When people from far outside from here think of the state of New York, the idea of skyscrapers and concrete usually come to mind.
Surely, people all over tend to generalize a place by its most noted locale – it’s likely people from New York think that everyone in Iowa is a farmer. But I think New York suffers from it more. Not only is New York, New York the largest city in the country, the “it’s so nice they named it twice” phenomenon really locks it in.
Not only that, many of our favorite songs about New York from the ILoveNY website are about NYC, and they’re not even including songs from Frank Sinatra or Daryl Hall.
One expects “finance, insurance, and real estate” to “comprise New York’s most important service industry group and New York City is the prime driver in this area. New York City is the nation’s leading financial center, home to the New York Stock Exchange.”
One knows about the various art museums, the United Nations, the Empire State Building, Coney Island, and the like. (Here’s an NYC story about when pinball was illegal.)
However, New York has a lot of territory north of the Bronx. The Adirondack Mountains region, “encompassing one-third of the total land area of New York State,” has 46 rugged peaks, and is known for “extensive wild landscapes, which includes tracts of an old-growth forest; wildflowers abound, and hundreds of species of shrubs, herbs, and grasses may be encountered in a day’s outing.”
Letchworth State Park, “renowned as the ‘Grand Canyon of the East,’ is one of the most scenically magnificent areas in the eastern U.S.” I’m hoping to visit there this year for the very first time.
Seneca Falls is the birthplace of the Women’s Rights Movement.
Cooperstown not only has the Baseball Hall of Fame but two other museums, all of which I have visited more than once.
New York is also an agricultural state. Among the 50 states, our rankings:
* Apples – 2nd
* Wine and juice grapes – 3rd
* Fresh Market vegetables – 6th
* Processing vegetables -5th; leading crops are cabbage, sweet corn, and onions.
* Field Crops – “New York produces a variety of field crops largely in support of its dairy industry. Corn, oats, and wheat are most widely grown with soybeans steadily increasing importance. NY is 3rd in corn silage.
* Milk and dairy production – 4th. “Dairy Milk is New York’s leading agricultural product and is produced all across the state. Milk sales account for over one-half of total agricultural receipts.”
* Duck meat and duck – 5th
* Maple syrup – 2nd
