Stadt Huys (City Hall)

New York’s first city government began meeting across the street in 1653 after the Dutch West India Company granted municipal rights to the townspeople. Built as a waterfront tavern in 1642, the Stadt Huys served as city hall because it was one of the town’s largest public buildings. Burgomasters and magistrates appointed by Director-General Stuyvesant and his council handled the city’s finances, sat as a trial court, and kept a jail there. After the English took over in 1664, they continued using the building as New York’s city hall until 1697, when the city government later moved to a new building at the corner of Wall and Nassau Streets. In 1979, archeologists excavating the site uncovered the foundations of Stadt Huys, the foundations of an English tavern built in 1670, and numerous artifacts, and today the outlines of those colonial buildings and foundation stones can be viewed under glass beneath the modern sidewalk.

New York, New York · United States