Two years after the labor strikes that shook the city of New York, the workers of Triangle factory returned to better wages and lower hours. But when a fire broke out near closing time on a Saturday afternoon, these same workers found themselves swept up in a catastrophe. Some would escape, but many would not. In the weeks that followed, a city mourned and began to wrestle with questions of responsibility. Where did the blame for the tragedy lie? With the city? With the factory owners? Or with the workers themselves? Support us by supporting our sponsors!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Inspired by the labor strikes at Triangle and other factories in Lower Manhattan, more than 30,000 garment workers took to the streets of New York in protest in late 1909. For the first time, an industry of women sought not to just halt production at one factory — they wanted to put the brakes on an entire trade. With over four hundred garment factories shut down, factory owners banded together with police and the courts to fight the striking workers. But as the labor movement attracted new high-society allies, internal politics began to fracture the labor movement, threatening to derail the entire cause.Support us by supporting our sponsors!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

On March 25, 1911, a fire broke out at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory in Manhattan, claiming the lives of 146 garment workers — mostly women and girls. It was one of the deadliest workplace disasters in American history. Caused by a combination of carelessness and poor safety measures, the fire eventually set off a wave of workplace reforms that changed industry in America and sent New York party politics in a totally different direction.But in the years before the fire, the workers of the Triangle factory were focused on a different issue — advocating for higher pay. Facing long hours and unsympathetic bosses unwilling to implement change, the women decided they had only one option left. It was time to go on strike.Support us by supporting our sponsors!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

New York City was founded on the Dutch principles of tolerance and capitalism, both of which were new ideas at the time. But much of the city's early history was lost until the 1970s, when a renewed interest in the Dutch period led to the founding of the New Netherland Center. Here, thousands of previously untranslated records shed new light on this crucial moment in Gotham’s history. Our guest today is Greg Young, who co-hosts the Bowery Boys, a popular podcast about all things New York City history. Young visited the New Netherland Center, and he joins us to share what he found there and where Dutch influence can still be seen in New York today.Support us by supporting our sponsors!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

In the years after Adrian Van der Donck won a municipal charter for New Amsterdam, and under Peter Stuyvesant's stern but capable rule, the city flourished. Even English residents of New England and Virginia sent their goods to Europe via the future New York Harbor, because the Dutch were so good at the business of shipping. Dutch features that would become part of American culture — from cookies and cole slaw to Santa Claus — became ingrained. Most importantly, the Dutch notions of tolerance, which fostered a multi-ethnic society, and free trade, became rooted in Manhattan. But in London, King Charles II and his brother, James, the Duke of York, were eager to build an empire. Their plan involved taking over slaving posts in West Africa, reorganizing their American colonies, and taking the Dutch colony, with its strategically located capital. And soon, they would send a squadron of warships to Manhattan.Support us by supporting our sponsors!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Peter Stuyvesant was fresh from losing a leg in battle against the Spanish when he arrived in Manhattan in 1647. He was a tough soldier who was ready to take charge of the unruly population of New Amsterdam. He soon clashed with Adrian Van der Donck, the leader of the opposition, who was secretly crafting a formal legal complaint that would compel the Dutch government to give the colony a form of representative government. When Stuyvesant discovered that Van der Donck had been spearheading an effort to overthrow his rule, he had him arrested for treason. But after a public faceoff revealed the Dutch government had come down on the side of colonists, Van der Donck was released. He returned to Europe and traveled to The Hague, where he argued that the Dutch government should take over the colony from the West India Company. At first, the Dutch government supported Van der Donck’s cause. It granted New Amsterdam a charter, giving the colony official status as a Dutch city, and ordered Stuyvesant's recall. But then order was abruptly rescinded. Oliver Cromwell’s English government was declaring war on the Dutch republic.Support us by supporting our sponsors!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Just as it was becoming a New World success story, disaster came to New Amsterdam. Willem Kieft, the Dutch leader appointed by the West India Trading Company, declared war on local tribes, sending soldiers to slaughter them in their villages. The tribes responded with waves of death and destruction that would set the European settlers back decades in their development. A new colonist named Adriaen Van der Donck arrived to find the place in chaos. The colonists were furious at Kieft for endangering their settlement with his attacks. Van der Donck had been trained as a lawyer, and he soon found a role organizing the colonists against Kieft. He lobbied Kieft to permit the formation of a council to give the residents a say in their government. But when it became clear Kieft had no intention of giving the council any real power, Van der Donck responded by going over Kieft’s head and appealing directly to the leaders of the West India Company for intervention. The response wasn’t what he expected. It would lead to the appointment of a new Dutch leader, a hardliner tasked with wrestling the wayward colonists back under control. His name was Peter Stuyvesant.Support us by supporting ours sponsors!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

New Amsterdam was a desperate place. For the first decade of its existence, the Dutch city on the tip of Manhattan Island served as a haven for pirates, prostitutes and smugglers. That was because the West India Company, which ran New Amsterdam, insisted on controlling all trade — something it simply couldn't manage effectively. Finally, in 1640, the Company gave up its monopoly, and what had been a rag-tag, Wild West kind of town quickly took on the hallmarks of Dutch capitalism. Trading firms in Amsterdam opened branch offices on Manhattan, and business boomed. Merchants traded in everything from furs to tobacco to Caribbean sugar and salt. Soon, Manhattan became a brash, free-wheeling pioneer settlement where visitors could hear some 18 different languages — at a time when the city’s population numbered only about 500. The ingredients were in place for an American success story utterly unlike the English colonies to the north. Support us by supporting our sponsors!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Twelve years after Henry Hudson's 1609 trip charting the Hudson River, the Dutch used his voyage as the basis for a new colony, which would be wedged between the English colonies in New England and Virginia. New Netherland began with tiny numbers of people from different backgrounds. They settled the entire region that Hudson had traveled, from Delaware to New York to Connecticut. But being spread out so thinly exposed them to danger. In 1626, in the area around the future Albany, New York, a small party became embroiled in a fight between two native tribes, and some settlers were killed.In the aftermath, the colonists chose a new leader. Peter Minuit's first decision was to call all the settlers together for strength. Then he selected a location for a capital city, one that was strategically located in a world-class harbor and at the mouth of the colony's central river—a wilderness island called Manhattan. Support us by supporting our sponsors!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

In 1609, a headstrong English sea captain named Henry Hudson set out on behalf of the Dutch East India Company to find a trade route to Asia — and promptly found himself and his crew stranded in icy waters off the coast of Norway. As supplies dwindled, Hudson announced to his frostbitten crew that the ship would change course. They set off across the Atlantic Ocean in search of an alternative route through the North American continent.Hudson never found the Northwest Passage, but he did come across something else on that journey — a small island the native people called Manna-hatta. That settlement would eventually give rise to a new Dutch colony called New Netherland, with Manhattan Island, or New Amsterdam, as it would come to be known, as its capital. New Amsterdam would come to be defined by two key Dutch values: tolerance and capitalism. This series by Russell Shorto, based on his book The Island at the Center of the World, traces how Manhattan’s brief chapter as a Dutch colony shaped the city for centuries to come.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.