Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
1812
British blockade of Manhattan during the War of 1812.
1825
Opening of the Erie Canal makes New York a major shipping port. Fulton Street dock and
market area built.
1830-50
First wave of mass immigration, principally German and Irish. The Lower East Side deve-
loped.
1831
Founding of New York University (NYU).
1835
Great Fire of New York destroys most of the buildings on the southern tip of Manhattan
around Wall Street.
1856-71
The city is ruled by a corrupt group of politicians known as Tammany Hall. Their leader is
deputy commissioner William “Boss” Tweed, who is finally indicted for corruption in
1873.
1858
The first Chinese immigrants arrive in what would become Manhattan's Chinatown;
12,000 live here by 1890.
1861-65
Though not a theatre of the Civil War, class and racial tensions lead to the Draft Riots of
1863, in which 1000 people are killed.
1876
Central Park opens to a design by Fredrick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux.
1880s
More immigrants (southern Italians and eastern European Jews) settle in the Lower East
Side.
1883
The Brooklyn Bridge links Manhattan with Brooklyn.
