Rivers	Hudson, East (really part of the Atlantic Ocean), and Harlem
Bridges	Verrazano-Narrows, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Triborough, Williamsburg, Queensboro (59th Street), Willis Avenue, Third Avenue, and George Washington
Boroughs	Manhattan (New York), Richmond (Staten Island), Kings (Brooklyn), Queens, and The Bronx
Landmarks (samples)	Ellis Island, Empire State Building, Chrysler Building, Battery Park, Battery Park, Fulton Fish Market, Gracie Mansion, Grant's Tomb, Roosevelt Island Tramway, United Nations Headquarters, Wall Street Financial District, Statue of Liberty, and Yankee Stadium

Before we started the "official" tour, we we had our first sightseeing experience. Almost immediately on leaving the Circle Line dock, our very knowledgeable guide began his commentary, filling us with facts about New York City. For example, we know know that the city's population today is about 7,350,000 and the metropolitan area has another 9,500,000, making NYC the largest city in the country in terms of population. It is the nation's #1 port and its trade center. In addition, with its banks and stock exchanges, it is the major financial center of the world.

Historically, NYC was founded by the Dutch in 1624 on Lower Manhattan Island as the town of Nieuwe Amsterdam. According to legend, the colonial administrator, Peter Minuit, supposedly bought the island from its Native American inhabitants for about $24 worth of trinkets. In 1664, the British seized the colony and renamed it New York. During the American Revolution they held New York from 1776 to 1781. New York was briefly (1789-90) the U.S. capital and was state capital until 1797.

By 1790 it was the largest city in the USA and the opening of the Erie Canal in 1825, linking New York with the Great Lakes, led to even greater expansion. In 1898 a new charter was adopted, making the city Greater New York, a metropolis of five boroughs,each of which is a county. Brooklyn (Kings County) and Queens occupy the western portion of Long Island, while Staten Island (Richmond County) and Manhattan are completely on their own land masses. The Bronx, to the north, is attached to the New York State mainland.

Why Big Apple? (According to the Society for New York City History) In the early years of the nineteenth century, refugees from war-torn Europe began arriving in New York in great numbers. Many were remnants of the crumbling French aristocracy, forced to seek refuge abroad from the dread "Monsieur Guillotine." Arriving here without funds or friends, many of these were forced to survive, as one contemporary put it, "by their wits or worse." One of these, arriving in late 1803 or early 1804, was Mlle. Evelyn Claudine de Saint-Évremond. Daughter of a noted courtier, wit, and littérateur, and herself a favorite of Marie Antoinette, Evelyn was by all accounts remarkably beautiful, vivacious, and well-educated, and she was soon a society favorite. For reasons never disclosed, however, a planned marriage the following year to John Hamilton, son of the late Alexander Hamilton, was called off at the last minute. Soon after, with support from several highly placed admirers, she established a salon --- in fact, it appears to have been an elegantly furnished bordello--- in a substantial house that still stands at 142 Bond Street, then one of the city's most exclusive residential districts. Evelyn's establishment quickly won a formidable reputation as the most entertaining and discreet of the city's many "temples of love," a place not only for lovemaking, but also for elegant dinners, high-stakes gambling, and witty conversation. The girls, many of them fresh arrivals from Paris or London, were noted for their beauty and bearing. More than a few of them, apparently, were actually able to secure wealthy husbands from among the establishment's clientele. When New Yorkers insisted on anglicizing her name to "Eve," Evelyn apparently found the biblical reference highly amusing, and for her part would refer to the temptresses in her employ as "my irresistible apples." The young men-about-town soon got into the habit of referring to their amorous adventures as "having a taste of Eve's Apples." This knowing phrase established the speaker as one of the "in" crowd. The enigmatic reference in Philip Hone's famous diary to "Ida, sweet as apple cider" (October 4, 1838) has been described as an oblique reference to a visit to what had by then become a notorious but cherished civic institution. The rest, as they say, is etymological history. The sexual connotation of the word "apple" was well known in New York and throughout the country until around World War I. The Gentleman's Directory of New York City, a privately published (1870) guide to the town's "houses of assignation," confidently asserted that "in freshness, sweetness, beauty, and firmness to the touch, New York's apples are superior to any in the New World or indeed the Old." Meanwhile, various "apple" catch-phrases--- "the Apple Tree," "the Real Apple," etc.--- were used as synonyms for New York City itself, which boasted (if that is the term) more houses of ill repute per capita than any other major U.S. municipality. William Jennings Bryan, though hardly the first to denounce New York as a sink of iniquity, appears to have been the first to use the "apple" epithet in public discourse, branding the city, in a widely reprinted 1892 campaign speech, as "the foulest Rotten Apple on the Tree of decadent Federalism." The double-entendre -- i.e., as a reference to both political and sexual corruption -- would have been well understood by voters of the time. The term "Big Apple" or "The Apple" had already passed into general use as a nickname for New York City by 1907, when one guidebook included the comment, "Some may think the Apple is losing some of its sap." Interestingly, the phrase had also become pretty well "sanitized" in the process, thanks to a vigorous campaign mounted just after the turn of the century by the Apple Marketing Board, a trade group based in upstate Cortland, New York. Alarmed by sharply declining sales, the Association launched what some believe to be the earliest example of what would now be called a "product positioning campaign." By devising and energetically promoting such slogans as "An apple a day keeps the Doctor away" and "as American as apple pie!" the Apple Marketing Board was able to successfully "rehabilitate" the apple as a popular comestible, free of unsavory associations. And slowly but surely, New York once again became know as "The Big Apple," only this time the nickname had only positive connotations.

The skyline of midtown Manhattan is dominated, of course, the Empire State Building, located on Fifth Avenue between 33rd Street and 34th Street. It was opened in 1933 and is still, along with the Statue of Liberty, one of NYC's top two "must sees" for tourists. With 102 stories soaring more than a quarter of a mile into the air above the heart of Manhattan, it was the tallest building on earth until the early 1970s when the World Trade Center was completed. Located on the 86th floor there is an observatory that offers visitors panoramic views from within a glass enclosed pavilion and from the surrounding open-air promenade. The "pointy thing" atop the building today serves as a television tower but was originally conceived to function as a dirigible (airship) mooring mast. The Empire State Building is now designated a National Historic Landmark.

After the midtown skyline, the first sights we came to were the new and old buildings of the of the city's downtown financial district. In the first third of the 20th Century, Lower Manhattan was New York City's (and the world's) most fabled skyline. Our guide explained that the first generation of major skyscrapers, highlighted by the Singer, Woolworth and Bankers Trust buildings, had very distinctive silhouettes.

The second generation of major downtown skyscrapers--- the A.I.G. Building, 40 Wall Street, One Wall Street and 20 Exchange Place--- were much thinner and close enough together to create the illusion of a forest arising out of the shrubbery of mere 20 and 30-storey towers. With the completion of these towers in the early 1930s, the Lower Manhattan skyline became and international icon.

The "'30s look" was an architectural form that was not significantly altered until 1960 with the erection of One Chase Manhattan Plaza, a very important building that significantly helped bolster the downtown office market and whose bulk overwhelmed the financial district's skyline. "Old timers" agreed that its massiveness was imposing but claimed it "de-graced" the entire skyline.

Soon, however, the Chase building was followed by the very elegant black tower known as 140 Broadway. While these two skyscrapers were in very "good taste" individually, their scale disrupted the"comfortable" architectural ambiance of Lower Manhattan. They were followed by the U. S. Steel Building (later to be known as One Liberty Plaza), built on the site of the former Singer Building. These three new towers were clustered near the center of the Financial District but other massive buildings were gradually erected along Water Street close to the East River, further "transforming the gentle mountain of Lower Manhattan into various ranges of jagged cliffs."

Everyone on the boat hushed as we past the section of the district where the twin World Trade Center towers stood. In the early 1970s, the building of the World Trade Center dramatically altered once more the Lower Manhattan skyline. The WTC's nicely proportioned and gleaming twin towers shifted the financial district's "optical center" the west. It be more than a decade until this "tilt" to be somewhat rectified by the creation of the World Financial Center at Battery Park City, a commercial complex of 40 to 50-storey office towers faced the Hudson River.

The tragic events of 9/11/01, of course, radically altered the skyline again. The twin towers are gone and reportedly will be replaced with smaller buildings. But, the sprawling and impressive visual-environment of Battery Park City is largely intact and continuing to be developed.

Before 911/01, shown in an old photo.

After, as we viewed the area in September 2004.

We cruised past Battery Park and moved farther out in New York harbor to where we got marvelous of Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty. Ellis Island has been United States Government property since 1808. It served as the chief entry station for immigrants, including Ralph's paternal grandparents, to the United States from 1892 to 1943. It is now open to tourists and has an immigration museum.

The Statue of Liberty, the nation's historic symbol of freedom stands tall on Liberty Island (formerly Bedloe's Island) in Upper New York Bay. Technically named "Liberty Enlightening the World, " it is actually in New Jersey waters but under New York jurisdiction. The 152-foot statue was presented to the United States by the Franco-American Union to commemorate the centennial of the Declaration of Independence. Dedicated in 1886, it became a national monument in 1924 and was extensively restored in 1986.

Historical Quiz: The Statue of Liberty once appeared on the US ten cent coin. Do you know what denomination bill it appears on? See below for the answer.

The Circle Line managers and guides know that the State of Liberty will be a #1 "photo op" for passengers and they took a lot of care to make sure we had plenty of chances to use our cameras from a variety of angles and distances.

Just before turning back toward the city, we had a great view of the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge that spans the Narrows at the entrance to New York Bay and connects Brooklyn with Staten Island. This is the longest vehicular suspension bridge in the United States and is named after Giovanni da Verrazano, who in 1524, was the first European to enter the bay of New York.. Completed in 1964, it has a main span of 4,260 feet and has two levels, crossed by more than 60 million vehicles per year. It is seen one the evening news once each year participants in the famous New York Marathon race must cross it. The impact of this bridge's construction was felt first by the Bay Ridge area where most of Ralph's family lived. About 800 buildings had to be demolished and thousands of residents relocated, including his aunt and cousin.

Until the building of the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge, the Staten Island's only connections with New York were ferries that crossed the harbor between the island, Manhattan and Brooklyn. Under normal conditions, the five miles crossing to Manhattan could be made in half an hour, the mile crossing to Brooklyn in about ten minutes. But if the bay was heavy with ice, or if a fog suddenly closed in, either trip could take much longer. And on clear days, when the ferries had no trouble in making their crossings on schedule, they were often so crowded, particularly on summer weekends, that drivers had to wait for hours to get to one. On the bridge, the crossing to Brooklyn can be made in three or four minutes.

The Verrazano-Narrows Bridge from near the Statue of Liberty, with the Brooklyn side on the left.

Ralph pointed out the place he lived in Brooklyn before the bridge was built, almost exactly at the point it crosses the Brooklyn shore near Fort Hamilton. (He also said he was a little sad because the bridge had eliminated the need for the old 69th Street Ferry that was popular with 1950s teenagers out on dates. The ride between Brooklyn and Staten Island provided a terrific evening view of Manhattan's lights and skyline and the fare was only a dime each way!)

What's in a Name? * The name Bronx was derived from the name of Jonas Bronck, the first European settler in Westchester County. In 1639, the Scandanavian-born Bronck purchased 500 acres from the Dutch between the Harlem River and the Aquehung (later the Bronx) River. * Brooklyn's name comes from the Dutch "Breukelen" which means "broken land." It is either from the look of the terrain or simply after the Breukelen municipality near Amsterdam in the Netherlands. * Manhattan Island was originally named Man-a-hat-a by the Algonquin Indians. It is said by some authorities to mean "little island." Others say it means"the people of the whirlpool," referring to Hell Gate; another authority gives its origin from the word Manna-ha-ta, "place of drunkenness." Henry Hudson, as the story goes, in 1609, took some chiefs into his cabin and made them drunk * Staten Island was called Monacnong, or Enchanted Woods, by the Indians. In 1609, Henry Hudson, who was in the area for the Dutch East India Company, dubbed the isle Staaten Eylandt. * Queens was named in in 1683 in honor of Queen Catherine of Braganza, who happens to be the wife of England's Charles II. (Queens then extended to include all of today's Nassau and Suffolk Counties.)

Our cruiser passed close to Battery Park which takes its name from a line of British cannons that protected the harbor in the late 1600s. Now, visitors will find a collection of memorials, gardens and breathtaking views of the Statue of Liberty. We saw dozens of people occupying the bench face the water, Liberty Island, and the Statue of Liberty. Ralph pointed out that the building in which he took his draft physical examination is located quite near Battery Park and that he often walked to the park for lunch when he worked in his dad's Wall Street office as a teenager.

Battery Park on the shore with the financial district's skyscrapers in the background.

Passing the Battery, we sailed past the South Street Seaport area, another of NYC's "must" tourist attractions. South Street Seaport is a comparatively new addition to the New York scene although its location near the end of Fulton Street has a long and significant part of the city's past glory as a port town. For example, the historic Fulton Fish Market has been at this location on South Street near the end of Wall Street and Fulton Street for over two centuries (but is scheduled to close down in favor of a new location in the Bronx in 2005.)

As the center of shipping between 1815 and 1860, this section of New York was known by to oceangoers around the globe. It was a bustling neighborhood that developed almost exclusively to cater to the needs of ships and sailors--- merchants, ship chandlers, sailmakers, and figurehead carvers took care of business while boarding houses, saloons, and brothels took care of seamen's physical needs and pleasures.

By 1880, cargo ships had become too large for South Street's facilities and the area began to decay. For many decades, the Seaport lay quiet. In fact when Ralph was working and going to school in NYC, the area that is now South Street Seaport was a rundown place that people avoided. In 1967, however, the South Street Seaport Maritime Museum, was opened and paved the way for the wonderfully preserved historic district that attracts tourists (and New Yorkers)today. Visitors can learn about NYC's past in a world-class museum, shop, and enjoy lunch and a drink at one of several restaurants, including those with outdoor dining areas overlooking the sailing vessels moored in the nearby marina.

When you leave the Battery and start up the East River, you have to get ready to see bridges! Remember that Manhattan is an island and the millions of people who commute to their jobs each day depend on bridges! (Well, OK, there are a few tunnels, too.)

The first span our cruise boat encountered was the Brooklyn Bridge, even today one of the most famous bridges in the world. It was the first steel-wire suspension bridge in the world, built from 1869 to 1883. Designed by John Augustus Roebling and his son Washington Augustus Roebling, it was the world's longest suspension bridge when completed.

According to our guide, a bridge over the East River, joining the cities of New York and Brooklyn, had been talked about for nearly as long as anyone can remember--- but nothing was done. The chief problem was always the East River, which, technically speaking, is not really a river at all but, rather, a tidal strait. It is one of the most turbulent and one of the busiest stretches of navigable salt water anywhere on earth. If there was to be a bridge, it had to arch from shore to shore and be high enough to allow the over the masts of the ships to pass under. No piers or drawbridge were possible.

We were told that although work on the project crippled him, John Augustus Roebling lived to see the bridge praised for its grace and utility. Pedestrians crossing from Brooklyn to Manhattan felt exhilarated while "climbing the river." The tall span with its Gothic arches would also inspire artists, writers, and poets then and now and be called the "eighth wonder of the world" when it opened.

(Ralph recalled visiting an rural schoolhouse in Hungary a few months earlier and seeing a small museum devoted to really old teaching tools and materials. In the collection was a stereopticon, dating back to the early 1900s, that students used to view such world-famous sights as the Pyramids, the Taj Mahal, the Eiffel Tower, and, yes, the Brooklyn Bridge.)

Notice the main cable and wires supporting the roadway.

The NYC skyline has changed enormously since 1883 but the bridge remains the same.

Next in the line of East River bridges was the Manhattan Bridge, followed by the Queensborough Street Bridge, the Williamsburg Bridge, and the Triborough Bridge, all built to facilitate travel to Manhattan from Brooklyn and Queens.

When first opened in 1903, Williamsburg Bridge had four surface or trolley tracks(Streetcars) and two elevated, or regular train tracks. Regular train service did not cross bridge until 1908. Now, the bridge, has two inner and two outer vehicular roadways and two subway tracks. It also two foot walks for pedestrians.

The Queensboro Bridge, completed in 1908, is a cantilever bridge over the East River. It connects the Queens, along with "Lawng Island" with Manhattan, passing over Roosevelt Island as it does so. It is also called the "59th Street Bridge", a name popularized by the Simon and Garfunkel song "The 59th St. Bridge Song" (Feelin' Groovy), because it enters Manhattan at that street. Ralph says this is the bridge his father usually drove across twice each day crosses commuting from Syosset, Long Island to his office in Manhattan.

The Triborough Bridge, completed in 1936, runs 3.5 miles and is actually a combination of fixed, lift, and suspension bridges and viaducts connecting. The Triborough was begun in 1929, but because of the Great Depression was not completed until 1936; the total cost was $44.2 million. This is another bridge that gets heavy use from commuters driving to and from Manhattan from NYC's sprawling suburbs on Long Island

Under the Manhattan Bridge, looking at Brooklyn.	The Triborough Bridge connects Manhattan, Queens, and Brooklyn.
The Williamsburg was the first all steel, large scale, suspension bridge.	The Queensboro Bridge's opening in 1909 featured a two-hour fireworks spectacular.

There were, of course other things than bridges to see as we progressed up the East River. We had a great view of one of the oldest and most beautiful of the city's skyscrapers, the Chrysler Building, opened in 1930. Our guide told us the story of how the building got its famous shining top. Automobile manufacturer Walter Chrysler thought the publicity connected with having built the world's tallest building would promote the sales of his cars. He proposed a 67-story, 808-foot-high tower with a rather squat glass dome that was to be illuminated from within at night. However, word got out that the Bank of Manhattan was having it new building redesigned with the addition of a flagpole atop its roof that would be two feet taller than Chrysler's project,

Chrysler gave his engineers the go ahead to add enough height to surpass Bank of Manhattan's building. In what was one of the greatest secrets and publicity coups in Manhattan's history, the stainless steel top was installed to the public's, and the Bank of Manhattan's, utter surprise in about 90 minutes in November, 1929. The building was now 1,046 feet--- 77 stories--- high. The seven-story stainless steel spire had been hidden in five pieces within the building's shell and was hoisted out of the top of the building and riveted into place!

Rumor has it that at Chrysler Building's peak, at the top of its 77 floors, is a bathroom with a window overlooking the city.

Other important structures easily viewed from the cruise boat included the Woolworth Building (far left), New York's City Hall (center), and the modern Verizon building (right center).

When we reached the midtown point of the river, we got another look at the Empire State Building towering above apartments and commercial structures.

The United Nations Building.

From midtown to its juncture with the Harlem River, the East River's vistas are pretty much apartment buildings, warehouses, and factories. But, at Hell Gate, a roaring stretch of water where the Harlem and East Rivers meet, we found one NYC's little-known and until recently rarely visited treasures--- Gracie Manor, the official residence of the Mayor of the City of New York. This 18th-century house was built in the early 1800s by a prosperous New York merchant, Archibald Gracie.

In 2003, 105,942,000 vehicles crossed over the George Washington Bridge.

General Grant National Memorial (Grant's Tomb) is the crypt of Ulysses S. Grant and his wife Julia. Grant died with almost no assets and the federal government would not provide money for a memorial resting place for him. Approximately 90,000 people from around the country and the world donated a total of over $600,000 towards construction of his tomb, the largest public fundraising effort ever at that time. The granite and marble structure was completed in 1897 and remains the largest mausoleum in North America. Over one million people attended the parade and dedication ceremony of Grant's Tomb.

Our guide told us something interesting about Grant's Tomb--- Julia Grant requested that the tomb was to have no tourist facilities whatsoever--- no rest rooms, no benches, no fountains--- nothing except the tombs for the General and herself. She wanted people to visit there just to honor her husband.

Quite near Grant's Tomb we saw the tower of the Riverside Church, another outstanding piece in New York's architectural amalgam. In the early 1900s, many Christian congregations in New York were questioning the fundamentalist interpretation of the Scriptures. Led by John D. Rockefeller, Jr., a group of modernists decided to create an interdenominational church, beautiful beyond words.

Using funds mainly contributed by wealthy members, notably Rockefeller, the new congregation obtained the Park Avenue Baptist Church which was remodeled and expanded and opened to all who affirmed their faith in Christ. Today, the Church continues its open door policy, celebrating the diversity found in a congregation broadly inclusive of persons from different backgrounds of race, economic class, culture, ethnicity, gender, age, and sexual orientation.

Overlooking the Hudson River, Grant's Tomb, the domed structure near the center, is located on Manhattan's Upper West Side next to the Riverside Church (tall tower).

Soon after passing Grants Tomb and Riverside Church, we could again see the Empire State Building commanding the midtown skyline and realized that we not too far from the end of our cruise.

As we neared our terminal at Pier 83, we passed the USS Intrepid, one of the most successful ships in American naval history. This World War II aircraft carrier has been converted into a museum and is one of the most unique attractions in New York City. Building on the long and distinguished history of the carrier USS Intrepid, the museum provides a glimpse back to a time when the future of the free world hinged on these ships. Together with the submarine USS Growler (moored next to it) and over twenty-five aircraft, the Intrepid provides visitors with to an inside look of life at sea, past, present and future.

We finally reached our boat's berth at Pier 83 and after thanking our great guide for a wonderfully informative three hours, we stepped stepped ashore and caught a cab to take us back to our hotel.

The WW II carrier, USS Intrepid. (Not the white boat!)

There's our berth, right in the middle of the pier.