Revolutionary New York: Birthplace of a Nation

We're standing at Bowling Green, New York's oldest public park, and you're looking at an empty pedestal surrounded by an elegant cast-iron fence from 1771. That fence once enclosed something very different: a two-ton gilded statue of King George III on horseback, erected in 1770 to celebrate the repeal of the Stamp Act…

You're standing in front of a brick Georgian building that's been here since 1719, though it's been rebuilt more than once. This is Fraunces Tavern, and in revolutionary New York, taverns weren't just places to drink—they were where democracy happened. The Sons of Liberty met in rooms upstairs, plotting resistance over…

We're standing at 26 Wall Street, where on April 30, 1789, George Washington stepped onto a second-floor balcony and took the oath of office as America's first president. The original Federal Hall is gone—demolished in 1812—but this Greek Revival building with its massive Doric columns marks the exact spot where revolu…

Look at this Georgian chapel—Manhattan's oldest church building, completed in 1766. Notice the brownstone facade, the elegant spire that once made it the tallest structure in New York, and those classical columns at the entrance. This is St. Paul's Chapel, where George Washington came to pray on April 30, 1789, immedia…

You are standing at Trinity Church, at the western end of Wall Street, where Broadway meets Trinity Place. The Episcopal parish was founded in 1697, and this is the third building on the site. Designed by Richard Upjohn and consecrated in 1846, the church is a landmark of American Gothic Revival: its brownstone and spi…

Trinity Church — Boston Trinity Church Copley Square 01.jpg | Wikimedia Commons

Trinity Church, Boston, Massachusetts LCCN2011630431 | 🔗 wikipedia.org

Boston Trinity Church 04 | 🔗 wikipedia.org

The founders who rest in Trinity Church left us an incomplete revolution—one that excluded the very people who helped build this city. Beneath this memorial lie the remains of more than 15,000 free and enslaved Africans who built colonial New York. When construction workers discovered this burial ground in 1991, they u…