State of New York, United States

Most of New York is dominated by farms, forests, rivers, mountains, and lakes. The state borders the U.S. states of Pennsylvania (west), New Jersey and Connecticut (south), Rhode Island (across Long Island Sound), Massachusetts and Vermont (east). New York also borders the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Quebec to the north. Additionally, New York touches the Atlantic Ocean to the southeast, and two of the Great Lakes: Lake Erie to the west and Lake Ontario to the northwest.

The State of New York was one of original 13 states and it entered the Union on July 26, 1788. Today it consists of 62 counties and 20 million residents (2021). The state capital is Albany, with more than 300 thousand residents, and New York City is the largest city in the state, with 8,5 million residents (2021). New York has nearly 200 parks, several forest preserves, a variety of national historic sites and monuments, great cultural, political and economic life.

Native American tribes inhabiting the area when the first European settlers arrived in the early 17th century. At the time, Lenape people, skilled hunters, occupied the lower Hudson River Valley and the Delaware Valley. The first contact of the Lenape people with Europeans was in 1524, when Florentine explorer Giovanni da Verrazzano (1485-1528), in the service of the King Francis I of France, explored North America.

In 1609, English explorer Henry Hudson was sailing on behalf of the Dutch East India Company, looking for easterly passage to India, on his ship Halve Maen (Half Moon), and spent ten days ascending the River that now bears his name. His voyage was used to establish Dutch claims to the region. In 1614, Hendrick Christiaensen, a Dutch explorer, sailed up the North River to Castle Island (now in Albany County N.Y.) and built a warehouse on the ruins of an abandoned French fur trader's fort. He named it Fort Nassau, which was the first Dutch settlement in North America. By 1618 it was abandoned due to frequent flooding. In 1624, a ship with 30 Walloons landed in New Netherland and 18 of the men were sent, under direction of the Dutch, to built Fort Orange, near present day Albany, about 2 miles north of Fort Nassau. The new fort was also prone to flooding. In the same year of 1624 the Dutch West India Company sent some 30 families to live and work in New Amsterdam, which was part of the Dutch colonial province of New Netherland.

The colony was renamed New York after the British takeover in 1664. New York became the 11th state to ratify the U.S. Constitution in 1788 and its capital was initially Kingston, later moved to Albany. More: Historical maps of New York State ►