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118-571: The Appalachian Highlands are characterized by a diverse physiographic division. The seven provinces are: The Adirondack Mountains are a circular dome of mountains in Northeastern New York about 160 miles wide with more than 100 peaks, at least 40 that are over 4,000 feet tall. There are over 200 named lakes, with the number of smaller lakes, ponds, and other bodies of water reaching over 3,000. The region has over 1,200 miles of river. The current relief owes much to glaciation. Among

236-603: A massif of mountains in Northeastern New York which form a circular dome approximately 160 miles (260 km) wide and covering about 5,000 square miles (13,000 km ). The region contains more than 100 peaks, including Mount Marcy , which is the highest point in New York at 5,344 feet (1,629 m). The Adirondack High Peaks , a traditional list of 46 peaks over 4,000 feet (1,200 m), are popular hiking destinations. There are over 200 named lakes with

354-636: A projectile point of red-brown chert found in 2007 at the edge of Tupper Lake. During an interval of roughly 11,000 years following the end of the Last Glacial Period, the climate of the Adirondacks gradually warmed, with the area's tundra being replaced by forests that were now able to grow. During the transition between the Archaic and Woodland (1000 BC – AD 1000) periods, multiple different groups replaced

472-426: A 10,000 feet (ca. 3,048 m) thick layer of ice to completely melt. Evidence of this period includes: Soils in the area are generally thin, sandy, acidic, and infertile, having developed since the glacial retreat. The climate is strongly continental , with high humidity and precipitation year-round. The Adirondacks typically experience pleasantly warm, rainy weather in the summer (June–August), with temperatures in

590-595: A 1981 article in Rolling Stone magazine calling the stretch of West 42nd Street between 7th and 8th Avenues the "sleaziest block in America". By the late 1990s, led by efforts by the city and the Walt Disney Company , the area had been revived as a center of tourism to the point where it was described by The New York Times as "arguably the most sought-after 13 acres of commercial property in

708-589: A day celebrated as Evacuation Day , marking when the last British forces left the city. From January 11, 1785, until 1789, New York City was the fifth of five capitals of the United States under the Articles of Confederation , with the Continental Congress meeting at New York City Hall (then at Fraunces Tavern ). New York was the first capital under the newly enacted Constitution of

826-563: A growing number of Indian restaurants and spice shops along a stretch of Lexington Avenue between 25th and 30th Streets which has become known as Curry Hill . Washington Heights in Uptown Manhattan is home to the largest Dominican immigrant community in the United States. Harlem , also in Upper Manhattan, is the historical epicenter of African American culture. Since 2010, a Little Australia has emerged and

944-930: A language other than English at home. Points of interest on Manhattan Island include the American Museum of Natural History ; the Battery ; Broadway and the Theater District ; Bryant Park ; Central Park , Chinatown ; the Chrysler Building ; The Cloisters ; Columbia University ; Curry Hill ; the Empire State Building ; Flatiron Building ; the Financial District (including the New York Stock Exchange Building ; Wall Street ; and

1062-515: A multibillion-dollar rebuilding plan was unveiled to restore the historic grandeur of Penn Station, in the process of upgrading the landmark's status as a critical transportation hub . The 700,000 sq ft (65,000 m ) Moynihan Train Hall , developed as a $ 1.6 billion renovation and expansion of Penn Station into the James A. Farley Building , the city's former main post office building,

1180-535: A series of spontaneous, violent protests by members of the gay community against a police raid that took place in the early morning hours of June 28, 1969, at the Stonewall Inn in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of Lower Manhattan. They are widely considered to constitute the single most important event leading to the gay liberation movement and the modern fight for LGBT rights . In

1298-467: A wildlife sanctuary, and several lawns and sporting areas, as well as 21 playgrounds, and a 6-mile (9.7 km) road from which automobile traffic has been banned since 2018. While much of the park looks natural, it is almost entirely landscaped; the construction of Central Park in the 1850s was one of the era's most massive public works projects, with some 20,000 workers moving 5 million cubic yards (3.8 million cubic meters) of material to shape

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1416-562: A year. In 1961, the struggling Pennsylvania Railroad unveiled plans to tear down the old Penn Station and replace it with a new Madison Square Garden and office building complex. Organized protests were aimed at preserving the McKim, Mead & White -designed structure completed in 1910, widely considered a masterpiece of the Beaux-Arts style and one of the architectural jewels of New York City. Despite these efforts, demolition of

1534-598: Is a name from the Dutch colonial era after Haarlem , a city in the Netherlands. Some have simple folkloric names, such as Hell's Kitchen , alongside their more official but lesser used title (in this case, Clinton). Some neighborhoods, such as SoHo , which is mixed use, are known for upscale shopping as well as residential use. Others, such as Greenwich Village , the Lower East Side , Alphabet City and

1652-473: Is a physiographic province of the larger Appalachian Highlands physiographic division. This province is about 580 miles long and consists of northern and southern physiographic sections, which divides near the Roanoke River gap. The northern section runs along a narrow ridge from just south of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania . The southern section is a plateau area that stretches to northern Georgia, with

1770-586: Is a physiographic province of the larger Appalachian division, containing only the Champlain physiographic section. The St. Lawrence Plain is a vast, flat plain, with elevations rarely exceeding 300m (1,000 feet) in Vermont and New York. This area was originally a forest-wetland complex, although very little of the forest remains today. The province abuts the eastern edge of the St. Lawrence River in New York along

1888-762: Is bounded by the Hudson River to the west and the East River to the east. To the north, the Harlem River divides Manhattan Island from the Bronx and the mainland United States. Early in the 19th century, land reclamation was used to expand Lower Manhattan from the natural Hudson shoreline at Greenwich Street to West Street . When building the World Trade Center in 1968, 1.2 million cubic yards (920,000 m ) of material excavated from

2006-646: Is bounded by three other provinces: the St. Lawrence (Champlain) on the north, northeast; the Appalachian Plateau to the south, southwest; and the Valley and Ridge to the southeast. The entire region lies within Adirondack Park , a New York state protected area of over 6,000,000 acres (2,400,000 ha). The park was established in 1892 by the state legislature to protect the region's natural resources and to provide recreational opportunities for

2124-578: Is caused by a hot spot in the Earth's crust . A recent study has revealed a column of seismically slow materials about 50–80 km deep beneath the Adirondack Mountains, which was interpreted to be the upwelling asthenosphere contributing to the uplift of the mountains. The occurrence of earthquake swarms near the center of the massif at Blue Mountain Lake may be evidence of this. Some of

2242-558: Is characterized by rolling hills and valleys that are underlain by crystalline metamorphic rocks. The Piedmont is a region of great geological diversity. It is underlain by a variety of rocks that range in age from Precambrian to Cenozoic. The oldest rocks in the Piedmont are gneisses and schists that formed more than a billion years ago during the Grenville orogeny. These rocks were later intruded by granites and other igneous rocks during

2360-480: Is considered extremely fragile, and was damaged by hikers prior to a 1970s campaign by the Adirondack Mountain Club to preserve it. Manhattan Manhattan ( / m æ n ˈ h æ t ən , m ə n -/ man- HAT -ən, mən- ) is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City . Coextensive with New York County , Manhattan

2478-508: Is growing in Nolita, Lower Manhattan. Manhattan has two central business districts, the Financial District at the southern tip of the island, and Midtown Manhattan . The term uptown also refers to the northern part of Manhattan above 72nd Street and downtown to the southern portion below 14th Street , with Midtown covering the area in between, though definitions can be fluid. Fifth Avenue roughly bisects Manhattan Island and acts as

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2596-558: Is land and 10.8 square miles (28 km ) (32%) is water. The northern segment of Upper Manhattan represents a geographic panhandle . Manhattan Island is 22.7 square miles (59 km ) in area, 13.4 miles (21.6 km) long and 2.3 miles (3.7 km) wide, at its widest point, near 14th Street . The borough consists primarily of Manhattan Island, along with the Marble Hill neighborhood and several small islands, including Randalls Island and Wards Island and Roosevelt Island in

2714-658: Is relatively evenly spread throughout the year. Average winter snowfall between 1981 and 2010 has been 25.8 inches (66 cm); this varies considerably from year to year. Manhattan's many neighborhoods are not named according to any particular convention, nor do they have official boundaries. Some are geographical (the Upper East Side ), or ethnically descriptive ( Little Italy ). Others are acronyms , such as TriBeCa (for "TRIangle BElow CAnal Street") or SoHo ("SOuth of HOuston"), NoLIta ("NOrth of Little ITAly"), and NoMad ("NOrth of MADison Square Park"). Harlem

2832-913: Is the world's seventh-tallest building (as of 2023) . The Occupy Wall Street protests in Zuccotti Park in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan began on September 17, 2011, receiving global attention and spawning the Occupy movement against social and economic inequality worldwide. On October 29 and 30, 2012, Hurricane Sandy caused extensive destruction in the borough, ravaging portions of Lower Manhattan with record-high storm surge from New York Harbor, severe flooding, and high winds, causing power outages for hundreds of thousands of city residents and leading to gasoline shortages and disruption of mass transit systems. The storm and its profound impacts have prompted discussion of constructing seawalls and other coastal barriers around

2950-471: Is the economic engine of New York City , with its 2.45 million workers drawn from the entire New York metropolitan area accounting for almost more than half of all jobs in New York City. Manhattan's workforce is overwhelmingly focused on white collar professions. In 2010, Manhattan's daytime population was swelling to 3.94 million, with commuters adding a net 1.48 million people to

3068-647: Is the most expensive shopping street in the world. The borough hosts many prominent bridges , tunnels , and skyscrapers including the Empire State Building , Chrysler Building , and One World Trade Center . It is also home to the National Basketball Association 's New York Knicks and the National Hockey League 's New York Rangers . Manhattan was historically part of the Lenapehoking territory inhabited by

3186-556: Is the smallest county by geographical area in the U.S. state of New York . Located almost entirely on Manhattan Island near the southern tip of the state, Manhattan constitutes the center of the Northeast megalopolis and the urban core of the New York metropolitan area . Manhattan serves as New York City's economic and administrative center and has been described as the cultural, financial, media , and entertainment capital of

3304-553: Is theorized that there is a "hotspot" beneath the region, which causes continued uplift at the rate of 1.5-3 cm annually. The Appalachian Plateau is a large, dissected plateau region in the eastern United States. It extends from New York southwest to Alabama. It runs parallel to Lake Erie on the northwest, but does not include the land adjacent to the Great Lakes. The plateau is composed of sedimentary rocks, including sandstones, conglomerates, and shales, that were deposited during

3422-708: Is well suited for the foundations of Manhattan's skyscrapers . It is part of the Manhattan Prong physiographic region. Under the Köppen climate classification , New York City features both a humid subtropical climate ( Cfa ) and a humid continental climate ( Dfa ); it is the northernmost major city on the North American continent with a humid subtropical climate. The city averages 234 days with at least some sunshine annually. Winters are cold and damp, and prevailing wind patterns that blow offshore temper

3540-616: The Algonquians who allied with the French. Another early use of the name, spelled Rontaks , was in 1729 by French missionary Joseph-François Lafitau . He explained that the word was used by the Iroquois as a derogatory term for groups of Algonquians who did not practice agriculture and therefore sometimes had to eat tree bark to survive harsh winters. The Mohawks had no written language, so Europeans used various phonetic spellings of

3658-745: The American Revolutionary War . The Continental Army was forced to abandon Manhattan after the Battle of Fort Washington on November 16, 1776. The city, greatly damaged by the Great Fire of New York during the campaign, became the British military and political center of operations in North America for the remainder of the war. British occupation lasted until November 25, 1783, when George Washington returned to Manhattan,

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3776-537: The Duke of York . New York, based in present-day Lower Manhattan , served as the capital of the United States from 1785 until 1790. The Statue of Liberty in New York Harbor greeted millions of arriving immigrants in the late 19th century and is a world symbol of the United States and its ideals. Manhattan became a borough during the consolidation of New York City in 1898 , and houses New York City Hall ,

3894-564: The East Village , have long been associated with the Bohemian subculture. Chelsea is one of several Manhattan neighborhoods with large gay populations and has become a center of both the international art industry and New York's nightlife. Chinatown has the highest concentration of people of Chinese descent outside of Asia . Koreatown is roughly centered on 32nd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. Rose Hill features

4012-908: The FBI as "something of a deadly dress rehearsal for 9/11", was a terrorist attack in which six people were killed when a van bomb filled with explosives was detonated in a parking lot below the North Tower of the World Trade Center complex . On September 11, 2001, the Twin Towers of the original World Trade Center were struck by hijacked aircraft and collapsed in the September 11 attacks launched by al-Qaeda terrorists. The collapse caused extensive damage to surrounding buildings and skyscrapers in Lower Manhattan, and resulted in

4130-585: The Harlem and Hudson rivers, separated it from 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. After a May 1984 court ruling that Marble Hill was simultaneously part of the Borough of Manhattan (not the Borough of the Bronx) and part of Bronx County (not New York County),

4248-602: The Hearst Tower , the rebuilt 7 World Trade Center , and the Bank of America Tower —the first skyscraper designed to attain a Platinum LEED Certification. The skyscraper , which has shaped Manhattan's distinctive skyline , has been closely associated with New York City's identity since the end of the 19th century. Structures such as the Equitable Building of 1915, which rises vertically forty stories from

4366-474: The Munsee , Lenape , and Wappinger tribes . There were several Lenape settlements in the area including Sapohanikan , Nechtanc , and Konaande Kongh , which were interconnected by a series of trails. The primary trail on the island, which would later become Broadway , ran from what is now Inwood in the north to Battery Park in the south. There were various sites for fishing and planting established by

4484-694: The South Street Seaport ); Grand Central Terminal ; Greenwich Village (including New York University ; Washington Square Arch ; and Stonewall Inn ); Harlem and Spanish Harlem ; the High Line ; Koreatown ; Lincoln Center ; Little Australia ; Little Italy ; Madison Square Garden ; Museum Mile on Fifth Avenue (including the Metropolitan Museum of Art ); Penn Station , Port Authority Bus Terminal ; Rockefeller Center (including Radio City Music Hall ); Times Square ; and

4602-496: The U.S. mainland . Manhattan Island is divided into three informally bounded components, each cutting across the borough's long axis: Lower Manhattan, Midtown , and Upper Manhattan. Manhattan is one of the most densely populated locations in the world, with a 2020 census population of 1,694,250 living in a land area of 22.66 square miles (58.69 km ), or 72,918 residents per square mile (28,154 residents/km ), and coextensive with New York County, its residential property has

4720-522: The World Trade Center (including the National September 11 Museum and One World Trade Center ). There are also numerous iconic bridges across rivers that connect to Manhattan Island, as well as an emerging number of supertall skyscrapers . The Statue of Liberty rests on Liberty Island , an exclave of Manhattan, and part of Ellis Island is also an exclave of Manhattan. The borough has many energy-efficient office buildings, such as

4838-466: The citadel of Fort Amsterdam on Manhattan Island, later called New Amsterdam ( Nieuw Amsterdam ), in what is now Lower Manhattan. The establishment of Fort Amsterdam is recognized as the birth of New York City. 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, English forces conquered New Netherland and renamed it "New York" after

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4956-478: The deaths of 2,606 of the 17,400 who had been in the buildings when the planes hit, in addition to those on the planes. Since 2001, most of Lower Manhattan has been restored, although there has been controversy surrounding the rebuilding. In 2014, the new One World Trade Center , at 1,776 feet (541 m) measured to the top of its spire, became the tallest building in the Western Hemisphere and

5074-626: The sedimentary rock was changed into metamorphic rock . It is these Proterozoic minerals and lithologies that make up the core of the massif. Minerals of interest include: The Adirondacks are uplifted by a hot spot in the Canadian Shield in contrast to other mountain ranges in New York which are a part of the Appalachian chain (not to be confused with the cultural region of Appalachia). Around 600 million years ago, as Laurentia drifted away from Baltica (European Craton),

5192-681: The topography and create the English-style pastoral landscape that Olmsted and Vaux sought. The remaining 70% of Manhattan's parkland includes 204 playgrounds, 251 Greenstreets, 371 basketball courts , and many other amenities. The next-largest park in Manhattan, the Hudson River Park , stretches 4.5 miles (7.2 km) along the Hudson River and comprises 550 acres (220 ha). Other major parks include: Manhattan

5310-527: The world's tallest building . Manhattan's majority white ethnic group declined from 98.7% in 1900 to 58.3% by 1990. On March 25, 1911, the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire in Greenwich Village killed 146 garment workers , leading to overhauls of the city's fire department, building codes , and workplace safety regulations. In 1912, about 20,000 workers, a quarter of them women, marched upon Washington Square Park to commemorate

5428-686: The 1,537,195 counted in the 2000 census . In 2010, the largest organized religious group in Manhattan was the Archdiocese of New York , with 323,325 Catholics worshiping at 109 parishes, followed by 64,000 Orthodox Jews with 77 congregations, an estimated 42,545 Muslims with 21 congregations, 42,502 non-denominational adherents with 54 congregations, 26,178 TEC Episcopalians with 46 congregations, 25,048 ABC-USA Baptists with 41 congregations, 24,536 Reform Jews with 10 congregations, 23,982 Mahayana Buddhists with 35 congregations, 10,503 PC-USA Presbyterians with 30 congregations, and 10,268 RCA Presbyterians with 10 congregations. Altogether, 44.0% of

5546-452: The 1920s, Manhattan experienced large arrivals of African-Americans as part of the Great Migration from the southern United States, and the Harlem Renaissance , part of a larger boom time in the Prohibition era that included new skyscrapers competing for the skyline, with the Woolworth Building (1913), 40 Wall Street (1930), Chrysler Building (1930) and the Empire State Building (1931) leapfrogging each other to take their place as

5664-440: The 1970s, job losses due to industrial restructuring caused New York City, including Manhattan, to suffer from economic problems and rising crime rates. While a resurgence in the financial industry greatly improved the city's economic health in the 1980s, New York's crime rate continued to increase through the decade and into the beginning of the 1990s. The 1980s saw a rebirth of Wall Street , and Manhattan reclaimed its role as

5782-417: The 19th century, the island was named so for a grove of hickory trees at its southern end that was considered ideal for the making of bows. In April 1524, Florentine explorer Giovanni da Verrazzano , sailing in service of Francis I of France , became the first documented European to visit the area that would become New York City. Verrazzano entered the tidal strait now known as The Narrows and named

5900-479: The 20th century failed for numerous reasons, including poaching, vehicle collisions, and conservation incompetence. Nearly 60 percent of the park is covered with northern hardwood forest . Above 2,600 feet (790 meters), conditions are too poor for hardwoods to thrive, and the trees become mixed with or replaced by balsam fir and red spruce . Above 3,500 feet (1,100 meters) black spruce replace red. Higher still, only trees short enough to be covered in snow during

6018-426: The Adirondack Mountains as hunting grounds. According to Haudenosaunee historian Rick Hill, the region was considered a ' Dish with One Spoon ,' symbolizing shared hunting resources between the groups. A group of Algonquian people, known as the Mahicans, also occupied the region, particularly the Hudson River Valley. These were the groups that the first European explorers of the area encountered. European presence in

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6136-433: The Adirondack mountains. Because local Iroquoian and Algonquian tribes had been decimated first by smallpox and measles in the 1600s, then by wars with encroaching European settlers, there likely were very few people living in the region by the time Pownhall wrote his description. It is only relatively recently that numerous archaeological finds have definitively shown that Native Americans were indeed very present in

6254-441: The Adirondacks before European contact, hunting, making pottery, and practicing agriculture. The European impression of a wild region devoid of human connection set up a narrative about wilderness that would persist through the next 200-some years of the region's history. While society's perception of the Adirondacks' value changed, they were always seen as a land of natural resources and physical beauty, not of human history. First

6372-456: The Adirondacks have been referred to as "new mountains from old rocks." It is theorized that there is a hotspot beneath the region, which causes continued uplift at the rate of 1.5–3 centimetres ( 5 ⁄ 8 – 1 + 1 ⁄ 8  in) annually. The Adirondack mountain range has such unusual characteristics compared to the area around it that it is divided into its own province within the Appalachian Highlands physiographic division. It

6490-432: The Adirondacks were Paleo-Indians who arrived around the 14th millennium BC following the end of the Last Glacial Period . The earliest migrants arrived from the St. Lawrence River Valley to the north, and settled along the shores of the Champlain Sea . During the Archaic Period (8000–1000 BC) this semi-nomadic hunter-gatherer Laurentian culture inhabited the Adirondacks; evidence of their presence includes

6608-404: The Appalachian Uplands of Canada meets the Eastern Quebec Uplands. The Valley and Ridge province is a physiographic province of the larger Appalachian division, located in the eastern United States. It is bordered on the east by the Blue Ridge and Piedmont provinces and on the west by the Appalachian Plateau. There are three sections of the province, the Hudson section, the Central section, and

6726-435: The Atlantic port to the vast agricultural markets of the Midwestern United States and Canada . 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. Covering 840 acres (340 ha) in the center of the island, Central Park , which opened its first portions to

6844-403: The Canadian border and contains most of Lake Champlain in Vermont and New York. Most of the northern border of the St. Lawrence Valley province is adjacent to a physiographic division in Canada that is not part of the Appalachian Mountains in that country. Canada considers all land of the St. Lawrence Valley to be part of the Central Lowlands. The part of the St. Lawrence Valley province that abuts

6962-607: The Coastal Plain of central Alabama. Its width varies from 14 to 80 miles (23 to 130 km). The area is home to many valuable resources, both economic and geo-heritage. Vast beds of anthracite coal exist in Pennsylvania and are mined at depths up to 600 m (2,000 ft). Iron and Zinc are also produced in the Valley and Ridge province, mined from the minerals hematite (iron) and sphalerite (zinc). 40°N 78°W  /  40°N 78°W  / 40; -78 Adirondack Mountains The Adirondack Mountains ( / ˌ æ d ɪ ˈ r ɒ n d æ k / AD -i- RON -dak ) are

7080-448: The East River; and Governors Island and Liberty Island to the south in New York Harbor . The Island is about 13.4 miles (21.6 km) from north to south, and at its widest, 2.3 miles (3.7 km). Manhattan Island is loosely divided into Downtown ( Lower Manhattan ), Midtown ( Midtown Manhattan ), and Uptown ( Upper Manhattan ), with Fifth Avenue dividing Manhattan lengthwise into its East Side and West Side . Manhattan Island

7198-405: The English Duke of York and Albany , the future King James II. In August 1673, the Dutch reconquered the colony, renaming it "New Orange", but permanently relinquished it back to England the following year under the terms of the Treaty of Westminster that ended the Third Anglo-Dutch War . Manhattan was at the heart of the New York Campaign , a series of major battles in the early stages of

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7316-428: The Laurentian culture—including the Sylvan Lake, River, Middlesex, Point Peninsula, and Owasco cultures. By the time of the Owasco culture c.  1 AD , maize and beans were being cultivated in the uplands of the Adirondacks. The first Iroquoian peoples, the Mohawk (or Kanyengehaga) and the Oneida (or Oneyotdehaga), arrived in the Adirondack region between 4,000 and 1,200 years ago. Both groups claimed

7434-431: The Lenape throughout Manhattan. The name Manhattan originated from the Lenape 's language, Munsee , manaháhtaan (where manah- means "gather", -aht- means " bow ", and -aan is an abstract element used to form verb stems ). The Lenape word has been translated as "the place where we get bows" or "place for gathering the (wood to make) bows". According to a Munsee tradition recorded by Albert Seqaqkind Anthony in

7552-438: The Paleozoic era. During the Mesozoic era, the Piedmont was covered by shallow seas that deposited layers of sandstone, shale, and limestone. These sedimentary rocks were later deformed and uplifted during the Cenozoic era. The Piedmont is also home to several important mineral resources. The region has long been known for its deposits of gold, which were mined extensively during the 19th century. Other important minerals found in

7670-474: The Piedmont include copper, iron, mica, and granite. The New England province is a physiographic province of the larger Appalachian Highlands division of the United States. It includes five subdivisions: the New England Uplands, New England Seaboard Lowland, Green Mountain, White Mountain, and Taconic. Much of the New England province’s bedrock aquifers are in consolidated rocks of sedimentary, igneous, and metamorphic origin. Some of these aquifers, mainly in

7788-407: The Precambrian age over 541 million years ago. The mountains include schists, gneisses, slates, and quartzites, and are extensively intruded by igneous bodies. The Blue Ridge Mountains contain the highest mountains in eastern North America south of Baffin Island . The highest peak in the Blue Ridge is Mt. Mitchell in North Carolina at 6,684 feet. The Piedmont province is a physiographic province of

7906-439: The Tennessee section. The province is a series of northeast-southwest trending synclines and anticlines composed of early Paleozoic sedimentary rocks. Limestones and shales are more susceptible to erosion and make up much of the valleys, whereas more resistant sandstones and conglomerates form the ridges. The Valley and Ridge province extends for nearly 1,200 miles (1,930 km) from the St. Lawrence Valley in upstate New York to

8024-419: The United Nations is located in the Turtle Bay neighborhood of Midtown Manhattan. Manhattan hosts three of the world's top 10 most-visited tourist attractions: Times Square , Central Park , and Grand Central Terminal . Penn Station is the busiest transportation hub in the Western Hemisphere . Chinatown incorporates the highest concentration of Chinese people in the Western Hemisphere. Fifth Avenue

8142-449: The United States , from March 4, 1789, to August 12, 1790, at Federal Hall . Federal Hall was where the United States Supreme Court met for the first time, the United States Bill of Rights were drafted and ratified, and where the Northwest Ordinance was adopted, establishing measures for admission to the Union of new states. New York grew as an economic center, first as a result of Alexander Hamilton 's policies and practices as

8260-406: The area began to be pulled apart forming the Iapetus Ocean . Faults developed, running north to northeast which formed valleys and deep lakes. Examples visible today include the grabens Lake George and Schroon Lake . By this time the Grenville mountains had been eroded away and the area was covered by a shallow sea. Several thousand feet of sediment accumulated on the sea bed. Trilobites were

8378-422: The area began with a battle between Samuel de Champlain and a group of Mohawks, in what is now Ticonderoga in 1609. The Jesuit missionary Isaac Jogues became the first recorded European to travel through the center of the Adirondacks, as the captive of a Mohawk hunting party, in 1642. The early European perception of the Adirondacks was of a vast, inhospitable wilderness. One map of the area from 1771 shows

8496-434: The area was an inhospitable tangle, then a lucrative store of lumber. After the American Revolutionary War , New York State gained ownership of most of the land in the region. Needing money to discharge war debts, the government sold nearly all the original public acreage about 7 million acres for pennies an acre. Lumbermen were welcomed to the interior, with few restraints, resulting in massive deforestation . Later,

8614-526: The boundaries of the Piedmont. The west side of the Piedmont runs through lesser populated areas, from south of Harrisburg to Lake Martin in Elmore County, Alabama . There are two sections of the Piedmont. The primary portion is called the Uplands section. There are two unconnected sections of the province, known as the lowlands, in the New York City and Harrisburg, Pennsylvania areas. The Piedmont

8732-534: The city became a hotbed of revolution (including anarchists and communists among others), syndicalism , racketeering , and unionization . In 1883, the opening of the Brooklyn Bridge across the East River established a road connection to Brooklyn and the rest of Long Island . In 1898, New York City consolidated with three neighboring counties to form "the City of Greater New York ", and Manhattan

8850-637: The city's skyline, most notably the Empire State Building, the Chrysler Building, and 30 Rockefeller Plaza . A postwar economic boom led to the development of huge housing developments targeted at returning veterans, the largest being Stuyvesant Town–Peter Cooper Village , which opened in 1947. The United Nations relocated to a new headquarters that was completed in 1952 along the East River. The Stonewall riots were

8968-1054: The coldest winter month. Spring and autumn are unpredictable and can range from chilly to warm, although they are usually mild with low humidity. Summers are typically warm to hot and humid, with a daily mean temperature of 76.5 °F (24.7 °C) in July. Nighttime conditions are often exacerbated by the urban heat island phenomenon, 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. Daytime temperatures exceed 90 °F (32 °C) on average of 17 days each summer and in some years exceed 100 °F (38 °C). Extreme temperatures have ranged from −15 °F (−26 °C), recorded on February 9, 1934, up to 106 °F (41 °C) on July 9, 1936. Manhattan lies in USDA plant hardiness zone 7b (5 to 10 °F/-15 to -12.2 °C). Manhattan receives 49.9 inches (1,270 mm) of precipitation annually, which

9086-472: The decade to 1,694,250, representing 19.2% of New York City's population of 8,804,194 and 8.4% of New York State's population of 20,201,230. The population density of New York County was 70,450.8 inhabitants per square mile (27,201.2/km ) in 2022, the highest population density of any county in the United States and higher than the density of any individual U.S. city . At the 2010 census , there were 1,585,873 people living in Manhattan, an increase of 3.2% from

9204-407: The demarcation line for east/west designations. South of Waverly Place , Fifth Avenue terminates and Broadway becomes the east/west demarcation line. In Manhattan, uptown means north and downtown means south. This usage differs from that of most American cities, where downtown refers to the central business district. As of the 2020 census , Manhattan's population had increased by 6.8% over

9322-546: The earthquakes have exceeded 5 on the Richter magnitude scale . Starting about 2.5 million years ago, a cycle of Pleistocene glacial and interglacial periods began which covered the area in ice. During the most recent episode, the Laurentide Ice Sheet covered most of northern North America between about 95,000 and c. 20,000 years ago. After this the climate warmed, but it took nearly 10,000 years for

9440-560: The fall line is the spot where rivers become unnavigable, port cities typically have sprung up where rivers cross this boundary. The east side of the Piedmont runs along the Hudson, parallel to Manhattan , New York City, through New Jersey , and then along a line near Philadelphia , Baltimore , Washington, D.C. , Richmond, Virginia , Raleigh, North Carolina , Columbia, South Carolina , Augusta, Georgia , Macon, Georgia , and Montgomery, Alabama . Richmond and Raleigh are both located within

9558-511: The fire. Many of the women wore fitted tucked-front blouses like those manufactured by the company, a clothing style that became the working woman's uniform and a symbol of women's liberation , reflecting the alliance of the labor and suffrage movements. Despite the Great Depression , some of the world's tallest skyscrapers were completed in Manhattan during the 1930s, including numerous Art Deco masterpieces that are still part of

9676-610: The first Secretary of the Treasury to expand the city's role as a center of commerce and industry. By 1810, New York City, then confined to Manhattan, had surpassed Philadelphia as the most populous city in the United States. The Commissioners' Plan of 1811 laid out the island of Manhattan in its familiar grid plan . The city's role as an economic center grew with the opening of the Erie Canal in 1825, cutting transportation costs by 90% compared to road transport and connecting

9794-491: The highest sale price per square foot in the United States. Manhattan is home to Wall Street as well as the world's two largest stock exchanges by total market capitalization , the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq . Many multinational media conglomerates are based in Manhattan, as are numerous colleges and universities, such as Columbia University and New York University . The headquarters of

9912-473: The land around Upper New York Harbor New Angoulême , in reference to the family name of King Francis I; he sailed far enough into the harbor to sight the Hudson River , and he named the Bay of Santa Margarita – what is now Upper New York Bay – after Marguerite de Navarre , the elder sister of the king. Manhattan was first mapped during a 1609 voyage of Henry Hudson . Hudson came across Manhattan Island and

10030-503: The larger Appalachian Mountains range. It is located in the eastern United States and stretches about 900 miles from New York to Alabama. The province starts in Rockland County, New York near South Mountain on the west side of the Hudson River . The eastern border of the Piedmont runs along a fall line , the point at which rivers traditionally drop rapidly from harder metamorphic rocks to softer sedimentary rocks. Because

10148-537: The late Paleozoic Era . These rocks are generally flat-lying, but have been dissected by streams to form a rugged and mountainous terrain. In addition to these sedimentary rocks, beds of coal are locally significant throughout the Appalachian Plateaus, making this area the heart of the American coal industry. The Appalachian Plateau includes several physiographic sections: The Blue Ridge province

10266-563: The matter was definitively settled later that year when the New York Legislature overwhelmingly passed legislation declaring the neighborhood part of both New York County and the Borough of Manhattan. Within New York Harbor , there are three smaller islands: Other smaller islands, in the East River , include (from north to south): The bedrock underlying much of Manhattan consists of three rock formations: Inwood marble , Fordham gneiss , and Manhattan schist , and

10384-692: The moderating effects of the Atlantic Ocean , yet the Atlantic and the partial shielding from colder air by the Appalachians keep the city warmer in the winter than inland North American cities at similar or lesser latitudes. The daily mean temperature in January, the area's coldest month, is 32.6 °F (0.3 °C); temperatures usually drop to 10 °F (−12 °C) several times per winter, and reach 60 °F (16 °C) several days in

10502-555: The more recent human history of the Adirondack region, see Adirondack Park . The rocks of the Adirondack mountains originated about two billion years ago as 50,000 feet (ca. 15,240 m) thick sediments at the bottom of a sea located near the equator . Because of plate tectonics these collided with Laurentia (the precursor of modern North America) in a mountain building episode known as the Grenville orogeny . During this time

10620-452: The named lakes around the mountains, are Lake George , Lake Placid , and Lake Tear of the Clouds , which is the source of the Hudson River . The Adirondack High Peaks are a list of 46 mountains in the Adirondacks that are above or close to 4,000 feet in elevation. The list was created when it was believed that all 46 peaks were at least 4,000 feet tall. Later surveys showed that four of

10738-473: The native people living there, and continued up the river that would later bear his name, the Hudson River . Manhattan was first recorded in writing as Manna-hata , in the logbook of Robert Juet, an officer on the voyage. 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

10856-455: The number of smaller lakes, ponds, and other bodies of water reaching over 3,000. Among the named lakes around the mountains are Lake George , Lake Placid , and Lake Tear of the Clouds . The region has over 1,200 miles (1,900 km) of river. Although the mountains are formed from ancient rocks more than 1 billion years old, geologically, the mountains are relatively young and were created during recent periods of glaciation. Because of this,

10974-466: The original World Trade Center , which was destroyed during the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks . Situated on one of the world's largest natural harbors , the borough is bounded by the Hudson , East , and Harlem rivers and includes several small adjacent islands , including Roosevelt , U Thant , and Randalls and Wards Islands . It also includes the small neighborhood of Marble Hill now on

11092-468: The peaks are actually lower than 4,000 feet. One 4,000 foot peak was also not included in the original list. The tallest peak is Mount Marcy , which is the highest point in New York at 5,344 feet (1,629 m). Although the mountains are formed from ancient rocks more than one billion years old, geologically, the 160-mile wide dome area, called a massif , is relatively new. Because of this, the Adirondacks have been referred to as "new mountains from old rocks." It

11210-848: The population was claimed as members by religious congregations, although members of historically African-American denominations were underrepresented due to incomplete information. In 2014, Manhattan had 703 religious organizations, the seventeenth most out of all US counties. There is a large Buddhist temple in Manhattan located at the foot of the Manhattan Bridge in Chinatown . As of 2015, 60.0% (927,650) of Manhattan residents, aged five and older, spoke only English at home, while 22.63% (350,112) spoke Spanish, 5.37% (83,013) Chinese, 2.21% (34,246) French, 0.85% (13,138) Korean, 0.72% (11,135) Russian, and 0.70% (10,766) Japanese. In total, 40.0% of Manhattan's population, aged five and older, spoke

11328-593: The principal life-form of the sea bed, and fossil tracks can be seen in the Potsdam sandstone floor of the Paul Smiths Visitor Interpretive Center. About 10 million years ago, the region began to be uplifted. It has been lifted about 7000 feet (ca. 2,134 meters) and is continuing at about 2 millimeters per year, which is greater than the rate of denudation . The cause of the uplift is unknown, but geologists theorize that it

11446-544: The public in 1858, became the first landscaped public park in an American city. New York City played a complex role in the American Civil War . The city had strong commercial ties to the South , but anger around conscription , resentment against Lincoln's war policies and paranoia about free Blacks taking the jobs of poor immigrants culminated in the three-day-long New York Draft Riots of July 1863, among

11564-472: The public. It covers over 20 percent of New York state's land area. The word Adirondack is thought to come from the Mohawk word atirǫ́·taks meaning "eaters of trees". The earliest written use of the name was in 1635 by Harmen Meyndertsz van den Bogaert in his Mohawk to Dutch glossary, found in his Journey into Mohawk Country . He spelled it Adirondakx and said that it stood for Frenchmen, meaning

11682-566: The range of 66–73 °F (19–23 °C), cooler than the rest of New York State due to the higher elevation. Summer evenings in the Adirondacks are chilly, with temperatures ranging on average between 45–54 °F (7–12 °C). Winters (December–March) are long, cold, snowy and harsh, with temperatures ranging from 18 to 23 °F (−8 to −5 °C). Winter nights are frigid, with temperatures between −2 and 4 °F (−19 and −16 °C). Spring (April–May) and fall (September–November) are short transitional seasons. The Adirondack Mountains form

11800-713: The region as a blank space in the northeastern corner of New York. In 1784, Thomas Pownhall wrote that the Native Americans referred to the area as "the Dismal Wilderness, or the Habitation of Winter," and that the area was "either not much known to them, or, if known, very wisely by them kept from the Knowledge of the Europeans." He clearly had the impression that native people did not live within

11918-596: The seat of the city's government . Harlem in Upper Manhattan became the center of what is now known as the cultural Harlem Renaissance in the 1920s. The Stonewall Inn in Greenwich Village , part of the Stonewall National Monument , is considered the birthplace in 1969 of the modern gay rights movement , cementing Manhattan's central role in LGBT culture . Manhattan was the site of

12036-589: The shorelines of the borough and the metropolitan area to minimize the risk of destructive consequences from another such event in the future. On October 31, 2017 , a terrorist drove a truck down a bike path alongside the West Side Highway in Lower Manhattan, killing eight. According to the United States Census Bureau , New York County has a total area of 33.6 square miles (87 km ), of which 22.8 square miles (59 km )

12154-432: The sidewalk, prompted the passage of the 1916 Zoning Resolution , requiring new buildings to contain setbacks withdrawing progressively at a defined angle from the street as they rose, in order to preserve a view of the sky at street level. Manhattan's skyline includes several buildings that are symbolic of New York, in particular the Chrysler Building and the Empire State Building , which sees about 4 million visitors

12272-548: The site was used to expand the Manhattan shoreline across West Street, creating Battery Park City . Constructed on piers at a cost of $ 260 million, Little Island opened on the Hudson River in May 2021, connected to the western termini of 13th and 14th Streets by footbridges . Marble Hill was part of the northern tip of Manhattan Island, but the Harlem River Ship Canal , dug in 1895 to better connect

12390-589: The southernmost part of the Eastern forest-boreal transition ecoregion . They are heavily forested, and contain one of the southernmost distributions of the taiga ecotype in North America. The forests of the Adirondacks include spruce , pine and deciduous trees. Lumbering, once an important industry, has been much restricted by the creation of state forest preserve. The mountains include many wetlands , of which there are three kinds: Breeding birds include northern forest specialists not found anywhere else in

12508-602: The southernmost point near Amicalola Mountain in Dawsonville, Georgia with the westernmost section being near Cohutta Mountain in Murray County, Georgia . The Blue Ridge Mountains are named for their distinctive blue haze, which is caused by the presence of atmospheric pollutants and water vapor. This contributes to the characteristic haze on the mountains and their perceived color. The mountains are made of highly deformed metamorphic rocks, largely developed during

12626-515: The state, such as boreal chickadees , Canada jays , spruce grouse , black-backed woodpeckers , common loons and crossbills . Mammals include raccoons , beavers , river otters , bobcats , moose , black bears , and coyotes . Extirpated or extinct mammals that formerly roamed the Adirondacks include the eastern cougar , eastern elk , wolverine , caribou , eastern wolf , and the Canada lynx . Attempted reintroductions of elk and lynx in

12744-642: The structure began in October 1963. The loss of Penn Station led directly to the enactment in 1965 of a local law establishing the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission , which is responsible for preserving the "city's historic, aesthetic, and cultural heritage ". The historic preservation movement triggered by Penn Station's demise has been credited with the retention of some one million structures nationwide, including over 1,000 in New York City. In 2017,

12862-590: The western portion of Vermont, consist of carbonate rocks (primarily limestone, dolomite, and marble). These consolidated rocks yield water primarily from bedding planes, fractures, joints, and faults, rather than from intergranular pores. Like the adjacent physiographic provinces, a large part of the New England province was peneplained during the Jurassic and Cretaceous periods, then uplifted, extensively dissected, and finally glaciated. The St. Lawrence Valley

12980-567: The wilderness character of the region became popular with the rise of the Romantic movement , and the Adirondacks became a destination for those wishing to escape the evils of city life. Rising concern over water quality and deforestation led to the creation of the Adirondack Park in 1885. In 1989, part of the Adirondack region was designated by UNESCO as the Champlain-Adirondack Biosphere Reserve . For

13098-434: The winter can survive. A small area on the highest peaks exists above the tree line and has an alpine climate . These areas are covered by plants which occupied a large lowland tundra following the most recent period of glaciation. The amount of area covered by this ecosystem changes from year to year due to local climate changes, and has been estimated to only cover between 65–85 acres (26–34 hectares). The alpine ecosystem

13216-470: The word, including Achkokx , Rondaxe , and Adirondax. Such words were strongly associated with the region, but they were not yet considered a place name; an English map from 1761 labels the area simply Deer Hunting Country . In 1838, the mountains were named Adirondacks by Ebenezer Emmons , the State Geologist for the northern New York State Geological District. The first humans to live in

13334-473: The world's financial center , with Wall Street employment doubling from 1977 to 1987. The 1980s also saw Manhattan at the heart of the AIDS crisis , with Greenwich Village at its epicenter. In the 1970s, Times Square and 42nd Street – with its sex shops , peep shows , and adult theaters, along with its sex trade , street crime, and public drug use – became emblematic of the city's decline, with

13452-419: The world. Present-day Manhattan was originally part of Lenape territory. European settlement began with the establishment of a trading post by Dutch colonists in 1624 on southern Manhattan Island; the post was named New Amsterdam in 1626. The territory and its surroundings came under English control in 1664 and were renamed New York after King Charles II of England granted the lands to his brother,

13570-537: The world." By the 1990s, crime rates began to drop dramatically and the city once again became the destination of immigrants from around the world, joining with low interest rates and Wall Street bonus payments to fuel the growth of the real estate market. Important new sectors, such as Silicon Alley , emerged in the Flatiron District , cementing technology as a key component of Manhattan's economy. The 1993 World Trade Center bombing , described by

13688-536: The worst incidents of civil disorder in American history. The rate of immigration from Europe grew steeply after the Civil War, and Manhattan became the first stop for millions seeking a new life in the United States, a role acknowledged by the dedication of the Statue of Liberty in 1886. This immigration brought further social upheaval. In a city of tenements packed with poorly paid laborers from dozens of nations,

13806-646: Was established as one of the five boroughs of New York City . The Bronx remained part of New York County until 1914, when Bronx County was established. The construction of the New York City Subway , which opened in 1904, helped bind the new city together, as did the completion of the Williamsburg Bridge (1903) and Manhattan Bridge (1909) connecting to Brooklyn and the Queensboro Bridge (1909) connecting to Queens. In

13924-439: Was opened in January 2021. Parkland covers a total of 2,659 acres (10.76 km ), accounting for 18.2% of the borough's land area; the 840-acre (3.4 km ) Central Park is the borough's largest park, comprising 31.6% of Manhattan's parkland. Designed by Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux , the park is anchored by the 12-acre (4.9 ha) Great Lawn and offers extensive walking tracks , two ice-skating rinks,

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