Did you know Quarantine is from an Italian word Quaranta meaning 40? In the following video, you can learn why quarantine means 40 and the quarantine history in the US and see some old footage of New York City.
Tag: history
Why is Bluetooth called Bluetooth?
The Man Behind the Tooth
Surprisingly, the name dates back more than a millennia to King Harald “Bluetooth” Gormsson who was well known for two things:
1. Uniting Denmark and Norway in 958.
2. His dead tooth, which was a dark blue/grey color, and earned him the nickname Bluetooth.
from Bluetooth
Click here to read more!
Why The Bronx?
There are five boroughs in New York City: Manhattan (New York County), Brooklyn (Kings County), Queens (Queens County), Staten Island (Richmond County), and The Bronx (Bronx County). Have you ever wondered why The Bronx has “The” in the name while the other boroughs don’t?
It all started in 1639 when a Scandinavian, Jonas Bronck, settled in a Dutch colonial province in New Netherland.
“When he dies in 1643 at the age of 43, the only thing that remained that was named after him through the ages was Bronck’s River,” says Bronx borough historian Lloyd Ultan.
Like with many names that can be difficult to say or write, the ‘ck’ was changed to an ‘x’—and the stream of water that ran next to Jonas Bronck’s farm became the Bronx River.
But the present day borough went without a name for more than 200 years until New York City got the land from Westchester County.
“They looked right smack in the middle of a map and there is the Bronx River, so they named it after the river, the borough of the Bronx, and that’s why it’s always called The Bronx and not just plain Bronx,” Ultan says.
The borough is named after the river. That’s named after the man that came from a foreign land in the 17th century.
from Spectrum News NY1
Click here to read more!
Keep Calm and Carry On
Image via: https://i.pinimg.com/originals/9a/eb/10/9aeb10c38a0272acfff46f8f1fbd9530.jpg
Have you ever wondered where the popular “Keep Calm and Carry On” phrase originated from when you saw the phrase or other funny memes derived from it? Here is a funny yet educational video explaining where it is from. Keep Calm and Learn English while watching the video whether it is true or not!
Manahatta to Manhattan
Here’s a great reading booklet from the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian about the first New Yorkers…
The Lenape, Manhattan’s original inhabitants, called the island Manahatta, which means “hilly island.”
Rich with natural resources, Manahatta had an abundance of fruits, nuts, birds, and animals. Fish and shellfish were plentiful and the ocean was full of seals, whales, and dolphins. Migrant birds flew to local marshes based on the available food supply or weather conditions.
The body of water off the coast of Lower Manhattan is an estuary, a place where saltwater from the Atlantic Ocean mixes with freshwater from the Hudson River. Estuaries are particularly good places for wildlife to live.
The Lenape called the Hudson River Shatemuc, meaning “the river that flows both ways,” because the river alternates its flow from north to south along with the Atlantic tides. Shatemuc was an important water route for the Lenape who traded with other Native people living in villages along its banks.
To read more, click here.
Before Columbus
Most people believe Christopher Columbus was the first European to reach America. They’re wrong! Here’s an article from History.com which explains:
Nearly 500 years before the birth of Christopher Columbus, a band of European sailors left their homeland behind in search of a new world. Their high-prowed Viking ship sliced through the cobalt waters of the Atlantic Ocean as winds billowed the boat’s enormous single sail. After traversing unfamiliar waters, the Norsemen aboard the wooden ship spied a new land, dropped anchor and went ashore. Half a millennium before Columbus “discovered” America, those Viking feet may have been the first European ones to ever have touched North American soil.
Click here to read more!
Get to Know U.S.
For those of you who are new to our program, here’s a short history of our organization. After you finish reading, take the quiz to test your comprehension!
A Short History of University Settlement
The settlement movement was a social movement beginning in the 1880s with the goal of helping poor people. It started in London, England, and its main object was the establishment of “settlement houses” in poor urban areas. These houses offered food, shelter, and education.
The first settlement house in the United States was University Settlement Society of New York, founded in 1886 by Stanton Coit. It is located at 184 Eldridge Street on New York’s Lower East Side. It provides many services for the mostly immigrant population of the neighborhood.
In 1886, on the Lower East Side, more than 3,000 people lived in a single square block. The tenement buildings of the area normally had four apartments on each floor; a typical apartment had one small room that might house a family of five or more.
Immigrants not only lived in bad conditions, but worked in bad conditions as well. Most of them worked in the garment industry. Working for very low wages in crowded, uncomfortable, dangerous sweatshops, they produced half of the clothing sold in the United States.
When it first began, University Settlement served as a home for immigrants who arrived in the United States. It provided courses for new immigrants on everything from politics to the English language to basketball. The University Settlement House also included a library, kindergarten, and bath house.
During his presidency, Franklin D. Roosevelt described University Settlement as “a landmark in the social history of the nation.” His wife, Eleanor Roosevelt, volunteered at University Settlement when she was a young woman. She began her work as a teacher of dance and calisthenics, a way to use physical exercise and movement to improve health after long hours of work in a confined space.
University Settlement continues to provide support services to residents of the Lower East Side, and now offers programs in 21 locations across Manhattan and Brooklyn. Programs serve New Yorkers of all ages and include child care, pre-school, housing assistance, mental health services, college and career preparation, crisis intervention, activities for seniors, arts events, English classes, after-school programs, and summer camps.
To visit the official University Settlement website, click here.
