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Along with Lower Manhattan’s wealth of dining, shopping and nightlife options—not to mention beautiful hotels—visitors to the neighborhood can take the time to discover the area’s heritage sites. In the early 1600s the Dutch established New Amsterdam here (back then, Lower Manhattan was the capital of New Netherland) because it was prime real estate for trade and defense. In the years since, the neighborhood has variously been where George Washington was inaugurated, one of battlegrounds where Americans fought for the fledgling city against the British and, of course, the seat of American finance. Through a variety of tours, visitors and residents can explore the area where small settlements took root and eventually expanded into the bustling five boroughs we know today.

Fast-forward from the New Amsterdam settlements to more than a century later—the colonists have won the American Revolutionary War, and General George Washington bids his officers adieu at Fraunces Tavern. Those glory days are evocatively revisited at the Fraunces Tavern Museum. To continue the immersion into that era of American history, visitors can grab a bite to eat and raise a glass to George and his men in the tavern itself.


Patriot Tours, a company that loyally leads visitors and residents through Lower Manhattan's history every day, stops at Fraunces Tavern and other seminal locations on its expeditions devoted to the Revolutionary War and History Highlights. The company also features tours dedicated to the Civil War and Lower Manhattan architecture. (If you're meeting your guide at New York's City Hall, the oldest city hall in the United States still housing its original government functions, look across Broadway to admire the Woolworth Building, one of NYC's first skyscrapers, and still one of its tallest.) Another tour company, Beyond Times Square, brings tour takers to Federal Hall National Memorial, the site of Washington's inauguration and the iconic statue crafted in his honor, and The Battery, where British troops based their artillery batteries and then eventually departed from American soil. Another location to explore in this area is Castle Clinton, a fort built to defend New York during the War of 1812.
 For those who prefer to trace the City's—and the country's—emergence as a financial powerhouse, Wall Street Walks offers tours covering everything from Lower Manhattan's prosperous beginnings as a Dutch trading post to the stock market's most shocking crashes.


The National Museum of the American Indian, housed in a Beaux-Arts building that was originally the US Custom House, is the starting point for a number of great downtown tours. Among them is one from Big Onion Walking Tours, whose name harkens back to a moniker for NYC from its pre–"Big Apple" days. The company's Historic Lower Manhattan tour stops at Trinity Church, a towering Gothic Revival/neo-Gothic building that was once one of the tallest structures in the area. If churches are a draw for you, don't miss St. Paul's Chapel, a few blocks away. Part of the Trinity Church parish, this chapel was (somewhat unbelievably) located outside the City's boundaries when it was built, a testament to how much NYC has grown from its diminutive origins. St. Paul's was the house of worship that Washington himself attended.

Of course, Lower Manhattan was also the site of a more somber piece of history. The National September 11 Memorial & Museum at the World Trade Center is scheduled to open on September 11, 2011. Until then, there's free admission to the 9/11 Memorial Preview Site, where the public can learn more about the memorial and museum and view ongoing construction at the World Trade Center site. The memorial will honor the nearly 3,000 people who died in the attacks on February 26, 1993, and September 11, 2001 (including those who were killed in Pennsylvania and at The Pentagon).

The City has a rich history of architecture, and The Municipal Art Society of New York focuses on that aspect of NYC lore. The society's weekly Downtown: Where New York Began tour gives guests an informed and up-close view of Lower Manhattan's many structural marvels. After the tour, architecture aficionados will also want to explore South Street Seaport, where they can get a glimpse of some of the oldest still-standing buildings in the City, which were saved from demolition in the '60s. The South Street Seaport Museum, meanwhile, explores New York's storied relationship with the sea. After the journey concludes, soak up the Seaport's vibrant atmosphere, complete with more than enough shopping, restaurants and live music to make a day of it.