The English took over of the area that had been called "New Netherland" in 1664, and renamed it New York to honor the Duke of York.

 The New York is home to the 6 million acre Adirondack Park, a preserve of public and private land, the largest outside of Alaska.
The Hudson and Mohawk River Valleys are a part of the Great Appalachian Valley, the route along which the Erie Canal was built to open westward
expansion across the Appalachian Mountain range.

Contrasting with New York City’s urban atmosphere, the vast majority of the state is dominated by farms, forests, rivers, mountains, and lakes.
Albany is known as the Cradle of the Union where the original plan for a central federal government with autonomous states was proposed.