The waterfront meeting place of the Sons of Liberty, the Lower Manhattan office of Alexander Hamilton, the park where a statue of King George III was violently removed by rebels, and many more historic locations can all be found in New York City with the guidance of the Gotham Center’s first multimedia walking tour, NYC Revolutionary Trail. This 90-minute adventure details New York City’s experience with the American Revolution from 1763 to 1789. The tour brings historic sites to life with video, narration, and more!
Join the creators of the tour, Peter-Christian Aigner, director of the Gotham Center for New York City History, and Ted Knudsen, PhD Candidate in History at the Graduate Center on June 6th as they talk with Untapped New York’s Chief Experience Officer Justin Rivers! This launch event will take place at the New York City Fire Museum. This event is free for Untapped New York Insiders! Not an Insider yet? Become a member today and get your first month free with code JOINUS.
Uncovering NYC’s Revolutionary Trail
The self-guided walking tour allows you to “choose your own adventure” as you navigate the streets of Lower Manhattan. At each stop, you can listen to audio narration with site information and character profiles, watch videos, and explore further with links to more online text and imagery. As you explore, you’ll uncover fascinating stories of Revolution-era New York City and meet characters who were instrumental in the fight for freedom.
Whether you’re new to the subject or a major history buff, this tour is sure to show you something new. Not only will you learn about famous figures like Alexander Hamilton and George Washington, but you’ll also discover lesser-known figures and sites around the city that played a pivotal role in the Revolution. Along the way, you’ll meet female rebels of New York City like Margaret Corbin and Elizabeth Burgin, as well as influential Indigenous leaders like Joseph Brant, Daniel Ninham, and Joseph Louis Cook. You’ll discover sites like Golden Hill where “the first blood of the Revolution” was shed and visit Wallabout Bay, where the skulls of prisoners of war covered the beach for years.
NYC Revolutionary Trail is the foundation of a larger, ongoing project by the Gotham Center that aims to expand beyond this core tour into the wider metropolitan region. The goal is to eventually recreate colonial New York in a virtual space and to organize existing historic sites into a networked whole before the start of the Revolution’s 250th anniversary. Supplemental materials that the Trail currently provides include lesson plans for classroom use, a scavenger hunt, and a trail guide.
Uncovering NYC’s Revolutionary Trail
You can learn more about the NYC Revolutionary Trail and plans for its expansion at a launch event with its creators on June 6th! This event will take place at the New York City Fire Museum where you can also explore an accompanying exhibition, Colonial Firefighting & The American Revolution. This special exhibit celebrates “the untold story of a group of volunteers, the colonial-era firefighters, that stood between New York and disaster during years of rampant arson, wars for North America, and the American Revolution.”
Next, check out 11 Revolutionary War Sites in NYC