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New York City in History & Board Games – Part 1
Everything seems to get ever bigger. Cars. Phones. Board game boxes. And the cities whose history and board games we explore are no exception: We started with Venice, moved on to Amsterdam, and today, we’re starting with New York. I say starting, because unlike the previous two cities, there is no way to do the vast number of board games set in New York’s history justice in a single post. Thus, this will be a mini-series with (tentatively) three instalments.
If somebody asked you what New York is, you’d probably start by saying it’s a city in the United States. Today, we’re looking at it before it was that – first, when the area which is today New York was settled by Native Americans, then, when the first Europeans founded an outpost there, and finally, when this little settlement received the name it bears until today.
The First Settlers
Names are given by people. “New York” was what the English called the settlement they took over in 1664, but the place had been inhabited by thousands of years before. While that is thus technically not the history of New York, we’ll take a short look at it.
We don’t know very much about the first humans to live in what would become New York: The indigenous people did not keep written records. Archaeology is hard to do in a place which is almost entirely covered in buildings and streets today. And the oral tradition of the Indians was largely destroyed when the westward expansion of the European colonists pushed them out of their native homes, broke up their communities, and finally confined them to reservations.
Five hundred years ago, several thousand Lenape Indians inhabited an island they called Mannahatta (“island of many hills”). They lived off slash-and-burn agriculture, hunting, and fishing. I am not aware of any board game which depicts their lives before the arrival of the first Europeans, but I think it would be a nice change of perspective while still retaining the familiar geography which draws many board gamers (of course, especially those from New York and its surroundings) to games about the city.
In 1524, Giovanni da Verrazzano, an Italian explorer employed by the king of France, sailed into what would be called New York Bay. There, he met a group of Lenape in their canoes. He called the area New Angoulême to honor the French royal house of Valois-Angoulême. For the next century, European fur traders would occasionally visit the Lenape, but not attempt to build a permanent presence.
Nieuw Amsterdam
Only in the 1620s did the Dutch, by then the premier commercial and maritime country of Europe, decide to colonize parts of North America. They resolved that this colony should include Mannahatta to take advantage of the rich beaver population whose pelts were much sought after in Europe, and put the merchant Peter Minuit in charge of the operation.
Minuit arrived on May 4, 1626. He met with some of the Lenape, and, according to his written report to Europe, purchased the southern tip of Mannahatta from them for trade goods worth 60 guilders. Even though nobody knows any details beyond Minuit’s own account, the deal is the founding story of New York. One thing that stands out about it is that it was a business transaction. Unlike other cities in North America, New York was not founded by a royal agent or religious refugees, but in the spirit and through the means of commerce (which has since remained the supreme political order and religious faith of New York). In that sense, Minuit’s purchase is either a very smart business move – after all, a large tract of land in such a prime position was surely worth more than the trade goods he handed over – or the hostile act of an unscrupulous merchant taking advantage of the less business-savvy (both actions hallmarks of New York’s commercial culture until today). Beyond the foundational myth, the transaction mostly shows different ways of thinking about land – the Lenape only accepted the right to temporarily co-use it, whereas the Europeans subscribed to the tenet of permanent, exclusive ownership.
While the Dutch colonized the whole mid-Atlantic coast of what is today the US, their settlement on Mannahatta was meant to be its center – as evidenced by its name of Nieuw Amsterdam (New Amsterdam), after the Dutch capital. Nieuw Amsterdam grew into a trading hub based on its deep natural harbor, the best on the Atlantic coast. The fur trade was soon complemented by Dutch farms which extended ever further north on Mannahatta, which triggered conflicts with the Lenape. This period is represented in New Amsterdam (Jeffrey D. Allers, White Goblin Games), which casts its players in the shoes of Dutch traders who will gather resources and expand New Amsterdam (at the expense of the Lenape).
Nieuw Amsterdam already contained the seeds of some characteristic New York traits: Its demographics diversified (Africans lived in Nieuw Amsterdam in 1626 already, an Italian followed a few years after); and the municipal council established in 1653, the first of its kind in America, was the start of the great democratic tradition of the city.
The English Colony
The Dutch colony did not last long. When the commercial and maritime rivalry with England flared up again, an English fleet seized Manhattan in 1664. To honor the heir presumptive, James, Duke of York, they renamed the city New York. The Dutch briefly recaptured the city in the next Anglo-Dutch war, but had to cede it permanently in 1674.
New York’s fine deep-water harbor was as valuable to English as it had been to Dutch traders, and the city continued to grow larger and more prosperous. When the British parliament imposed taxes on the American colonies from the 1760s on, the merchants of New York found themselves in a bind: On the one hand, like all entrepreneurs, they resented being parted from money. On the other, a rupture between Britain and its American colonies would cut off trade entirely – much worse than having to pay a moderate due. New York became thus both a hotbed of anti-British activism and one of the places in the American colonies which least wanted a war with the British motherland.
Fierier heads than those of the New Yorkers prevailed. War between Britain and the colonies erupted in 1775. Once George Washington had expelled the British from Boston in the first major action of the war, he moved his headquarters to New York. The city was thus the biggest possible prize for the British smarting from their first defeat. If they could beat the colonials there soundly, force Washington to surrender with his army, they could still quash the rebellion quickly… or so they thought. The amphibious campaign against New York would become the biggest operation of the entire War of Independence. While the British defeated Washington’s army and took the city, the wily colonial commander extricated most of his forces and lived to fight another day. The city of New York, however, would remain under British occupation for the rest of the war.
The British occupation cut New York off from its sister colonies. Many New Yorkers fled to towns which were under control of the American rebels. The loyalists left the town when Britain recognized American independence. In 1783, New York’s population had fallen by 60% compared to the pre-war number of 30,000. From then on, however, the city would know nothing but spectacular growth for over a century… but that’s a story for next time.
Games Referenced
New Amsterdam (Jeffrey D. Allers, White Goblin Games)
Liberty or Death (Harold Buchanan, GMT Games)
Further Reading
For a concise introduction, especially focused on local politics, see Lankevich, George J.: New York City. A Short History, New York University Press, New York City, NY/London 1998.
If you want a treatment which is both more in-depth and more journalistic (and lavishly illustrated) and don’t mind its history practically ending around 1970, see the book version of the 17-hour PBS documentary from 1999: Burns, Ric/Sanders, James/Ades, Lisa: New York. An Illustrated History, Knopf, New York City, NY 2001.
