Schenectady County, NY
| Schenectady County, New York | ||
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The Nott Memorial
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 Location in the U.S. state of New York |
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 New York's location in the U.S. |
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| Founded | 1809 | |
| Seat | Schenectady | |
| Largest city | Schenectady | |
| Area | ||
| • Total | 209 sq mi (541 km2) | |
| • Land | 205 sq mi (531 km2) | |
| • Water | 4.9 sq mi (13 km2), 2.3% | |
| Population | ||
| • (2010) | 154,727 | |
| • Density | 757/sq mi (292/km²) | |
| Congressional district | 20th | |
| Time zone | Eastern: UTC-5/-4 | |
| Website | www |
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Schenectady County (/skəˈnɛktədi/) is a county located in the U.S. state of New York. As of the 2010 census, the population was 154,727. The county seat is Schenectady. The name is from a Mohawk language word meaning "on the other side of the pine lands," a term that originally applied to Albany.
Schenectady County is part of the Albany-Schenectady-Troy, NY Metropolitan Statistical Area, and is located west of the confluence of the Mohawk with the Hudson River. It included territory on both the north and the south sides of the Mohawk River.
This area of the river valley was historically occupied by the Mohawk people, the easternmost of the Five Nations comprising the Iroquois Confederacy or Haudenosaunee. They cultivated maize fields in the flats along the Mohawk River and had villages in the hills.
European settlement started in the present-day county by Dutch colonists in the 17th century; the village of Schenectady was founded in 1661. The fur traders in Albany kept a monopoly and prohibited settlers in Schenectady from the trade; those residents mostly became farmers. Other areas of the county were also developed for farming. The English enforced the Albany monopoly on the fur trade when they took over the New Netherland colony in 1664.
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