Happy Birthday, New York City (?)

It's the anniversary (1664), at least, of New Amsterdam becoming New York, after being surrendered by the Dutch to the British Duke of York. Henry Hudson claims to have discovered the land in 1609, however, while searching for a route to India. He was sailing for the Dutch West India Company, which is how the Dutch came to settle it in 1614, six years earlier than Plymouth Rock. In any event, that's a lot of candles (344 years young).

New York is quite the aged one, but it's not the wrinkliest raisin off the vine. Like the state's demographic, Florida claims the oldest continuously settled city in the United States. St. Augustine (1565) is 99 years New York's elder, thanks to Spain who established it as the first permanent settlement in North America.


Narf moment-- If you reverse New York's age, you get St. Augustine's: 344→443


Old New York