
NEW YORK: Despite its modern lack of either greenery or open space, downtown Manhattan was, as recently as the 19th century, part farmland. Construction workers stumbled across a site from that time—a wall and well that were once part of the farm of Stephanus van Cortlandt, the city's first native-born mayor, and his descendants. Among other artifacts, archaeologists found a pipestem, pottery and stoneware, and a yellow ceramic bird's head, all likely from the 18th century.