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New York City

most populous city in the United States

137 dated entries naming New York City, drawn from 103 separate years between 2800 BCE and 2020 CE. Nothing here is written by us: each line is the sentence a Wikipedia year article used, and the link beside it opens the exact revision.

Also written as New York City, New York, New York, New York in the source articles; Wikipedia redirects those to the same subject, so their entries are on this page.

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28th century BC

  • 2800 BCEc. 2800 BC – 2700 BC: Seated Harp Player, from Keros, Cyclades, is made. It is now at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.source

23rd century BC

  • 2288 BCEc. 2288 BC: "Queen Merye-ankhnes and her son Pepy II" is sculpted, Sixth dynasty of Egypt. The alabaster statuette is now at the Brooklyn Museum of Art, New York.source

8th century BC

  • 750 BCEc. 750 BC – 700 BC—Funerary Vase (Krater), from the Dipylon Cemetery, Athens, is made. Attributed to the Hirschfield workshop. It is now at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.source
  • 750 BCEc. 750 BC—Man and Centaur, perhaps from Olympia, is made. It is now at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.source

5th century BC

  • 450 BCEThe grave stela from Paros, Little girl with a bird, is made. It is now kept at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York (approximate date).source

13th century

  • 12151215–1216 – The Macy Jug, from Iran, is made. It is now kept at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.source

17th century

  • 1625The Dutch settle Manhattan, founding the town of New Amsterdam. The town will transform into a piece of New York City.source
  • 1653February 2 – New Amsterdam (now New York City) received municipal rights by a charter from New Netherland Governor Peter Stuyvesant.source
  • 1664October 4 – New Netherland is captured by England. The English promptly rename the fledgling city New York, after the Duke of York (later King James II).source
  • 166512 June – the city of New Amsterdam in the Province of New York is reincorporated as New York, named after James, Duke of York, and the first Mayor appointed.source
  • 167330 July (9 August New Style) – Third Anglo-Dutch War: a Dutch fleet retakes New York in the American colonies, renaming it New Orange.source
  • 1673August 8 – In the American colonies, a Dutch battle fleet of 23 ships demands the surrender of New York.source
  • 1673August 9 – Dutch forces under Admiral Cornelis Evertsen the Youngest recapture New York from the English; the city is known as New Orange until regained by the English in 1674.source
  • 1674November 10 – As provided in the Treaty of Westminster of February 19, the Dutch Republic cedes its colony of New Netherland to England. This includes the colonial capital, New Orange, which is returned to its English name of New York. The colonies of Surinam, Essequibo and Berbice remain in Dutch hands.source
  • 167410 November – as provided in the Treaty of Westminster of 19 February, the Dutch Republic cedes its colony of New Netherland to England. This includes the colonial capital, New Orange, which is returned to its English name of New York.source

18th century

  • 1704February 28 – Establishment of the first school open to African-Americans in New York City by Frenchman Elias Neau.source
  • 1711December 13 – Wall Street in New York City becomes the city's first official slave market for the sale and rental of enslaved Africans and Indians.source
  • 1730April 8 – Congregation Shearith Israel, the first synagogue in New York City, is dedicated.source
  • 1741April 6 – The New York Slave Insurrection, a plot to set fire to New York City, is discovered.source
  • 1756March 17 – St. Patrick's Day is celebrated in New York City for the first time (at the Crown and Thistle Tavern).source
  • 1760April 18 – Mary Alexander, influential colonial-era merchant in New York City (born 1693)source
  • 1767November 27 – Oconostota and Attakullakulla, Chiefs of the Cherokee people in the Carolinas, depart from Charleston, South Carolina on a ship voyage to New York City, where they are welcomed by British colonial officials as a prelude to negotiations with Britain's Superintendent of Indian Affairs, Sir William Johnson.source
  • 1776July 9 – American Revolution: An angry mob in New York City topples and beheads the equestrian statue of George III in Bowling Green; much of its metal content will be used to make musket balls.source
  • 1776September 22 – American Revolution: Nathan Hale is executed by the British in New York City for espionage.source
  • 1785January 11 – The Confederation Congress reconvenes in New York City having previously convened in Trenton, New Jersey.source
  • 1789March 4 – At Federal Hall in New York City, the 1st United States Congress meets and declares the new United States Constitution to be in effect.source
  • 1790January 8 – President of the U.S. George Washington gives the first State of the Union address, in New York City.source

19th century

  • 1807August 17 – The Clermont, Robert Fulton's first American steamboat, leaves New York City for Albany, New York, on the Hudson River, inaugurating the first commercial steamboat service in the world.source
  • 1811October 11 – Inventor John Stevens' boat, the Juliana, begins operation as the first steam-powered ferry service, between New York City and Hoboken, New Jersey.source
  • 1811October 11 – Inventor John Stevens' boat, the Juliana, begins operation as the first steam-powered ferry (service between New York, New York, and Hoboken, New Jersey).source
  • 1817May – The General Convention of the Episcopal Church founds the General Theological Seminary while meeting in New York City.source
  • 1820February 6 – 86 free African American colonists sail from New York City to Freetown, Sierra Leone.source
  • 1821September 3 – The 1821 Norfolk and Long Island hurricane strikes New York City.source
  • 1825June 11 – The first cornerstone is laid for Fort Hamilton in New York City.source
  • 18254 July – The sloop Restauration set sail from Stavanger to New York City. It is considered the first organized emigration from Norway to the United States.source
  • 1825October 26 – US finishes Erie Canal from Buffalo to Hudson River and New York City.source
  • 1826September 3 – The USS Vincennes, commanded by William Finch, leaves New York City to become the first U.S. warship to circumnavigate the globe.source
  • 1832July–August – The 1829–51 cholera pandemic reaches the Northeastern seaboard, beginning with New York City.source
  • 1834July 7–10 – Anti-abolitionist riots break out in New York City.source
  • 1836May 4 – The Ancient Order of Hibernians, an Irish Catholic fraternal organization, is founded in New York City.source
  • 1837May 10 – The Panic of 1837 begins in New York City.source
  • 1837May 10 – Panic of 1837: New York City banks fail, and unemployment reaches record levels.source
  • 18384–22 April – the paddle steamer SS Sirius (1837) makes the Transatlantic Crossing to New York from Cork in eighteen days, though not using steam continuously.source
  • 1840April 3 – Johnny Appleseed meets Abraham Lincoln, and plants apple trees in New York City.source
  • 1843February 6 – The Virginia Minstrels perform the first minstrel show (Bowery Amphitheatre, New York City).source
  • 1843October 13 – In New York City, Henry Jones and 11 others found B'nai B'rith, the oldest Jewish service organization in the world.source
  • 184622 September – the Great Western Steamship Company's SS Great Britain, bound from Liverpool for New York, runs aground in Dundrum Bay (County Down). She lies here for almost a year, protected by temporary measures organised by her designer, I. K. Brunel.source
  • 1847January 17 – Saint Anthony Hall is founded at Columbia University in New York City.source
  • 1849Global healthcare and pharmaceutical company Pfizer founded in New York, United States.source
  • 1849February 14 – James Knox Polk becomes the first sitting president of the United States to have his photograph taken, in New York City.source
  • 1849October – Swedish writer and reformist Fredrika Bremer travels to the United States and lands in New York City, beginning her two year long journey across the US and Britain.source
  • 185015 April – iron paddle steamer SS City of Glasgow, built by Tod & Macgregor of Partick, makes her maiden voyage as the first steamer on the Glasgow–New York route.source
  • 1850July 19 – The ship Elizabeth, an American merchant freighter carrying cargo that included mostly marble from Carrara, slammed into a sandbar less than 100 yards from Fire Island, New York, drowning Margaret Fuller, her husband Ossoli, and their young son Angelino.source
  • 1852End of the Great Famine. In the period it has lasted since 1845, one million people have emigrated from Ireland. The Irish now make up a quarter of the population of Liverpool, Boston, New York, Philadelphia and Baltimore; and a half of Toronto.source
  • 1852January 15 – Nine men representing various Hebrew charitable organizations come together to form what will become the Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City.source
  • 1854February 28 – The Black Warrior Affair: A ship destined for New York City is detained in Havana, Cuba (under Spanish control at the time). The incident strains U.S.–Spanish relations.source
  • 1855May 17 – Mount Sinai Hospital, New York, is dedicated (originally named as the Jews' Hospital) in New York City; it opens to patients on June 5.source
  • 1855May 17 – The Mount Sinai Hospital is dedicated (as the Jews' Hospital) in New York City; it opens to patients on June 5.source
  • 1858Squibb Pharmacy, as predecessor of Bristol Myers Squibb, a worldwide pharmaceutical brand, is founded in New York, United States.source
  • 1858July 8 – The Paulist Fathers, a Roman Catholic society of apostolic life for men, is founded in New York City by Isaac Hecker.source
  • 1867December 2 – In a New York City theater, English author Charles Dickens gives his first public reading in the United States.source
  • 1868March 24 – The Metropolitan Life Insurance Company is formed, in New York City.source
  • 1873September 18 – The New York stock market crash triggers the Panic of 1873, part of the Long Depression.source
  • 1875December 4 – Notorious New York City politician Boss Tweed escapes from prison and flees to Cuba, then to Spain.source
  • 1876June 4 – The Transcontinental Express arrives in San Francisco via the first transcontinental railroad, 83 hours and 39 minutes after having left New York City.source
  • 1876June 4 – The Transcontinental Express arrives in San Francisco, California via the First Transcontinental Railroad, 83 hours and 39 minutes after having left New York City.source
  • 1879December 31 – Gilbert and Sullivan's comic opera The Pirates of Penzance opens at the Fifth Avenue Theatre in New York City (following a token performance the day before for U.K. copyright reasons in Paignton, Devon).source
  • 1881February 22 – Cleopatra's Needle is erected in Central Park, New York City.source
  • 1883May 30 – In New York City, a rumor that the Brooklyn Bridge is going to collapse causes a stampede which crushes 12 people.source
  • 1885October 10 – The largest ever explosion for a non-military purpose is set off in the East River of New York City as part of a scheme for the removal of Hell Gate rocks by the United States Army Corps of Engineers.source
  • 1886Undated – Arthur Hinds & Company, later Barnes & Noble booksellers, is founded in New York City.source
  • 1886September – Avon Products, a worldwide cosmetics and household brand is founded by David H. McConnell in New York City, United States.source
  • 1887The first English-language edition of Friedrich Engels' 1844 study of The Condition of the Working Class in England, translated by Florence Kelley, is published in New York City.source
  • 1888December 1 – The Washington Bridge opens to permit-holding pedestrians over the Harlem River in New York City, connecting the boroughs of Manhattan and The Bronx.source
  • 1890December 10 – The New York World Building is completed in New York City, the tallest building in the United States for 10 years at a height of 110 meters.source
  • 1897January 2 – The International Alpha Omicron Pi sorority is founded, in New York City.source
  • 1898January 1 – New York City annexes land from surrounding counties, creating the City of Greater New York as the world's second largest. The city is geographically divided into five boroughs: Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, The Bronx and Staten Island.source
  • 1899July 20 – Park Row Building in New York City is completed. It is the world's tallest building until 1908.source
  • 1899September 14 – Henry H. Bliss becomes the first person to be killed by a motor vehicle in the United States. Upon disembarking from a streetcar in New York City, an electric-powered taxicab strikes and crushes him and he dies from his injuries the following morning.source
  • 1899November 8 – The Bronx Zoological Park opens in New York City.source
  • 19001 September – The German-American Telegraph Company opens the first direct line between Germany and the United States. At 7,917 kilometres or 4,919 miles, the line was the longest transatlantic cable to that time, running from Emden to New York City, via the Azores Islands.source

20th century

  • 1902January 8 – A train collision in the New York Central Railroad's Park Avenue Tunnel kills 17 people, injures 38, and leads to increased demand for electric trains and the banning of steam locomotives in New York City.source
  • 1903March 2 – In New York City, the Martha Washington Hotel, the first hotel exclusively for women, opens.source
  • 1905May 4 –The first world championship of professional wrestling takes place at Madison Square Garden in New York City.source
  • 1905October 11 – The Institute of Musical Art, predecessor of the Juilliard School, opens in New York City.source
  • 1907October 22 – Panic of 1907: A bank run forces New York's Knickerbocker Trust Company to suspend operations.source
  • 1907November 16 – Passenger liner RMS Mauretania, the world's largest and fastest at this date, sets out on her maiden voyage from Liverpool (England) to New York.source
  • 1908March 26 – The US Thomas Flyer car sails for Alaska at the head of a motor race from New York to Paris.source
  • 1909November 28 – Sergei Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No. 3 is premièred in New York City with the composer as soloist.source
  • 1910December 12 – New York City socialite Dorothy Arnold disappears. Her family does not notify the police until 6 weeks later, after their own investigations fail to produce any results.source
  • 1911March 25 – The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire in New York City kills 146.source
  • 1913February 2 – New York City's Grand Central Terminal, having been rebuilt, reopens as the world's largest train station.source
  • 19157 May – Sinking of the Lusitania: British ocean liner RMS Lusitania was sunk by Imperial German Navy U-boat U-20 about 11 mi off Old Head of Kinsale, County Cork, killing 1,198 civilians en route from New York to Liverpool, among them the Irish-born art dealer and benefactor Sir Hugh Lane and Irish composer and conductor Thomas O'Brien Butler.source
  • 1916September 30 – Construction is completed on the Hell Gate Bridge in New York City.source
  • 1918May 15 – The United States Post Office Department begins the world's third regular airmail service, between New York City, Philadelphia and Washington, D.C.source
  • 1918May 15 – The United States Post Office Department (later renamed the United States Postal Service) begins the first regular airmail service in the world (between New York City, Philadelphia and Washington, DC).source
  • 1918December 14 – Giacomo Puccini's comic opera Gianni Schicchi premiered at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City.source
  • 1921June 15 – Compagnie Générale Transatlantique's liner SS Paris makes her maiden voyage from Le Havre to New York.source
  • 1930July 26 – Charles Creighton and James Hargis leave New York City for Los Angeles on a roundtrip journey, driving 11,555 km using only a reverse gear; the trip lasts the next 42 days.source
  • 1932November 16 – New York City's Palace Theatre fully converts to a cinema, which is considered the final death knell of vaudeville as a popular entertainment in the United States.source
  • 1932December 27 – The Radio City Music Hall is opened in New York City.source
  • 1933March 2 – King Kong: The original King Kong film, starring Fay Wray and directed by Merian C. Cooper, debuts in New York City.source
  • 1936February 5 – Modern Times, widely considered one of the greatest films ever, premieres in New York City.source
  • 1936November 25 – The Abraham Lincoln Brigade sails from New York City on its way to the Spanish Civil War.source
  • 1937September 30 – Hedy Lamarr, an Austrian-born actress of Jewish descent, arrives in New York City to flee from her possessive husband, Friedrich Mandl, who made arms agreements with the Nazis, and to begin her Hollywood career.source
  • 1939November 8 – CBS television station W2XAB resumes test transmission, with an all-electronic system broadcast from the top of the Chrysler Building in New York City.source
  • 1943March – Exiled French aviator Antoine de Saint-Exupéry's self-illustrated children's novella, The Little Prince, is published in New York City, the all-time best-selling book originating in French.source
  • 1947February 21 – Edwin Land demonstrates the first "instant camera", his Polaroid Land Camera, to a meeting of the Optical Society of America in New York City.source
  • 1947April 16 – The first public demonstration of a TV camera zoom lens, the Jerry Fairbanks Zoomar, is held at NBC studios in New York.source
  • 1949January 4 – RMS Caronia (1947) of the Cunard Line departs Southampton for New York City on her maiden voyage.source
  • 1949January 17 – The first VW Type 1 to arrive in the United States, a 1948 model, is brought to New York by Dutch businessman Ben Pon. Unable to interest dealers or importers in the Volkswagen, Pon sells the sample car to pay his travel expenses. Only two 1949 models are sold in America that year, convincing Volkswagen chairman Heinrich Nordhoff the car has no future in the U.S. (The Type 1 goes on to become an automotive phenomenon.)source
  • 1952February 7 – New York City announces its first crosswalk devices to be installed.source
  • 1952July 3 - The SS United States Has Her maiden voyage en route from New York To Southampton And wins the Blue Ribandsource
  • 1959January 25 – American Airlines begins the first U.S. domestic jet service with a Boeing 707 airliner flight between New York and Los Angeles.source
  • 1960Air India enters United States with flights to New York.source
  • 1960July 21 – English navigator Francis Chichester wins the first Single-Handed Trans-Atlantic Race, arriving in New York aboard Gypsy Moth III having made a record solo Atlantic crossing in 40 days.source
  • 1962October 12 – Jazz bassist/composer Charles Mingus presents a disastrous concert at Town Hall in New York City. It will gain a reputation as the worst moment of his career.source
  • 19649 July – The remains of the Revisionist Zionist leader Ze'ev Jabotinsky are transferred to Israel for burial in Jerusalem at Mount Herzl Cemetery from his original burial site in New York.source
  • 1967June 14–15 – Glenn Gould records Prokofiev's Seventh Piano Sonata, Op. 83, in New York City (his only recording of a Prokofiev composition).source
  • 1969June 28 – The Stonewall riots, a milestone in the modern gay rights movement in the United States, began in New York City.source
  • 1969December 2 – The Boeing 747 jumbo jet makes its first passenger flight. It carries 191 people, most of them reporters and photographers, from Seattle to New York City.source
  • 1970September 6 – Dawson's Field hijackings: The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine hijacks four passenger aircraft from Pan Am, TWA and Swissair on flights to New York from Brussels, Frankfurt and Zurich and flies them to a desert airstrip in Jordan.source
  • 1971January 1 – Fifth Street Women's Building Takeover: A coalition of over 100 feminists illegally occupy an abandoned city building in New York City. They establish a women's center, homeless shelter, food co-operative, and lesbian center before being raided by police 13 days later.source
  • 1971July 19 – The South Tower of the World Trade Center in New York City tops out at 1,362 ft, making it the second-tallest building in the world after the North Tower that had topped out in December 1970.source
  • 1974January – Cargolux takes over Loftleiðir's maintenance and engineering departments, which were subsequently transferred from New York City to Luxembourg City.source
  • 1974August 7 – French acrobat Philippe Petit walks across a high wire slung between the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York.source
  • 1979February 13 – The Guardian Angels are formed in New York City as an unarmed organization of young crime fighters.source
  • 1979October 2 – Pope John Paul II arrives in New York City for his first papal tour where he addresses the U.N. General Assembly against all forms of concentration camps and torture.source
  • 1982June 12 – A rally against nuclear weapons draws 750,000 to New York City's Central Park. Jackson Browne, James Taylor, Bruce Springsteen and Linda Ronstadt attend. An international convocation at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine features prominent peace activists from around the world and afterward participants march on Fifth Avenue to Central Park for the rally.source
  • 1989April 19 – Central Park jogger case: Trisha Meili is seriously assaulted and raped whilst jogging in New York City's Central Park; the convictions of five teenagers for the crime are vacated in 2002 (the jogger's identity remains secret for years, hence she is referred to as the "Central Park Jogger").source
  • 199025 January – Avianca Flight 052: 73 people die after an Avianca plane flying from Medellín to New York City, United States crashes in Cove Neck, New York.source
  • 1991July 29 – In New York City, a grand jury indicts Bank of Credit and Commerce International of the largest bank fraud in history, accusing the bank of defrauding depositors of US$5 billion.source
  • 1998February 20 – Rudy Giuliani kicks off his "quality of life" campaign in New York City, focused on increasing civility and reducing nuisances like littering and reckless driving.source

21st century

  • 2001September 11 – 2,996 killed in the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City, New York, The Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, and Shanksville, Pennsylvania. Saddam Hussein immediately declares that his government played no part in the attacks. Also that day a U.S. military RQ-1B Predator drone crashed near Basra, Iraq claims to have shot it down.source
  • 2002March 11 – The Tribute in Light is installed at the World Trade Center site in New York City.source
  • 2013November 12 – Three Studies of Lucian Freud, a series of portraits of Lucian Freud by the British painter Francis Bacon, sells for US$142.4 million in a New York City auction, setting a world record for an auctioned work of art.source
  • 2020April 5 – COVID-19 pandemic: The first case of COVID-19 in a zoo animal is reported: a four-year-old female Malayan tiger at the Bronx Zoo in New York City.source

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