New York City

New York City:The Crossroad of World Trade

Robert Wesley Bridger JrHistory 141, 71154

The Country and the City (1609-1825)Dutch Empire

• Found and explored by Henry Hudson in 1607 while looking for a western passage to Asia.

• In 1624 the Dutch West India Company set up the first trading post and called it New Amsterdam.

• Peter Stuyvesant, the new Director General, was sent to fix the problems of New Amsterdam. This he managed to do by emplacing many new laws and performing the much needed construction.

The Country and the City (1609-1825)British Empire

• 22 August 1664, Britain takes control without a shot fired. Two days later the city is renamed New York.

• In 1699 the old Dutch walls sealing the city are torn down and in its place Wall Street is made.

• By 1700 New York is the 3rd largest port in the British Empire, behind London and Philadelphia.

• 1758-1763 war with France, and New York becomes the British Stronghold, bringing in a flow of money to the local economy.

The Country and the City (1609-1825)United States

• On 29 August 1776, George Washington withdrew his forces from Brooklyn and New York officially became the British Stronghold during for the rest of the Revolutionary War.

• British surrender on 25 November 1783 in New York. Two years later congress makes it the nation's first Capital.

• In 1799 Alexander Hamilton was able to get the Gradual Emancipation Act passed for the state of New York. He died five years later in a duel and was buried at trinity church.

• 1804, within less than a decade, the population doubled to 80,000.

Order and Disorder (1825-1865)Erie Canal Causes a Spiked Growth

• In October 1825 the Erie Canal opened and brought with it all the wealth of the western world.

• City began to expand northward along the river.

• 1825 population was just under 170,000. This being the largest city in the United States, yet still having its rural look.

• Beginning of the 1840s saw the coming of both Frederick Douglass (African American rights advocate) and Walt Whitman (famous poet) to the great city of New York.

Order and Disorder (1825-1865)Growth as a Cultural Center

• By the 1830s New York had created the world's first business center or “downtown”.

• New York Herald was created by James Gordon Bennett in 1835. This would be the first politically independent newspapers of the nation and later the world's most successful newspaper.

• American Museum was built in New York by Phineas T. Barnum in 1841. This museum was a place of the strange and unusual. In its 27 years of operation it sold 42 million tickets (more than the population of the United States at the time).

Order and Disorder (1825-1865)Incoming Irish

• During the Potato Famine years of 1845-1855, 1.5 million Irish migrated through New York, a total of 1/8 of Ireland.

• The deprived and starving Irish would contend for the lowest paying jobs and worst housing with the African American community while being blamed for all problems of the city by those who were here before them.

• There were an average of 300 people per acre in the Irish slums and death rates were three times higher than the rest of New York.

• By 1854 there were more Irish in New York than anywhere in the world except the capital of Ireland itself, Dublin.

A Merger That Puts New York on TopKey concepts in an article written by Mike Clough

• Prior to the information age, New York controlled the American market by way of exports to Europe and “triangle trade,” controlling cotton trade with the South and England.

• America Online buying Time Warner raises the question whether New York will be the capital in the new global American information economy.

• Some primary contenders for this possession are Seattle, San Francisco, Los Angles, and Redmond.

The Great Transatlantic MigrationBiggest Growth in the New World

• Between the early nineteenth century and World War II, three-fifths of all immigrants from Europe came to the United States and most of these would come through New York.

• Key factors that promoted migration were steam-power transports, an absence of legal restraints (until 1924), agricultural development on the frontiers, and industrialization.

• The variety of cultures was incomparable to any other New World country. People were coming to the United States from everywhere, including massive immigration from Europe in the east and a large influx from Asia in the west.

The Great Transatlantic MigrationSlowing Down of Immigration

• The four decades after 1880 began the most vocal anti-immigrant movement in all of the New World. The citizens began to see the immigrants as a cause of their problems, taking their jobs, and unfaithful to the United States.

• World War I, the harshly restrictive quota law of 1924, and the Great Depression slowed the flow of European immigration. During these times the migration flowed to countries that were not involved in the war, not hit so harshly by the Great Depression, and didn’t have such restricting laws against them.

The Great Transatlantic MigrationWhere Did They Come From

• During the late 1800s the primary source of migration to the United States was from Great Britain, Ireland, Germany, and Italy.

• In the first two decades of the 1900s the primary source of migration shifted some to Great Britain, Italy, and Spain. There was also a moderate amount from Austria-Hungary, Russia, and Portugal.

• This does only mention a small amount of who came from Europe. Unlike many of the other New World countries, the United States received migration from everywhere.