Welcome to From the Seaport to Silicon Alley: A History of Technology in NYC, 1820-2000, an online exhibit produced by the Archivists Round Table of Metropolitan New York, Inc. (ART) to celebrate New York Archives Week 2000. ART considers this initiative, one of the first joint virtual exhibits by a professional archives organization in the United States, a work in progress. We hope to update this exhibit throughout 2001.

As a major commercial, industrial and transportation center, New York has been the stage for technological innovations that have had a significant impact on the rest of America and the world. As New York developed into a sophisticated city, so did its systems of transportation, financial markets, medical fields, communication technologies, utility departments, and engineering designs.

This exhibit highlights nineteenth- and twentieth-century technological innovations developed and uniquely applied by institutions in the New York metropolitan area, which have had a profound impact on people’s lives or on industry locally, nationally, and internationally.

By tapping the rich archival resources in the New York City area, we have highlighted some of the major technological innovations using prints, lithographs, drawings, and photographs. The exhibit includes approximately 60 images collected from 26 different archival repositories throughout the metropolitan area, which are listed in the Acknowledgements section of the exhibit. The materials are arranged into six major categories, which include communications/media, engineering, finance, medicine/scientific research, transportation, and utilities.