While one New York tree gets all the glory, we thought we put together a collection of some other archival Christmas Trees.

New York City has 520 miles of waterfront (which is more than Miami, Boston, Los Angeles, and San Francisco put together)! Situated on one of the world's largest natural harbors, with rivers that separate and surround its land, the waterways of the city have long played a major role in the development and growth of the city. The safe passage of goods, fuel, and passengers has always been of paramount importance and as such dozens of lighthouses have been erected on land and at sea, used to aid in maritime navigation. This lists highlights a few of historic lighthouses that have illuminated the waterways of the city.

Look at any view of New York’s waterfront before the mid-20th century and you’re likely to see a barge. Barges linked Manhattan and Long Island with the rest of the country’s rail network, which had no direct freight link across the lower Hudson or the harbor. Even today, freight trains must take a 300-mile detour across a bridge at Selkirk, near Albany, to get from Brooklyn to New Jersey. Instead, 2-3 times every weekday, freight cars roll-aboard barges called car floats (built for the Pennsylvania Railroad) to cross the harbor between Owls Head, Brooklyn, and Greenville, Jersey City, just as they have for more than 150 years. In addition to barges carrying entire train cars, this lighterage system had a whole set of barge cognates for rail cars. Every railroad that served New York had its own fleet. Written by Stefan D-W, Associate Archivist, the Seamen’s Church Institute & Museum Assistant, the Waterfront Museum.

Seamen's Church Institute, 1925. The Seamen's Church Institute was founded in 1834 by group of Episcopal men. Their original "building," constructed in 1844, was the Floating Church of Our Savior, a boat docked at Pike Street. This facility served to community of sailors that entered the city for some temporary amount of time from the seafaring life. The institute went through at least one other floating church and one other onshore structure before constructing their own 12-story building at 25 South Street in 1913. The building could house nearly 600 people and became a popular dormitory space for sailors and seamen. In the wake of the Titanic disaster, survivor, socialite, and philanthropist Molly Brown insisted on a memorial for the victims. Installed at the top of the new Seamen's Church Institute building in 1913, the 60-foot-tall (including the large spire) lighthouse was a memorial for the victims. For decades a ball was lowered at noon as a commemoration and for ships anchored in the harbor to set their clock by. In 1968 the Institute moved to a new building and 25 South Street was razed. The lighthouse was moved and reinstalled as part of the campus of the South Street Seaport Museum in 1976.

While New York does not have the real estate to devote to massive roadside attractions (think Palm Springs' dinosaurs, the Long Island's Big Duck, or a picnic basket-shaped building), it does have the perfect architectural feature for displaying weird and quirky attractions and advertisements: ROOFS. For more than a century New York building owner have looked up to their highest points as not just unusable real estate, but as the perfect location for signage, fabulous rooftop gardens, theatres, and the occasional giant jug of milk!

Explore a few special New York Harbor's lighthouses with us! We hope that this virtual tour will help you discover less familiar lighthouses, as well as learn the incredible stories of their long-term caretakers, and their continuing impact as icons of maritime heritage. For more stories on others New York Harbor lighthouses may be a bit more hidden, and less known visit our blog!

From its earliest days, New York has been a city in a hurry. But luckily, from hot dog carts to taco trucks, there have always been places to grab a bite on the go. This week we combed our archives for photos and history of street food in New York.