History of New York City (1784–1854) as the financial and mercantile capital of the western hemisphere. The Great New York City Fire of 1845 destroyed 345 wooden buildings in the Financial District. The Hudson River Railroad (which grew into the New York Central) opened October 3, 1851; it extended the Mohawk and Hudson Railroad, the first railroad built in the state, south to New York City. The city and its nearby suburbs grew rapidly for several reasons. The natural harbor at the base of Manhattan, Brooklyn, and the New Jersey ports at Newark and Elizabeth provided almost unlimited capacity for trading ships and protection from storms.
New Jersey v. New York New Jersey v. New York New Jersey v. New York, 523 U.S. 767 (1998), was a United States Supreme Court case in which it was determined that roughly 90% of Ellis Island was part of New Jersey rather than New York. An interstate compact had been signed between New York and New Jersey in 1834, prior to Ellis Island becoming a major immigration center. This compact granted New York the rights to all islands in the water channel separating the two states including both Ellis Island and Liberty Island, but granting New Jersey the rights to half of the water