One of the oldest in the United States, this asylum started out in the cellar of the north wing of New York Hospital, which was a general hospital. It got its own building in 1808, the New York Lunatic Asylum, which was renamed as the Bloomingdale Asylum in 1821. The modern descendent of this asylum is the Westchester division of the New York Hospital in White Plains: the asylum moved there in 1894. Columbia University now occupies the former site. A guidebook proclaimed of the site (when it was still an asylum): "it occupies a most beautiful and commanding site...the central building is always open to visitors and the view from the top of it, being the most extensive and beautiful of any in the vicinity of the city, is well worthy of attention."Buell Hall of Columbia University is the only asylum building remaining. This striking building with its stained glass windows was the Asylum's administration building, and is the oldest building on the college campus. The library was constructed the year after the Asylum left the grounds.&nbsp;

Columbia University, Morningside Heights

New York's first insane asylum

In keeping with much of downtown's transformation to residential, the building became mixed use with the top 30 floors converted into 33 luxury condominiums including a five-level penthouse dubbed the “townhome in the sky,” to be sold for $110 million, highest ever downtown.

F. W. Woolworth, an entrepreneur who had become successful because of his "Five-and-Dimes" (5- and 10-cent stores), began planning a new headquarters for the F. W. Woolworth Company in 1910. It was the tallest building in the world when it was completed at 792'. The title lasted 21 years. The skyscraper was unusual because it was financed entirely in cash. The highlight of the opening ceremony featured United States President Woodrow Wilson throwing a switch to illuminate the building. Much of the original terra-cotta cladding has since been replaced with cast stone.The lobby is one of the most impressive in the city. It features a shining mosaic barrel vault, stained-glass skylight, marble walls, bronze fixtures, mezzanine murals entitled Labor and Commerce, and carved gargoyle representations of Gilbert, Woolworth, and other figures key to the design, engineering and construction of this landmark.

It consists of a 30-story base topped by a 30-story tower.&amp;nbsp;  

By September 1910, Gilbert had designed an even taller structure, with a 40-story tower on Park Place adjacent to a shorter 25-story annex, yielding a 550-foot-tall building.After the latest design, Woolworth wrote to Gilbert in November 1910 and asked for the building's height to be increased to 620 feet, which was 8 feet taller than the Singer Building, Lower Manhattan's tallest building. This design, unveiled to the public the same month, was a 45-story tower rising 625 feet, sitting on a lot by 105 by 197 feet.On December&nbsp;20, 1910, Woolworth sent a team of surveyors to measure the Metropolitan Life Tower's,&nbsp;then the tallest building in New York City and the world, height and come up with a precise measurement, so he could make his skyscraper 50 feet taller.By January&nbsp;18, 1911, the final site for the project was acquired at a total cost of $4.5&nbsp;million; the lot measured 152 feet on Broadway, 192.5 feet on Barclay Street, and 197.83 feet on Park Place.&nbsp;In order to fit the correct architectural proportions, Gilbert redesigned the building to its current 792-foot height.

Some of the Woolworth Building's windows are set within arch-shaped openings. Most of the building's&amp;nbsp;spandrels, or triangles between the top corners of the window and the top of the arch, have golden Gothic tracery against a bright blue backdrop. On the 25th, 39th, and 40th&amp;nbsp;stories, the spandrels consist of iconography found in the&amp;nbsp;royal coat of arms of the United Kingdom. Gold-on-blue tracery is also found on the 26th, 27th, and 42nd&amp;nbsp;floors.  

and installation of the building's terracotta began on February&amp;nbsp;1, 1912. The building rose at the rate of&amp;nbsp;1+1&amp;frasl;2&amp;nbsp;stories a week&amp;nbsp;  

The decision to use terracotta for the facade was based on both aesthetic and functional concerns. Not only was terracotta fireproof, but Gilbert believed it would be a purely ornamental addition, clarifying the Woolworth Building's steel construction.The&nbsp;Atlantic Terra Cotta Company&nbsp;provided the original terracotta cladding.

Woolworth Building

Aaron Burr promised Latrobe he would win the competition to design NY City Hall in 1802. But, Joseph Francois Magnin &amp; John McComb Jr won the $350 prize, becoming the oldest continuously occupied City Hall in America since completed in 1811.French Renaissance plus Federal equals this massive administrative and legislative structure. It houses the City Council and the Mayor's Office, with New York's first and most beautiful (now former) subway station buried right beneath it.

Mullets Monstrosity, City Hall, Park Row and City Hall Park.&amp;nbsp;The structure on the right is the Manhattan station for the cable cars which ran across the Brooklyn Bridge.  

McComb Architectural Drawing Collection, Collection of the New-York Historical Society

New York City Hall

 At the statue of Nathan Hale in City Hall Park, Kaplan discusses Hale's life and significance, and the history of City Hall. 

Giovanni da Verrazzano, the explorer observed "Sapohannikan" - a central gathering and farming area by the Lenape, meaning "Land of Tobacco Growth." It served as a meeting place for different Lenape groups, including Munsee and Unami speakers, who played music, traded, and held games.&nbsp;

The site later became part of Manhattan’s first free Black settlement before evolving into a potter’s field.

Eventually, converted into a military parade ground.&nbsp;

By the 19th century, it transformed into a public park, surrounded by elegant residences.

A marsh. A cemetery. A parade ground. A gathering spot for avant-garde artists. A battleground for chess enthusiasts. A playground for canines and children. Washington Square Park has served various roles for its community throughout the years, adapting to meet its needs. Well-known for its arch, honoring George Washington, the man for whom the park is named, and its fountain, the arch's elder by 43 years and a popular meeting spot, Washington Square Park also houses several other monuments and facilities.

The vertical line shows the path that would become known as Bowery Road, but was originally the same up island trail that was incorporated into Broadway. The path westward to the Hudson River became known as Sand Hill Road until it crossed Minetta Creek, and still exists past that point as Greenwich Avenue. Stokes thinks the 1644 cattle fence followed this path from Bowery to Minetta Creek. These paths connected Lenape villages, farms and hunting and fishing grounds. From Indian paths in the great metropolis by Reginald Pelham Bolton, published by the New York Museum of the American Indian and Heye Foundation.

In Manhatta, the area that would become the Manhattan Borough of New York City, the Lenape lived in multi-family dwellings, in contrast to the smaller-sized wigwams of the Philadelphia region. This engraving from the late 19th century purports to describe a scene from 16th century Manhatta.

including removing trees and breaking up the ground to prepare the soil for cultivation.Source: The Lenapes by R. S. Grumet and F. W. Porter, 1989, New York, Chelsea House.

Washington Square Park

published in The New York Daily Herald&nbsp;

One-time New York Mayor Philip Hone lived in an elegant townhouse at 235 Broadway, opposite City Hall Park at the corner of Broadway and Park Place. The site was later one of those purchased by F. W. Woolworth for the construction of the Woolworth Building.&nbsp;

Philip Hone, who served as Mayor of New York City from 1826 to 1827, acted as a key cultural ambassador by commissioning artwork to decorate City Hall.

The land north of Greenwich Village’s overcrowded burial grounds was owned by Sailors’ Snug Harbor, a retirement home for aging seamen. After the institution relocated to Staten Island in 1831, Philip Hone proposed converting the former potter’s field into a military parade ground to raise the property’s value. In 1826, the site was renamed the Washington Parade Ground and hosted a large celebration marking the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. The transformation significantly increased the land’s worth. By the end of Hone’s term, the grounds had expanded to their current size. The military departed in the late 1840s, and the space was eventually renamed Washington Square Park.

Philip Hone was Mayor of New York City from 1826 to 1827. He was most notable for a detailed diary he kept from 1828 until the time of his death in 1851, which is said to be the most extensive and detailed on the first half of 19th-century America.&nbsp;

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