Marble Hill, Manhattan

Marble Hill
Neighborhood of Manhattan
An overview of Marble Hill, seen from the west. The John F. Kennedy Educational Campus can be seen in the foreground, and the rest of the neighborhood is in the center. The Bronx is in the background.
Marble Hill Show map of New York City Marble Hill Show map of New York Marble Hill Show map of the US Location in New York City
Coordinates: 40°52′34″N 73°54′40″W / 40.87611°N 73.91111°W / 40.87611; -73.91111Coordinates: 40°52′34″N 73°54′40″W / 40.87611°N 73.91111°W / 40.87611; -73.91111
Country	United States
State	New York
City	New York City
Borough	Manhattan
Founded	1891
Named for	Local deposits of dolomite marble quarried for Federal buildings in lower Manhattan when New York was the Capital of the United States in the 1780s.
Area
• Total	0.38 km2 (0.145 sq mi)
Population (2010)
• Total	9,481
• Density	25,000/km2 (65,000/sq mi)
Economics
• Median income	$44,096
ZIP code	10463
Area code	718, 347, and 646

Marble Hill is the northernmost neighborhood in the New York City borough of Manhattan. It is the only Manhattan neighborhood on the mainland of North America. Marble Hill was occupied as a Dutch colonial settlement in 1646, and gained its current name in 1891 because of marble deposits underneath the neighborhood.

Politically a part of Manhattan and New York County, Marble Hill became an island in the Harlem River when it was separated from the island of Manhattan by the construction of the Harlem Ship Canal in 1895. In 1914, the Harlem River was filled in on the north side of Marble Hill, connecting it to the North American mainland and the Bronx. Because of this change in geography, Marble Hill is often associated with the Bronx and is part of two of the latter's Community Board Districts.

Marble Hill has been occupied since the Dutch colonial period. On August 18, 1646, Governor Willem Kieft, the Dutch Director of New Netherland, signed a land grant to Mattius Jansen van Keulan and Huyck Aertsen. This grant had comprised the whole of the present community. Johannes Verveelen petitioned the Harlem authorities to move his ferry from what is now the East River and 125th Street to Spuyten Duyvil Creek because the creek was shallow enough to wade across, thus providing a means of evading the toll. The ferry charter was granted in 1667. Many settlers circumvented the toll for the ferry by crossing the creek from northern Marble Hill to modern Kingsbridge, Bronx, a point where it was feasible to wade or swim through the waters. In 1669 Verveelen transplanted his ferry to the northern tip of Marble Hill, at today's Broadway and West 231st Street.