The Bronx, New York
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The Bronx () is a
borough of New York City New York City is composed of five boroughs: The Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Queens, and Staten Island. Each borough is coextensive with a respective county of New York State, making New York City the largest U.S. municipality situated in m ...
, coextensive with Bronx County, in the
state State may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Literature * ''State Magazine'', a monthly magazine published by the U.S. Department of State * ''The State'' (newspaper), a daily newspaper in Columbia, South Carolina, United States * ''Our S ...
of
New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...
. It is south of
Westchester County Westchester County is located in the U.S. state of New York. It is the seventh most populous county in the State of New York and the most populous north of New York City. According to the 2020 United States Census, the county had a population ...
; north and east of the New York City borough of
Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...
, across the
Harlem River The Harlem River is an tidal strait in New York, United States, flowing between the Hudson River and the East River and separating the island of Manhattan from the Bronx on the New York mainland. The northern stretch, also called the Spuyt ...
; and north of the New York City borough of
Queens Queens is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Queens County, in the U.S. state of New York. Located on Long Island, it is the largest New York City borough by area. It is bordered by the borough of Brooklyn at the western tip of Long ...
, across the
East River The East River is a saltwater tidal estuary in New York City. The waterway, which is actually not a river despite its name, connects Upper New York Bay on its south end to Long Island Sound on its north end. It separates the borough of Quee ...
. The Bronx has a land area of and a population of 1,472,654 in the 2020 census. If each borough were ranked as a city, the Bronx would rank as the ninth-most-populous in the U.S. Of the five boroughs, it has the fourth-largest area, fourth-highest population, and third-highest
population density Population density (in agriculture: standing stock or plant density) is a measurement of population per unit land area. It is mostly applied to humans, but sometimes to other living organisms too. It is a key geographical term.Matt RosenberPopu ...
.New York State Department of Health
''Population, Land Area, and Population Density by County, New York State – 2010''
retrieved on August 8, 2015.
It is the only borough of New York City not primarily on an island. With a population that is 54.8% Hispanic as of 2020, it is the only majority-Hispanic county in the
Northeastern United States The Northeastern United States, also referred to as the Northeast, the East Coast, or the American Northeast, is a geographic region of the United States. It is located on the Atlantic coast of North America, with Canada to its north, the Southe ...
and the fourth-most-populous nationwide. The Bronx is divided by the Bronx River into a hillier section in the
west West or Occident is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from east and is the direction in which the Sun sets on the Earth. Etymology The word "west" is a Germanic word passed into some ...
, and a flatter eastern section. East and west street names are divided by
Jerome Avenue Jerome Avenue is one of the longest thoroughfares in the New York City borough of the Bronx, New York, United States. The road is long and stretches from Concourse to Woodlawn. Both of these termini are with the Major Deegan Expressway which r ...
. The West Bronx was annexed to New York City in 1874, and the areas east of the Bronx River in 1895. Bronx County was separated from New York County in 1914.On the start of business for Bronx County
Bronx County In Motion. New Officials All Find Work to Do on Their First Day.
''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'', January 3, 1914 (
PDF Portable Document Format (PDF), standardized as ISO 32000, is a file format developed by Adobe in 1992 to present documents, including text formatting and images, in a manner independent of application software, hardware, and operating systems. ...
retrieved on June 26, 2008): :"Despite the fact that the new Bronx County Court House is not completed there was no delay yesterday in getting the court machinery in motion. All the new county officials were on hand and the County Clerk, the District Attorney, the Surrogate, and the County Judge soon had things in working order. The seal to be used by the new county was selected by County Judge Louis D. Gibbs. It is circular. In the center is a seated figure of Justice. To her right is an American shield and over the figure is written 'Populi Suprema.' ..." :"Surrogate George M. S. Schulz, with his office force, was busy at the stroke of 9 o'clock. Two wills were filed in the early morning, but owing to the absence of a safe they were recorded and then returned to the attorneys for safe keeping. ..." :"There was a rush of business to the new County Clerk's office. Between seventy-five and a hundred men applied for first naturalization papers. Two certificates of incorporation were issued, and seventeen judgments, seven lis pendens, three mechanics' liens and one suit for negligence were filed." :"Sheriff O'Brien announced several additional appointments."
About a quarter of the Bronx's area is open space, including Woodlawn Cemetery,
Van Cortlandt Park Van Cortlandt Park is a park located in the borough of the Bronx in New York City. Owned by the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation, it is managed with assistance from the Van Cortlandt Park Alliance. The park, the city's third-lar ...
, Pelham Bay Park, the
New York Botanical Garden The New York Botanical Garden (NYBG) is a botanical garden at Bronx Park in the Bronx, New York City. Established in 1891, it is located on a site that contains a landscape with over one million living plants; the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory, ...
, and the
Bronx Zoo The Bronx Zoo (also historically the Bronx Zoological Park and the Bronx Zoological Gardens) is a zoo within Bronx Park in the Bronx, New York. It is one of the largest zoos in the United States by area and is the largest metropolitan zoo in ...
in the borough's north and center. The
Thain Family Forest The Thain Family Forest is a 50-acre (20 ha) section of old-growth forest along the Bronx River in the New York Botanical Garden, for a time known as the Native Forest and historically as the Hemlock Grove. Its heritage dates in part to pre-colonia ...
at the New York Botanical Garden is thousands of years old; it is New York City's largest remaining tract of the original forest that once covered the city. These open spaces are primarily on land reserved in the late 19th century as urban development progressed north and east from Manhattan. The word "Bronx" originated with Faroese-born (or Swedish-born)
Jonas Bronck Jonas Bronck (alternatively Jonas Jonsson Brunk, Jonas Jonasson Bronk, or Jonas Jonassen Bronck) was born around year 1600 and died in 1643. Bronck was an immigrant to the Dutch colony of New Netherland after whom the Bronx River, and by extensio ...
, who established the first settlement in the area as part of the
New Netherland New Netherland ( nl, Nieuw Nederland; la, Novum Belgium or ) was a 17th-century colonial province of the Dutch Republic that was located on the east coast of what is now the United States. The claimed territories extended from the Delmarva ...
colony in 1639. European settlers displaced the native
Lenape The Lenape (, , or Lenape , del, Lënapeyok) also called the Leni Lenape, Lenni Lenape and Delaware people, are an indigenous peoples of the Northeastern Woodlands, who live in the United States and Canada. Their historical territory inclu ...
after 1643. In the 19th and 20th centuries, the Bronx received many immigrant and migrant groups as it was transformed into an urban community, first from European countries (particularly
Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, in north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel, the Irish Sea, and St George's Channel. Ireland is the s ...
,
Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwee ...
,
Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...
and
Eastern Europe Eastern Europe is a subregion of the European continent. As a largely ambiguous term, it has a wide range of geopolitical, geographical, ethnic, cultural, and socio-economic connotations. The vast majority of the region is covered by Russia, whi ...
) and later from the
Caribbean The Caribbean (, ) ( es, El Caribe; french: la Caraïbe; ht, Karayib; nl, De Caraïben) is a region of the Americas that consists of the Caribbean Sea, its islands (some surrounded by the Caribbean Sea and some bordering both the Caribbean ...
region (particularly
Puerto Rico Puerto Rico (; abbreviated PR; tnq, Boriken, ''Borinquen''), officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico ( es, link=yes, Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico, lit=Free Associated State of Puerto Rico), is a Caribbean island and unincorporated ...
,
Trinidad Trinidad is the larger and more populous of the two major islands of Trinidad and Tobago. The island lies off the northeastern coast of Venezuela and sits on the continental shelf of South America. It is often referred to as the southernmos ...
,
Haiti Haiti (; ht, Ayiti ; French: ), officially the Republic of Haiti (); ) and formerly known as Hayti, is a country located on the island of Hispaniola in the Greater Antilles archipelago of the Caribbean Sea, east of Cuba and Jamaica, and s ...
,
Guyana Guyana ( or ), officially the Cooperative Republic of Guyana, is a country on the northern mainland of South America. Guyana is an indigenous word which means "Land of Many Waters". The capital city is Georgetown. Guyana is bordered by the ...
,
Jamaica Jamaica (; ) is an island country situated in the Caribbean Sea. Spanning in area, it is the third-largest island of the Greater Antilles and the Caribbean (after Cuba and Hispaniola). Jamaica lies about south of Cuba, and west of Hispa ...
,
Barbados Barbados is an island country in the Lesser Antilles of the West Indies, in the Caribbean region of the Americas, and the most easterly of the Caribbean Islands. It occupies an area of and has a population of about 287,000 (2019 estima ...
, and the
Dominican Republic The Dominican Republic ( ; es, República Dominicana, ) is a country located on the island of Hispaniola in the Greater Antilles archipelago of the Caribbean region. It occupies the eastern five-eighths of the island, which it shares with ...
), as well as immigrants from
West Africa West Africa or Western Africa is the westernmost region of Africa. The United Nations defines Western Africa as the 16 countries of Benin, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, The Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Ivory Coast, Liberia, Mali ...
(particularly from
Ghana Ghana (; tw, Gaana, ee, Gana), officially the Republic of Ghana, is a country in West Africa. It abuts the Gulf of Guinea and the Atlantic Ocean to the south, sharing borders with Ivory Coast in the west, Burkina Faso in the north, and Tog ...
and
Nigeria Nigeria ( ), , ig, Naìjíríyà, yo, Nàìjíríà, pcm, Naijá , ff, Naajeeriya, kcg, Naijeriya officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a country in West Africa. It is situated between the Sahel to the north and the Gulf o ...
),
African American African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of ens ...
migrants from the
southern United States The Southern United States (sometimes Dixie, also referred to as the Southern States, the American South, the Southland, or simply the South) is a geographic and cultural region of the United States of America. It is between the Atlantic Ocean ...
, Panamanians, Hondurans, and South Asians. The Bronx contains the poorest congressional district in the United States, the 15th. There are, however, some upper-income, as well as middle-income neighborhoods such as Riverdale, Fieldston, Spuyten Duyvil,
Schuylerville Schuylerville () is a village in Saratoga County, New York, United States. The village is located in the northeastern part of the Town of Saratoga, east of Saratoga Springs. The Village of Victory is adjacent to Schuylerville to the southwest ...
, Pelham Bay, Pelham Gardens, Morris Park, and
Country Club A country club is a privately owned club, often with a membership quota and admittance by invitation or sponsorship, that generally offers both a variety of recreational sports and facilities for dining and entertaining. Typical athletic offe ...
.''
The Almanac of American Politics ''The Almanac of American Politics'' is a reference work published biennially by Columbia Books & Information Services. It aims to provide a detailed look at the politics of the United States through an approach of profiling individual leaders an ...
2008'', edited by Michael Barone with
Richard E. Cohen Richard E. Cohen is a journalist and author. He is a congressional correspondent for ''POLITICO''. Awards and honors He received the Everett McKinley Dirksen Award for distinguished reporting on Congress in 1990. Cohen also received the Sigma De ...
and Grant Ujifusa,
National Journal ''National Journal'' is an advisory services company based in Washington, D.C., offering services in government affairs, advocacy communications, stakeholder mapping, and policy brands research for government and business leaders. It publishes d ...
Group, Washington, D.C., 2008 (paperback) or (hardback), chapter on New York state
U.S. Census Bureau The United States Census Bureau (USCB), officially the Bureau of the Census, is a principal agency of the U.S. Federal Statistical System, responsible for producing data about the American people and economy. The Census Bureau is part of the ...
, ''
Statistical Abstract of the United States The ''Statistical Abstract of the United States'' was a publication of the United States Census Bureau, an agency of the United States Department of Commerce. Published annually from 1878 to 2011, the statistics described social, political and ...
: 2003'', Section 31, Table 1384. Congressional District Profiles – 108th Congress: 2000
Parts of the Bronx saw a steep decline in population, livable housing, and quality of life in the late 1960s, throughout the 1970s and 1980s, and into the early 1990s, culminating in a wave of
arson Arson is the crime of willfully and deliberately setting fire to or charring property. Although the act of arson typically involves buildings, the term can also refer to the intentional burning of other things, such as motor vehicles, wate ...
in the late 1970s. The
South Bronx The South Bronx is an area of the New York City borough of the Bronx. The area comprises neighborhoods in the southern part of the Bronx, such as Concourse, Mott Haven, Melrose, and Port Morris. In the early 1900s, the South Bronx was orig ...
, in particular, experienced severe
urban decay Urban decay (also known as urban rot, urban death or urban blight) is the sociological process by which a previously functioning city, or part of a city, falls into disrepair and decrepitude. There is no single process that leads to urban deca ...
. The borough began experiencing new population growth starting in the late 1990s and continuing to the present day.


Etymology and naming


Early names

The Bronx was called ' by the native Siwanoy band of
Lenape The Lenape (, , or Lenape , del, Lënapeyok) also called the Leni Lenape, Lenni Lenape and Delaware people, are an indigenous peoples of the Northeastern Woodlands, who live in the United States and Canada. Their historical territory inclu ...
(also known historically as ''the Delawares''), while other Native Americans knew the Bronx as ''Keskeskeck''. It was divided by the Aquahung River (now known in English as the Bronx River}. The Bronx was named after
Jonas Bronck Jonas Bronck (alternatively Jonas Jonsson Brunk, Jonas Jonasson Bronk, or Jonas Jonassen Bronck) was born around year 1600 and died in 1643. Bronck was an immigrant to the Dutch colony of New Netherland after whom the Bronx River, and by extensio ...
(), a European settler whose precise origins are disputed. Documents indicate he was a Swedish-born immigrant from Komstad, Norra Ljunga parish, in
Småland Småland () is a historical province () in southern Sweden. Småland borders Blekinge, Scania, Halland, Västergötland, Östergötland and the island Öland in the Baltic Sea. The name Småland literally means ''Small Lands''. The Latinized f ...
, Sweden, who arrived in
New Netherland New Netherland ( nl, Nieuw Nederland; la, Novum Belgium or ) was a 17th-century colonial province of the Dutch Republic that was located on the east coast of what is now the United States. The claimed territories extended from the Delmarva ...
during the spring of 1639., excerpted a
The Bronx ... Its History & Perspective
/ref> Bronck became the first recorded European settler in the present-day Bronx and built a farm named "Emmaus" close to what today is the corner of Willis Avenue and 132nd Street in
Mott Haven Mott Haven is an American primarily residential neighborhood in the southwestern section of the New York City borough of the Bronx. Its boundaries, starting from the north and moving clockwise, are East 149th Street to the north, the Bruckner ...
. He leased land from the
Dutch West India Company The Dutch West India Company ( nl, Geoctrooieerde Westindische Compagnie, ''WIC'' or ''GWC''; ; en, Chartered West India Company) was a chartered company of Dutch merchants as well as foreign investors. Among its founders was Willem Usselincx ...
on the neck of the mainland immediately north of the Dutch settlement of New Haarlem (on
Manhattan Island Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five Boroughs of New York City, boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the List of co ...
), and bought additional tracts from the local tribes. He eventually accumulated between the
Harlem River The Harlem River is an tidal strait in New York, United States, flowing between the Hudson River and the East River and separating the island of Manhattan from the Bronx on the New York mainland. The northern stretch, also called the Spuyt ...
and the Aquahung, which became known as ''Bronck's River'' or ''the
Bronx The Bronx () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Bronx County, in the state of New York. It is south of Westchester County; north and east of the New York City borough of Manhattan, across the Harlem River; and north of the New Y ...
iver'. Dutch and English settlers referred to the area as ''Bronck's Land''. The American poet William Bronk was a descendant of Pieter Bronck, either Jonas Bronck's son or his younger brother, but most probably a nephew or cousin, as there was an age difference of 16 years. Much work on the Swedish claim has been undertaken by Brian G. Andersson, former Commissioner of New York City's Department of Records, who helped organize a 375th Anniversary celebration in Bronck's hometown in 2014.


Use of definite article

The Bronx is referred to with the
definite article An article is any member of a class of dedicated words that are used with noun phrases to mark the identifiability of the referents of the noun phrases. The category of articles constitutes a part of speech. In English, both "the" and "a(n)" a ...
as "the Bronx" or "The Bronx", both legally and colloquially. The "County of Bronx" does not take "the" immediately before "Bronx" in formal references, unlike the coextensive "Borough of the Bronx". The
United States Postal Service The United States Postal Service (USPS), also known as the Post Office, U.S. Mail, or Postal Service, is an independent agency of the executive branch of the United States federal government responsible for providing postal service in the ...
uses "Bronx, NY" for mailing addresses. The region was apparently named after the Bronx River and first appeared in the "Annexed District of The Bronx" created in 1874 out of part of
Westchester County Westchester County is located in the U.S. state of New York. It is the seventh most populous county in the State of New York and the most populous north of New York City. According to the 2020 United States Census, the county had a population ...
. It was continued in the "Borough of The Bronx", which included a larger annexation from Westchester County in 1898. The use of the definite article is attributed to the style of referring to rivers. A time-worn story purportedly explaining the use of the definite article in the borough's name says it stems from the phrase "visiting the Broncks", referring to the settler's family. The capitalization of the borough's name is sometimes disputed. Generally, the definite article is lowercase in place names ("the Bronx") except in some official references. The definite article is capitalized ("The Bronx") at the beginning of a sentence or in any other situation when a normally lowercase word would be capitalized. However, some people and groups refer to the borough with a capital letter at all times, such as Bronx Borough Historian Lloyd Ultan,
The Bronx County Historical Society The Bronx County Historical Society is a private non-profit organization that collects and disseminates historical material and information about the New York City borough of the Bronx, as well as southern Westchester County, New York. The Socie ...
, and the Bronx-based organization Great and Glorious Grand Army of The Bronx, arguing the definite article is part of the proper name. In particular, the Great and Glorious Grand Army of The Bronx is leading efforts to make the city refer to the borough with an uppercase definite article in all uses, comparing the lowercase article in the Bronx's name to "not capitalizing the 's' in 'Staten Island.


History

European colonization of the Bronx began in 1639. The Bronx was originally part of
Westchester County Westchester County is located in the U.S. state of New York. It is the seventh most populous county in the State of New York and the most populous north of New York City. According to the 2020 United States Census, the county had a population ...
, but it was ceded to
New York County Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...
in two major parts (
West Bronx The West Bronx is a region in the New York City borough of the Bronx. The region lies west of the Bronx River and roughly corresponds to the western half of the borough. The West Bronx is more densely populated than the East Bronx, and is clo ...
, 1874 and
East Bronx The East Bronx is the part of the New York City borough of the Bronx which lies east of the Bronx River; this roughly corresponds to the eastern half of the borough. Neighborhoods include: Baychester, Castle Hill, City Island, Co-op Cit ...
, 1895) before it became Bronx County. Originally, the area was part of the
Lenape The Lenape (, , or Lenape , del, Lënapeyok) also called the Leni Lenape, Lenni Lenape and Delaware people, are an indigenous peoples of the Northeastern Woodlands, who live in the United States and Canada. Their historical territory inclu ...
's
Lenapehoking Lenapehoking ( Unami: ''Lënapehòkink'') is widely translated as 'homelands of the Lenape', which in the 16th and 17th centuries, ranged along the Eastern seaboard from western Connecticut to Delaware, and encompassed the territory adjacent to th ...
territory inhabited by Siwanoy of the
Wappinger The Wappinger () were an Eastern Algonquian Munsee-speaking Native American people from what is now southern New York and western Connecticut. At the time of first contact in the 17th century they were primarily based in what is now Dutches ...
Confederacy. Over time, European colonists converted the borough into farmlands.


Before 1914

The Bronx's development is directly connected to its strategic location between
New England New England is a region comprising six states in the Northeastern United States: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It is bordered by the state of New York to the west and by the Canadian provinces ...
and New York (
Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...
). Control over the bridges across the Harlem River plagued the period of British colonial rule. The King's Bridge, built in 1693 where
Broadway Broadway may refer to: Theatre * Broadway Theatre (disambiguation) * Broadway theatre, theatrical productions in professional theatres near Broadway, Manhattan, New York City, U.S. ** Broadway (Manhattan), the street **Broadway Theatre (53rd Stree ...
reached the Spuyten Duyvil Creek, was a possession of
Frederick Philipse Frederick Philipse (born Frederick Flypsen;Appleton, W.S. ''The Heraldic Journal, Recording the Amorial Bearings and Genealogies of American Families'', Wiggen & Lunt, Boston, 1867 1626 in Bolsward, Netherlands – December 23, 1702), first Lord ...
, lord of Philipse Manor. Local farmers on both sides of the creek resented the tolls, and in 1759, Jacobus Dyckman and Benjamin Palmer led them in building a free bridge across the Harlem River. After the
American Revolutionary War The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was a major war of the American Revolution. Widely considered as the war that secured the independence of t ...
, the King's Bridge toll was abolished. The territory now contained within Bronx County was originally part of
Westchester County Westchester County is located in the U.S. state of New York. It is the seventh most populous county in the State of New York and the most populous north of New York City. According to the 2020 United States Census, the county had a population ...
, one of the 12 original counties of the English
Province of New York The Province of New York (1664–1776) was a British proprietary colony and later royal colony on the northeast coast of North America. As one of the Middle Colonies, New York achieved independence and worked with the others to found the U ...
. The present Bronx County was contained in the town of Westchester and parts of the towns in Yonkers, Eastchester, and Pelham. In 1846, a new town was created by division of Westchester, called West Farms. The town of
Morrisania Morrisania ( ) is a residential neighborhood in the southwestern Bronx, New York City, New York. Its boundaries are the Cross-Bronx Expressway to the north, Crotona-Prospect Avenue to the east, East 161st Street to the south, and Webster Avenue ...
was created, in turn, from West Farms in 1855. In 1873, the town of Kingsbridge was established within the former borders of the town of Yonkers, roughly corresponding to the modern Bronx neighborhoods of Kingsbridge, Riverdale, and Woodlawn Heights, and included Woodlawn Cemetery. Among famous settlers in the Bronx during the 19th and early 20th centuries were author Willa Cather, tobacco merchant Pierre Lorillard, and inventor
Jordan L. Mott Jordan Lawrence Mott (1799 — 1866) was an American inventor and industrialist. He established the J. L. Mott Iron Works in New York City. His father was Jacob Mott, an alderman of New York in 1804-1810 and at one time acting mayor of the city, ...
, who established
Mott Haven Mott Haven is an American primarily residential neighborhood in the southwestern section of the New York City borough of the Bronx. Its boundaries, starting from the north and moving clockwise, are East 149th Street to the north, the Bruckner ...
to house the workers at his iron works. The consolidation of the Bronx into New York City proceeded in two stages. In 1873, the state legislature annexed Kingsbridge, West Farms, and Morrisania to New York, effective in 1874; the three towns were soon abolished in the process. The whole territory east of the Bronx River was annexed to the city in 1895, three years before New York's consolidation with
Brooklyn Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...
,
Queens Queens is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Queens County, in the U.S. state of New York. Located on Long Island, it is the largest New York City borough by area. It is bordered by the borough of Brooklyn at the western tip of Long ...
, and
Staten Island Staten Island ( ) is a Boroughs of New York City, borough of New York City, coextensive with Richmond County, in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York. Located in the city's southwest portion, the borough is separated from New Jersey b ...
. This included the Town of Westchester (which had voted against consolidation in 1894) and parts of Eastchester and Pelham.Peck, Richard
"In the Bronx, the Gentry Live On; The Gentry Live On"
''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'', December 2, 1973. Accessed July 17, 2008. "But the Harlem riverfront was industrializing, and in 1874 the city annexed the area west of the Bronx River: Morrisania, West Farms and Kingsbridge. A second annexation in 1894 gathered in Westchester and portions of Eastchester and Pelham." However, 1894 must refer to the referendum, since the enabling act was not passed or signed until 1895.
The nautical community of City Island voted to join the city in 1896. On January 1, 1898, the consolidated
City of New York New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...
was born, including the Bronx as one of the five distinct
boroughs A borough is an administrative division in various English-speaking countries. In principle, the term ''borough'' designates a self-governing walled town, although in practice, official use of the term varies widely. History In the Middle A ...
(at the same time, the Bronx's territory moved from Westchester County into
New York County Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...
, which already included Manhattan and the rest of pre-1874 New York City). On April 19, 1912, those parts of New York County which had been annexed from Westchester County in previous decades were newly constituted as Bronx County, the 62nd and last county to be created by the state, effective in 1914. Bronx County's courts opened for business on January 2, 1914 (the same day that John P. Mitchel started work as
Mayor of New York City The mayor of New York City, officially Mayor of the City of New York, is head of the executive branch of the government of New York City and the chief executive of New York City. The mayor's office administers all city services, public property ...
). Marble Hill, Manhattan was now connected to the Bronx by filling in the former waterway, but it did not become part of the borough or county.Steinhauer, Jennifer
"F.Y.I."
''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'', October 10, 1993. Accessed August 23, 2021. "Marble Hill's Exile Q. Why is there a small piece of Manhattan in the Bronx?. ... A. Marble Hill was originally attached to the northern part of Manhattan, but was severed in 1895 when the city deepened and straightened the waterway that connected the Hudson River to what was known as Spuyten Duyvil Creek (Dutch for 'in Spite of the Devil', thought to be a reference to the trouble it took to cross it). ... Around 1914, Spuyten Duyvil Creek was filled in and the area became physically a part of the Bronx, but it remained politically part of Manhattan."


After 1914

The history of the Bronx during the 20th century may be divided into four periods: a boom period during 1900–1929, with a population growth by a factor of six from 200,000 in 1900 to 1.3 million in 1930. The
Great Depression The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagio ...
and post World War II years saw a slowing of growth leading into an eventual decline. The mid to late century were hard times, as the Bronx changed during 1950–1985 from a predominantly moderate-income to a predominantly lower-income area with high rates of violent crime and poverty in some areas. The Bronx has experienced an economic and developmental resurgence starting in the late 1980s that continues into today.


New York City expands

The Bronx was a mostly rural area for many generations, with small farms supplying the city markets. In the late 19th century, however, it grew into a railroad suburb. Faster transportation enabled rapid population growth in the late 19th century, involving the move from horse-drawn street cars to elevated railways and the subway system, which linked to Manhattan in 1904.Olmsted (1989); Olmsted (1998) The South Bronx was a manufacturing center for many years and was noted as a center of
piano The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keyboa ...
manufacturing in the early part of the 20th century. In 1919, the Bronx was the site of 63 piano factories employing more than 5,000 workers. At the end of
World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...
, the Bronx hosted the rather small 1918 World's Fair at 177th Street and DeVoe Avenue.Lloyd Ultann
"History of the Bronx River"
Paper presented to the
Bronx River Alliance Bronx River Alliance is a non-profit organization dedicated to conserving, preserving, and improving the health of the Bronx river and surrounding environments. Organization history The ''Bronx River Restoration Project (BXRR),'' founded by Ru ...
, November 5, 2002 (notes taken by Maarten de Kadt, November 16, 2002), retrieved on August 29, 2008. This hour talk covers much of the early history of the Bronx as a whole, in addition to the Bronx River.
The Bronx underwent rapid urban growth after World War I. Extensions of the
New York City Subway The New York City Subway is a rapid transit system owned by the government of New York City and leased to the New York City Transit Authority, an affiliate agency of the state-run Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA). Opened on October ...
contributed to the increase in population as thousands of immigrants came to the Bronx, resulting in a major boom in residential construction. Among these groups, many
Irish Americans , image = Irish ancestry in the USA 2018; Where Irish eyes are Smiling.png , image_caption = Irish Americans, % of population by state , caption = Notable Irish Americans , population = 36,115,472 (10.9%) alone ...
,
Italian Americans Italian Americans ( it, italoamericani or ''italo-americani'', ) are Americans who have full or partial Italian ancestry. The largest concentrations of Italian Americans are in the urban Northeast and industrial Midwestern metropolitan areas, ...
, and especially Jewish Americans settled here. In addition,
French French (french: français(e), link=no) may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to France ** French language, which originated in France, and its various dialects and accents ** French people, a nation and ethnic group identified with Franc ...
,
German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) **Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ge ...
, Polish, and other immigrants moved into the borough. As evidence of the change in population, by 1937, 592,185 Jews lived in the Bronx (43.9% of the borough's population), while only 54,000 Jews lived in the borough in 2011. Many
synagogue A synagogue, ', 'house of assembly', or ', "house of prayer"; Yiddish: ''shul'', Ladino: or ' (from synagogue); or ', "community". sometimes referred to as shul, and interchangeably used with the word temple, is a Jewish house of wor ...
s still stand in the Bronx, but most have been converted to other uses.Seymour J. Perlin
"Remembrance of Synagogues Past: The Lost Civilization of the Jewish South Bronx"
(retrieved on August 10, 2008), citing population estimates in "The Jewish Community Study of New York: 2002", UJA nited Jewish AppealFederation of New York, June 2004, and his own survey of synagogue sites.


Change

Bootleggers Bootleg or bootlegging most often refers to: * Bootleg recording, an audio or video recording released unofficially * Rum-running, the illegal business of transporting and trading in alcoholic beverages, hence: ** Moonshine, or illicitly made an ...
and gangs were active in the Bronx during
Prohibition Prohibition is the act or practice of forbidding something by law; more particularly the term refers to the banning of the manufacture, storage (whether in barrels or in bottles), transportation, sale, possession, and consumption of alcoholi ...
(1920–1933). Irish, Italian, Jewish, and Polish gangs smuggled in most of the illegal whiskey, and the oldest sections of the borough became poverty-stricken. Enright declared that speakeasies were home to "the vicious elements, bootleggers, gamblers and their friends in all walks of life" cooperating to "evade the law, escape punishment for their crimes, or to deter the police from doing their duty". Between 1930 and 1960, moderate and upper income Bronxites (predominantly non-Hispanic Whites) began to relocate from the borough's southwestern neighborhoods. This migration has left a mostly poor African American and Hispanic (largely Puerto Rican) population in the West Bronx. One significant factor that shifted the racial and economic demographics was the construction of Co-op City, built to house middle-class residents in family-sized apartments. The high-rise complex played a significant role in draining middle-class residents from older tenement buildings in the borough's southern and western fringes. Most predominantly non-Hispanic White communities today are in the eastern and northwestern sections of the borough. From the early 1960s to the early 1980s, the
quality of life Quality of life (QOL) is defined by the World Health Organization as "an individual's perception of their position in life in the context of the culture and value systems in which they live and in relation to their goals, expectations, standards ...
changed for some Bronx residents. Historians and social scientists have suggested many factors, including the theory that
Robert Moses Robert Moses (December 18, 1888 – July 29, 1981) was an American urban planner and public official who worked in the New York metropolitan area during the early to mid 20th century. Despite never being elected to any office, Moses is regarded ...
'
Cross Bronx Expressway The Cross Bronx Expressway is a major freeway in the New York City borough of the Bronx. It is mainly designated as part of Interstate 95 (I-95), but also includes portions of I-295 and U.S. Route 1 (US 1). The Cross Bronx begins ...
destroyed existing residential neighborhoods and created instant slums, as put forward in
Robert Caro Robert Allan Caro (born October 30, 1935) is an American journalist and author known for his biographies of United States political figures Robert Moses and Lyndon B. Johnson. After working for many years as a reporter, Caro wrote '' The Power ...
's biography ''
The Power Broker ''The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York'' is a 1974 biography of Robert Moses by Robert Caro. The book focuses on the creation and use of power in New York local and state politics, as witnessed through Moses' use of unelecte ...
''. Another factor in the Bronx's decline may have been the development of high-rise
housing projects Public housing is a form of housing tenure in which the property is usually owned by a government authority, either central or local. Although the common goal of public housing is to provide affordable housing, the details, terminology, d ...
, particularly in the
South Bronx The South Bronx is an area of the New York City borough of the Bronx. The area comprises neighborhoods in the southern part of the Bronx, such as Concourse, Mott Haven, Melrose, and Port Morris. In the early 1900s, the South Bronx was orig ...
. Yet another factor may have been a reduction in the real estate listings and property-related financial services offered in some areas of the Bronx, such as
mortgage loan A mortgage loan or simply mortgage (), in civil law jurisdicions known also as a hypothec loan, is a loan used either by purchasers of real property to raise funds to buy real estate, or by existing property owners to raise funds for any ...
s or insurance policies—a process known as
redlining In the United States, redlining is a discriminatory practice in which services ( financial and otherwise) are withheld from potential customers who reside in neighborhoods classified as "hazardous" to investment; these neighborhoods have sign ...
. Others have suggested a " planned shrinkage" of municipal services, such as fire-fighting. There was also much debate as to whether
rent control Rent regulation is a system of laws, administered by a court or a public authority, which aims to ensure the affordability of housing and tenancies on the rental market for dwellings. Generally, a system of rent regulation involves: *Price cont ...
laws had made it less profitable (or more costly) for landlords to maintain existing buildings with their existing tenants than to abandon or destroy those buildings. In the 1970s, parts of the Bronx were plagued by a wave of arson. The burning of buildings was predominantly in the poorest communities, such as the South Bronx. One explanation of this event was that landlords decided to burn their low property-value buildings and take the insurance money, as it was easier for them to get insurance money than to try to refurbish a dilapidated building or sell a building in a severely distressed area. The Bronx became identified with a high rate of poverty and unemployment, which was mainly a persistent problem in the South Bronx.Gonzalez (2004) There were cases where tenants set fire to the building they lived in so they could qualify for emergency relocations by city social service agencies to better residences, sometimes being relocated to other parts of the city. Out of 289 census tracts in the Bronx borough, 7 tracts lost more than 97% of their buildings to arson and abandonment between 1970 and 1980; another 44 tracts had more than 50% of their buildings meet the same fate. By the early 1980s, the Bronx was considered the most blighted urban area in the country, particularly the South Bronx which experienced a loss of 60% of the population and 40% of housing units. However, starting in the 1990s, many of the burned-out and run-down tenements were replaced by new housing units.


Revitalization

Since the late 1980s, significant development has occurred in the Bronx, first stimulated by the city's "Ten-Year Housing Plan" and community members working to rebuild the social, economic and environmental infrastructure by creating
affordable housing Affordable housing is housing which is deemed affordable to those with a household income at or below the median as rated by the national government or a local government by a recognized housing affordability index. Most of the literature on af ...
. Groups affiliated with churches in the South Bronx erected the Nehemiah Homes with about 1,000 units. The grass roots organization Nos Quedamos' endeavor known as Melrose Commons began to rebuild areas in the South Bronx. The
IRT White Plains Road Line The White Plains Road Line is a rapid transit line of the A Division of the New York City Subway serving the central Bronx. It is mostly elevated and served both subway and elevated trains until 1952. The original part of the line, the part op ...
() began to show an increase in riders. Chains such as
Marshalls Marshalls is an American chain of off-price department stores owned by TJX Companies. Marshalls has over 1,000 American stores, including larger stores named Marshalls Mega Store, covering 42 states and Puerto Rico, and 61 stores in Canada. M ...
, Staples, and
Target Target may refer to: Physical items * Shooting target, used in marksmanship training and various shooting sports ** Bullseye (target), the goal one for which one aims in many of these sports ** Aiming point, in field artillery, fi ...
opened stores in the Bronx. More bank branches opened in the Bronx as a whole (rising from 106 in 1997 to 149 in 2007), although not primarily in poor or minority neighborhoods, while the Bronx still has fewer branches per person than other boroughs. In 1997, the Bronx was designated an ''
All America City The All-America City Award is a community recognition program in the United States given by the National Civic League. The award recognizes the work of communities in using inclusive civic engagement to address critical issues and create stronge ...
'' by the
National Civic League The National Civic League is an American nonpartisan, non-profit organization founded in 1894 with a mission to advance civic engagement to create equitable, thriving communities. The League envisions a country where the full diversity of communi ...
, acknowledging its comeback from the decline of the mid-century. In 2006, ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' reported that "construction cranes have become the borough's new visual metaphor, replacing the window decals of the 1980s in which pictures of potted plants and drawn curtains were placed in the windows of abandoned buildings." The borough has experienced substantial new building construction since 2002. Between 2002 and June 2007, 33,687 new units of housing were built or were under way and $4.8 billion has been invested in new housing. In the first six months of 2007 alone total investment in new residential development was $965 million and 5,187 residential units were scheduled to be completed. Much of the new development is springing up in formerly vacant lots across the South Bronx. In addition there came a revitalization of the existing housing market in areas such as Hunts Point, the Lower Concourse, and the neighborhoods surrounding the Third Avenue Bridge as people buy apartments and renovate them. Several boutique and chain hotels opened in the 2010s in the
South Bronx The South Bronx is an area of the New York City borough of the Bronx. The area comprises neighborhoods in the southern part of the Bronx, such as Concourse, Mott Haven, Melrose, and Port Morris. In the early 1900s, the South Bronx was orig ...
. New developments are underway. The Bronx General Post Office on the corner of the Grand Concourse and East 149th Street is being converted into a market place, boutiques, restaurants and office space with a USPS concession. The
Kingsbridge Armory The Kingsbridge Armory, also known as the Eighth Regiment Armory, is a decommissioned Arsenal, armory at Jerome Avenue and West Kingsbridge Road in the Kingsbridge, Bronx, Kingsbridge neighborhood of the Bronx in New York City. It was built in the ...
, often cited as the largest armory in the world, is scheduled for redevelopment as the Kingsbridge National Ice Center. Under consideration for future development is the construction of a platform over the
New York City Subway The New York City Subway is a rapid transit system owned by the government of New York City and leased to the New York City Transit Authority, an affiliate agency of the state-run Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA). Opened on October ...
's
Concourse Yard The New York City Transit Authority operates a total of 24 rail yards for the New York City Subway system, and one for the Staten Island Railway. There are 10 active A Division yards and 11 active B Division yards, two of which are shared betwe ...
adjacent to
Lehman College Lehman College is a public college in the Bronx borough of New York City. Founded in 1931 as the Bronx campus of Hunter College, the school became an independent college within CUNY in September 1967. The college is named after Herbert H. Lehman ...
. The construction would permit approximately of development and would cost . Despite significant investment compared to the post war period, many exacerbated social problems remain including high rates of violent crime, substance abuse, overcrowding, and substandard housing conditions. The Bronx has the highest rate of poverty in New York City, and the greater South Bronx is the poorest area.


Geography


Location and physical features

According to the
U.S. Census Bureau The United States Census Bureau (USCB), officially the Bureau of the Census, is a principal agency of the U.S. Federal Statistical System, responsible for producing data about the American people and economy. The Census Bureau is part of the ...
, Bronx County has a total area of , of which is land and (27%) is water. The Bronx is New York City's northernmost borough, New York State's southernmost mainland county and the only part of New York City that is almost entirely on the North American mainland. Its
bedrock In geology, bedrock is solid rock that lies under loose material ( regolith) within the crust of Earth or another terrestrial planet. Definition Bedrock is the solid rock that underlies looser surface material. An exposed portion of be ...
is primarily Fordham gneiss, a high-grade heavily banded
metamorphic rock Metamorphic rocks arise from the transformation of existing rock to new types of rock in a process called metamorphism. The original rock (protolith) is subjected to temperatures greater than and, often, elevated pressure of or more, caus ...
containing significant amounts of pink feldspar. Marble Hill – politically part of Manhattan but now physically attached to the Bronx – is so-called because of the formation of
Inwood marble Tuckahoe marble (also known as Inwood and Westchester marble) is a type of marble found in southern New York state and western Connecticut. Part of the Inwood Formation of the Manhattan Prong, it dates from the Late Cambrian to the Early Ordovic ...
there as well as in Inwood, Manhattan and parts of the Bronx and Westchester County. The
Hudson River The Hudson River is a river that flows from north to south primarily through eastern New York. It originates in the Adirondack Mountains of Upstate New York and flows southward through the Hudson Valley to the New York Harbor between Ne ...
separates the Bronx on the west from
Alpine Alpine may refer to any mountainous region. It may also refer to: Places Europe * Alps, a European mountain range ** Alpine states, which overlap with the European range Australia * Alpine, New South Wales, a Northern Village * Alpine National P ...
,
Tenafly Tenafly () is a borough in Bergen County, New Jersey, United States. As of the 2020 census the borough had a population of 15,409,
and Englewood Cliffs in
Bergen County, New Jersey Bergen County is the most populous county in the U.S. state of New Jersey.Harlem River The Harlem River is an tidal strait in New York, United States, flowing between the Hudson River and the East River and separating the island of Manhattan from the Bronx on the New York mainland. The northern stretch, also called the Spuyt ...
separates it from the island of
Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...
to the southwest; the
East River The East River is a saltwater tidal estuary in New York City. The waterway, which is actually not a river despite its name, connects Upper New York Bay on its south end to Long Island Sound on its north end. It separates the borough of Quee ...
separates it from
Queens Queens is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Queens County, in the U.S. state of New York. Located on Long Island, it is the largest New York City borough by area. It is bordered by the borough of Brooklyn at the western tip of Long ...
to the southeast; and to the east,
Long Island Sound Long Island Sound is a marine sound and tidal estuary of the Atlantic Ocean. It lies predominantly between the U.S. state of Connecticut to the north and Long Island in New York to the south. From west to east, the sound stretches from the Eas ...
separates it from Nassau County in western Long Island. Directly north of the Bronx are (from west to east) the adjoining
Westchester County Westchester County is located in the U.S. state of New York. It is the seventh most populous county in the State of New York and the most populous north of New York City. According to the 2020 United States Census, the county had a population ...
communities of Yonkers,
Mount Vernon Mount Vernon is an American landmark and former plantation of Founding Father, commander of the Continental Army in the Revolutionary War, and the first president of the United States George Washington and his wife, Martha. The estate is on ...
, Pelham Manor and, though physically separated by water,
New Rochelle New Rochelle (; older french: La Nouvelle-Rochelle) is a city in Westchester County, New York, United States, in the southeastern portion of the state. In 2020, the city had a population of 79,726, making it the seventh-largest in the state o ...
. There is also a short southern land boundary with Marble Hill in the Borough of Manhattan, over the filled-in former course of the Spuyten Duyvil Creek; Marble Hill's postal ZIP code, telephonic
area codes A telephone numbering plan is a type of numbering scheme used in telecommunication to assign telephone numbers to subscriber telephones or other telephony endpoints. Telephone numbers are the addresses of participants in a telephone network, r ...
and fire service, however, are shared with the Bronx and not Manhattan. The Bronx River flows south from Westchester County through the borough, emptying into the East River; it is the only entirely
freshwater Fresh water or freshwater is any naturally occurring liquid or frozen water containing low concentrations of dissolved salts and other total dissolved solids. Although the term specifically excludes seawater and brackish water, it does incl ...
river in New York City. A smaller river, the
Hutchinson River The Hutchinson River is a freshwater stream located in the Bronx, and Southern Westchester County, New York. The river forms in Scarsdale at Brookline Road and flows 10 miles (16 km) south until it empties into Eastchester Bay in ...
(named after the religious leader Anne Hutchinson, killed along its banks in 1641), passes through the East Bronx and empties into
Eastchester Bay Eastchester Bay is a sound between City Island and the mainland Bronx in New York City, New York. Technically, it is not a bay, since it is open to larger bodies of water at both ends. The northern end connects via a narrow channel to Pelham ...
. The Bronx also includes several small islands in the
East River The East River is a saltwater tidal estuary in New York City. The waterway, which is actually not a river despite its name, connects Upper New York Bay on its south end to Long Island Sound on its north end. It separates the borough of Quee ...
and
Long Island Sound Long Island Sound is a marine sound and tidal estuary of the Atlantic Ocean. It lies predominantly between the U.S. state of Connecticut to the north and Long Island in New York to the south. From west to east, the sound stretches from the Eas ...
, such as City Island and Hart Island.
Rikers Island Rikers Island is a island in the East River between Queens and the Bronx that contains New York City's main jail complex. Named after Abraham Rycken, who took possession of the island in 1664, the island was originally under in size, but has ...
in the East River, home to the large jail complex for the entire city, is also part of the Bronx. The Bronx's highest elevation at is in the northwest corner, west of
Van Cortlandt Park Van Cortlandt Park is a park located in the borough of the Bronx in New York City. Owned by the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation, it is managed with assistance from the Van Cortlandt Park Alliance. The park, the city's third-lar ...
and in the Chapel Farm area near the Riverdale Country School. The opposite (southeastern) side of the Bronx has four large low peninsulas or "necks" of low-lying land that jut into the waters of the East River and were once
salt marsh A salt marsh or saltmarsh, also known as a coastal salt marsh or a tidal marsh, is a coastal ecosystem in the upper coastal intertidal zone between land and open saltwater or brackish water that is regularly flooded by the tides. It is domin ...
: Hunt's Point, Clason's Point, Screvin's Neck and
Throggs Neck Throggs Neck (also known as Throgs Neck) is a neighborhood and peninsula in the south-eastern portion of the borough of the Bronx in New York City. It is bounded by the East River and Long Island Sound to the south and east, Westchester Creek on ...
. Further up the coastline, Rodman's Neck lies between Pelham Bay Park in the northeast and City Island. The Bronx's irregular shoreline extends for .


Parks and open space

Although Bronx County was the third most densely populated county in the United States as of 2006 (after
Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...
and
Brooklyn Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...
), of the Bronx—about one fifth of the Bronx's area, and one quarter of its land area—is given over to parkland.Ladies and gentlemen, the Bronx is blooming!
by Beth J. Harpaz, Travel Editor of The
Associated Press The Associated Press (AP) is an American non-profit news agency headquartered in New York City. Founded in 1846, it operates as a cooperative, unincorporated association. It produces news reports that are distributed to its members, U.S. new ...
(AP), June 30, 2008, retrieved on July 11, 2008
The vision of a system of major Bronx parks connected by park-like thoroughfares is usually attributed to
John Mullaly John Mullaly (1835–1915), known as father of the Bronx's park system, was a newspaper reporter and editor who was instrumental in forming the New York Park Association. He was born in Belfast, Ireland. After coming to the United States, he wo ...
. Woodlawn Cemetery, one of the largest cemeteries in New York City, sits on the western bank of the Bronx River near Yonkers. It opened in 1863, in what was then the town of Yonkers, at the time a rural area. The borough's northern side includes the largest park in New York City— Pelham Bay Park, which includes Orchard Beach—and the third-largest,
Van Cortlandt Park Van Cortlandt Park is a park located in the borough of the Bronx in New York City. Owned by the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation, it is managed with assistance from the Van Cortlandt Park Alliance. The park, the city's third-lar ...
, which is west of Woodlawn Cemetery and borders Yonkers. Also in the northern Bronx,
Wave Hill Wave Hill is a estate in the Hudson Hill section of Riverdale in the Bronx, New York City. Wave Hill currently consists of public horticultural gardens and a cultural center, all situated on the slopes overlooking the Hudson River, with exp ...
, the former estate of George W. Perkins—known for a historic house, gardens, changing site-specific art installations and concerts—overlooks the
New Jersey Palisades The Palisades, also called the New Jersey Palisades or the Hudson River Palisades, are a line of steep cliffs along the west side of the lower Hudson River in Northeastern New Jersey and Southeastern New York in the United States. The cliffs s ...
from a promontory on the Hudson in Riverdale. Nearer the borough's center, and along the Bronx River, is Bronx Park; its northern end houses the
New York Botanical Gardens The New York Botanical Garden (NYBG) is a botanical garden at Bronx Park in the Bronx, New York City. Established in 1891, it is located on a site that contains a landscape with over one million living plants; the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory, ...
, which preserve the last patch of the original hemlock forest that once covered the county, and its southern end the
Bronx Zoo The Bronx Zoo (also historically the Bronx Zoological Park and the Bronx Zoological Gardens) is a zoo within Bronx Park in the Bronx, New York. It is one of the largest zoos in the United States by area and is the largest metropolitan zoo in ...
, the largest urban zoological gardens in the United States. In 1904 the Chestnut Blight pathogen ('' Cryphonectria parasitica'') was found for the first time outside of
Asia Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in its own right or a subcontinent of Eurasia, which shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with Africa. Asia covers an are ...
, here, at the Bronx Zoo. Over the next 40 years it spread throughout
eastern North America The Nearctic realm is one of the eight biogeographic realms constituting the Earth's land surface. The Nearctic realm covers most of North America, including Greenland, Central Florida, and the highlands of Mexico. The parts of North Americ ...
and killed back essentially every American Chestnut (''
Castanea dentata The American chestnut (''Castanea dentata'') is a large, fast-growing deciduous tree of the beech family native to eastern North America. As is true of all species in genus Castanea, the American chestnut produces burred fruit with edible nuts. ...
''), causing ecological and economic devastation. Just south of
Van Cortlandt Park Van Cortlandt Park is a park located in the borough of the Bronx in New York City. Owned by the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation, it is managed with assistance from the Van Cortlandt Park Alliance. The park, the city's third-lar ...
is the
Jerome Park Reservoir The Jerome Park Reservoir is a reservoir located in Jerome Park, a neighborhood in the North Bronx, New York City. The reservoir is surrounded by DeWitt Clinton High School, the Bronx High School of Science, Lehman College, and Walton High Scho ...
, surrounded by of stone walls and bordering several small parks in the Bedford Park neighborhood; the
reservoir A reservoir (; from French ''réservoir'' ) is an enlarged lake behind a dam. Such a dam may be either artificial, built to store fresh water or it may be a natural formation. Reservoirs can be created in a number of ways, including contr ...
was built in the 1890s on the site of the former Jerome Park Racetrack. Further south is
Crotona Park Crotona Park is a public park in the South Bronx in New York City, covering . The park is bounded by streets of the same name on its northern, eastern, southern, and western borders, and is adjacent to the Crotona Park East and Morrisania neigh ...
, home to a lake, 28 species of trees, and a large swimming pool. The land for these parks, and many others, was bought by New York City in 1888, while land was still open and inexpensive, in anticipation of future needs and future pressures for development. Some of the acquired land was set aside for the Grand Concourse and Pelham Parkway, the first of a series of
boulevard A boulevard is a type of broad avenue planted with rows of trees, or in parts of North America, any urban highway. Boulevards were originally circumferential roads following the line of former city walls. In American usage, boulevards may ...
s and
parkway A parkway is a landscaped thoroughfare.''"parkway."''Webster's Third New International Dictionary, Unabridged. Merriam-Webster, 2002. http://unabridged.merriam-webster.com (14 Apr. 2007). The term is particularly used for a roadway in a park or ...
s (
thoroughfare A thoroughfare is a primary passage or way as a transit route through regularly trafficked areas, whether by road on dry land or, by extension, via watercraft or aircraft. On land, a thoroughfare may refer to anything from a multi-lane highw ...
s lined with trees, vegetation and greenery). Later projects included the
Bronx River Parkway The Bronx River Parkway (sometimes abbreviated as the Bronx Parkway) is a long parkway in downstate New York in the United States. It is named for the nearby Bronx River, which it parallels. The southern terminus of the parkway is at Story Aven ...
, which developed a road while restoring the riverbank and reducing pollution, Mosholu Parkway and the
Henry Hudson Parkway The Henry Hudson Parkway is a parkway in New York City. The southern terminus is in Manhattan at 72nd Street, where the parkway continues south as the West Side Highway. It is often erroneously referred to as the West Side Highway throughout its ...
. In 2006, a five-year, $220-million program of capital improvements and natural restoration in 70 Bronx parks was begun (financed by water and sewer revenues) as part of an agreement that allowed a water filtration plant under Mosholu Golf Course in Van Cortlandt Park. One major focus is on opening more of the Bronx River's banks and restoring them to a natural state.


Neighborhoods

The number, locations, and boundaries of the Bronx's neighborhoods (many of them sitting on the sites of 19th-century villages) have become unclear with time and successive waves of newcomers. In 2006, Manny Fernandez of ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' wrote,
According to a Department of City Planning map of the city's neighborhoods, the Bronx has 49. The map publisher Hagstrom identifies 69. The borough president,
Adolfo Carrión Jr. Adolfo Carrión Jr. (born March 6, 1961) is an American businessman and former elected official from City Island. He has three sisters Elizabeth Carrión-Stevens, Damaris Carrión-Harris and Lizette Carrión. He served one term as a member of th ...
, says 61. The Mayor's Community Assistance Unit, in a listing of the borough's community boards, names 68.
Notable Bronx neighborhoods include the
South Bronx The South Bronx is an area of the New York City borough of the Bronx. The area comprises neighborhoods in the southern part of the Bronx, such as Concourse, Mott Haven, Melrose, and Port Morris. In the early 1900s, the South Bronx was orig ...
; Little Italy on
Arthur Avenue Arthur Avenue is a street in the Belmont neighborhood of the Bronx, New York City, which serves as the center of the Bronx's "Little Italy". Although the historical and commercial center of Little Italy is Arthur Avenue itself, the area stretch ...
in the Belmont section; and Riverdale.


East Bronx

( Bronx Community Districts 9 '' outh central', 10 '' ast', 11 '' ast central' and 12 '' orth central' ) East of the Bronx River, the borough is relatively flat and includes four large low peninsulas, or 'necks,' of low-lying land which jut into the waters of the East River and were once saltmarsh: Hunts Point, Clason's Point, Screvin's Neck (Castle Hill Point) and
Throgs Neck Throggs Neck (also known as Throgs Neck) is a neighborhood and peninsula in the south-eastern portion of the borough of the Bronx in New York City. It is bounded by the East River and Long Island Sound to the south and east, Westchester Creek on ...
. The East Bronx has older tenement buildings, low income public housing complexes, and multifamily homes, as well as single family homes. It includes New York City's largest park: Pelham Bay Park along the Westchester-Bronx border. Neighborhoods include: Clason's Point, Harding Park, Soundview, Castle Hill, Parkchester ''( Community District 9)'';
Throggs Neck Throggs Neck (also known as Throgs Neck) is a neighborhood and peninsula in the south-eastern portion of the borough of the Bronx in New York City. It is bounded by the East River and Long Island Sound to the south and east, Westchester Creek on ...
,
Country Club A country club is a privately owned club, often with a membership quota and admittance by invitation or sponsorship, that generally offers both a variety of recreational sports and facilities for dining and entertaining. Typical athletic offe ...
, City Island, Pelham Bay, Edgewater Park, Co-op City ''( Community District 10)'';
Westchester Square Westchester Square is a residential neighborhood geographically located in the eastern section of the New York City borough of the Bronx. Its boundaries, starting from the north and moving clockwise are: East Tremont Avenue and Silver Street, Bl ...
,
Van Nest Van Nest is a working-class neighborhood geographically located in the East Bronx section of the Bronx, New York City. Going clockwise, its boundaries are Bronxdale Avenue to the northeast, the Amtrak tracks to the southeast, and Bronx Park to t ...
, Pelham Parkway, Morris Park ''( Community District 11)'';
Williamsbridge Williamsbridge is a neighborhood geographically located in the north-central portion of the Bronx in New York City. Its boundaries, starting from the north and moving clockwise are East 222nd Street to the north, Boston Road to the east, East G ...
, Eastchester, Baychester, Edenwald and
Wakefield Wakefield is a cathedral city in West Yorkshire, England located on the River Calder. The city had a population of 99,251 in the 2011 census.https://www.nomisweb.co.uk/census/2011/ks101ew Census 2011 table KS101EW Usual resident population, ...
''( Community District 12)''.


=City Island and Hart Island

= ( Bronx Community District 10) City Island is east of Pelham Bay Park in
Long Island Sound Long Island Sound is a marine sound and tidal estuary of the Atlantic Ocean. It lies predominantly between the U.S. state of Connecticut to the north and Long Island in New York to the south. From west to east, the sound stretches from the Eas ...
and is known for its seafood restaurants and private waterfront homes. City Island's single shopping street, City Island Avenue, is reminiscent of a small New England town. It is connected to Rodman's Neck on the mainland by the
City Island Bridge The City Island Bridge is a bridge in the New York City borough of the Bronx, connecting City Island with Rodman's Neck on the mainland. The original bridge, which carried vehicles from 1901 to 2015, was replaced by the current bridge (also call ...
. East of City Island is Hart Island, which is uninhabited and not open to the public. It once served as a prison and now houses New York City's
potter's field A potter's field, paupers' grave or common grave is a place for the burial of unknown, unclaimed or indigent people. "Potter's field" is of Biblical origin, referring to Akeldama (meaning ''field of blood'' in Aramaic), stated to have been pu ...
for unclaimed bodies.


West Bronx

( Bronx Community Districts 1 to 8, progressing roughly from south to northwest) The western parts of the Bronx are hillier and are dominated by a series of parallel ridges, running south to north. The West Bronx has older apartment buildings, low income public housing complexes, multifamily homes in its lower income areas as well as larger single family homes in more affluent areas such as Riverdale and Fieldston. It includes New York City's third-largest park:
Van Cortlandt Park Van Cortlandt Park is a park located in the borough of the Bronx in New York City. Owned by the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation, it is managed with assistance from the Van Cortlandt Park Alliance. The park, the city's third-lar ...
along the Westchester-Bronx border. The Grand Concourse, a wide boulevard, runs through it, north to south.


=Northwestern Bronx

= ( Bronx Community Districts 7 ''[between the
Bronx The Bronx () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Bronx County, in the state of New York. It is south of Westchester County; north and east of the New York City borough of Manhattan, across the Harlem River; and north of the New Y ...
and
Harlem River The Harlem River is an tidal strait in New York, United States, flowing between the Hudson River and the East River and separating the island of Manhattan from the Bronx on the New York mainland. The northern stretch, also called the Spuyt ...
s]'' and 8 ''[facing the
Hudson River The Hudson River is a river that flows from north to south primarily through eastern New York. It originates in the Adirondack Mountains of Upstate New York and flows southward through the Hudson Valley to the New York Harbor between Ne ...
]'' – plus part of Board 12) Neighborhoods include: Fordham-Bedford, Bedford Park, Norwood, Bronx, Norwood,
Kingsbridge Heights Kingsbridge Heights is a residential neighborhood geographically located in the northwest Bronx, New York City. Its boundaries are Van Cortlandt Park to the north, Jerome Avenue to the east, Kingsbridge Road to the south, and the Major Deegan Expr ...
''( Community District 7)'', Kingsbridge, Riverdale ''( Community District 8)'', and Woodlawn Heights ''( Community District 12)''. ( Marble Hill, Manhattan is now connected by land to the Bronx rather than Manhattan and is served by Bronx Community District 8.)


=South Bronx

= ( Bronx Community Districts 1 to 6 plus part of CD 7—''progressing northwards, CDs 2, 3 and 6 border the Bronx River from its mouth to Bronx Park, while 1, 4, 5 and 7 face Manhattan across the
Harlem River The Harlem River is an tidal strait in New York, United States, flowing between the Hudson River and the East River and separating the island of Manhattan from the Bronx on the New York mainland. The northern stretch, also called the Spuyt ...
'') Like other
neighborhoods in New York City The neighborhoods in New York City are located within the five boroughs of the City of New York. Their names and borders are not officially defined, and they change from time to time. Boroughs New York City is split up into five boroughs: the ...
, the South Bronx has no official boundaries. The name has been used to represent poverty in the Bronx and is applied to progressively more northern places so that by the 2000s, Fordham Road was often used as a northern limit. The Bronx River more consistently forms an eastern boundary. The South Bronx has many high-density apartment buildings, low income public housing complexes, and multi-unit homes. The South Bronx is home to the Bronx County Courthouse, Borough Hall, and other government buildings, as well as
Yankee Stadium Yankee Stadium is a baseball stadium located in the Bronx, New York City. It is the home field of the New York Yankees of Major League Baseball, and New York City FC of Major League Soccer. Opened in April 2009, the stadium replaced the orig ...
. The
Cross Bronx Expressway The Cross Bronx Expressway is a major freeway in the New York City borough of the Bronx. It is mainly designated as part of Interstate 95 (I-95), but also includes portions of I-295 and U.S. Route 1 (US 1). The Cross Bronx begins ...
bisects it, east to west. The South Bronx has some of the poorest neighborhoods in the country, as well as very high crime areas. Neighborhoods include:
The Hub The Hub may refer to: Places * The Hub, Bronx, an area of the South Bronx, New York, known for its convergence of subway and bus lines * The Hub (Edinburgh), former church in Edinburgh that is now home to the Edinburgh International Festival * T ...
(a retail district at
Third Avenue Third Avenue is a north-south thoroughfare on the East Side of the New York City borough of Manhattan, as well as in the center portion of the Bronx. Its southern end is at Astor Place and St. Mark's Place. It transitions into Cooper Squ ...
and East 149th Street), Port Morris,
Mott Haven Mott Haven is an American primarily residential neighborhood in the southwestern section of the New York City borough of the Bronx. Its boundaries, starting from the north and moving clockwise, are East 149th Street to the north, the Bruckner ...
''( Community District 1)'',
Melrose Melrose may refer to: Places United Kingdom * Melrose, Scottish Borders, a town in the Scottish Borders, Scotland ** Melrose Abbey, ruined monastery ** Melrose RFC, rugby club Australia * Melrose, Queensland, a locality in the South Burnett R ...
''( Community District 1 & Community District 3)'',
Morrisania Morrisania ( ) is a residential neighborhood in the southwestern Bronx, New York City, New York. Its boundaries are the Cross-Bronx Expressway to the north, Crotona-Prospect Avenue to the east, East 161st Street to the south, and Webster Avenue ...
, East Morrisania lso known as Crotona Park East''( Community District 3)'', Hunts Point, Longwood ''( Community District 2)'', Highbridge,
Concourse A concourse is a place where pathways or roads meet, such as in a hotel, a convention center, a railway station, an airport terminal, a hall, or other space. The term is not limited to places where there are literally pathways or roadways or t ...
''( Community District 4)'', West Farms, Belmont,
East Tremont East Tremont is a residential neighborhood located in the West Bronx, New York City. From the north and moving clockwise, it is bounded by East 180th Street, Southern Boulevard, the Cross-Bronx Expressway and Third Avenue. East Tremont Avenue is ...
''( Community District 6)'', Tremont, Morris Heights ''( Community District 5)'', University Heights. ''( Community District 5 & Community District 7)''.


Adjacent counties

The Bronx adjoins: *
Westchester County Westchester County is located in the U.S. state of New York. It is the seventh most populous county in the State of New York and the most populous north of New York City. According to the 2020 United States Census, the county had a population ...
– north *
Nassau County, New York Nassau County ( ) is a county in the U.S. state of New York. At the 2020 U.S. census, Nassau County's population is 1,395,774. The county seat is Mineola and the largest town is Hempstead. Nassau County is situated on western Long Isla ...
– southeast (across the
East River The East River is a saltwater tidal estuary in New York City. The waterway, which is actually not a river despite its name, connects Upper New York Bay on its south end to Long Island Sound on its north end. It separates the borough of Quee ...
) * Queens County, New York (Queens) – south (across the East River) * New York County, New York (Manhattan) – southwest *
Bergen County, New Jersey Bergen County is the most populous county in the U.S. state of New Jersey.Hudson River The Hudson River is a river that flows from north to south primarily through eastern New York. It originates in the Adirondack Mountains of Upstate New York and flows southward through the Hudson Valley to the New York Harbor between Ne ...
)


Climate


Demographics


Race, ethnicity, language, and immigration


2018 estimates

The borough's most populous racial group, white, declined from 99.3% in 1920 to 44.9% in 2018. The Bronx has 532,487 housing units, with a median value of $371,800, and with an owner-occupancy rate of 19.7%, the lowest of the five boroughs. There are 495,356 households, with 2.85 persons per household. 59.3% of residents speak a language besides English at home, the highest rate of the five boroughs. In the Bronx, the population is 7.2% under 5, 17.6% 6–18, 62.4% 19–64, and 12.8% over 65. 52.9% of the population is female. 35.3% of residents are foreign born. The per capita income is $19,721, while the median household income is $36,593, both being the lowest of the five boroughs. 27.9% of residents live below the poverty line, the highest of the five boroughs.


2010 census

According to the 2010 Census, 53.5% of Bronx's population was of Hispanic, Latino, or Spanish origin (they may be of any race); 30.1% non-Hispanic Black or African American, 10.9% of the population was non-Hispanic White, 3.4% non-Hispanic Asian, 0.6% from some other race (non-Hispanic) and 1.2% of two or more races (non-Hispanic). As of 2010, 46.29% (584,463) of Bronx residents aged five and older spoke Spanish at home, while 44.02% (555,767) spoke
English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ...
, 2.48% (31,361)
African languages The languages of Africa are divided into several major language families: * Niger–Congo or perhaps Atlantic–Congo languages (includes Bantu and non-Bantu, and possibly Mande and others) are spoken in West, Central, Southeast and Souther ...
, 0.91% (11,455)
French French (french: français(e), link=no) may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to France ** French language, which originated in France, and its various dialects and accents ** French people, a nation and ethnic group identified with Franc ...
, 0.90% (11,355) Italian, 0.87% (10,946) various Indic languages, 0.70% (8,836) other Indo-European languages, and Chinese was spoken at home by 0.50% (6,610) of the population over the age of five. In total, 55.98% (706,783) of the Bronx's population age five and older spoke a language at home other than English. A
Garifuna The Garifuna people ( or ; pl. Garínagu in Garifuna) are a people of mixed free African and indigenous American ancestry that originated in the Caribbean island of Saint Vincent and speak Garifuna, an Arawakan language, and Vincentian Cr ...
-speaking community from
Honduras Honduras, officially the Republic of Honduras, is a country in Central America. The republic of Honduras is bordered to the west by Guatemala, to the southwest by El Salvador, to the southeast by Nicaragua, to the south by the Pacific Oce ...
and
Guatemala Guatemala ( ; ), officially the Republic of Guatemala ( es, República de Guatemala, links=no), is a country in Central America. It is bordered to the north and west by Mexico; to the northeast by Belize and the Caribbean; to the east by Hon ...
also makes the Bronx its home.


2009 community survey

According to the 2009 American Community Survey,
White Americans White Americans are Americans who identify as and are perceived to be white people. This group constitutes the majority of the people in the United States. As of the 2020 Census, 61.6%, or 204,277,273 people, were white alone. This represented ...
of both Hispanic and non-Hispanic origin represented over one-fifth (22.9%) of the Bronx's population. However,
non-Hispanic whites Non-Hispanic whites or Non-Latino whites are Americans who are classified as "white", and are not of Hispanic (also known as "Latino") heritage. The United States Census Bureau defines ''white'' to include European Americans, Middle Eastern Ame ...
formed under one-eighth (12.1%) of the population, down from 34.4% in 1980. Out of all five boroughs, the Bronx has the lowest number and percentage of white residents. 320,640 whites called the Bronx home, of which 168,570 were non-Hispanic whites. The majority of the non-Hispanic European American population is of Italian and Irish descent. People of Italian descent numbered over 55,000 individuals and made up 3.9% of the population. People of Irish descent numbered over 43,500 individuals and made up 3.1% of the population.
German Americans German Americans (german: Deutschamerikaner, ) are Americans who have full or partial German ancestry. With an estimated size of approximately 43 million in 2019, German Americans are the largest of the self-reported ancestry groups by the Unite ...
and
Polish Americans Polish Americans ( pl, Polonia amerykańska) are Americans who either have total or partial Polish ancestry, or are citizens of the Republic of Poland. There are an estimated 9.15 million self-identified Polish Americans, representing about 2.83 ...
made up 1.4% and 0.8% of the population respectively. The Bronx is the only New York City borough with a
Hispanic The term ''Hispanic'' ( es, hispano) refers to people, cultures, or countries related to Spain, the Spanish language, or Hispanidad. The term commonly applies to countries with a cultural and historical link to Spain and to viceroyalties for ...
majority, many of whom are
Puerto Ricans Puerto Ricans ( es, Puertorriqueños; or boricuas) are the people of Puerto Rico, the inhabitants, and citizens of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico and their descendants. Overview The culture held in common by most Puerto Ricans is referred t ...
and Dominicans. At the 2009 American Community Survey,
Black Americans African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of ensla ...
made the second largest group in the Bronx after Hispanics and Latinos. Black people of both Hispanic and non-Hispanic origin represented over one-third (35.4%) of the Bronx's population. Black people of non-Hispanic origin made up 30.8% of the population. Over 495,200 Black people resided in the borough, of which 430,600 were non-Hispanic Black people. Over 61,000 people identified themselves as "Sub-Saharan African" in the survey, making up 4.4% of the population. Native Americans are a very small minority in the borough. Only some 5,560 individuals (out of the borough's 1.4 million people) are Native American, which is equal to just 0.4% of the population. In addition, roughly 2,500 people are Native Americans of non-Hispanic origin. In 2009, Hispanic and Latino Americans represented 52.0% of the Bronx's population. Puerto Ricans represented 23.2% of the borough's population. Over 72,500 Mexicans lived in the Bronx, and they formed 5.2% of the population. Cubans numbered over 9,640 members and formed 0.7% of the population. In addition, over 319,000 people were of various Hispanic and Latino groups, such as Dominican, Salvadoran, and so on. These groups collectively represented 22.9% of the population. At the 2010 Census, 53.5% of Bronx's population was of Hispanic, Latino, or Spanish origin (they may be of any race).
Asian Americans Asian Americans are Americans of Asian ancestry (including naturalized Americans who are immigrants from specific regions in Asia and descendants of such immigrants). Although this term had historically been used for all the indigenous peopl ...
are a small but sizable minority in the borough. Roughly 49,600 Asians make up 3.6% of the population. Roughly 13,600 Indians call the Bronx home, along with 9,800 Chinese, 6,540 Filipinos, 2,260 Vietnamese, 2,010 Koreans, and 1,100 Japanese. Multiracial Americans are also a sizable minority in the Bronx. People of multiracial heritage number over 41,800 individuals and represent 3.0% of the population. People of mixed Caucasian and African American heritage number over 6,850 members and form 0.5% of the population. People of mixed Caucasian and Native American heritage number over 2,450 members and form 0.2% of the population. People of mixed Caucasian and Asian heritage number over 880 members and form 0.1% of the population. People of mixed African American and Native American heritage number over 1,220 members and form 0.1% of the population.


Older estimates

The Census of 1930 counted only 1.0% (12,930) of the Bronx's population as Negro (while making no distinct counts of Hispanic or Spanish-surname residents).Historical Census Browser
University of Virginia The University of Virginia (UVA) is a public research university in Charlottesville, Virginia. Founded in 1819 by Thomas Jefferson, the university is ranked among the top academic institutions in the United States, with highly selective ad ...
, Geospatial and Statistical Data Center, retrieved on August 7, 2008, querying 1930 Census for New York State. "The data and terminology presented in the Historical Census Browser are drawn directly from historical volumes of the U.S. Census of Population and Housing."


Population and housing

As of the 2010 Census, there were 1,385,108 people living in the Bronx, a 3.9% increase since 2000. As of the United States Census of 2000, there were 1,332,650 people, 463,212 households, and 314,984 families residing in the borough. The
population density Population density (in agriculture: standing stock or plant density) is a measurement of population per unit land area. It is mostly applied to humans, but sometimes to other living organisms too. It is a key geographical term.Matt RosenberPopu ...
was 31,709.3 inhabitants per square mile (12,242.2/km2). There were 490,659 housing units at an average density of 11,674.8 per square mile (4,507.4/km2). Census estimates place total population of Bronx county at 1,392,002 as of 2012. There were 463,212 households, out of which 38.1% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 31.4% were married couples living together, 30.4% had a female householder with no husband present, and 32.0% were non-families. 27.4% of all households were made up of individuals, and 9.4% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.78 and the average family size was 3.37. The age distribution of the population in the Bronx were as follows: 29.8% under the age of 18, 10.6% from 18 to 24, 30.7% from 25 to 44, 18.8% from 45 to 64, and 10.1% 65 years of age or older. The median age was 31 years. For every 100 females, there were 87.0 males.


Individual and household income

The 1999
median income The median income is the income amount that divides a population into two equal groups, half having an income above that amount, and half having an income below that amount. It may differ from the mean (or average) income. Both of these are ways o ...
for a household in the borough was $27,611, and the median family income was $30,682. Males had a median income of $31,178 versus $29,429 for females. The
per capita income Per capita income (PCI) or total income measures the average income earned per person in a given area (city, region, country, etc.) in a specified year. It is calculated by dividing the area's total income by its total population. Per capita i ...
for the borough was $13,959. About 28.0% of families and 30.7% of the population were below the
poverty line The poverty threshold, poverty limit, poverty line or breadline is the minimum level of income deemed adequate in a particular country. The poverty line is usually calculated by estimating the total cost of one year's worth of necessities for ...
, including 41.5% of those under age 18 and 21.3% of those age 65 or over. More than half of the neighborhoods in the Bronx are high poverty or extreme poverty areas. From 2015 Census data, the
median income The median income is the income amount that divides a population into two equal groups, half having an income above that amount, and half having an income below that amount. It may differ from the mean (or average) income. Both of these are ways o ...
for a household was (in 2015 dollars) $34,299.
Per capita income Per capita income (PCI) or total income measures the average income earned per person in a given area (city, region, country, etc.) in a specified year. It is calculated by dividing the area's total income by its total population. Per capita i ...
in past 12 months (in 2015 dollars): $18,456 with persons in poverty at 30.3%. Per the 2016 Census data, the
median income The median income is the income amount that divides a population into two equal groups, half having an income above that amount, and half having an income below that amount. It may differ from the mean (or average) income. Both of these are ways o ...
for a household was $35,302. Per capita income was cited at $18,896.


Culture and institutions

Author
Edgar Allan Poe Edgar Allan Poe (; Edgar Poe; January 19, 1809 – October 7, 1849) was an American writer, poet, editor, and literary critic. Poe is best known for his poetry and short stories, particularly his tales of mystery and the macabre. He is wid ...
spent the last years of his life (1846 to 1849) in the Bronx at
Poe Cottage The Edgar Allan Poe Cottage (or Poe Cottage) is the former home of American writer Edgar Allan Poe. It is located on Kingsbridge Road and the Grand Concourse in the Fordham neighborhood of the Bronx, New York, a short distance from its origin ...
, now at Kingsbridge Road and the Grand Concourse. A small wooden farmhouse built around 1812, the cottage once commanded unobstructed vistas over the rolling Bronx hills to the shores of
Long Island Long Island is a densely populated island in the southeastern region of the U.S. state of New York, part of the New York metropolitan area. With over 8 million people, Long Island is the most populous island in the United States and the 18 ...
. Poe moved there to get away from the Manhattan city air and crowding in hope that the then rural area would be beneficial for his wife's tuberculosis. It was in the Bronx that Poe wrote one of his most famous works, " Annabel Lee". More than a century later, the Bronx would evolve from a hot bed of Latin jazz to an incubator of hip hop as documented in the award-winning documentary, produced by
City Lore City Lore: the New York Center for Urban Culture was founded in 1986 and was the first organization in the United States devoted expressly to the "documentation, preservation, and presentation of urban folk culture." Their mission is to produce pr ...
and broadcast on PBS in 2006, "From Mambo to Hip Hop: A South Bronx Tale." Hip hop first emerged in the South Bronx in the early 1970s. ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' has identified 1520 Sedgwick Avenue "an otherwise unremarkable high-rise just north of the
Cross Bronx Expressway The Cross Bronx Expressway is a major freeway in the New York City borough of the Bronx. It is mainly designated as part of Interstate 95 (I-95), but also includes portions of I-295 and U.S. Route 1 (US 1). The Cross Bronx begins ...
and hard along the
Major Deegan Expressway Interstate 87 (I-87) is a north–south Interstate Highway located entirely within the US state of New York. It is most of the main highway between New York City and Montreal. The highway begins at exit 47 off I-278 in the New York ...
" as a starting point, where DJ Kool Herc presided over parties in the community room. The 2016
Netflix Netflix, Inc. is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service and production company based in Los Gatos, California. Founded in 1997 by Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph in Scotts Valley, California, it offers a ...
series '' The Get Down'' is based on the development of hip hop in 1977 in the South Bronx. Ten years earlier, the
Bronx Opera Bronx Opera (BxO) is an opera company in the Bronx, New York. It was founded in 1967 by artistic director and music director, the conductor Michael Spierman. The company is a member of the New York Opera Alliance. The company performs two operas a ...
had been founded.


Founding of hip-hop

On August 11, 1973, DJ Kool Herc was a
D.J. A disc jockey, more commonly abbreviated as DJ, is a person who plays recorded music for an audience. Types of DJs include radio DJs (who host programs on music radio stations), club DJs (who work at a nightclub or music festival), mobile ...
and M.C. at a party in the
recreation room A recreation room (also known as a rec room, rumpus room, play room, playroom, games room, or ruckus room) is a room used for a variety of purposes, such as parties, games and other everyday or casual activities. The term ''recreation room'' is ...
of
1520 Sedgwick Avenue 1520 Sedgwick Avenue is a 102-unit apartment building in the Morris Heights neighborhood in the Bronx, New York City. Recognized as a long-time "haven for working class families," it has been historically accepted as the birthplace of hip hop ...
in the Bronx adjacent to the Cross Bronx Expressway.Tukufu Zuberi ("detective"), "Birthplace of Hip Hop", '' History Detectives'', Season 6, Episode 11, New York City, found a
PBS official website
Accessed February 24, 2009.
While it was not the actual "Birthplace of Hip Hop" – the
genre Genre () is any form or type of communication in any mode (written, spoken, digital, artistic, etc.) with socially-agreed-upon conventions developed over time. In popular usage, it normally describes a category of literature, music, or other f ...
developed slowly in several places in the 1970s – it was verified to be the place where ''one of'' the pivotal and formative events occurred. Specifically: Beginning with the advent of beat match DJing, in which Bronx disc jockeys including
Grandmaster Flash Joseph Saddler (born January 1, 1958), popularly known by his stage name Grandmaster Flash, is an American DJ and rapper. He is considered to be one of the pioneers of Hip Hop DJing, cutting, scratching and mixing. Grandmaster Flash and the ...
,
Afrika Bambaataa Lance Taylor (born on April 17, 1957), also known as Afrika Bambaataa (), is an American DJ, rapper, and producer from the South Bronx, New York. He is notable for releasing a series of genre-defining electro tracks in the 1980s that influence ...
and DJ Kool Herc extended the breaks of
funk Funk is a music genre that originated in African American communities in the mid-1960s when musicians created a rhythmic, danceable new form of music through a mixture of various music genres that were popular among African Americans in the mi ...
records, a major new musical genre emerged that sought to isolate the percussion breaks of hit funk,
disco Disco is a genre of dance music and a subculture that emerged in the 1970s from the United States' urban nightlife scene. Its sound is typified by four-on-the-floor beats, syncopated basslines, string sections, brass and horns, electric p ...
and
soul In many religious and philosophical traditions, there is a belief that a soul is "the immaterial aspect or essence of a human being". Etymology The Modern English noun '' soul'' is derived from Old English ''sāwol, sāwel''. The earliest att ...
songs. As hip hop's popularity grew, performers began speaking ("
rapping Rapping (also rhyming, spitting, emceeing or MCing) is a musical form of vocal delivery that incorporates "rhyme, rhythmic speech, and street vernacular". It is performed or chanted, usually over a backing beat or musical accompaniment. The ...
") in sync with the beats, and became known as MCs or emcees. The Herculoids, made up of Herc, Coke La Rock, and Clark Kent, were the earliest to gain major fame. The Bronx is referred to in hip-hop slang as "The Boogie Down Bronx", or just "The Boogie Down". This was hip-hop pioneer
KRS-One Lawrence "Kris" Parker (born August 20, 1965), better known by his stage names KRS-One (; an abbreviation of "Knowledge Reigns Supreme Over Nearly Everyone") and Teacha, is an American rapper from New York City. He rose to prominence as part of ...
's inspiration for his group BDP, or
Boogie Down Productions Boogie Down Productions (BDP) was an American hip hop group originally composed of KRS-One, D-Nice, and DJ Scott La Rock. DJ Scott La Rock was murdered on August 27, 1987, five months after the release of BDP's debut album, '' Criminal Minde ...
, which included DJ Scott La Rock. Newer hip hop artists from the Bronx include
Big Pun Christopher Lee Rios (November 10, 1971 – February 7, 2000), better known by his stage name Big Pun (short for Big Punisher), was an American rapper. Emerging from the underground hip hop scene in the Bronx borough of New York City in the e ...
, Lord Tariq and Peter Gunz, Camp Lo,
Swizz Beatz Kasseem Daoud Dean (born September 13, 1978), known professionally as Swizz Beatz, is an American record producer, rapper, disc jockey (DJ) and songwriter. Born and raised in New York City, Dean embarked on his musical career as a DJ. At the ag ...
,
Drag-On Melvin Smalls, known professionally as Drag-On, is an American rapper. He is best known for his time on Ruff Ryders, through whom he released his debut album, '' Opposite of H2O'' (2000). The album was successful, debuting at number five on th ...
,
Fat Joe Joseph Antonio Cartagena (born August 19, 1970), better known by his stage name Fat Joe, is an American rapper from New York City. He began his music career as a member of hip hop group Diggin' in the Crates Crew (D.I.T.C.), then forged a sol ...
, Terror Squad, Cory Gunz, A Boogie wit da Hoodie,
French Montana Karim Kharbouch (Arabic: æɾiːm χɑɾbuːʃ born November 9, 1984), better known by his stage name French Montana, is a Moroccan-American rapper. Born and raised in Morocco, he emigrated to the United States with his family when he was 13. ...
and
Cardi B Belcalis Marlenis Almánzar Cephus (, ; born October 11, 1992), known professionally as Cardi B, is an American rapper and songwriter. She first gained popularity as an influencer on Vine (service), Vine and Instagram. From 2015 to early 2017, ...
, among others. , a tour company founded in 2002 by local licensed sightseeing tour guide Debra Harris, has established a sightseeing tour of the Bronx showcasing the locations that helped shape hip hop culture, and features some of the pioneers of hip hop as tour guides. The Bronx's recognition as an important center of
African-American culture African-American culture refers to the contributions of African Americans to the culture of the United States, either as part of or distinct from mainstream American culture. The culture is both distinct and enormously influential on Ameri ...
has led
Fordham University Fordham University () is a private Jesuit research university in New York City. Established in 1841 and named after the Fordham neighborhood of the Bronx in which its original campus is located, Fordham is the oldest Catholic and Jesuit un ...
to establish the Bronx African-American History Project (BAAHP).


Sports

The Bronx is the home of the
New York Yankees The New York Yankees are an American professional baseball team based in the New York City borough of the Bronx. The Yankees compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) East division. They are one ...
, nicknamed "the Bronx Bombers", of
Major League Baseball Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball organization and the oldest major professional sports league in the world. MLB is composed of 30 total teams, divided equally between the National League (NL) and the American League (A ...
. The original
Yankee Stadium Yankee Stadium is a baseball stadium located in the Bronx, New York City. It is the home field of the New York Yankees of Major League Baseball, and New York City FC of Major League Soccer. Opened in April 2009, the stadium replaced the orig ...
opened in 1923 on 161st Street and River Avenue, a year that saw the Yankees bring home the first of their 27
World Series The World Series is the annual championship series of Major League Baseball (MLB) in the United States and Canada, contested since 1903 between the champion teams of the American League (AL) and the National League (NL). The winner of the Worl ...
Championships. With the famous façade, the short right field porch and Monument Park, Yankee Stadium has been home to many of baseball's greatest players including
Babe Ruth George Herman "Babe" Ruth Jr. (February 6, 1895 – August 16, 1948) was an American professional baseball player whose career in Major League Baseball (MLB) spanned 22 seasons, from 1914 through 1935. Nicknamed "the Bambino" and "the Su ...
,
Lou Gehrig Henry Louis Gehrig (born Heinrich Ludwig Gehrig ; June 19, 1903June 2, 1941) was an American professional baseball first baseman who played 17 seasons in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the New York Yankees (1923–1939). Gehrig was renowned f ...
,
Joe DiMaggio Joseph Paul DiMaggio (November 25, 1914 – March 8, 1999), nicknamed "Joltin' Joe", "The Yankee Clipper" and "Joe D.", was an American baseball center fielder who played his entire 13-year career in Major League Baseball for the New York Yank ...
,
Whitey Ford Edward Charles "Whitey" Ford (October 21, 1928 – October 8, 2020), nicknamed "the Chairman of the Board", was an American professional baseball pitcher who played his entire 16-year Major League Baseball (MLB) career with the New York Yankees ...
,
Yogi Berra Lawrence Peter "Yogi" Berra (May 12, 1925 – September 22, 2015) was an American professional baseball catcher who later took on the roles of manager and coach. He played 19 seasons in Major League Baseball (MLB) (1946–1963, 1965), all but t ...
,
Mickey Mantle Mickey Charles Mantle (October 20, 1931 – August 13, 1995), nicknamed "the Commerce Comet" and "the Mick", was an American professional baseball player. Mantle played his entire Major League Baseball (MLB) career (1951–1968) with the New York ...
,
Reggie Jackson Reginald Martinez Jackson (born May 18, 1946) is an American former professional baseball right fielder who played 21 seasons in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the Kansas City / Oakland Athletics, Baltimore Orioles, New York Yankees, and Cali ...
, Thurman Munson,
Don Mattingly Donald Arthur Mattingly (born April 20, 1961) is an American former professional baseball first baseman, coach, and manager in Major League Baseball (MLB). He is the bench coach for the Toronto Blue Jays of Major League Baseball (MLB). Nickname ...
,
Derek Jeter Derek Sanderson Jeter ( ; born June 26, 1974) is an American former professional baseball shortstop, businessman, and baseball executive. As a player, Jeter spent his entire 20-year Major League Baseball (MLB) career with the New York Yankees ...
and
Mariano Rivera Mariano Rivera (born November 29, 1969) is a Panamanian-American former professional baseball pitcher who played 19 seasons in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the New York Yankees, from 1995 to 2013. Nicknamed "Mo" and "Sandman", he spent most ...
. The original stadium was the scene of
Lou Gehrig Henry Louis Gehrig (born Heinrich Ludwig Gehrig ; June 19, 1903June 2, 1941) was an American professional baseball first baseman who played 17 seasons in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the New York Yankees (1923–1939). Gehrig was renowned f ...
's Farewell Speech in 1939, Don Larsen's perfect game in the 1956 World Series, Roger Maris' record breaking 61st home run in 1961, and Reggie Jackson's 3 home runs to clinch Game 6 of the 1977 World Series. The Stadium was the former home of the
New York Giants The New York Giants are a professional American football team based in the New York metropolitan area. The Giants compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's National Football Conference (NFC) East divisio ...
of the
National Football League The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the majo ...
from 1956 to 1973. The original Yankee Stadium closed in 2008 to make way for a new
Yankee Stadium Yankee Stadium is a baseball stadium located in the Bronx, New York City. It is the home field of the New York Yankees of Major League Baseball, and New York City FC of Major League Soccer. Opened in April 2009, the stadium replaced the orig ...
in which the team started play in 2009. It is north-northeast of the 1923 Yankee Stadium, on the former site of Macombs Dam Park. The current Yankee Stadium is also the home of
New York City FC New York City Football Club is an American professional soccer club based in New York City that competes in Major League Soccer (MLS), the highest level of American soccer, as a member of the league's Eastern Conference. The club is co-owned b ...
of
Major League Soccer Major League Soccer (MLS) is a men's professional soccer league sanctioned by the United States Soccer Federation, which represents the sport's highest level in the United States. The league comprises 29 teams—26 in the U.S. and 3 in Cana ...
, who began play in 2015.


Off-Off-Broadway

The Bronx is home to several
Off-Off-Broadway Off-off-Broadway theaters are smaller New York City theaters than Broadway and off-Broadway theaters, and usually have fewer than 100 seats. The off-off-Broadway movement began in 1958 as part of a response to perceived commercialism of the pro ...
theaters, many staging new works by immigrant playwrights from Latin America and Africa. The
Pregones Theater The Puerto Rican Traveling Theater is a theater company based at the 47th Street Theater in New York City. It was founded as El Nuevo Círculo Dramatico (The New Drama Circuit) by Míriam Colón and Roberto Rodríguez. It was one of the first Pu ...
, which produces Latin American work, opened a new 130-seat theater in 2005 on Walton Avenue in the South Bronx. Some artists from elsewhere in New York City have begun to converge on the area, and housing prices have nearly quadrupled in the area since 2002. However, rising prices directly correlate to a housing shortage across the city and the entire metro area.


Arts

The
Bronx Academy of Arts and Dance Bronx Academy of Arts and Dance, also referred to as BAAD!, is a New York performing and visual art workshop space and performance venue located in The Bronx. The Academy is home to the Arthur Aviles Typical Theatre and The Bronx Dance Coalition. ...
, founded in 1998 by Arthur Aviles and Charles Rice-Gonzalez, provides dance, theatre and art workshops, festivals and performances focusing on contemporary and modern art in relation to race, gender and sexuality. It is home to the Arthur Aviles Typical Theatre, a contemporary dance company, and the Bronx Dance Coalition. The Academy was formerly in the
American Bank Note Company Building The American Bank Note Company Building is a five-story building at 70 Broad Street (Manhattan), Broad Street in the Financial District, Manhattan, Financial District of Manhattan in New York City. The building was designed by architects Kirby, ...
before relocating to a venue on the grounds of St. Peter's Episcopal Church. The
Bronx Museum of the Arts The Bronx Museum of the Arts (BxMA), also called the Bronx Museum of Art or simply the Bronx Museum, is an American cultural institution located in Concourse, Bronx, New York. The museum focuses on contemporary and 20th-century works created by ...
, founded in 1971, exhibits 20th century and contemporary art through its central museum space and of galleries. Many of its exhibitions are on themes of special interest to the Bronx. Its permanent collection features more than 800 works of art, primarily by artists from Africa, Asia and Latin America, including paintings, photographs, prints, drawings, and mixed media. The museum was temporarily closed in 2006 while it underwent an expansion designed by the architectural firm Arquitectonica that would double the museum's size to . The Bronx has also become home to a peculiar poetic tribute in the form of the "
Heinrich Heine Christian Johann Heinrich Heine (; born Harry Heine; 13 December 1797 – 17 February 1856) was a German poet, writer and literary critic. He is best known outside Germany for his early lyric poetry, which was set to music in the form of '' Lied ...
Memorial", better known as the
Lorelei Fountain The Lorelei Fountain, also known as the Heinrich Heine Memorial, is a monument located on East 161st Street in the Concourse section of the Bronx, New York City, near the Bronx County Courthouse. It was designed by German sculptor Ernst Herte ...
. After Heine's German birthplace of
Düsseldorf Düsseldorf ( , , ; often in English sources; Low Franconian and Ripuarian: ''Düsseldörp'' ; archaic nl, Dusseldorp ) is the capital city of North Rhine-Westphalia, the most populous state of Germany. It is the second-largest city in ...
had rejected, allegedly for
anti-Semitic Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite. Antisemitism is considered to be a form of racism. Antis ...
motives, a centennial monument to the radical German-Jewish poet (1797–1856), his incensed
German-American German Americans (german: Deutschamerikaner, ) are Americans who have full or partial German ancestry. With an estimated size of approximately 43 million in 2019, German Americans are the largest of the self-reported ancestry groups by the Unite ...
admirers, including
Carl Schurz Carl Schurz (; March 2, 1829 – May 14, 1906) was a German revolutionary and an American statesman, journalist, and reformer. He immigrated to the United States after the German revolutions of 1848–1849 and became a prominent member of the new ...
, started a movement to place one instead in
Midtown Manhattan Midtown Manhattan is the central portion of the New York City borough of Manhattan and serves as the city's primary central business district. Midtown is home to some of the city's most prominent buildings, including the Empire State Buildi ...
, at
Fifth Avenue Fifth Avenue is a major and prominent thoroughfare in the borough of Manhattan in New York City. It stretches north from Washington Square Park in Greenwich Village to West 143rd Street in Harlem. It is one of the most expensive shopping ...
and 59th Street. However, this intention was thwarted by a combination of ethnic antagonism, aesthetic controversy and political struggles over the institutional control of public art.Christopher Gray
"Sturm und Drang Over a Memorial to Heinrich Heine"
''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'', May 27, 2007, retrieved on July 3, 2008.. See als
Public Art in the Bronx: Joyce Kilmer Park
, from
Lehman College Lehman College is a public college in the Bronx borough of New York City. Founded in 1931 as the Bronx campus of Hunter College, the school became an independent college within CUNY in September 1967. The college is named after Herbert H. Lehman ...
In 1899, the memorial by
Ernst Gustav Herter Ernst Gustav Herter (14 May 1846, Berlin – 19 December 1917, Berlin) was a German sculptor. He specialized in creating statues of mythological figures. Life and work Herter studied at the Academy of Arts in Berlin and later also as apprent ...
was placed in Joyce Kilmer Park, near the
Yankee Stadium Yankee Stadium is a baseball stadium located in the Bronx, New York City. It is the home field of the New York Yankees of Major League Baseball, and New York City FC of Major League Soccer. Opened in April 2009, the stadium replaced the orig ...
. In 1999, it was moved to 161st Street and the Concourse.


Maritime heritage

The
peninsula A peninsula (; ) is a landform that extends from a mainland and is surrounded by water on most, but not all of its borders. A peninsula is also sometimes defined as a piece of land bordered by water on three of its sides. Peninsulas exist on a ...
r borough's maritime heritage is acknowledged in several ways. The City Island Historical Society and Nautical Museum occupies a former public school designed by the New York City school system's turn-of-the-last-century master architect
C. B. J. Snyder Charles B. J. Snyder (November 4, 1860 – November 14, 1945) was an American architect, architectural engineer, and mechanical engineer in the field of urban school building design and construction. He is widely recognized for his leadership, i ...
. The state's Maritime College in Fort Schuyler (on the southeastern shore) houses the
Maritime Industry Museum Fort Schuyler is a preserved 19th century fortification in the New York City borough of the Bronx. It houses a museum, the Stephen B. Luce Library, and the Marine Transportation Department and Administrative offices of the State University of ...
. In addition, the Harlem River is reemerging as "Scullers' Row" due in large part to the efforts of the Bronx River Restoration Project, a joint public-private endeavor of the city's parks department.
Canoeing Canoeing is an activity which involves paddling a canoe with a single-bladed paddle. Common meanings of the term are limited to when the canoeing is the central purpose of the activity. Broader meanings include when it is combined with other act ...
and
kayaking Kayaking is the use of a kayak for moving over water. It is distinguished from canoeing by the sitting position of the paddler and the number of blades on the paddle. A kayak is a low-to-the-water, canoe-like boat in which the paddler sits faci ...
on the borough's namesake river have been promoted by the Bronx River Alliance. The river is also straddled by the
New York Botanical Gardens The New York Botanical Garden (NYBG) is a botanical garden at Bronx Park in the Bronx, New York City. Established in 1891, it is located on a site that contains a landscape with over one million living plants; the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory, ...
, its neighbor, the
Bronx Zoo The Bronx Zoo (also historically the Bronx Zoological Park and the Bronx Zoological Gardens) is a zoo within Bronx Park in the Bronx, New York. It is one of the largest zoos in the United States by area and is the largest metropolitan zoo in ...
, and a little further south, on the west shore, Bronx River Art Center.


Community celebrations

"Bronx Week", traditionally held in May, began as a one-day celebration. Begun by Bronx historian Lloyd Ultan and supported by then borough president Robert Abrams, the original one-day program was based on the "Bronx Borough Day" festival which took place in the 1920s. The following year, at the height of the decade's civil unrest, the festival was extended to a one-week event. In the 1980s the key event, the "Bronx Ball", was launched. The week includes the Bronx Week Parade as well as inductions into the "Bronx Walk of Fame." Various Bronx neighborhoods conduct their own community celebrations. The Arthur Avenue "Little Italy" neighborhood conducts an annual Autumn Ferragosto Festival that celebrates Italian culture. Hunts Point hosts an annual "Fish Parade and Summer Festival" at the start of summer. Edgewater Park hosts an annual "Ragamuffin" children's walk in November. There are several events to honor the borough's veterans. Albanian Independence Day is also observed. There are also parades to celebrate Dominican, Italian, and Irish heritage.


Press and broadcasting

The Bronx is home to several local newspapers and radio and television studios.


Newspapers

The Bronx has several local newspapers, including The Bronx Daily, ''The
Bronx News The ''Bronx News'' is a weekly newspaper that covers the entire Bronx. Founded in 1975, the ''Bronx News'' is known for its headlines and reporting. News stories range from crime, sports, entertainment and politics. The front page appears in colo ...
'', '' Parkchester News'', ''City News'', ''The
Norwood News ''Norwood News'' is a bi-weekly newspaper that primarily serves the Northwest Bronx neighborhoods of Norwood, Bedford Park, Fordham and University Heights. It was founded in October 1988 by the Mosholu Preservation Corporation, a not-for-prof ...
'', ''The
Riverdale Press Founded in 1950 by David A. Stein and wife Celia Stein, ''The Riverdale Press'' is a weekly newspaper that covers the Northwest Bronx neighborhoods of Riverdale, Spuyten Duyvil, Kingsbridge, Kingsbridge Heights and Van Cortlandt Village, as w ...
'', '' Riverdale Review'', ''The
Bronx Times Reporter The ''Bronx Times-Reporter'' is a weekly newspaper published in the Bronx, New York. It was co-founded in 1981 by John Collazzi and Assemblyman Michael Benedetto. The ''Bronx Times-Reporter'' covers local news and publishes columns by local co ...
'', '' Inner City Press'' (which now has more of a focus on national issues) and '' Co-op City Times''. Four non-profit news outlets, ''
Norwood News ''Norwood News'' is a bi-weekly newspaper that primarily serves the Northwest Bronx neighborhoods of Norwood, Bedford Park, Fordham and University Heights. It was founded in October 1988 by the Mosholu Preservation Corporation, a not-for-prof ...
'', ''Mount Hope Monitor'', ''
Mott Haven Herald The ''Mott Haven Herald'' is a monthly newspaper that covers the Mott Haven, Port Morris, and Melrose sections of the Bronx. Founded in the spring of 2009, the ''Herald's'' news stories range from crime, arts, entertainment, and politics to the ...
'' and ''The Hunts Point Express'' serve the borough's poorer communities. The editor and co-publisher of ''The Riverdale Press'', Bernard Stein, won the
Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Writing The Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Writing is one of the fourteen American Pulitzer Prizes that are annually awarded for Journalism. It has been awarded since 1917 for distinguished editorial writing, the test of excellence being clearness of styl ...
for his editorials about Bronx and New York City issues in 1998. (Stein graduated from the
Bronx High School of Science The Bronx High School of Science, commonly called Bronx Science, is a public specialized high school in The Bronx in New York City. It is operated by the New York City Department of Education. Admission to Bronx Science involves passing the Sp ...
in 1959.) The Bronx once had its own daily newspaper, '' The Bronx Home News'', which started publishing on January 20, 1907, and merged into the ''
New York Post The ''New York Post'' (''NY Post'') is a conservative daily tabloid newspaper published in New York City. The ''Post'' also operates NYPost.com, the celebrity gossip site PageSix.com, and the entertainment site Decider.com. It was established ...
'' in 1948. It became a special section of the ''Post'', sold only in the Bronx, and eventually disappeared from view.


Radio and television

One of New York City's major non-commercial radio broadcasters is WFUV, a
National Public Radio National Public Radio (NPR, stylized in all lowercase) is an American privately and state funded nonprofit media organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with its NPR West headquarters in Culver City, California. It differs from other n ...
-affiliated 50,000-watt station broadcasting from
Fordham University Fordham University () is a private Jesuit research university in New York City. Established in 1841 and named after the Fordham neighborhood of the Bronx in which its original campus is located, Fordham is the oldest Catholic and Jesuit un ...
's Rose Hill campus in the Bronx. The radio station's antenna was relocated to the top an apartment building owned by
Montefiore Medical Center Montefiore Medical Center is a premier academic medical center and the primary teaching hospital of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in the Bronx, New York City. Its main campus, the Henry and Lucy Moses Division, is located in the Norwoo ...
, which expanded the reach of the station's signal. The City of New York has an official television station run by NYC Media and broadcasting from
Bronx Community College The Bronx Community College of the City University of New York (BCC) is a public community college in the Bronx, New York City. It is part of the City University of New York system. History The college was established in 1957 through the e ...
, and
Cablevision Cablevision Systems Corporation was an American cable television company with systems serving areas surrounding New York City. It was the fifth-largest cable provider and ninth-largest television provider in the United States. Throughout its e ...
operates News 12 The Bronx, both of which feature programming based in the Bronx. Co-op City was the first area in the Bronx, and the first in New York beyond
Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...
, to have its own
cable television Cable television is a system of delivering television programming to consumers via radio frequency (RF) signals transmitted through coaxial cables, or in more recent systems, light pulses through fibre-optic cables. This contrasts with bro ...
provider. The local public-access television station
BronxNet BronxNet is a public, educational, and government access (PEG) cable television network in The Bronx, New York, airing on multiple Cablevision and Verizon FiOS channels. BronxNet is located on the campus of Lehman College, and at a new studio, ...
originates from Herbert H. Lehman College, the borough's only four year CUNY school, and provides government-access television (GATV) public affairs programming in addition to programming produced by Bronx residents.


Economy

Shopping malls and markets in the Bronx include: * Bay Plaza Shopping Center * Bronx Terminal Market *
Hunts Point Cooperative Market The Hunts Point Cooperative Market is a 24/7 wholesale food market located on in the Hunts Point neighborhood of the Bronx, New York City. The largest food distribution center of its kind in the world, it earns annual revenues of over $2 billion ...


Shopping districts

Prominent shopping areas in the Bronx include Fordham Road, Bay Plaza in Co-op City,
The Hub The Hub may refer to: Places * The Hub, Bronx, an area of the South Bronx, New York, known for its convergence of subway and bus lines * The Hub (Edinburgh), former church in Edinburgh that is now home to the Edinburgh International Festival * T ...
, the Riverdale/ Kingsbridge shopping center, and Bruckner Boulevard. Shops are also concentrated on streets aligned underneath elevated railroad lines, including Westchester Avenue,
White Plains Road White Plains Road is a major north-south thoroughfare which runs the length of the New York City borough of the Bronx. It runs from Castle Hill and Clason Point in the south to Wakefield in the north, where it crosses the city line and becomes ...
,
Jerome Avenue Jerome Avenue is one of the longest thoroughfares in the New York City borough of the Bronx, New York, United States. The road is long and stretches from Concourse to Woodlawn. Both of these termini are with the Major Deegan Expressway which r ...
, Southern Boulevard, and
Broadway Broadway may refer to: Theatre * Broadway Theatre (disambiguation) * Broadway theatre, theatrical productions in professional theatres near Broadway, Manhattan, New York City, U.S. ** Broadway (Manhattan), the street **Broadway Theatre (53rd Stree ...
. The Bronx Terminal Market contains several
big-box store A big-box store (also hyperstore, supercenter, superstore, or megastore) is a physically large retail establishment, usually part of a chain of stores. The term sometimes also refers, by extension, to the company that operates the store. The te ...
s, which opened in 2009 south of Yankee Stadium. The Bronx has three primary shopping centers: The Hub, Gateway Center and Southern Boulevard. The Hub–Third Avenue Business Improvement District (B.I.D.), in
The Hub The Hub may refer to: Places * The Hub, Bronx, an area of the South Bronx, New York, known for its convergence of subway and bus lines * The Hub (Edinburgh), former church in Edinburgh that is now home to the Edinburgh International Festival * T ...
, is the retail heart of the
South Bronx The South Bronx is an area of the New York City borough of the Bronx. The area comprises neighborhoods in the southern part of the Bronx, such as Concourse, Mott Haven, Melrose, and Port Morris. In the early 1900s, the South Bronx was orig ...
, where four roads converge: East 149th Street, Willis, Melrose and Third Avenues. It is primarily inside the neighborhood of
Melrose Melrose may refer to: Places United Kingdom * Melrose, Scottish Borders, a town in the Scottish Borders, Scotland ** Melrose Abbey, ruined monastery ** Melrose RFC, rugby club Australia * Melrose, Queensland, a locality in the South Burnett R ...
but also lines the northern border of Mott Haven. The Hub has been called "the Broadway of the Bronx", being likened to the real Broadway in Manhattan and the northwestern Bronx. It is the site of both maximum traffic and architectural density. In configuration, it resembles a miniature
Times Square Times Square is a major commercial intersection, tourist destination, entertainment hub, and neighborhood in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. It is formed by the junction of Broadway, Seventh Avenue, and 42nd Street. Together with adjacent ...
, a spatial "bow-tie" created by the geometry of the street. The Hub is part of
Bronx Community Board 1 Bronx Community Board 1 is a local government unit of the city of New York, encompassing the neighborhoods of Mott Haven, Melrose, and Port Morris in the borough of the Bronx. It is delimited by the East River, East 149th Street, and Prospect A ...
. The Bronx Terminal Market, in the
West Bronx The West Bronx is a region in the New York City borough of the Bronx. The region lies west of the Bronx River and roughly corresponds to the western half of the borough. The West Bronx is more densely populated than the East Bronx, and is clo ...
, formerly known as Gateway Center, is a shopping center that encompasses less than one million square feet of retail space, built on a site that formerly held a wholesale fruit and vegetable market also named Bronx Terminal Market as well as the former Bronx House of Detention, south of
Yankee Stadium Yankee Stadium is a baseball stadium located in the Bronx, New York City. It is the home field of the New York Yankees of Major League Baseball, and New York City FC of Major League Soccer. Opened in April 2009, the stadium replaced the orig ...
. The $500 million shopping center, which was completed in 2009, saw the construction of new buildings and two smaller buildings, one new and the other a renovation of an existing building that was part of the original market. The two main buildings are linked by a six-level garage for 2,600 cars. The center's design has earned it a
LEED Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) is a green building certification program used worldwide. Developed by the non-profit U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC), it includes a set of rating systems for the design, construction ...
"Silver" designation.


Government and politics


Local government

Since New York City's consolidation in 1898, the New York City Charter that provides for a "strong" mayor–council system has governed the Bronx. The centralized New York City government is responsible for public education, correctional institutions, libraries, public safety, recreational facilities, sanitation, water supply, and welfare services in the Bronx. The office of Borough President was created in the consolidation of 1898 to balance centralization with local authority. Each borough president had a powerful administrative role derived from having a vote on the New York City Board of Estimate, which was responsible for creating and approving the city's budget and proposals for land use. In 1989 the
Supreme Court of the United States The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. Federal tribunals in the United States, federal court cases, and over Stat ...
declared the Board of Estimate unconstitutional on the grounds that
Brooklyn Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...
, the most populous borough, had no greater effective representation on the Board than
Staten Island Staten Island ( ) is a Boroughs of New York City, borough of New York City, coextensive with Richmond County, in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York. Located in the city's southwest portion, the borough is separated from New Jersey b ...
, the least populous borough, a violation of the Fourteenth Amendment's
Equal Protection Clause The Equal Protection Clause is part of the first section of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. The clause, which took effect in 1868, provides "''nor shall any State ... deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal ...
pursuant to the high court's 1964 "one man, one vote" decision.Cornell Law School Supreme Court Collection: Board of Estimate of City of New York v. Morris
accessed June 12, 2006
Since 1990 the Borough President has acted as an advocate for the borough at the mayoral agencies, the
City Council A municipal council is the legislative body of a municipality or local government area. Depending on the location and classification of the municipality it may be known as a city council, town council, town board, community council, rural coun ...
, the New York state government, and corporations. Until March 1, 2009, the Borough President of the Bronx was
Adolfo Carrión Jr. Adolfo Carrión Jr. (born March 6, 1961) is an American businessman and former elected official from City Island. He has three sisters Elizabeth Carrión-Stevens, Damaris Carrión-Harris and Lizette Carrión. He served one term as a member of th ...
, elected as a Democrat in 2001 and 2005 before retiring early to direct the White House Office of Urban Affairs Policy. His successor, Democratic
New York State Assembly The New York State Assembly is the lower house of the New York State Legislature, with the New York State Senate being the upper house. There are 150 seats in the Assembly. Assembly members serve two-year terms without term limits. The Ass ...
member Rubén Díaz, Jr. — after winning a special election on April 21, 2009 by a vote of 86.3% (29,420) on the "Bronx Unity" line to 13.3% (4,646) for the Republican district leader Anthony Ribustello on the "People First" line,Trymaine Lee
"Bronx Voters Elect Díaz as New Borough President"
''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'', New York edition, April 22, 2009, page A24, retrieved on May 13, 2009
The Board of Elections in the City of New York
Bronx Borough President special election results, April 21, 2009
(
PDF Portable Document Format (PDF), standardized as ISO 32000, is a file format developed by Adobe in 1992 to present documents, including text formatting and images, in a manner independent of application software, hardware, and operating systems. ...
with details by Assembly District, April 29, 2009), retrieved on May 13, 2009
— became Borough President on May 1, 2009. In 2021, Rubén Díaz's Democratic successor, Vanessa Gibson was elected (to begin serving in 2022) with 79.9% of the vote against 13.4% for Janell King (Republican) and 6.5% for Sammy Ravelo (Conservative). All of the Bronx's currently elected public officials have first won the nomination of the Democratic Party (in addition to any other endorsements). Local party platforms center on affordable housing, education and economic development. Controversial political issues in the Bronx include environmental issues, the cost of housing, and annexation of parkland for new
Yankee Stadium Yankee Stadium is a baseball stadium located in the Bronx, New York City. It is the home field of the New York Yankees of Major League Baseball, and New York City FC of Major League Soccer. Opened in April 2009, the stadium replaced the orig ...
. Since its separation from
New York County Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...
on January 1, 1914, the Bronx, has had, like each of the other 61 counties of New York State, its own criminal court system and
District Attorney In the United States, a district attorney (DA), county attorney, state's attorney, prosecuting attorney, commonwealth's attorney, or state attorney is the chief prosecutor and/or chief law enforcement officer representing a U.S. state in a ...
, the chief public prosecutor who is directly elected by popular vote. Darcel D. Clark has been the
Bronx County District Attorney The Bronx County District Attorney is the elected district attorney for Bronx County, which is coterminous with the Borough of the Bronx, in New York City. The office is responsible for the prosecution of violations of New York state laws. (Federa ...
since 2016. Her predecessor was Robert T. Johnson, the District Attorney from 1989 to 2015. He was the first African-American District Attorney in New York State. The Bronx also has twelve Community Boards, appointed bodies that advise on land use and municipal facilities and services for local residents, businesses and institutions.


Bronx votes for Mayor and President


Presidential vote

After becoming a separate county in 1914, the Bronx has supported only two Republican presidential candidates. It voted heavily for the winning Republican Warren G. Harding in
1920 Events January * January 1 ** Polish–Soviet War in 1920: The Russian Red Army increases its troops along the Polish border from 4 divisions to 20. ** Kauniainen, completely surrounded by the city of Espoo, secedes from Espoo as its own ma ...
, but much more narrowly on a split vote for his victorious Republican successor
Calvin Coolidge Calvin Coolidge (born John Calvin Coolidge Jr.; ; July 4, 1872January 5, 1933) was the 30th president of the United States from 1923 to 1929. Born in Vermont, Coolidge was a Republican lawyer from New England who climbed up the ladder of Ma ...
in
1924 Events January * January 12 – Gopinath Saha shoots Ernest Day, whom he has mistaken for Sir Charles Tegart, the police commissioner of Calcutta, and is arrested soon after. * January 20– 30 – Kuomintang in China hold ...
(Coolidge 79,562; John W. Davis, Dem., 72,834;
Robert La Follette Robert Marion "Fighting Bob" La Follette Sr. (June 14, 1855June 18, 1925), was an American lawyer and politician. He represented Wisconsin in both chambers of Congress and served as the 20th Governor of Wisconsin. A Republican for most of his ...
, 62,202 equally divided between the Progressive and
Socialist Socialism is a left-wing economic philosophy and movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to private ownership. As a term, it describes the ...
lines). Since then, the Bronx has always supported the Democratic Party's nominee for president, starting with a vote of 2–1 for the unsuccessful
Al Smith Alfred Emanuel Smith (December 30, 1873 – October 4, 1944) was an American politician who served four terms as Governor of New York and was the Democratic Party's candidate for president in 1928. The son of an Irish-American mother and a Ci ...
in 1928, followed by four 2–1 votes for the successful Franklin D. Roosevelt. (Both had been Governors of New York, but Republican former Gov.
Thomas E. Dewey Thomas Edmund Dewey (March 24, 1902 – March 16, 1971) was an American lawyer, prosecutor, and politician who served as the 47th governor of New York from 1943 to 1954. He was the Republican candidate for president in 1944 and 1948: although ...
won only 28% of the Bronx's vote in 1948 against 55% for Pres.
Harry Truman Harry S. Truman (May 8, 1884December 26, 1972) was the 33rd president of the United States, serving from 1945 to 1953. A leader of the Democratic Party, he previously served as the 34th vice president from January to April 1945 under Franklin ...
, the winning Democrat, and 17% for
Henry A. Wallace Henry Agard Wallace (October 7, 1888 – November 18, 1965) was an American politician, journalist, farmer, and businessman who served as the 33rd vice president of the United States, the 11th U.S. Secretary of Agriculture, and the 10th U.S. ...
of the
Progressives Progressivism holds that it is possible to improve human societies through political action. As a political movement, progressivism seeks to advance the human condition through social reform based on purported advancements in science, techn ...
. It was only 32 years earlier, by contrast, that another Republican former Governor who narrowly lost the Presidency,
Charles Evans Hughes Charles Evans Hughes Sr. (April 11, 1862 – August 27, 1948) was an American statesman, politician and jurist who served as the 11th Chief Justice of the United States from 1930 to 1941. A member of the Republican Party, he previously was the ...
, had won 42.6% of the Bronx's 1916 vote against Democratic President
Woodrow Wilson Thomas Woodrow Wilson (December 28, 1856February 3, 1924) was an American politician and academic who served as the 28th president of the United States from 1913 to 1921. A member of the Democratic Party, Wilson served as the president of ...
's 49.8% and Socialist candidate Allan Benson's 7.3%.)


Elections for Mayor of New York

The Bronx has often shown striking differences from other boroughs in elections for Mayor. The only Republican to carry the Bronx since 1914 was
Fiorello La Guardia Fiorello Henry LaGuardia (; born Fiorello Enrico LaGuardia, ; December 11, 1882September 20, 1947) was an American attorney and politician who represented New York in the House of Representatives and served as the 99th Mayor of New York City fr ...
in 1933, 1937 and 1941 (and in the latter two elections, only because his 30% to 32% vote on the
American Labor Party The American Labor Party (ALP) was a political party in the United States established in 1936 that was active almost exclusively in the state of New York. The organization was founded by labor leaders and former members of the Socialist Party of A ...
line was added to 22% to 23% as a Republican). The Bronx was thus the only borough not carried by the successful Republican re-election campaigns of Mayors
Rudolph Giuliani Rudolph William Louis Giuliani (, ; born May 28, 1944) is an American politician and lawyer who served as the 107th Mayor of New York City from 1994 to 2001. He previously served as the United States Associate Attorney General from 1981 to 198 ...
in 1997 and
Michael Bloomberg Michael Rubens Bloomberg (born February 14, 1942) is an American businessman, politician, philanthropist, and author. He is the majority owner, co-founder and CEO of Bloomberg L.P. He was Mayor of New York City from 2002 to 2013, and was a c ...
in 2005. The anti-war
Socialist Socialism is a left-wing economic philosophy and movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to private ownership. As a term, it describes the ...
campaign of
Morris Hillquit Morris Hillquit (August 1, 1869 – October 8, 1933) was a founder and leader of the Socialist Party of America and prominent labor lawyer in New York City's Lower East Side. Together with Eugene V. Debs and Congressman Victor L. Berger, Hillqu ...
in the 1917 mayoral election won over 31% of the Bronx's vote, putting him second and well ahead of the 20% won by the incumbent pro-war Fusion Mayor John P. Mitchel, who came in second (ahead of Hillquit) everywhere else and outpolled Hillquit citywide by 23.2% to 21.7%. * Republican and Democratic columns for presidential elections also include their candidates' votes on other lines, such as the
New York State Right to Life Party The New York State Right to Life Party was a minor anti-abortion American political party that was active only in the state of New York and was founded to oppose the legalization of abortion in New York State in 1970. History In 1970 the Right t ...
and the
Working Families Party The Working Families Party (WFP) is a minor political party in the United States, founded in New York in 1998. There are active chapters in California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Georgia, Illinois, Maryland, Ne ...
. * For details of votes and parties in a particular election, click the year or see
New York City mayoral elections The mayor of New York City is elected in early November every four years, in the year immediately following a United States presidential election year, and takes office at the beginning of the following year. The city, which elects the mayor as i ...
.


Education

Education in the Bronx is provided by a large number of public and private institutions, many of which draw students who live beyond the Bronx. The New York City Department of Education manages the borough's public noncharter schools. In 2000, public schools enrolled nearly 280,000 of the Bronx's residents over 3 years old (out of 333,100 enrolled in all pre-college schools).QT-P19. School Enrollment: 2000; Data Set: Census 2000 Summary File 3 (SF 3) – Sample Data; Geographic Area: Bronx County, New York
United States Census Bureau The United States Census Bureau (USCB), officially the Bureau of the Census, is a principal agency of the U.S. Federal Statistical System, responsible for producing data about the American people and economy. The Census Bureau is part of th ...
, retrieved August 22, 2008
There are also several public
charter schools A charter school is a school that receives government funding but operates independently of the established state school system in which it is located. It is independent in the sense that it operates according to the basic principle of autono ...
. Private schools range from élite
independent school An independent school is independent in its finances and governance. Also known as private schools, non-governmental, privately funded, or non-state schools, they are not administered by local, state or national governments. In British En ...
s to religiously affiliated
schools A school is an educational institution designed to provide learning spaces and learning environments for the teaching of students under the direction of teachers. Most countries have systems of formal education, which is sometimes compulsor ...
run by the
Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York The Archdiocese of New York ( la, Archidiœcesis Neo-Eboracensis) is an ecclesiastical territory or archdiocese of the Catholic Church ( particularly the Roman Catholic or Latin Church) located in the New York (state), State of New York. It encom ...
and Jewish organizations. A small portion of land between Pelham and Pelham Bay Park, with 35 houses, is a part of the Bronx, but is cut off from the rest of the borough due to the county boundaries; the New York City government pays for the residents' children to go to
Pelham Union Free School District Pelham Public Schools or the Pelham Public School District, formally the Pelham Union Free School District, is a school district headquartered in Pelham, New York. It serves Pelham, which includes Pelham Manor and the Village of Pelham. , the ...
schools, including
Pelham Memorial High School The Pelham Memorial High School is the only high school within the town of Pelham, New York, United States. It is part of the Pelham Union Free School District. A small portion of land that is between Pelham and Pelham Bay Park, with a total ...
, since that is more cost effective than sending school buses to take the students to New York City schools. This arrangement has been in place since 1948. ()


Educational attainment

In 2000, according to the United States Census, out of the nearly 800,000 people in the Bronx who were then at least 25 years old, 62.3% had graduated from high school and 14.6% held a bachelor's or higher college degree. These percentages were lower than those for New York's other boroughs, which ranged from 68.8% (Brooklyn) to 82.6% (Staten Island) for high school graduates over 24, and from 21.8% (Brooklyn) to 49.4% (Manhattan) for college graduates. (The respective state and national percentages were '' Y' 79.1% & 27.4% and '' S' 80.4% & 24.4%.)


High schools

In the 2000 Census, 79,240 of the nearly 95,000 Bronx residents enrolled in high school attended public schools. Many public
high schools A secondary school describes an institution that provides secondary education and also usually includes the building where this takes place. Some secondary schools provide both '' lower secondary education'' (ages 11 to 14) and ''upper seconda ...
are in the borough including the elite
Bronx High School of Science The Bronx High School of Science, commonly called Bronx Science, is a public specialized high school in The Bronx in New York City. It is operated by the New York City Department of Education. Admission to Bronx Science involves passing the Sp ...
,
Celia Cruz Bronx High School of Music Celia Cruz Bronx High School of Music (CCBXHSM) is the first comprehensive high school of music in the Bronx, New York, United States. The current principal is Jerrod Mabry, who became principal in March 2013 after having taught English and acted ...
,
DeWitt Clinton High School , motto_translation = Without Work Nothing Is Accomplished , image = DeWitt Clinton High School front entrance IMG 7441 HLG.jpg , seal_image = File:Clinton News.JPG , seal_size = 124px , ...
, High School for Violin and Dance,
Bronx Leadership Academy 2 Morris High School, in New York City, was a high school in the Melrose section of the Bronx borough's South Bronx area. The direct predecessor of Morris was built in 1897 and established as the Mixed High School, situated in a small brick buildin ...
,
Bronx International High School Morris High School, in New York City, was a high school in the Melrose section of the Bronx borough's South Bronx area. The direct predecessor of Morris was built in 1897 and established as the Mixed High School, situated in a small brick buildin ...
, the
School for Excellence Morris High School, in New York City, was a high school in the Melrose section of the Bronx borough's South Bronx area. The direct predecessor of Morris was built in 1897 and established as the Mixed High School, situated in a small brick buildin ...
, the Morris Academy for Collaborative Study, Wings Academy for young adults, The Bronx School for Law, Government and Justice, Validus Preparatory Academy, The Eagle Academy For Young Men, Bronx Expeditionary Learning High School, Bronx Academy of Letters,
Herbert H. Lehman High School Herbert H. Lehman High School is a public high school at 3000 East Tremont Avenue, in the Westchester Square section of the Bronx, New York City. The school is named after former New York State Governor Herbert Henry Lehman (1878–1963). The sch ...
and High School of American Studies. The Bronx is also home to three of New York City's most prestigious private, secular schools: Fieldston,
Horace Mann Horace Mann (May 4, 1796August 2, 1859) was an American educational reformer, slavery abolitionist and Whig politician known for his commitment to promoting public education. In 1848, after public service as Secretary of the Massachusetts Sta ...
, and Riverdale Country School. High schools linked to the
Catholic Church The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwide . It is am ...
include: Saint Raymond's Academy for Girls,
All Hallows High School All Hallows High School (formerly known as the All Hallows Institute) is a Catholic boys' high school in the South Bronx, New York, United States. Located at 111 East 164th Street, near Yankee Stadium, the school has an enrollment of approximate ...
,
Fordham Preparatory School Fordham Preparatory School (also known as Fordham Prep) is an American private, Jesuit, boys' college-preparatory school located on the Rose Hill campus of Fordham University in the Bronx, New York City. From its founding in 1841 until 1970, ...
,
Monsignor Scanlan High School Monsignor Scanlan High School is an American four-year private, Roman Catholic high school located in the Throggs Neck neighborhood of The Bronx, New York City, New York. It is part of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York and is accredit ...
,
St. Raymond High School for Boys St. Raymond High School for Boys is an American parochial high school, located in the Parkchester section of the Bronx, New York. Affiliated with the Catholic schools of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York, it is accredited by the Board ...
,
Cardinal Hayes High School Cardinal Hayes High School is an American Catholic high school for boys in the Concourse Village neighborhood of the Bronx, New York City, New York. The school serves the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York. It is a member of the Catholic H ...
, Cardinal Spellman High School, The Academy of Mount Saint Ursula, Aquinas High School, Preston High School,
St. Catharine Academy St. Catharine High School is an American all-girls', private, Roman Catholic high school located in the Pelham Gardens neighborhood of the Bronx, New York. It is located within the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York. History The Sister ...
, Mount Saint Michael Academy, and
St. Barnabas High School Saint Barnabas High School is an American all-girls, private, Roman Catholic high school located in the Woodlawn Heights section of The Bronx, New York. It also borders the southeastern section of the city of Yonkers in neighboring Westchester ...
. The
SAR Academy Salanter Akiba Riverdale Academy, better known by the acronym, SAR Academy, is a coeducational, private Modern Orthodox Jewish day school. The school is located in the Riverdale section of the New York City borough of the Bronx. Its name deri ...
and
SAR High School Salanter Akiba Riverdale High School (SAR High School) is an Open Orthodox Jewish day school located in Riverdale, New York City. It was founded in 2003 by Rabbi Naftali (Tully) Harcsztark. The school is affiliated with SAR Academy, which is a ...
are Modern Orthodox Jewish
Yeshiva A yeshiva (; he, ישיבה, , sitting; pl. , or ) is a traditional Jewish educational institution focused on the study of Rabbinic literature, primarily the Talmud and halacha (Jewish law), while Torah and Jewish philosophy a ...
coeducational day schools in Riverdale, with roots in Manhattan's
Lower East Side The Lower East Side, sometimes abbreviated as LES, is a historic neighborhood in the southeastern part of Manhattan in New York City. It is located roughly between the Bowery and the East River from Canal to Houston streets. Traditionally an im ...
. In the 1990s, New York City began closing the large, public high schools in the Bronx and replacing them with small high schools. Among the reasons cited for the changes were poor graduation rates and concerns about safety. Schools that have been closed or reduced in size include John F. Kennedy,
James Monroe James Monroe ( ; April 28, 1758July 4, 1831) was an American statesman, lawyer, diplomat, and Founding Father who served as the fifth president of the United States from 1817 to 1825. A member of the Democratic-Republican Party, Monroe was ...
, Taft,
Theodore Roosevelt Theodore Roosevelt Jr. ( ; October 27, 1858 – January 6, 1919), often referred to as Teddy or by his initials, T. R., was an American politician, statesman, soldier, conservationist, naturalist, historian, and writer who served as the 26t ...
, Adlai Stevenson, Evander Childs,
Christopher Columbus Christopher Columbus * lij, Cristoffa C(or)ombo * es, link=no, Cristóbal Colón * pt, Cristóvão Colombo * ca, Cristòfor (or ) * la, Christophorus Columbus. (; born between 25 August and 31 October 1451, died 20 May 1506) was a ...
, Morris, Walton, and South Bronx High Schools.


Colleges and universities

In 2000, 49,442 (57.5%) of the 86,014 Bronx residents seeking college, graduate or professional degrees attended public institutions. Several colleges and universities are in the Bronx.
Fordham University Fordham University () is a private Jesuit research university in New York City. Established in 1841 and named after the Fordham neighborhood of the Bronx in which its original campus is located, Fordham is the oldest Catholic and Jesuit un ...
was founded as St. John's College in 1841 by the Diocese of New York as the first Catholic institution of higher education in the
northeast The points of the compass are a set of horizontal, radially arrayed compass directions (or azimuths) used in navigation and cartography. A compass rose is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, east, south, and west—each sep ...
. It is now officially an independent institution, but strongly embraces its
Jesuit , image = Ihs-logo.svg , image_size = 175px , caption = ChristogramOfficial seal of the Jesuits , abbreviation = SJ , nickname = Jesuits , formation = , founders ...
heritage. The Bronx campus, known as Rose Hill, is the main campus of the university, and is among the largest within the city (other Fordham campuses are in Manhattan and Westchester County).In September 2008,
Fordham University Fordham University () is a private Jesuit research university in New York City. Established in 1841 and named after the Fordham neighborhood of the Bronx in which its original campus is located, Fordham is the oldest Catholic and Jesuit un ...
and its neighbor, the Wildlife Conservation Society, a global research organization which operates the
Bronx Zoo The Bronx Zoo (also historically the Bronx Zoological Park and the Bronx Zoological Gardens) is a zoo within Bronx Park in the Bronx, New York. It is one of the largest zoos in the United States by area and is the largest metropolitan zoo in ...
, will begin a joint program leading to a
Master of Science A Master of Science ( la, Magisterii Scientiae; abbreviated MS, M.S., MSc, M.Sc., SM, S.M., ScM or Sc.M.) is a master's degree in the field of science awarded by universities in many countries or a person holding such a degree. In contrast t ...
degree in adolescent science education (biology grades 7–12).
Three campuses of the
City University of New York The City University of New York ( CUNY; , ) is the public university system of New York City. It is the largest urban university system in the United States, comprising 25 campuses: eleven senior colleges, seven community colleges and seven pro ...
are in the Bronx:
Hostos Community College Eugenio María de Hostos Community College of The City University of New York is a public community college in the South Bronx, New York City. It is part of the City University of New York (CUNY) system and was created by an act of the Board o ...
,
Bronx Community College The Bronx Community College of the City University of New York (BCC) is a public community college in the Bronx, New York City. It is part of the City University of New York system. History The college was established in 1957 through the e ...
(occupying the former University Heights Campus of
New York University New York University (NYU) is a private research university in New York City. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded by a group of New Yorkers led by then- Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin. In 1832, th ...
) and Herbert H.
Lehman College Lehman College is a public college in the Bronx borough of New York City. Founded in 1931 as the Bronx campus of Hunter College, the school became an independent college within CUNY in September 1967. The college is named after Herbert H. Lehman ...
(formerly the uptown campus of
Hunter College Hunter College is a public university in New York City. It is one of the constituent colleges of the City University of New York and offers studies in more than one hundred undergraduate and postgraduate fields across five schools. It also admin ...
), which offers both undergraduate and graduate degrees. The
College of Mount Saint Vincent A college (Latin: ''collegium'') is an educational institution or a constituent part of one. A college may be a degree-awarding tertiary educational institution, a part of a collegiate or federal university, an institution offering ...
is a Catholic liberal arts college in Riverdale under the direction of the Sisters of Charity of New York. Founded in 1847 as a school for girls, the academy became a degree-granting college in 1911 and began admitting men in 1974. The school serves 1,600 students. Its campus is also home to the Academy for Jewish Religion, a transdenominational rabbinical and cantorial school.
Manhattan College Manhattan College is a private, Catholic, liberal arts university in the Bronx, New York City. Originally established in 1853 by the Brothers of the Christian Schools (De La Salle Christian Brothers) as an academy for day students, it was la ...
is a Catholic college in Riverdale which offers undergraduate programs in the arts, business, education, engineering, and science. It also offers graduate programs in education and engineering.
Albert Einstein College of Medicine Albert Einstein College of Medicine is a research-intensive medical school located in the Morris Park neighborhood of the Bronx in New York City. Founded in 1953, Einstein operates as an independent degree-granting institution as part of t ...
, part of the
Montefiore Medical Center Montefiore Medical Center is a premier academic medical center and the primary teaching hospital of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in the Bronx, New York City. Its main campus, the Henry and Lucy Moses Division, is located in the Norwoo ...
, is in Morris Park. The coeducational and non-sectarian Mercy College—with its main campus in
Dobbs Ferry Dobbs Ferry is a village in Westchester County, New York, United States. The population was 10,875 according to the 2010 United States Census. In 2019, its population rose to an estimated 11,027. The village of Dobbs Ferry is located in, and is a ...
—has a Bronx campus near
Westchester Square Westchester Square is a residential neighborhood geographically located in the eastern section of the New York City borough of the Bronx. Its boundaries, starting from the north and moving clockwise are: East Tremont Avenue and Silver Street, Bl ...
. The State University of New York Maritime College in Fort Schuyler (
Throggs Neck Throggs Neck (also known as Throgs Neck) is a neighborhood and peninsula in the south-eastern portion of the borough of the Bronx in New York City. It is bounded by the East River and Long Island Sound to the south and east, Westchester Creek on ...
)—at the far southeastern tip of the Bronx—is the national leader in maritime education and houses the
Maritime Industry Museum Fort Schuyler is a preserved 19th century fortification in the New York City borough of the Bronx. It houses a museum, the Stephen B. Luce Library, and the Marine Transportation Department and Administrative offices of the State University of ...
. (Directly across
Long Island Sound Long Island Sound is a marine sound and tidal estuary of the Atlantic Ocean. It lies predominantly between the U.S. state of Connecticut to the north and Long Island in New York to the south. From west to east, the sound stretches from the Eas ...
is Kings Point, Long Island, home of the
United States Merchant Marine Academy The United States Merchant Marine Academy (USMMA or Kings Point) is a United States service academy in Kings Point, New York. It trains its midshipmen (as students at the academy are called) to serve as officers in the United States Merchant ...
and the American Merchant Marine Museum.) As of 2017, graduates from the university earned an average annual salary of $144,000, the highest of any university graduates in the United States. In addition, the private, proprietary Monroe College, focused on preparation for business and the professions, started in the Bronx in 1933 and now has a campus in
New Rochelle New Rochelle (; older french: La Nouvelle-Rochelle) is a city in Westchester County, New York, United States, in the southeastern portion of the state. In 2020, the city had a population of 79,726, making it the seventh-largest in the state o ...
(Westchester County) as well the Bronx's Fordham neighborhood.


Transportation


Roads and streets


Surface streets

The Bronx street grid is irregular. Like the northernmost part of upper Manhattan, the
West Bronx The West Bronx is a region in the New York City borough of the Bronx. The region lies west of the Bronx River and roughly corresponds to the western half of the borough. The West Bronx is more densely populated than the East Bronx, and is clo ...
's hilly terrain leaves a relatively free-style street grid. Much of the West Bronx's street numbering carries over from upper Manhattan, but does not match it exactly; East 132nd Street is the lowest numbered street in the Bronx. This dates from the mid-19th century when the southwestern area of
Westchester County Westchester County is located in the U.S. state of New York. It is the seventh most populous county in the State of New York and the most populous north of New York City. According to the 2020 United States Census, the county had a population ...
west of the Bronx River, was incorporated into New York City and known as the Northside. The
East Bronx The East Bronx is the part of the New York City borough of the Bronx which lies east of the Bronx River; this roughly corresponds to the eastern half of the borough. Neighborhoods include: Baychester, Castle Hill, City Island, Co-op Cit ...
is considerably flatter, and the street layout tends to be more regular. Only the
Wakefield Wakefield is a cathedral city in West Yorkshire, England located on the River Calder. The city had a population of 99,251 in the 2011 census.https://www.nomisweb.co.uk/census/2011/ks101ew Census 2011 table KS101EW Usual resident population, ...
neighborhood picks up the street numbering, albeit at a misalignment due to Tremont Avenue's layout. At the same diagonal latitude, West 262nd Street in Riverdale matches East 237th Street in Wakefield. Three major north–south thoroughfares run between Manhattan and the Bronx:
Third Avenue Third Avenue is a north-south thoroughfare on the East Side of the New York City borough of Manhattan, as well as in the center portion of the Bronx. Its southern end is at Astor Place and St. Mark's Place. It transitions into Cooper Squ ...
,
Park Avenue Park Avenue is a wide New York City boulevard which carries north and southbound traffic in the boroughs of Manhattan and the Bronx. For most of the road's length in Manhattan, it runs parallel to Madison Avenue to the west and Lexington Av ...
, and
Broadway Broadway may refer to: Theatre * Broadway Theatre (disambiguation) * Broadway theatre, theatrical productions in professional theatres near Broadway, Manhattan, New York City, U.S. ** Broadway (Manhattan), the street **Broadway Theatre (53rd Stree ...
. Other major north–south roads include the Grand Concourse,
Jerome Avenue Jerome Avenue is one of the longest thoroughfares in the New York City borough of the Bronx, New York, United States. The road is long and stretches from Concourse to Woodlawn. Both of these termini are with the Major Deegan Expressway which r ...
, Sedgwick Avenue,
Webster Avenue Webster Avenue is a major north–south thoroughfare in the Bronx, New York City, United States. It stretches for from Melrose to Woodlawn (on the Bronx- Westchester borderline). The road starts at the intersection of Melrose Avenue, East 165t ...
, and
White Plains Road White Plains Road is a major north-south thoroughfare which runs the length of the New York City borough of the Bronx. It runs from Castle Hill and Clason Point in the south to Wakefield in the north, where it crosses the city line and becomes ...
. Major east-west thoroughfares include Mosholu Parkway, Gun Hill Road, Fordham Road, Pelham Parkway, and Tremont Avenue. Most east–west streets are prefixed with either ''East'' or ''West'', to indicate on which side of Jerome Avenue they lie (continuing the similar system in Manhattan, which uses
Fifth Avenue Fifth Avenue is a major and prominent thoroughfare in the borough of Manhattan in New York City. It stretches north from Washington Square Park in Greenwich Village to West 143rd Street in Harlem. It is one of the most expensive shopping ...
as the dividing line). The historic
Boston Post Road The Boston Post Road was a system of mail-delivery routes between New York City and Boston, Massachusetts that evolved into one of the first major highways in the United States. The three major alignments were the Lower Post Road (now U.S. Ro ...
, part of the long pre-revolutionary road connecting
Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...
with other northeastern cities, runs east–west in some places, and sometimes northeast–southwest. Mosholu and Pelham Parkways, with Bronx Park between them,
Van Cortlandt Park Van Cortlandt Park is a park located in the borough of the Bronx in New York City. Owned by the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation, it is managed with assistance from the Van Cortlandt Park Alliance. The park, the city's third-lar ...
to the west and Pelham Bay Park to the east, are also linked by
bridle path A bridle path, also bridleway, equestrian trail, horse riding path, ride, bridle road, or horse trail, is a trail or a thoroughfare that is used by people riding on horses. Trails originally created for use by horses often now serve a wider r ...
s. As of the 2000 Census, approximately 61.6% of all Bronx households do not have access to a car. Citywide, the percentage of autoless households is 55%.


Highways

Several major limited access highways traverse the Bronx. These include: * the
Bronx River Parkway The Bronx River Parkway (sometimes abbreviated as the Bronx Parkway) is a long parkway in downstate New York in the United States. It is named for the nearby Bronx River, which it parallels. The southern terminus of the parkway is at Story Aven ...
* the Bruckner Expressway (
I-278 Interstate 278 (I-278) is an auxiliary Interstate Highway in New Jersey and New York in the United States. The road runs from US Route 1/9 (US 1/9) in Linden, New Jersey, northeast to the Bruckner Interchange in the New York ...
/
I-95 Interstate 95 (I-95) is the main north–south Interstate Highway on the East Coast of the United States, running from US Route 1 (US 1) in Miami, Florida, to the Houlton–Woodstock Border Crossing between Maine and the Canadia ...
) * the
Cross Bronx Expressway The Cross Bronx Expressway is a major freeway in the New York City borough of the Bronx. It is mainly designated as part of Interstate 95 (I-95), but also includes portions of I-295 and U.S. Route 1 (US 1). The Cross Bronx begins ...
(
I-95 Interstate 95 (I-95) is the main north–south Interstate Highway on the East Coast of the United States, running from US Route 1 (US 1) in Miami, Florida, to the Houlton–Woodstock Border Crossing between Maine and the Canadia ...
/ I-295) * the New England Thruway (
I-95 Interstate 95 (I-95) is the main north–south Interstate Highway on the East Coast of the United States, running from US Route 1 (US 1) in Miami, Florida, to the Houlton–Woodstock Border Crossing between Maine and the Canadia ...
) * the
Henry Hudson Parkway The Henry Hudson Parkway is a parkway in New York City. The southern terminus is in Manhattan at 72nd Street, where the parkway continues south as the West Side Highway. It is often erroneously referred to as the West Side Highway throughout its ...
( NY-9A) * the
Hutchinson River Parkway The Hutchinson River Parkway (known colloquially as The Hutch) is a north–south parkway in southern New York in the United States. It extends for from the massive Bruckner Interchange in the Throggs Neck section of the Bronx to the New York ...
* the
Major Deegan Expressway Interstate 87 (I-87) is a north–south Interstate Highway located entirely within the US state of New York. It is most of the main highway between New York City and Montreal. The highway begins at exit 47 off I-278 in the New York ...
( I-87)


Bridges and tunnels

Thirteen bridges and three tunnels connect the Bronx to Manhattan, and three bridges connect the Bronx to
Queens Queens is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Queens County, in the U.S. state of New York. Located on Long Island, it is the largest New York City borough by area. It is bordered by the borough of Brooklyn at the western tip of Long ...
. These are, from west to east: ''To Manhattan:'' the
Spuyten Duyvil Bridge The Spuyten Duyvil Bridge is a railroad swing bridge that spans the Spuyten Duyvil Creek between Manhattan and the Bronx, in New York City. The bridge is located at the northern tip of Manhattan where the Spuyten Duyvil Creek meets the Hudson R ...
, the
Henry Hudson Bridge The Henry Hudson Bridge is a steel arch toll bridge in New York City across the Spuyten Duyvil Creek. It connects Spuyten Duyvil in the Bronx with Inwood in Manhattan to the south, via the Henry Hudson Parkway ( NY 9A). On the Manhattan side ...
, the Broadway Bridge, the University Heights Bridge, the Washington Bridge, the Alexander Hamilton Bridge, the High Bridge, the
Concourse Tunnel A concourse is a place where pathways or roads meet, such as in a hotel, a convention center, a railway station, an airport terminal, a hall, or other space. The term is not limited to places where there are literally pathways or roadways or t ...
, the Macombs Dam Bridge, the 145th Street Bridge, the 149th Street Tunnel, the Madison Avenue Bridge, the Park Avenue Bridge, the
Lexington Avenue Tunnel Lexington may refer to: Places England * Laxton, Nottinghamshire, formerly Lexington Canada * Lexington, a district in Waterloo, Ontario United States * Lexington, Kentucky, the largest city with this name * Lexington, Massachusetts, the oldes ...
, the Third Avenue Bridge (southbound traffic only), and the Willis Avenue Bridge (northbound traffic only). ''To both Manhattan and Queens:'' the
Robert F. Kennedy Bridge The Robert F. Kennedy Bridge (RFK Bridge; formerly known and still commonly referred to as the Triborough Bridge) is a complex of bridges and elevated expressway viaducts in New York City. The bridges link the boroughs of Manhattan, Queens, ...
, formerly known as the Triborough Bridge. ''To Queens:'' the
Bronx–Whitestone Bridge The Bronx–Whitestone Bridge (colloquially referred to as the Whitestone Bridge or simply the Whitestone) is a suspension bridge in New York City, carrying six lanes of Interstate 678 over the East River. The bridge connects Throggs Neck and ...
and the
Throgs Neck Bridge The Throgs Neck Bridge is a suspension bridge in New York City, carrying six lanes of Interstate 295 (I-295) over the East River where it meets the Long Island Sound. The bridge connects the Throggs Neck section of the Bronx with the Bay Ter ...
.


Mass transit

The Bronx is served by seven
New York City Subway The New York City Subway is a rapid transit system owned by the government of New York City and leased to the New York City Transit Authority, an affiliate agency of the state-run Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA). Opened on October ...
services along six physical lines, with 70 stations in the Bronx: *
IND Concourse Line The Concourse Line is an IND rapid transit line of the New York City Subway system. It runs from 205th Street in Norwood, Bronx, primarily under the Grand Concourse, to 145th Street in Harlem, Manhattan. It is the only B Division line, and a ...
() * IRT Broadway–Seventh Avenue Line () *
IRT Dyre Avenue Line The IRT Dyre Avenue Line (formerly the IND Dyre Avenue–East 174th Street Line) is a New York City Subway rapid transit line, part of the A Division. It is a branch of the IRT White Plains Road Line in the northeastern section of the Bronx, n ...
() *
IRT Jerome Avenue Line The IRT Jerome Avenue Line, also unofficially known as IRT Woodlawn Line and IRT Burnside Avenue Line is an A Division New York City Subway line mostly along Jerome Avenue in the Bronx. Originally an Interborough Rapid Transit Company-operated r ...
() *
IRT Pelham Line The IRT Pelham Line is a rapid transit line on the New York City Subway, operated as part of the A Division and served by the 6 and <6> trains. It was built as part of the Dual Contracts expansion and opened between 1918 and 1920. It is ...
() *
IRT White Plains Road Line The White Plains Road Line is a rapid transit line of the A Division of the New York City Subway serving the central Bronx. It is mostly elevated and served both subway and elevated trains until 1952. The original part of the line, the part op ...
() There are also many MTA Regional Bus Operations bus routes in the Bronx. This includes local and express routes as well as
Bee-Line Bus System The Westchester County Bee-Line System, branded on the buses in lowercase as ''the bee-line system'', is a bus system serving Westchester County, New York. The system is owned by the county's Department of Public Works and Transportation. Histor ...
routes. Two
Metro-North Railroad Metro-North Railroad , trading as MTA Metro-North Railroad, is a suburban commuter rail service run by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), a public authority of the U.S. state of New York and under contract with the Connectic ...
commuter rail lines (the
Harlem Line The Metro-North Railroad Harlem Line, originally chartered as the New York and Harlem Railroad, is an commuter rail line running north from New York City to Wassaic, in eastern Dutchess County. The lower from Grand Central Terminal to Sou ...
and the Hudson Line) serve 11 stations in the Bronx. ( Marble Hill, between the Spuyten Duyvil and University Heights stations, is actually in the only part of Manhattan connected to the mainland.) In addition, some trains serving the
New Haven Line The Metro-North Railroad New Haven Line is a commuter rail line running from New Haven, Connecticut to New York City. It joins the Harlem Line at Mount Vernon, New York and continues south to Grand Central Terminal in Manhattan. The New Haven ...
stop at Fordham Plaza. As part of Penn Station Access, the 2018 MTA budget funded construction of four new stops along the New Haven Line to serve Hunts Point, Parkchester, Morris Park, and Co-op City. In 2018,
NYC Ferry NYC Ferry is a public network of ferry routes in New York City operated by Hornblower Cruises. , there are six routes, as well as one seasonal route, connecting 25 ferry piers across all five boroughs. NYC Ferry has the largest passenger fleet ...
's Soundview line opened, connecting the Soundview landing in Clason Point Park to three
East River The East River is a saltwater tidal estuary in New York City. The waterway, which is actually not a river despite its name, connects Upper New York Bay on its south end to Long Island Sound on its north end. It separates the borough of Quee ...
locations in Manhattan. On December 28, 2021; the Throgs Neck Ferry landing at Ferry Point Park in
Throgs Neck Throggs Neck (also known as Throgs Neck) is a neighborhood and peninsula in the south-eastern portion of the borough of the Bronx in New York City. It is bounded by the East River and Long Island Sound to the south and east, Westchester Creek on ...
was opened providing an additional stop on the Soundview line. The ferry is operated by Hornblower Cruises.


In popular culture


Film and television


Mid-20th century

Mid-20th century movies set in the Bronx portrayed densely settled, working-class, urban culture. '' From This Day Forward'' (1946), set in Highbridge, occasionally delved into Bronx life. The most notable examinations of working class Bronx life were
Paddy Chayefsky Sidney Aaron "Paddy" Chayefsky (January 29, 1923 – August 1, 1981) was an American playwright, screenwriter and novelist. He is the only person to have won three solo Academy Awards for writing both adapted and original screenplays. He was ...
's
Academy Award The Academy Awards, better known as the Oscars, are awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international film industry. The awards are regarded by many as the most prestigious, significant awards in the entertainment ind ...
-winning '' Marty'' and his 1956 film '' The Catered Affair.'' Other films that portrayed life in the Bronx are: the 1993
Robert De Niro Robert Anthony De Niro Jr. ( , ; born August 17, 1943) is an American actor. Known for his collaborations with Martin Scorsese, he is considered to be one of the best actors of his generation. De Niro is the recipient of various accolades ...
/
Chazz Palminteri Calogero Lorenzo "Chazz" Palminteri (born May 15, 1952)
Chazzpalminteri.net. Retrieved on November 19, 2013.
is an American ...
film, ''
A Bronx Tale ''A Bronx Tale'' is a 1993 American coming-of-age crime film directed by and starring Robert De Niro in his directorial debut and produced by Jane Rosenthal, adapted from Chazz Palminteri's 1989 play of the same name. It tells the coming of a ...
'',
Spike Lee Shelton Jackson "Spike" Lee (born March 20, 1957) is an American film director, producer, screenwriter, and actor. His production company, 40 Acres and a Mule Filmworks, has produced more than 35 films since 1983. He made his directorial debut ...
's 1999 movie '' Summer of Sam'', which focused on an
Italian-American Italian Americans ( it, italoamericani or ''italo-americani'', ) are Americans who have full or partial Italian ancestry. The largest concentrations of Italian Americans are in the urban Northeast and industrial Midwestern metropolitan areas, ...
Bronx community in the 1970's, 1994's '' I Like It Like That'' which takes place in the predominantly Puerto Rican neighborhood of the South Bronx, and ''Doughboys'', the story of two Italian-American brothers in danger of losing their bakery thanks to one brother's gambling debts. The Bronx's gritty urban life had worked its way into the movies even earlier, with depictions of the " Bronx cheer", a loud flatulent-like sound of disapproval, allegedly first made by
New York Yankees The New York Yankees are an American professional baseball team based in the New York City borough of the Bronx. The Yankees compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) East division. They are one ...
fans. The sound can be heard, for example, on the Spike Jones and His City Slickers recording of "Der Fuehrer's Face" (from the 1942
Disney The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney (), is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was originally founded on October ...
animated film Animation is a method by which still figures are manipulated to appear as moving images. In traditional animation, images are drawn or painted by hand on transparent celluloid sheets to be photographed and exhibited on film. Today, most ani ...
of the same name), repeatedly lambasting
Adolf Hitler Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Germany from 1933 until his death in 1945. He rose to power as the leader of the Nazi Party, becoming the chancellor in 1933 and the ...
with: "We'll Heil! (Bronx cheer) Heil! (Bronx cheer) Right in Der Fuehrer's Face!"


Symbolism

Starting in the 1970s, the Bronx often symbolized violence, decay, and urban ruin. The wave of arson in the South Bronx in the 1960s and 1970s inspired the observation that "The Bronx is burning": in 1974 it was the title of both a ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
''
editorial An editorial, or leading article (UK) or leader (UK) is an article written by the senior editorial people or publisher of a newspaper, magazine, or any other written document, often unsigned. Australian and major United States newspapers, such ...
and a BBC
documentary film A documentary film or documentary is a non-fictional motion-picture intended to "document reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction, education or maintaining a historical record". Bill Nichols has characterized the documentary in te ...
. The line entered the pop-consciousness with Game Two of the 1977 World Series, when a fire broke out near
Yankee Stadium Yankee Stadium is a baseball stadium located in the Bronx, New York City. It is the home field of the New York Yankees of Major League Baseball, and New York City FC of Major League Soccer. Opened in April 2009, the stadium replaced the orig ...
as the team was playing the
Los Angeles Dodgers The Los Angeles Dodgers are an American professional baseball team based in Los Angeles. The Dodgers compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the National League (NL) National League West, West division. Established in 1883 i ...
. Many fires had broken out in the Bronx before this fire. As the fire was captured on live television, announcer Howard Cosell is wrongly remembered to have said something like, "There it is, ladies and gentlemen: the Bronx is burning". Historians of New York City often point to Cosell's remark as an acknowledgement of both the city and the borough's decline. A new feature-length documentary film by Edwin Pagan called ''Bronx Burning'' is in production in 2006, chronicling what led up to the many arson-for-insurance fraud fires of the 1970s in the borough. Bronx gang life was depicted in the 1974 novel ''The Wanderers'' by Bronx native Richard Price and the 1979 movie of the same name. They are set in the heart of the Bronx, showing apartment life and the then-landmark Krums ice cream parlor. In the 1979 film '' The Warriors'', the eponymous gang go to a meeting in
Van Cortlandt Park Van Cortlandt Park is a park located in the borough of the Bronx in New York City. Owned by the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation, it is managed with assistance from the Van Cortlandt Park Alliance. The park, the city's third-lar ...
in the Bronx, and have to fight their way out of the borough and get back to
Coney Island Coney Island is a peninsular neighborhood and entertainment area in the southwestern section of the New York City borough of Brooklyn. The neighborhood is bounded by Brighton Beach and Manhattan Beach, Brooklyn, Manhattan Beach to its east, L ...
in
Brooklyn Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...
. ''
A Bronx Tale ''A Bronx Tale'' is a 1993 American coming-of-age crime film directed by and starring Robert De Niro in his directorial debut and produced by Jane Rosenthal, adapted from Chazz Palminteri's 1989 play of the same name. It tells the coming of a ...
'' (1993) depicts gang activities in the Belmont "Little Italy" section of the Bronx. The 2005 video game adaptation features levels called Pelham, Tremont, and "Gunhill" (a play off the name Gun Hill Road). This theme lends itself to the title of '' The Bronx Is Burning'', an eight-part
ESPN ESPN (originally an initialism for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by ESPN Inc., owned jointly by The Walt Disney Company (80%) and Hearst Communications (20%). The ...
TV mini-series (2007) about the
New York Yankees The New York Yankees are an American professional baseball team based in the New York City borough of the Bronx. The Yankees compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) East division. They are one ...
' drive to winning baseball's 1977 World Series. The TV series emphasizes the team's boisterous nature, led by manager
Billy Martin Alfred Manuel Martin Jr. (May 16, 1928 – December 25, 1989), commonly called "Billy", was an American Major League Baseball second baseman and manager who, in addition to leading other teams, was five times the manager of the New York Yan ...
, catcher Thurman Munson and outfielder
Reggie Jackson Reginald Martinez Jackson (born May 18, 1946) is an American former professional baseball right fielder who played 21 seasons in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the Kansas City / Oakland Athletics, Baltimore Orioles, New York Yankees, and Cali ...
, as well as the malaise of the Bronx and New York City in general during that time, such as the blackout, the city's serious financial woes and near bankruptcy, the arson for insurance payments, and the election of
Ed Koch Edward Irving Koch ( ; December 12, 1924February 1, 2013) was an American politician, lawyer, political commentator, film critic, and television personality. He served in the United States House of Representatives from 1969 to 1977 and was ma ...
as mayor. The 1981 film '' Fort Apache, The Bronx'' is another film that used the Bronx's gritty image for its storyline. The movie's title is from the nickname for the 41st Police Precinct in the South Bronx which was nicknamed "Fort Apache". Also from 1981 is the horror film '' Wolfen'' making use of the rubble of the Bronx as a home for werewolf type creatures. ''
Knights of the South Bronx ''Knights of the South Bronx'' is a 2005 American drama television film directed by Allen Hughes and written by Jamal Joseph and Dianne Houston. Based on a true story, it stars Ted Danson as a teacher who helps students at a tough South Bronx el ...
'', a true story of a teacher who worked with disadvantaged children, is another film also set in the Bronx released in 2005. The Bronx was the setting for the 1983 film '' Fuga dal Bronx'', also known as ''Bronx Warriors 2'' and ''Escape 2000'', an Italian B-movie best known for its appearance on the television series ''
Mystery Science Theater 3000 ''Mystery Science Theater 3000'' (abbreviated as ''MST3K'') is an American science fiction comedy film review television series created by Joel Hodgson. The show premiered on WUCW, KTMA-TV (now WUCW) in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on November 24, 1 ...
''. The plot revolves around a sinister construction corporation's plans to depopulate, destroy and redevelop the Bronx, and a band of rebels who are out to expose the corporation's murderous ways and save their homes. The film is memorable for its almost incessant use of the phrase, "Leave the Bronx!" Many of the movie's scenes were filmed in
Queens Queens is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Queens County, in the U.S. state of New York. Located on Long Island, it is the largest New York City borough by area. It is bordered by the borough of Brooklyn at the western tip of Long ...
, substituting as the Bronx. '' Rumble in the Bronx'', filmed in Vancouver, was a 1995
Jackie Chan Fang Shilong (born 7 April 1954), known professionally in English as Jackie Chan and in Chinese as Cheng Long ( zh, c=成龍, j=Sing4 Lung4; "becoming the dragon"), is a Hong Kong actor, filmmaker, martial artist, and stuntman known for ...
kung-fu Chinese martial arts, often called by the umbrella terms kung fu (; ), kuoshu () or wushu (), are multiple fighting styles that have developed over the centuries in Greater China. These fighting styles are often classified according to common ...
film, another which popularized the Bronx to international audiences. '' Last Bronx'', a 1996 Sega game played on the bad reputation of the Bronx to lend its name to an alternate version of post-Japanese bubble Tokyo, where crime and gang warfare is rampant.


Literature


Books

The Bronx has been featured significantly in fiction literature. All of the characters in
Herman Wouk Herman Wouk ( ; May 27, 1915 – May 17, 2019) was an American author best known for historical fiction such as ''The Caine Mutiny'' (1951) for which he won the Pulitzer Prize in fiction. His other major works include ''The Winds of War'' and ...
's City Boy: The Adventures of Herbie Bookbinder (1948) live in the Bronx, and about half of the action is set there.
Kate Simon Kate Simon (December 5, 1912 – February 4, 1990) was a Polish-born American writer. Life and career She was born Kaila Grobsmith in Warsaw, Poland, the daughter of David Grobsmith, a shoe designer, and Lonia Grobsmith née Babicz, a corsetiere. ...
's ''Bronx Primitive: Portraits of a Childhood'' (1982) is directly autobiographical, a warm account of a Polish-Jewish girl in an immigrant family growing up before World War II, and living near
Arthur Avenue Arthur Avenue is a street in the Belmont neighborhood of the Bronx, New York City, which serves as the center of the Bronx's "Little Italy". Although the historical and commercial center of Little Italy is Arthur Avenue itself, the area stretch ...
and
Tremont Avenue Tremont Avenue is a street in the Bronx, New York City. Its west end is at Sedgwick Avenue in Morris Heights, and its east end is at Schurz Avenue in Throggs Neck, running almost the entire width of the Bronx. Around 2009, part of East Tremon ...
. In Jacob M. Appel's short story, "The Grand Concourse" (2007), a woman who grew up in the iconic
Lewis Morris Lewis Morris (April 8, 1726 – January 22, 1798) was an American Founding Father, landowner, and developer from Morrisania, New York, presently part of Bronx County. He signed the U.S. Declaration of Independence as a delegate to the Contin ...
Building returns to the
Morrisania Morrisania ( ) is a residential neighborhood in the southwestern Bronx, New York City, New York. Its boundaries are the Cross-Bronx Expressway to the north, Crotona-Prospect Avenue to the east, East 161st Street to the south, and Webster Avenue ...
neighborhood with her adult daughter. Similarly, in Avery Corman's book ''The Old Neighborhood'' (1980), an upper-middle class white protagonist returns to his birth neighborhood ( Fordham Road and the Grand Concourse), and learns that even though the folks are poor, Hispanic and African-American, they are good people. By contrast,
Tom Wolfe Thomas Kennerly Wolfe Jr. (March 2, 1930 – May 14, 2018)Some sources say 1931; ''The New York Times'' and Reuters both initially reported 1931 in their obituaries before changing to 1930. See and was an American author and journalist widely ...
's ''
Bonfire of the Vanities A bonfire of the vanities ( it, falò delle vanità) is a burning of objects condemned by religious authorities as occasions of sin. The phrase itself usually refers to the bonfire of 7 February 1497, when supporters of the Dominican friar G ...
'' (1987) portrays a wealthy, white protagonist, Sherman McCoy, getting lost off the Bruckner Expressway in the
South Bronx The South Bronx is an area of the New York City borough of the Bronx. The area comprises neighborhoods in the southern part of the Bronx, such as Concourse, Mott Haven, Melrose, and Port Morris. In the early 1900s, the South Bronx was orig ...
and having an altercation with locals. A substantial piece of the last part of the book is set in the resulting riotous trial at the Bronx County Courthouse. However, times change, and in 2007, ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' reported that "the Bronx neighborhoods near the site of Sherman's accident are now dotted with townhouses and apartments." In the same article, the Reverend Al Sharpton (whose fictional analogue in the novel is "Reverend Bacon") asserts that "twenty years later, the cynicism of ''The Bonfire of the Vanities'' is as out of style as
Tom Wolfe Thomas Kennerly Wolfe Jr. (March 2, 1930 – May 14, 2018)Some sources say 1931; ''The New York Times'' and Reuters both initially reported 1931 in their obituaries before changing to 1930. See and was an American author and journalist widely ...
's wardrobe." Don DeLillo's ''
Underworld The underworld, also known as the netherworld or hell, is the supernatural world of the dead in various religious traditions and myths, located below the world of the living. Chthonic is the technical adjective for things of the underwo ...
'' (1997) is also set in the Bronx and offers a perspective on the area from the 1950s onward.


Poetry

In poetry, the Bronx has been immortalized by one of the world's shortest
couplet A couplet is a pair of successive lines of metre in poetry. A couplet usually consists of two successive lines that rhyme and have the same metre. A couplet may be formal (closed) or run-on (open). In a formal (or closed) couplet, each of the ...
s: The Bronx No Thonx :
Ogden Nash Frederic Ogden Nash (August 19, 1902 – May 19, 1971) was an American poet well known for his light verse, of which he wrote over 500 pieces. With his unconventional rhyming schemes, he was declared by ''The New York Times'' the country's best ...
, ''
The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...
'', 1931
Nash repented 33 years after his calumny, penning in 1964 the following prose poem to the Dean of
Bronx Community College The Bronx Community College of the City University of New York (BCC) is a public community college in the Bronx, New York City. It is part of the City University of New York system. History The college was established in 1957 through the e ...
: I can't seem to escape the sins of my smart-alec youth; Here are my amends. I wrote those lines, "The Bronx? No thonx"; I shudder to confess them. Now I'm an older, wiser man I cry, "The Bronx? God bless them!" In 2016, W. R. Rodriguez published ''Bronx Trilogy''—consisting of ''the shoe shine parlor poems et al'', ''concrete pastures of the beautiful bronx'', and ''from the banks of brook avenue''. The trilogy celebrates Bronx people, places, and events.
DeWitt Clinton High School , motto_translation = Without Work Nothing Is Accomplished , image = DeWitt Clinton High School front entrance IMG 7441 HLG.jpg , seal_image = File:Clinton News.JPG , seal_size = 124px , ...
, St. Mary's Park, and Brook Avenue are a few of the schools, parks, and streets Rodriguez uses as subjects for his poems. Nash's couplet "The Bronx No Thonx" and his subsequent blessing are mentioned in ''Bronx Accent: A Literary and Pictorial History of the Borough'', edited by Llyod Ultan and Barbara Unger and published in 2000. The book, which includes the work of Yiddish poets, offers a selection from
Allen Ginsberg Irwin Allen Ginsberg (; June 3, 1926 – April 5, 1997) was an American poet and writer. As a student at Columbia University in the 1940s, he began friendships with William S. Burroughs and Jack Kerouac, forming the core of the Beat Gener ...
's ''
Kaddish Kaddish or Qaddish or Qadish ( arc, קדיש "holy") is a hymn praising God that is recited during Jewish prayer services. The central theme of the Kaddish is the magnification and sanctification of God's name. In the liturgy, different version ...
'', as his Aunt Elanor and his mother, Naomi, lived near Woodlawn Cemetery. Also featured is Ruth Lisa Schecther's poem, "Bronx", which is described as a celebration of the borough's landmarks. There is a selection of works from poets such as
Sandra María Esteves Sandra María Esteves (born May 10, 1948) is a Latina poet and graphic artist. She was born and raised in the Bronx, New York, and is one of the founders of the Nuyorican poetry movement. She has published collections of poetry and has conduct ...
, Milton Kessler, Joan Murray, W. R. Rodriguez, Myra Shapiro, Gayl Teller, and Terence Winch, Terence Wynch. "Bronx Migrations" by Michelle M. Tokarczyk is a collection that spans five decades of Tokarczyk's life in the Bronx, from her exodus in 1962 to her return in search of her childhood tenement.


Bronx Memoir Project

''Bronx Memoir Project: Vol. 1'' is a published anthology by the Bronx Council on the Arts and brought forth through a series of workshops meant to empower Bronx residents and shed the stigma on the Bronx's burning past. The Bronx Memoir Project was created as an ongoing collaboration between the Bronx Council on the Arts and other cultural institutions, including the Bronx Documentary film, Documentary Center, the Bronx Library Center, the (Edgar Allan) Poe Park Visitor Center, Mindbuilders, and other institutions and funded through a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. The goal was to develop and refine memoir fragments written by people of all walks of life that share a common bond residing within the Bronx.


Songs

* "Jenny from the Block" (2002) byJennifer Lopez, from the album ''This Is Me... Then, This is me...Then'' is specifically about the South Bronx, where Lopez grew up. * In Marc Ferris's 5-page, 15-column list of "Songs and Compositions Inspired by New York City" in ''The Encyclopedia of New York City'' (1995), only a handful refer to the Bronx; most refer to New York City proper, especially Manhattan and Brooklyn. Ferris's extensive but selective 1995 list mentions only four songs referring specifically to the Bronx: "On the Banks of the Bronx" (1919), by William LeBaron & Victor Jacobi; "Bronx Express" (1922), by Henry Creamer, Ossip Dymow & Turner Layton; "The
Tremont Avenue Tremont Avenue is a street in the Bronx, New York City. Its west end is at Sedgwick Avenue in Morris Heights, and its east end is at Schurz Avenue in Throggs Neck, running almost the entire width of the Bronx. Around 2009, part of East Tremon ...
Cruisewear Fashion Show" (1973), by Jerry Livingston & Mark David; and "I Love the
New York Yankees The New York Yankees are an American professional baseball team based in the New York City borough of the Bronx. The Yankees compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) East division. They are one ...
" (1987), by Paula Lindstrom.


Theater

Clifford Odets’s play Awake and Sing!, Awake and Sing is set in 1933 in the Bronx. The play, first produced at the Belasco Theater in 1935, concerns a poor family living in small quarters, the struggles of the controlling parents and the aspirations of their children. René Marqués La Carreta, The Oxcart (1959), concerns a rural Puerto Rican family who immigrate to the Bronx for a better life. A Bronx Tale (play), A Bronx Tale is an autobiographical one-man show written and performed by
Chazz Palminteri Calogero Lorenzo "Chazz" Palminteri (born May 15, 1952)
Chazzpalminteri.net. Retrieved on November 19, 2013.
is an American ...
. It is a coming-of-age story set in the Bronx. It premiered in Los Angeles in the 1980s and then played on Off-Broadway. After a film version involving Palminteri and Robert DeNiro, Palminteri performed his one-man show on Broadway and on tour in 2007.


See also

* Bronx Borough Hall * Bronx court system delays * List of counties in New York * List of people from the Bronx * National Register of Historic Places listings in the Bronx * Wildlife in the Bronx


References


Notes


Citations


Further reading


General

* * Briggs, Xavier de Souza, Anita Miller and John Shapiro. 1996. "CCRP in the South Bronx." Planners' Casebook, Winter. * Corman, Avery. "My Old Neighborhood Remembered, A Memoir." Barricade Books (2014) * Chronopoulos, Themis. "Paddy Chayefsky's 'Marty' and Its Significance to the Social History of Arthur Avenue, The Bronx, in the 1950s." The Bronx County Historical Society Journal XLIV (Spring/Fall 2007): 50–59. * Chronopoulos, Themis. "Urban Decline and the Withdrawal of New York University from University Heights, The Bronx." The Bronx County Historical Society Journal XLVI (Spring/Fall 2009): 4–24. * de Kadt, Maarten. ''The Bronx River: An Environmental and Social History.'' The History Press (2011) * DiBrino, Nicholas. ''The History of the Morris Park Racecourse and the Morris Family'' (1977) * Jackson, Kenneth T., ed. ''The Encyclopedia of New York City'', (Yale University Press and the New-York Historical Society, (1995) ), has entries, maps, illustrations, statistics and bibliographic references on almost all of the significant topics in this article, from the entire borough to individual neighborhoods, people, events and artistic works. * McNamara, John ''History In Asphalt: The Origin of Bronx Street and Place Names'' (1993) * McNamara, John ''McNamara's Old Bronx'' (1989) * Twomey, Bill and Casey, Thomas ''Images of America Series: Northwest Bronx'' (2011) * Twomey, Bill and McNamara, John. ''Throggs Neck Memories'' (1993) * Twomey, Bill and McNamara, John. ''Images of America Series: Throggs Neck-Pelham Bay'' (1998) * Twomey, Bill and Moussot, Peter. ''Throggs Neck'' (1983), pictorial * Twomey, Bill. ''Images of America Series: East Bronx'' (1999) * Twomey, Bill. ''Images of America Series: South Bronx'' (2002) * Twomey, Bill. ''The Bronx in Bits and Pieces'' (2007)


Bronx history

* Barrows, Edward, and Mike Wallace. ''Gotham: A History of New York City to 1898'' (1999) * * Federal Writers' Project. ''New York City Guide: A Comprehensive Guide to the Five Boroughs of the Metropolis: Manhattan, Brooklyn, the Bronx, Queens, and Richmond'' (1939
online edition
* Fitzpatrick Benedict. ''The Bronx and Its People; A History 1609–1927'' (The Lewis Historical Publishing Company, 1927. 3 volumes), Narrative history plus many biographies of prominent citizens * Gonzalez, Evelyn. ''The Bronx''. (Columbia University Press, 2004. 263 ), scholarly history focused on the slums of the South Bron
online edition
* Goodman, Sam. "The Golden Ghetto: The Grand Concourse in the Twentieth Century", ''Bronx County Historical Society Journal'' 2004 41(1): 4–18 and 2005 42(2): 80–99 * Greene, Anthony C., "The Black Bronx: A Look at the Foundation of the Bronx's Black Communities until 1900", ''Bronx County Historical Society Journal'', 44 (Spring–Fall 2007), 1–18. * Jackson, Kenneth T., ed. ''The Encyclopedia of New York City'', (Yale University Press and the New-York Historical Society, (1995) ), has entries, maps, illustrations, statistics and bibliographic references on almost all of the significant topics in this article, from the entire borough to individual neighborhoods, people, events and artistic works. * Jonnes, Jull. ''South Bronx Rising: The Rise, Fall, and Resurrection of an American City'' (2002
online edition


by David Gonzalez (journalist), David Gonzales, ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'', published and retrieved on September 19, 2008 * * * * * Rodríguez, Clara E. ''Puerto Ricans: Born in the U.S.A'' (1991
online edition
* Samtur, Stephen M. and Martin A. Jackson. ''The Bronx: Lost, Found, and Remembered, 1935–1975'' (1999
online review
nostalgia * Lloyd Ultan (historian), Ultan, Lloyd. ''The Northern Borough: A History Of The Bronx'' (2009), popular general history * Ultan, Lloyd. ''The Bronx in the frontier era: from the beginning to 1696'' (1994) * Ultan, Lloyd. ''The Beautiful Bronx (1920–1950)'' (1979), heavily illustrated * Ultan, Lloyd. ''The Birth of the Bronx, 1609–1900'' (2000), popular * Ultan, Lloyd. ''The Bronx in the innocent years, 1890–1925'' (1985), popular * Ultan, Lloyd. ''The Bronx: It Was Only Yesterday, "The Bronx: It Was Only Yesterday 1935–1965'' (1992), heavily illustrated popular history


External links


Bronx Borough President's Office
*


Newspapers


The Bronx Times Reporter

The Bronx Daily



The Hunts Point Express

The Mott Haven Herald

Norwood News

The Riverdale Press


Associations


The Bronx River Alliance

Bronx Council for Environmental Quality

Throggs Neck Merchant Association

The Bronx Market

The South Bronx Overall Economic Development Corporation

Bronx County, NY Website


History


City Island Nautical Museum

East Bronx History Forum



Museum of Bronx History

The Bronx County Historical Society

The Bronx: A Swedish Connection

Report of the Bronx Parkway Commission, December 31, 1918
retrieved on July 24, 2008
Remembrance of Synagogues Past: The Lost Civilization of the Jewish South Bronx
by Seymour Perlin, retrieved on August 10, 2008
Forgotten New York: Relics of a Rich History in the Everyday Life of New York City
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bronx, The The Bronx, Boroughs of New York City County seats in New York (state) Populated coastal places in New York (state) Populated places established in 1898 1898 establishments in New York City Majority-minority counties in New York Hispanic and Latino American culture in New York (state)