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My wife and I live in Florida. A rabid history buff, I've traveled to the four major cities along the Eastern seaboard (NY, Boston, Philly, and DC), plus Baltimore and Williamsburg/Yorktown VA.
Our vacations are essentially nerd-out trips where we hit up the well-known historic sites as well as those off the beaten path.
In New York, we checked these off our list:
- Federal Hall
- The Museum of American Finance
- Fraunces Tavern
- The Mount Vernon Hotel
- The New York Historical Society
- The Museum of the City of New York
- Central Park
- The Grange
- Morris Jumel Mansion
- The Museum of Natural History/Wall Street
- Grand Central Station
- Boat tour around Statue of Liberty/Ellis Island (admission tickets were sold out)
- Times Square
- Trinity Church
- St. Paul's Chapel
- St. Patrick's Cathedral
Friends, colleagues, and relatives of mine who have visited NYC have neither visited nor heard of many of the sites listed above.
With exception to the main touristy spots, the places weren't exactly packed to the brim when we visited in April 2017. It seems there were more enthused guests at the attractions and museums in Boston, DC, and Philly (e.g., Freedom Trail, Liberty Bell, National Mall).
For a city steeped in rich history, it strikes me as odd that NYC doesn't do more to sell its colonial/revolutionary past. It was, after all, the first capital of the country post Constitution.
I remember seeing plenty of Statue of Liberty souvenirs in the gift shops, but not much revolving around George Washington or Alexander Hamilton.
Is it that people just don't come to New York for its history (save for the Statue and Ellis Island)?
Do you feel it could do a better job of highlighting its rich past in its advertising?
My wife and I live in Florida. A rabid history buff, I've traveled to the four major cities along the Eastern seaboard (NY, Boston, Philly, and DC), plus Baltimore and Williamsburg/Yorktown VA.
Our vacations are essentially nerd-out trips where we hit up the well-known historic sites as well as those off the beaten path.
In New York, we checked these off our list:
- Federal Hall
- The Museum of American Finance
- Fraunces Tavern
- The Mount Vernon Hotel
- The New York Historical Society
- The Museum of the City of New York
- Central Park
- The Grange
- Morris Jumel Mansion
- The Museum of Natural History/Wall Street
- Grand Central Station
- Boat tour around Statue of Liberty/Ellis Island (admission tickets were sold out)
- Times Square
- Trinity Church
- St. Paul's Chapel
- St. Patrick's Cathedral
Friends, colleagues, and relatives of mine who have visited NYC have neither visited nor heard of many of the sites listed above.
With exception to the main touristy spots, the places weren't exactly packed to the brim when we visited in April 2017. It seems there were more enthused guests at the attractions and museums in Boston, DC, and Philly (e.g., Freedom Trail, Liberty Bell, National Mall).
For a city steeped in rich history, it strikes me as odd that NYC doesn't do more to sell its colonial/revolutionary past. It was, after all, the first capital of the country post Constitution.
I remember seeing plenty of Statue of Liberty souvenirs in the gift shops, but not much revolving around George Washington or Alexander Hamilton.
Is it that people just don't come to New York for its history (save for the Statue and Ellis Island)?
Do you feel it could do a better job of highlighting its rich past in its advertising?
Along the lines of your list of major historic points in NYC, you should check out Threadwell Merchant House Museum, towards the northern end of the East Village. The Tenement Museum (Lower East Side) is a bit Disneylandish with live actors impersonating poor immigrants, but still worth taking a look. The small but fascinating Skyscraper Museum in the Battery area definitely needs to be seen. Unlike Boston, NYC has hardly anything still physically preserved from before the 1820s, but there is a lot from the subsequent 200 years. There are some city tours that emphasize history.
Towards the deeper end of historic exploration, NYC has over 37,000 (thirty seven thousand!) buildings protected as historic landmarks, and about 150 protected historic districts. The NYC Landmarks Preservation puts out a periodically updated book, Guide to NYC Landmarks (which I of course have, several editions), and you could spend ten years just going around the city with that book, looking at hundreds of buildings, and looking up historic facts related to those buildingsp. There is also the AIA (American Institute of Architects) Guide to NYC. I have several NYC tour books published in the 19th century, and bound volumes of local magazines from around 1860s onward. There are a lot of books on the subject, but you basically have to do your own research.
There is actually a lot of material out there for both a casual and a serious NYC history enthusiast. It is actually pretty overwhelming when you start getting into it :-). But I think the city is a bit too preoccupied at the moment with its bankrupt present to focus more on its rich past...
I think NYC overpromotes its history. Too many people want to turn it into a museum to itself, rather than be a dynamic, living, changing city.
To turn NYC into a museum to itself - what a perfectly fabulous idea!!!
Living cities can be dynamic, or can change, only based on some genuine reason for dynamism and change. If a city sinks into a swamp of futility and bankruptcy, it is very hard to tow it out of it. If the city has a good fortune to have had a huge past, you can at least use that past to make the city into a historic preserve.
Since people are getting their history from "Hamilton", no need to advertise.
Speaking of that subject matter, and something that OP may want to check out, is a triangle of streets just south of the westernmost part of Houston St (west of SoHo proper), which is the land that was owned by Aaron Burr, who also had his mansion there (he was not the first owner of the mansion, which had been previously used by Washington as his headquarters during the war). This area of only a few blocks is a protected historic district called Charlton-King-Vandam District. The Washington headquarters/Burr's mansion no longer stands, but the district is filled with original Federal houses from the 1820s, some of the oldest blocks in NYC.
Since people are getting their history from "Hamilton", no need to advertise.
It's great that the musical has (hopefully) made some people more interested in history. But the fact that the production figures more prominently in the search results on Google than its namesake says a lot. I think the musical (which, by the way, takes several creative liberties), should be seen as a supplement to one's learning rather than as a substitute.
Yes NYC can do a better job promoting its history! I can't remember learning anything about local history in school, which is too bad because there are so many fascinating things to know. My kid has been learning a bit more - his history book last year was actually pretty focused on NYC - so maybe that is changing.
Quote:
Originally Posted by NycLaidBack
Are you implying more statues?
OK you win the thread!
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