New York City serves as a home to top class museums in art, photography, graphics, history, architecture and technology. These museums have transformed the City into a sophisticated one with numerous historical and memorable events, articles, antiquities, artwork and valuable works stored and preserved. The museums of prominent and eminent status are:
Whitney Museum
This museum serves as one of the foremost institution of American art and culture. It holds 20th and 21st century cultural and artworks. The Marcel Breuer-building where it is housed is a breakthrough when it comes to modern building and architecture. The art works displayed are those from notable artists such as Georgia O’Keeffe, Edward Hopper, Jasper Johns, Jackson Pollock and several other distinct artists.
New York Skyride
It is situated on the second floor of the Empire State Building. Through the Skyride, you will experience New York’s prominent and recognised sites form a view you can’t even imagine. It is a great aerial tour of the City of New York that gets you around, above and below the city, making you to experience all what the city has to offer.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art
It is popularly known as The Met and it’s sited on the eastern edge of Central Park, beside Museum Mile in New York City. It has two locations, the major one sited at the Central Park. It is usually referred to as the world’s biggest art galleries. The second one is located in Upper Manhattan at The Cloisters and it features medieval art.
Permanent collection works featured are art from Ancient Egypt and classical antiquity, sculptures and paintings and wide collections of American and modern art.
Museum of the City of New York
Founded in 1923, and in 1982, it received The Hundred Year Association of New York’s Gold Medal Award in acknowledgement of distinct contributions to New York City. The Museum is situated at the top of Museum Mile on 5th Avenue and 103rd Street and it operates as a private non-profit organization and also receives government support.
The museum offers exhilarating exhibitions which explores the past, present and the future of New York. It offers a ‘back-stage’ of what gives the City of New York its distinct character.
The Cathedral of St. John the Divine
The Cathedral is located at 1047 Amsterdam Avenue at 112th Street, New York. It is one of New York City’s unique attractions. It is the world’s largest Cathedral with none other comparable to it in terms of its uniqueness. It has the length of two football fields, and far taller than the Statue of Liberty. It has a Romanesque and Gothic architecture, splendid stained glass windows, stunning garden and beautiful peacocks. The Cathedral accommodates one of the nation’s premiere textile protection laboratories to help protect the cathedral’s textiles. This laboratory also keeps tapestries, costumes, needlepoint, textiles and upholstery for its clients. The cathedral also serves as a key centre for various musical concerts in the City of New York.
The history of New York dates back to September 2, 1609, when it began as a European settlement. The historical figure associated with the discovery of the present day New York was an English man, Henry Hudson, who through the assistance of the Dutch East India Company sailed through the Narrows from the Half Moon into Upper New York Bay.
Hudson’s primary aim of sailing was to look for a westerly passage to Asia. In place of finding this passage, he found something else, and that is an abundant population of beaver. This discovery led to the founding of Dutch Trading Colonies, because the beaver pelts was actually a lucrative business then. The Dutch trading colonies was founded in the New World, and among them was New Amsterdam, which later became the New York City.
Before Hudson’s exploration and discovery, an Italian explorer by name Giovanni da Verrazano, visited the area around 1524. It is of the general belief that he travelled in Upper New York Bay where he met with native Lenape. He gave this area the name Nouvelle-Angouleme (New Angouleme), and this is the present day New York City.
The region around New York City was famous for the multiple battles fought there. Various battles of the American Revolutionary War, as well as the greatest and largest battle of the war, the Battle of Brooklyn were fought there. The battle was won by the British and they occupied the city from September 1776 to 1783.
After the World War II around 1946 to 1927, New York sprang up as the leading city of the world. Like other prominent cities in US, New York experienced some set back due to race riots, wars between gangs, and decline in the population in the 1960s.
There are some famous American figures which are known to come from New York, and lived during 1830s and 1840s. They include Herman Merville, Natheniel Parker Willis, Edgar Allan Poe, William Cullen Bryant and Washington Irving. These men are prominent literary figures in the hisory of America.
In 1898, the New York modern city sprang up from the union of Brooklyn, the County of Richmond, the County of New York and the western part of the County of Queens. In 1904, a subway was opened and it further helped in bringing the new city together. In the 1960s, New York suffered a setback, as there was in increase in the crime rate and economic problems also erupted. By 1980, the crime rate was still up and the trend followed to 1990. By the 1990s, the crime rate began to drop, and this was attributed to the increased policemen present at that era and also due to gentrification.
New York is known as the home of different sports fans, as there are various entities of sports which are prominent in the city. The ones which are common are baseball, basketball, rugby, hockey, soccer, tennis and milrose games. These sports have brought millions of sport fans from around the world, as the state is known for producing winning teams in the various sports represented.
The New York Knicks and the New York Liberty are the men and women basketball team respectively. The National Invitational Tournament was held in the city in 1938, and since then has remained in the city. Just within the confinement of the metropolitan area is the New Jersey Nets, a team in the National Basketball Association (NBA).
In soccer, the Red Bull New York represents in the State in the Major League Soccer and they have their home game played in the Red Bull Arena in New Jersey.
The U.S. Tennis Open, which is one of the four Grand Slam tournaments, is hosted in Queens, New York. This tournament brings multitudes of fans of the sport to the city. As the tournament hosted here is the last and final of the Grand Slam, the stadium is usually filled up.
The New York Yankees are located in the borough of the Bronx and are part of the Major League Baseballs’ American League East Division. It was originally founded in Baltimore, Maryland in 1901 with the name Baltimore Orioles, and later moved to New York City in 1903 where they were famous as the New York Highlanders before they were formally called the New York Yankees in 1913. It had one of the most famous world’s sport venues, that is, the Yankee Stadium which was made use of from 1923 to 2008. In 2009, they moved into a new stadium also called the Yankee Stadium where they make use of till date.
For about seven years now, they have attracted over three million fans each year, and also made a record in 2005 by attracting 4,090,696 fans. This is the third franchise in the history of sport to draw over four million fans in a standard season attendance.
The favorite and official song of the Yankees is ‘’Here Come the Yankees’’, which was composed by Lou Stallman and Bob Bundin in 1967. This song is not used frequently, and another popular song among the fans is, ‘’New York, New York’’.
Hockey is also a prominent sport in New York and the New York Rangers represent the city especially in the National Hockey League, even thought there are two other NHL franchises in the metropolitan area. These franchises are the New Jersey Devils, and the New York Islanders.
Many sports have been associated with the immigrant societies of New York, and among these sports is Stickball, which is a street version of baseball. It was made popular by teens and youths from Irish and German neighborhoods. New York’s most known sport street is Stickball Blvd.
New York City is known as one of the most famous cities in the US and also the most populated. One of the things that have contributed to the fame of the city is the magnificent parks that are strategically located across it. These parks have brought in numerous tourists from across the world to come and experience the magnitude of natural and aesthetic attractions such as gorgeous lakes, well fashioned ponds, woodlands and great vegetations with a wonderful view to behold.
New York City possesses over 27, 000 acres of public parkland and about 23km of public beaches also. These parklands have been greatly increased by the federal and state thousands of acres parkland. Within New York, there is National Recreational Area of which New York State has its own portion. The State’s portions include the Ford Wadsworth which is located in Staten Island and with a history of pre-civil war era. Another portion of the New York State is the Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge located in Brooklyn and with a size of about 9,000 acres.
There are currently seven parks within the limit of New York, with the Clay Pit Ponds State Park included. This Clay Pit Ponds State Park has a natural beauty with riding trails inclusive. The Riverbank State Park is also another magnificent park and has a large facility of about 28 acres and is raised above the Hudson River by about 69 feet.
There is also a Central Park located in Manhattan and it’s about 883 acre in size. It attracts about 25 million visitors every year, making it to be the most visited park in the United States. It has a lot of features and attractions such as the Central Park Zone, the Central Park Conservatory Garden, magnificent ponds and lakes and also ice-skating rinks. Indoor attractions are also provided and they include the Carousel, the Belvedere Castle and the Swedish Cottage Marionette Theatre. This gives you different options to choose how much you want to entertain yourself.
In Staten Island, a park is located there called the Conference House Park. This park contains a Conference House with historical background. The Conference House served as the place where a peaceful resolution was to be made between Americans represented by Benjamin Franklin and the British Crown represented by Lord Howe.
Flushing Meadows-Corona Park, which is the city’s third largest park, is very prominent and also has historical background attached to it. It served as the setting of the 1934 World’s Fair and the 1964 World’s Fair. Another prominent park is the Prospect Park located in Brooklyn. Its features are a large meadow, widespread woodlands and a lake. The historic Battle Pass which is famous for the Battle of Long Island is also situated within this park.
In the Bronx’s area, that is about 7,000 acres, is given over to parks and open space. Parks and gardens located there are; Pelham Bay Park, New York Botanical Gardens and the Bronx Zoo.