III.

History

The village of Nieuw Haarlem (named for Haarlem, the Netherlands) was established in 1658 by the Dutch governor Peter Stuyvesant. In 1776, during the American Revolution, the Battle of Harlem Heights was fought in the vicinity. The community grew as a suburb of New York City from about 1830 and by the 1880s was a fashionable residential area. From about 1900 through World War I (1914-1918) it developed as a black population center. By the 1920s it had become the center of a black literary and intellectual movement known as the Harlem Renaissance.

By the end of World War II (1939-1945) housing conditions had deteriorated; today the community contains extensive slum areas as well as newer housing developments, a large state office building, and blocks of renovated brownstone houses. An economic revival in Harlem began during the 1990s, spurred by federal funding. New businesses opened and affluent, middle-class residents flocked to the neighborhood. As the city’s real estate market boomed, Harlem’s historic brownstones became highly desirable. After leaving the White House in 2001, President Bill Clinton opened an office in Harlem.