n e w b u r g h ~ n e w y o r k

"The year 1891 finds us the most thriving city on the Hudson, with citizens full of spirit of public enterprise, with public institutions comparatively unequalled, and with apparently every factor and requisite to ensure its bright future as a manufacturing and commercial city of importance. . ." (Nutt 27)

     The above prophecy came true, and this vision lasted for almost half a century. Even from the beginning, all signs pointed toward Newburgh's prosperity. When Henry Hudson sailed up his namesake river in search of the northwest passage to the Pacific, he stood on the land that would become Newburgh and remarked that it is "a pleasant place to build a town on" (The Newburgh Survey 3). Sixty miles upriver from New York City, on the west bank of the Hudson, Newburgh was not simply on a "pleasant place"; this place, its geography, would make Newburgh's success possible for more than one hundred years. The four parts of this this section cover Newburgh's history from the days of its first settlers in the 1700s to life after urban renewal in the 1980s. Start with "riverside sanctuary to GW's headquarters."