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 English New Jersey, plus Middlesex and Monmouth Counties. Therefore, the short-"a" system of these areas of New Jersey is most similar to the New York City split-"a" system, however with some variation. East of the Hackensack River, Labov finds the short-"a" system to occurs with no more variation than in New York City proper. However, west of the Hackensack River, he finds that the normal function word constraint of New York City English is lost and the open syllable constraint becomes variable. While most of the New York metropolitan dialect heard in New Jersey is rhotic, that of Newark and Jersey