Thursday, December 31, 2020

The First Times Square New Year's Eve on This Day in History

 

Times Square NYE 2019 - New York's Last Good Year

Today in History: The first New Year's Eve (NYE) celebration is held in Times Square (then known as Longacre Square) in Manhattan on this day in 1907. Tonight they will still drop the ball, but you're not allowed to be there to watch it, which would make it the first time since 1907 that throngs of people would not gather in Midtown.

There will be live performances, and “Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve with Ryan Seacrest 2021,” will air live from Times Square on ABC...but nobody will be allowed there to witness it all.

The ball drop was suspended in 1942 and 1943 during World War II, but many still gathered in Times Square and marked the new year with a minute of silence. 

Think about this: During the very deadly Spanish Flu, people were not stopped from going to Times Square on NYE...in fact it was the first time they had rain during that Times Square celebration. Times Square on NYE was also not shut down during the Asian Flu nor the Hong Kong Flu.

On an interesting side-note: The ball in Times Square weighs 11,875 pounds, contains 32,256 LED lights, and is made up of 2,688 Waterford crystals, and it cost more than a million dollars.


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