NEW YORK CITY

George Lankevich Central Park, Manhattan, New York City, flanked by the apartment buildings of the Upper East Side. city and port located at the mouth of the Hudson River, southeastern New York state, northeastern U.S. It is the largest and most influential American metropolis, encompassing Manhattan and Staten islands, the western sections of Long Island, and a small portion of the New York state mainland to the north of Manhattan. New York City is in reality a collection of many neighbourhoods scattered among the city's five boroughsManhattan, Brooklyn, the Bronx, Queens, and Staten Islandeach exhibiting its own lifestyle. Moving from one city neighbourhood to the next may be like passing from one country to another. New York is the most populous and the most international city in the country. Its urban area extends into adjoining parts of New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut. Located where the Hudson and East rivers empty into one of the world's premier harbours, New York is both the gateway to the North American continent and its preferred exit to the oceans of the globe. Area 309 square miles (800 square km). Pop. (1990) city, 7,322,564; New York PMSA, 8,546,846; New YorkNorthern New JerseyLong Island CMSA, 19,566,968; (1999 est.) city, 7,428,162; New York PMSA, 8,712,600; New YorkNew JerseyLong Island CMSA, 20,196,649. city and port located at the mouth of the Hudson River, southeastern New York state, northeastern U.S. New York City is the centre of the largest urban agglomeration in the United States. It occupies Manhattan and Staten islands, the western end of Long Island, a portion of the mainland, and various islands in New York Harbor and Long Island Sound. Its urban area extends into neighbouring parts of New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut. The city consists of five boroughs (Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, the Bronx, and Staten Island [formerly Richmond]), which correspond to five counties of New York state (New York, Kings, Queens, Bronx, and Richmond, respectively). All are located near the point where the Hudson River empties into Upper New York Bay of the Atlantic Ocean. The city's only land boundaries are Westchester county on the north and Nassau county on Long Island to the east. The city's waterfront is used for shipping and recreation. New York City is an ethnic melting pot where the most dramatic cultural contrasts are commonplace. It is among the most geographically and demographically complex of world cities, its economy one of the most diverse, and its cultural scene among the richest and most variegated. The city may be described as a collection of many neighbourhoods, each with its own character and life-style. Manhattan is the economic and cultural heart of the city and is often considered to be the city. Administration and services, however, have become increasingly decentralized as community planning boards have assumed more power in areas such as education, health, housing, and public works. Manhattan, the magnet for tourists and businessmen, is at first glance a city of skyscrapers, glaring lights, and frenetic pace. The shopping promenade of Fifth Avenue, the financial institutions of Wall Street, the residential mansions of Park Avenue, or the bohemian sections of the East Village and SoHo give typical impressions. Of the other boroughs, only Brooklyn has a similar ethnic heterogeneity and a similar range of social life, with commercial and industrial districts and residential areas ranging from the wealth of Brooklyn Heights to the most abject poverty of parts of Bedford-Stuyvesant. Queens is mainly residential and middle class, and Staten Island is partly suburban but still rural in some areas. In the Bronx luxurious residences and solid middle-class apartments prevail in some sections, but other areas, especially the South Bronx, are the scene of severe urban blight. Ethnic pockets abound throughout Manhattan, from black and Spanish Harlem in the north to the various enclaves of the Lower East Side such as Little Italy and Chinatown. New York City has large numbers of Italians, Irish, Puerto Ricans, Asians, and West Indians, as well as the largest Jewish population of any city in the world. This ethnic and racial mix is the result of the waves of immigration that the city has absorbed during its history. The Statue of Liberty, located on Liberty Island off Manhattan, has long stood as a symbol of refuge and opportunity. New York City is a centre of world trade and finance, communications, art and entertainment, and fashion. The city is the financial capital of the United States and holds the headquarters of many of the world's largest corporations. Wall Street in Manhattan is home to the nation's largest stock exchange and is the headquarters of the country's largest brokerage firms. With the headquarters of the nation's television and radio networks and the main offices of the largest advertising agencies, New York City is the heart of the mass media in the United States. Printing and publishing are also of great importance, and most of the nation's major publishing houses are based in midtown Manhattan. The city's economic life also depends on the great diversity of its numerous small businesses and manufacturing establishments. Service industries account for the greatest share of employment. The main nonmanufacturing employers include wholesale and retail trades; finance, insurance, and real estate; transport and public utilities; government; and construction. Wearing apparel, symbolized by New York City's famous garment district, continues to be its major manufacturing industry. Other manufactures include chemicals and chemical products, electronic equipment, processed food, textile mill products, and fabricated metal products. Automation and mergers have resulted in the loss of many jobs in the city. In addition, escalating rents and taxes and high crime rates have caused many firms to leave. Steps have been taken by the city government, however, to alleviate these problems and to provide incentives for remaining. The artists of New York City exhibit in a wide variety of forms, ranging from traditional crafts to the most avant-garde work, flavoured by complex blends of ethnic and national influences. Theatrical arts and entertainment are also important: Broadway is the synonym for musical comedies and legitimate drama; Carnegie Hall is one of the most famous concert halls in the world; and the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts is the home of the Metropolitan Opera, the New York City Opera, the New York Philharmonic, and the New York City Ballet. Though the importance of Broadway has declined, theatre is very much alive in the more venturesome Off-Broadway and off-off-Broadway productions. The city has numerous motion-picture theatres, among which are many revival and foreign-film houses. The New York Public Library is one of the best research libraries in the world. Most famous among the city's many museums are the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, the Whitney Museum of American Art, and the American Museum of Natural History. Many smaller museums house special collections. The city's extensive system of public parks includes Central Park in Manhattan. New York City has an extensive public university system. Outstanding private colleges and universities include Columbia, New York, Rockefeller, and Fordham universities, many medical schools, the New School for Social Research, and the Juilliard School. New York City's subway system carries some 3.5 million of the mass-transit passengers in the metropolitan area, with the balance served by buses and commuter rail lines. The once-famous docks of Hell's Kitchen along the Hudson River in Manhattan have disappeared, and considerable shipping has shifted to the New Jersey side of the harbour. Rail lines radiate in all directions. International and domestic air service is provided by Kennedy, La Guardia, and Newark (New Jersey) international airports. Area city, 304 square miles (787 square km); metropolitan area, 1,384 square miles (3,585 square km). Pop. (1990) city, 7,322,564; New York PMSA, 8,546,846; New YorkNorthern New JerseyLong Island CMSA, 17,838,074; (1994 est.) city, 7,333,253; New York PMSA, 8,573,345; New YorkNorthern New JerseyLong Island CMSA, 18,063,918. Additional reading The development of New York City has inspired an enormous outpouring of historical analysisthe size and importance of the metropolis demands the attention of anyone interested in urban affairs. A good first approach to its history is Kenneth T. Jackson (ed.), The Encyclopedia of New York City (1995), a magnificent compilation of information by hundreds of scholars. In addition, volumes such as Eric Homberger, The Historical Atlas of New York City, 2nd ed. (1996, reissued 1998); Elliot Willensky and Norval White (eds.), AIA Guide to New York City, 3rd ed. (1988); Federal Writers' Project, New York City Guide, rev. ed. (1939, reprinted as The WPA Guide to New York City, 1982); Manuel D. Lopez, New York: A Guide to Information and Reference Sources, 19791986 (1987); and John A. Kouwenhoven, The Columbia Historical Portrait of New York (1953, reissued 1972), provide excellent access to the history of the city.Those who prefer to taste the flavour of events as they occurred might begin with Bayrd Still, Mirror for Gotham: New York as Seen by Contemporaries from Dutch Days to the Present (1956, reissued 1994); or with great source works edited by Allan Nevins, The Diary of Philip Hone, 18281851, 2 vol. (1927, reprinted 2 vol. in 1, 1969), and The Diary of George Templeton Strong, 4 vol. (1952, reprinted 1974), also available in an abridged one-volume version with the same title (1988). Different perspectives on the 19th-century city are provided by James D. McCabe, Jr., Lights and Shadows of New York Life (1872, reissued 1970); William L. Riordan, Plunkitt of Tammany Hall (1905, available in many later printings); and Jacob A. Riis, How the Other Half Lives (1890, reprinted 1972). Insights into 20th-century phenomena can be gained from Edward J. Flynn, You're the Boss (1947, reprinted 1983); Meyer Berger, Meyer Berger's New York (1960); Joseph Mitchell, The Bottom of the Harbor (1959, reissued 1994); Oscar Lewis, La Vida (1966, reissued 1968); and two self-serving but amusing volumes by Edward I. Koch and William Rauch, Mayor (1984), and Politics (1985).The unique mechanisms of political life in the metropolis are analyzed by Wallace S. Sayre and Herbert Kaufman, Governing New York City (1960, reissued 1965). The Democratic machine is examined by Gustavus Myers, The History of Tammany Hall, 2nd ed., rev. and enlarged (1917, reprinted 1971); Alfred Connable and Edward Silberfarb, Tigers of Tammany: Nine Men Who Ran New York (1967); and Edward N. Costikyan, Behind Closed Doors: Politics in the Public Interest (1966). The changing face of the people is documented in Sean Wilentz, Chants Democratic: New York City & the Rise of the American Working Class, 17881850 (1984, reissued 1986); and Edward K. Spann, The New Metropolis: New York City, 18491857 (1981). The epic of Jewish Manhattan is covered by Irving Howe and Kenneth Libo, World of Our Fathers (1976, reissued 1994; also published as The Immigrant Jews of New York, 1881 to the Present, 1976); while immigration is brought up to date in Nathan Glazer and Daniel Patrick Moynihan, Beyond the Melting Pot: The Negroes, Puerto Ricans, Jews, Italians, and Irish of New York City, 2nd ed. (1970, reprinted 1995); and Frederick M. Binder and David M. Reimers, All the Nations Under Heaven: An Ethnic and Racial History of New York City (1995). The centennial of Greater New York fostered publication of many new studies, including Edwin G. Burrows and Mike Wallace, Gotham: A History of New York City to 1898 (1999), which won a Pulitzer; and George J. Lankevich, American Metropolis: A History of New York City (1998), which carries Gotham's politics up to the year 2000.The contemporary city is covered in Robert A. Caro, The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York (1974); and Thomas Kessner, Fiorello H. La Guardia and the Making of Modern New York (1989; reissued 1991). Scholarly criticism of the work of Moses and La Guardia is presented in Jane Jacobs, The Death and Life of Great American Cities (1961, reissued 1994); and Joel Schwartz, The New York Approach: Robert Moses, Urban Liberals, and Redevelopment of the Inner City (1993). The financial collapse of New York is treated in Ken Auletta, The Streets Were Paved with Gold (1979); and Charles R. Morris, The Cost of Good Intentions: New York City and the Liberal Experiment, 19601975 (1980); while the relationship of the city to its natural surroundings is covered by Ann L. Buttenwieser, Manhattan, Water-Bound: Planning and Developing Manhattan's Waterfront from the Seventeenth Century to the Present, 2nd ed. (1999).The long-standing cultural ascendancy of New York can be traced in volumes such as Thomas Bender, New York Intellect: A History of Intellectual Life in New York City, from 1750 to the Beginnings of Our Own Time (1987); Lewis A. Erenberg, Steppin' Out: New York Nightlife and the Transformation of American Culture, 18901930 (1981, reissued 1984); Ann Douglas, Terrible Honesty: Mongrel Manhattan in the 1920s (1995); and David W. Dunlap, On Broadway: A Journey Uptown Over Time (1990). Numerous monographs illuminate every facet of the endlessly fascinating Empire City, among them George Chauncey, Gay New York: Gender, Urban Culture, and the Makings of the Gay Male World, 18901940 (1994); Virgil W. Peterson, The Mob: 200 Years of Organized Crime in New York (1983); Clifton Hood, 722 Miles: The Building of the Subways and How They Transformed New York (1993, reissued 1995); and Nathan Silver, Lost New York (1967, reissued 1993). George Lankevich