Why USA — New York & East Coast works
New York is a state in the Northeastern United States, bordering New England to the east, Pennsylvania and New Jersey to the south, and Canada to the north, with a coastline on the Atlantic Ocean and a shoreline on the Great Lakes as well. It is the fourth most populous U.S. state, with over 20 million residents, and its geography splits broadly into Downstate, the southeastern region encompassing New York City, Long Island, and the lower Hudson Valley that together hold about two-thirds of the state's population, and the larger Upstate region running from the Great Lakes to Lake Champlain, including the Adirondack and Catskill mountains. New York City, the most populous city in the United States, sits at the heart of the state's identity, while Albany, on the Hudson River near where it meets the Mohawk River Valley, serves as the state capital.
The land's European history begins with Henry Hudson's 1609 voyage into Upper New York Bay while sailing for the Dutch East India Company, which drew Dutch merchants seeking the fur trade with local Iroquois and Lenape communities and led to the founding of New Netherland, including the trading posts that grew into Albany and New Amsterdam, the settlement that became New York City. England seized the colony during the Second Anglo-Dutch War and renamed it the Province of New York, and after New York joined the other twelve colonies in the American Revolution and ratified the U.S. Constitution in 1788, the state's 19th-century construction of the Erie Canal opened its interior to trade in a way that gave it a lasting economic advantage, a rise that earned it the nickname the Empire State.
New York's national parks and historic sites trace much of this history in physical form: the Statue of Liberty, a gift from France dedicated in New York Harbor in 1886, and the adjoining Ellis Island anchor the Statue of Liberty National Monument, while Saratoga National Historical Park preserves the site of the 1777 battle that persuaded France to enter the Revolutionary War as an American ally. Stonewall National Monument in Greenwich Village, the country's first national monument dedicated to LGBTQ rights, marks the site of the 1969 Stonewall riots, and Niagara Falls National Heritage Area, running along the Niagara River to Lake Ontario, preserves the communities and parkland around the falls themselves. Beyond Downstate, the state also holds 22 units of the National Park System altogether, along with 262 national historic landmarks and more than 5,000 listings on the National Register of Historic Places, spread from Fire Island's barrier beaches to the Adirondack High Peaks.
Climate in New York varies by both latitude and proximity to the coast: Downstate, including New York City and Long Island, has a humid subtropical climate with hot, sometimes humid summers and winters that are cold but comparatively mild for the state, while Upstate New York sees warmer summers broken by only occasional humid spells and longer, colder winters, with the Tug Hill region near Lake Ontario receiving heavy lake-effect snow before the lake surface freezes over. Mount Marcy, in the Adirondack High Peaks, is the state's highest point at 5,344 feet, and the Adirondacks themselves hold vast tracts of mountain wilderness west of the Lake Champlain valley, a landscape of forests, lakes, and farmland that stands in sharp contrast to New York City's dense urban core just a few hours south.
New York draws more visitors than any other U.S. state, and in 2013 four of its landmarks ranked among the ten most-visited tourist attractions in the world: Times Square, Central Park, Niagara Falls, and Grand Central Terminal. Tourism has grown into one of the state's largest industries, supporting roughly one in ten jobs statewide, and the "I Love New York" campaign, running since 1977 under its trademarked heart logo, has promoted the state and city to visitors for nearly half a century. Alongside its landmarks, New York City is also home to the headquarters of the United Nations and to Columbia and Cornell, two of the state's Ivy League universities, reinforcing its role as a global hub for culture, diplomacy, and higher education well beyond its tourist sites alone.
- New York (state) — Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0
Text adapted from the linked articles under CC BY-SA 4.0; edited for length.
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