000 m³) of material was excavated from the site. Rather than dumping the spoil at sea or in landfills, the fill material was used to expand the Manhattan shoreline across West Street, creating Battery Park City. The result was a 700 foot (210 m) extension into the river, running six blocks or 1,484 feet (450 m), covering 92 acres (37 ha), providing a 1.2 mile (1.9 km) riverfront esplanade and over 30 acres (12 ha) of parks.
Manhattan is loosely divided into downtown, midtown, and uptown, with Fifth Avenue dividing Manhattan's east and west sides.
Manhattan has fixed vehicular connections with New Jersey to the west via the George Washington Bridge, Holland Tunnel and Lincoln Tunnel, and to three of the four other New York City boroughs—the Bronx to the northeast and Brooklyn and Queens on Long Island to the east and south. Its only direct connection with the fifth New York City borough is the Staten Island Ferry across New York Harbor, which is free of charge. The ferry terminal is located adjacent to Battery Park at its southern tip. It is possible to travel to Staten Island via Brooklyn, using the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge.
The Commissioners' Plan of 1811, called for twelve numbered avenues running north and south roughly parallel to the shore of the Hudson River, each wide, with First Avenue on the east side and Twelfth Avenue in the west. There are several intermittent avenues east of First Avenue, including four additional lettered avenues running from Avenue A eastward to Avenue D in an area now known as Alphabet City in Manhattan's East Village. The numbered streets in Manhattan run east-west, and are wide, with about 200 feet (61 m) between each pair of streets. With each combined street and block adding up to about 260 feet (79 m), there are almost exactly 20 blocks per mile. Fifteen crosstown streets were designated as 100 feet (30 m) wide, including 34th, 42nd, 57th and 125th Streets, some of the borough's most significant transportation and shopping venues. Broadway is the most notable of many exceptions to the grid, starting at Bowling Green in Lower Manhattan and continuing north into the Bronx at Manhattan's northern tip. In much of Midtown Manhattan, Broadway runs at a diagonal to the grid, creating major named intersections at Union Square, Herald Square|Sixth Avenue]] and 34th Street), Times Square|Seventh Avenue]] and 42nd Street), Columbus Circle|Eighth Avenue]]/Central Park West and 59th Street)
A consequence of the strict grid plan of most of Manhattan, and the grid's skew of approximately 28.9 degrees, is a phenomenon sometimes referred to as Manhattanhenge (by analogy with Stonehenge). On separate occasions in late May and early July, the sunset is aligned with the street grid lines, with the result that the sun is visible at or near the western horizon from street level. A similar phenomenon occurs with the sunrise in January and December.
The Wildlife Conservation Society, which operates the zoos and aquariums in the city, is currently undertaking The Mannahatta Project, a computer simulation to visually reconstruct the ecology and geography of Manhattan when Henry Hudson first sailed by in 1609, and compare it to what we know of the island today.
Adjacent counties
Climate
Although located at about the same latitude as the much warmer European cities of Naples and Madrid, Manhattan has a humid continental climate resulting from prevailing wind patterns that bring cool air from the interior of the North American continent. The city's coastal position keeps temperatures relatively warmer than inland regions during winter, helping to moderate the amount of snow which averages 25 to 35 inches (63.5 to 88.9 cm) each year. New York City has a frost-free period lasting an average of 220 days between seasonal freezes. Spring and fall in New York City are mild, while summer is very warm and humid, with temperatures of 90 °F (32 °C) or higher recorded from 18 to 25 days on average during the season. The city's longterm climate patterns are affected by the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation, a 70-year-long warming and cooling cycle in the Atlantic that influences the frequency and severity of hurricanes and coastal storms in the region.
Temperature records have been set as high as 106 °F (41 °C) on July 9, 1936 and as low as -15 °F (-26 °C) on February 9, 1934. These temperatures are not common and have not been matched or surpassed in more than seven decades. Most recently, temperatures have hit 100 degrees as recently as July 2005 and 103 degrees in August 2006, and dropped to just 1 above zero as recently as January 2004. New York can have excessive days of rain or long stretches of dry weather.
Summer evening temperatures are exacerbated by the urban heat island effect which causes heat absorbed during the day to be radiated back at night, raising temperatures by as much as 7 °F (4 °C) when winds are slow.
Government
Since New York City's consolidation in 1898, Manhattan has been governed by the New York City Charter, which has provided for a "strong" mayor-council system since its revision in 1989. The centralized New York City government is responsible for public education, correctional institutions, libraries, public safety, recreational facilities, sanitation, water supply, and welfare services in Manhattan.
The office of Borough President was created in the consolidation of 1898 to balance centralization with local authority. Each borough president had a powerful administrative role derived from having a vote on the New York City Board of Estimate, which was responsible for creating and approving the city's budget and proposals for land use. In 1989 the Supreme Court of the United States declared the Board of Estimate unconstitutional on the grounds that Brooklyn, the most populous borough, had no greater effective representation on the Board than Staten Island, the least populous borough, a violation of the Fourteenth Amendment's Equal Protection Clause pursuant to the high court's 1964 "one man, one vote" decision.
Since 1990, the largely-powerless Borough President has acted as an advocate for the borough at the mayoral agencies, the City Council, the New York state government, and corporations. Manhattan's Borough President is Scott Stringer, elected as a Democrat in 2005.
Robert M. Morgenthau, a Democrat, has been the District Attorney of New York County since 1974. Manhattan has ten City Council members, the third largest contingent among the five boroughs. It also has 12 administrative districts, each served by a local Community Board. Community Boards are representative bodies that field complaints and serve as advocates for local residents.
As the host of the United Nations, the borough is home to the world's largest international consular corps, comprising 105 consulates, consulates general and honorary consulates. It is also the home of New York City Hall, the seat of New York City government housing the Mayor of New York City and the New York City Council. The mayor's staff and thirteen municipal agencies are located in the nearby Manhattan Municipal Building, completed in 1916, one of the largest governmental buildings in the world.
Politics
Presidential elections results | Year | Reps | Dems |
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| 2004 | 16.7% 107,405 | 82.1% 526,765 | | 2000 | 14.2% 79,921 | 79.8% 449,300 | | 1996 | 13.8% 67,839 | 80.0% 394,131 | | 1992 | 15.9% 84,501 | 78.2% 416,142 | | 1988 | 22.9% 115,927 | 76.1% 385,675 | | 1984 | 27.4% 144,281 | 72.1% 379,521 | | 1980 | 26.2% 115,911 | 62.4% 275,742 | | 1976 | 25.5% 117,702 | 73.2% 337,438 | | 1972 | 33.4% 178,515 | 66.2% 354,326 | | 1968 | 25.6% 135,458 | 70.0% 370,806 | | 1964 | 19.2% 120,125 | 80.5% 503,848 | | 1960 | 34.2% 217,271 | 65.3% 414,902 | |
The Democratic Party holds the majority of public offices. Registered Republicans are a small minority in the borough, only constituting approximately 20% of the electorate. The Democrats hold nearly 80% of those registered in a party, especially those on the Upper East Side and Financial District. Local party platforms center on affordable housing, education and economic development. Controversial political issues in Manhattan include development, noise, and the cost of housing.
Manhattan is divided between four congressional districts, all of which are represented by Democrats.
- Charles Rangel represents the 15th district in Upper Manhattan, which incorporates Harlem, Spanish Harlem, Washington Heights, Inwood and parts of the Upper West Side.
- Jerrold Nadler represents the 8th district, based on the West Side which covers most of the Upper West Side, Hell's Kitchen, Chelsea, Greenwich Village, Chinatown, Tribeca and Battery Park City, as well as some sections of Southwest Brooklyn.
- Carolyn Maloney represents the 14th district, the so-called "Silk Stocking" district which was the political base for Teddy Roosevelt and John Lindsay. It covers most of the Upper East Side, Yorkville, Gramercy Park, the East Village, Roosevelt Island and most of the Lower East Side, as well as portions of western Queens.
- Nydia Velazquez of the Brooklyn-Queens based 12th district, represents a few heavily Puerto Rican sections of the Lower East Side.
No Republican has won the presidential election in Manhattan since 1924, when Calvin Coolidge won a plurality of the New York County vote over Democrat John W. Davis, 41.20%–39.55%. Warren G. Harding was the most recent Republican presidential candidate to win a majority of the Manhattan vote, with 59.22% of the 1920 vote. In the 2004 presidential election, Democrat John Kerry received 82.1% of the vote in Manhattan and Republican George W. Bush received 16.7%. The borough is the most important source of funding for presidential campaigns in the United States; in 2004, it was home to six of the top seven zip codes in the nation for political contributions. The top ZIP code, 10021 on the Upper East Side, generated the most money for the United States presidential election for all presidential candidates, including both Kerry and Bush during the 2004 election.
Crime
Starting in the mid-19th century, the United States became a magnet for immigrants seeking to escape poverty in their home countries. After arriving in New York, many new arrivals ended up living in squalor in the slums of the Five Points neighborhood, an area between Broadway and the Bowery, northeast of New York City Hall. By the 1820s, the area was home to many gambling dens and "houses of ill repute", and was known as a dangerous place to go. In 1842, Charles Dickens visited the area and was appalled at the horrendous living conditions he had seen. The area was so notorious at the time that it even caught the attention of Abraham Lincoln, who visited the area before his Cooper Union Address in 1860. The predominantly Irish Five Points Gang was one of the country's first major organized crime entities.
As Italian immigration grew in the early 1900s, many joined the Irish gangs. Al Capone got his start in crime with the Five Points Gang, as did | |
