1. In 1932, construction began on Rockefeller Center in Midtown Manhattan. The project took over a decade to complete, and when it was finished, it was the largest privately funded development in history.

2. On August 3, 1984, the New York Mets retired the number 37 in honor of catcher Jerry Grote. Grote was a key player on the Mets team that won the World Series in 1969.

3. In 2003, the New York Times reported that the city's health department had discovered a new strain of drug-resistant tuberculosis. The outbreak was centered in Brooklyn, and over 400 people were infected before the disease was brought under control.

4. On August 3, 1949, the first televised baseball game was broadcast from Ebbets Field in Brooklyn. The Brooklyn Dodgers played the Cincinnati Reds, and the game was seen by only a few thousand viewers in the New York area.

5. In 1914, the first transcontinental phone line was completed, connecting New York City with San Francisco. The line required over 130,000 telephone poles and over 2 million miles of wire, and it revolutionized communication between the coasts.