Taking Manhattan

Illustrated talk on the the birth of New York City, presented at the Museum September 28, 2025, by Russell Shorto, author of The Island at the Center of the World.

Hosted by HLFM director Pierce Rafferty

Russell introduces us to “Taking Manhattan” his new riveting narrative that chronicles the birth of New York City in 1664 after England decided to invade the Dutch-controlled city of New Amsterdam on Manhattan Island.

Bristling with vibrant characters, Taking Manhattan reveals the founding of New York to be an invention, the result of creative negotiations between Richard Nicholls, the military officer who led the threatening English flotilla, and Peter Stuyvesant, New Netherland’s canny director general. The New York that emerged from their peaceful talks blended the multiethnic, capitalistic society of New Amsterdam with the power of the rising English empire.

Russell Shorto is the director of the New Amsterdam Project at The New York Historical and senior scholar at the New Netherland Institute. He writes books of narrative history. His books have been published in fourteen languages and have won numerous awards. In 2009 Russell was given a knighthood by the Dutch government for advancing Dutch-American historical awareness. In 2018 he was inducted into the New York State Writers Hall of Fame. His work has been described as “astonishing” (New York Times) and “literary alchemy” (Chicago Tribune), has once again mined archival sources to offer a vibrant tale and a fresh and trenchant argument about American beginnings.