Murray Hill is a neighborhood on the east side of Manhattan in New York City. Murray Hill is generally bordered to the east by the East River or Kips Bay and to the west by Midtown Manhattan, though the exact boundaries are disputed. Murray Hill is situated on a steep glacial hill that peaked between Lexington Avenue and Broadway. It was named after Robert Murray, the head of the Murray family, a mercantile family that settled in the area in the 18th century.

The Murray farm was formed before 1762 and existed until at least the early 19th century. Through the 19th century, Murray Hill was relatively isolated from the rest of New York City, which at the time was centered in Lower Manhattan. Murray Hill became an upscale neighborhood during the 20th century. Today, it contains several cultural institutions such as the Morgan Library & Museum, as well as missions and consulates to the nearby United Nations headquarters. The neighborhood also contains architectural landmarks, some of which are in the Murray Hill Historic District, a city and national historic district.

Murray Hill is part of Manhattan Community District 6, and its primary ZIP Codes are 10016 and 10017. It is patrolled by the 17th Precinct of the New York City Police Department.

Geography Murray Hill derives its name from Robert Murray (1721–1786), a Scottish-born merchant, whose family had a large estate in what is now the modern-day neighborhood.; The modern neighborhood was once an abrupt, steep-sided mound of glacial till typical of Manhattan Island's still-unmodified post-glacial terrain. It was described by one author as a "hill of the rudest and most heterogeneous mixture of stone and gravel and boulders, cemented together into a matrix of almost impenetrable density existed, crowning the underlying schist... It had a natural rise from 34th Street, sinking towards 42nd Street and reaching from Lexington Avenue to Broadway."L.P. Gratacap, Geology of the City of New York (New York, 1904), quoted in . The hill still exists, with an incline from 31st to 35th Streets, as well as a decline north of 37th Street.

During the 19th century, modern-day Murray Hill was "uptown" with the city ending with the reservoir at Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street covering what today is the New York Public Library Main Branch and Bryant Park. To the north was for the most part farmland. A stream called t'Oude Wrack (Dutch for "Old Wreck") ran across the area, emptying into Sunfish Pond, located at the present-day Park Avenue South and 31st Street in Kips Bay. The stream originated at what is now Broadway and 44th Street in the middle of Times Square. A glue factory polluted Sunfish Pond heavily during the 1820s; it was infilled in 1839 after most of its water was used to extinguish a fire at the New York House of Refuge.

Boundaries According to the Murray Hill Neighborhood Association (formerly the Murray Hill Committee), the neighborhood encompasses the 10016 zip code—bounded by 27th Street to the south, 40th Street to the north, Fifth Avenue to the west, and the East River to the east. By this definition, Murray Hill overlaps with Rose Hill, which is also known as Curry Hill and Little India. This section of Murray Hill was formerly also known as Little Armenia.

The New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission has described Murray Hill's boundaries as roughly 34th Street on the south, 40th Street on the north, Fifth Avenue on the west, and Third Avenue on the east. The city's Planning Department has described the boundaries as roughly 34th Street on the south, 40th Street on the north, Madison Avenue on the west, and Second Avenue on the east. Manhattan Community Board 6—of which Murray Hill is part—has defined the boundaries as 34th Street to the south, 40th Street to the north, Madison Avenue to the west, and the East River to the east. This definition explicitly excludes Tudor City, just north of 40th Street between First and Second Avenues, which the community board's chairman said in 2021 "is considered its own neighborhood".

For its entry on Murray Hill, the American Institute of Architects' AIA Guide to New York City uses the area bounded by 32nd Street to the south, 40th Street to the north, Madison Avenue to the west, and Third Avenue to the east. In AIA Guide, Murray Hill abuts Midtown to the north and west, Kips Bay to the east, and Rose Hill to the south. Robert A. M. Stern's book New York 1960 defined the area as being bounded precisely by 34th Street to the south, 42nd Street to the north, Fifth Avenue to the west, and Third Avenue to the east.

The New York Times states that commonly used boundaries of Murray Hill are 34th Street to the south, 42nd Street to the north, Madison Avenue to the west, and the East River to the east. Additionally, "the younger, more bar-centric area south of the neighborhood in the upper 20s and lower 30s" is sometimes held to be part of Murray Hill. Times architectural critic Herbert Muschamp, writing in 1997, said the Zagat Survey defined all of the area bounded by East 30th and 40th Streets between the East River and Fifth Avenue as part of Murray Hill. Summarizing the conflicting boundaries, Muschamp said that a then-recent survey of residents found many were unable to distinguish Murray Hill by its name.

History What is now Midtown Manhattan was first settled by the Munsee Native Americans. With European colonization in the 17th century, the site was called Belmont and was part of the common lands of New York City.

18th century Robert Murray (1721–1786) moved from Philadelphia to New York City in 1753. During that decade, he became a prosperous merchant, purchasing three vessels and obtaining an ownership stake in another. Murray had a townhouse on Pearl Street in Lower Manhattan, which was close to his wharf on the East River at Wall Street, as well as to his retail store.

Creation of Murray estate By the late 1750s, Murray was relatively successful and wished to build his own mansion. Before 1762, Murray had leased some land in a sparsely populated portion of Manhattan island for use as for his large house and farm. Murray's house was built on a since-leveled hill at what is today Park Avenue and 36th Street. The hill was named Inclenberg, or "fire beacon hill" in Dutch, referencing the fact that settlers of New Amsterdam used fire beacons to give notice of armed Native American groups. The Murray farm's total area was just under . The farm began a few feet south of modern-day 33rd Street and extended north to the middle of the block between 38th and 39th Streets., gives a northern boundary between 42nd and 43rd Streets. At the southern end, the plot was narrow, but at the northern end it extended from approximately Lexington Avenue to a spot between Madison and Fifth Avenues.

The great square house, west of the Eastern Post Road, was approached by an avenue of mixed trees leading from the road.Shown on a detail of the British Headquarters map, in . The orchards are shown behind the house to the north. It was flanked on three sides by verandas and contained apartments on either side of a large hall. The mansion was at approximately the present location of Park Avenue and 37th Street. Near the house were a barn, kitchen, and stable. The Murray farm was bounded to the north by Thomas Bridgen Atwood's farm, which was on the western side of the Eastern Post Road between modern-day 38th and 41st Streets, and to the east by Jacobus Kip's farm, along the eastern side of the same road from 28th to 39th Street extending to the East River.;

The site overlooked the East River and Kips Bay. Like the other grand projects created by distinguished residents upon Manhattan's prominent rises of ground, the Murray house was used for purposes other than farming. According to historians Edwin G. Burrows and Mike Wallace, while some of these farms were for-profit enterprises, "their primary purpose—besides providing refuge from epidemics—was to serve as theaters of refinement".. One descendant wrote that Robert Murray "entertained at various times almost every foreigner of distinction who came to the American shores". Early in 1773, and again in 1774, advertisements for the Inclenberg estate were circulated, positioning the house and farm as a summer mansion.

American Revolution and late century

During the American Revolutionary War, Mary Lindley Murray is credited with delaying William Howe and his army during General Washington's retreat from New York following the British landing at Kip's Bay, September 15, 1776. The most common version of the story is that Mrs. Murray invited the officers to teaPlying them with cakes and wine in earlier tellings, as reported in . and succeeded in delaying the British troops for a period sufficient to allow a successful American retreat.McCullough, David. "1776", p. 216. "In explanation, a romantic story spread – a story that would become legendary – that a Mrs. Robert Murray, a Quaker and an ardent patriot, had delayed William Howe and his generals by inviting them to afternoon tea at her country home at Inclenberg, later known as Murray Hill." The Rev. T. Dewitt Talmage said she saved American independence by detaining Lord Howe long enough to permit Israel Putnam to pass up the Greenwich road from the city and join the forces of George Washington in the north end of the island, before Howe was able to overtake him. The 3,500 men led by Washington were able to escape safely. James Thacher, a surgeon with the Continental Army, wrote in his journal: "It is a common saying among our officers that Mrs. Murray saved this part of the American army."

According to later scholarship, the Murrays did not have such a large influence on the landing at Kip's Bay as was portrayed in contemporary sources. One contemporary rumor posited that Mrs. Murray and her two daughters had used "feminine wiles" to convince the officers to stop by for tea. However, later scholarship stated that Howe had ordered his troops to stand down until all the British Army troops had landed at Kips Bay. According to these writers, it was unlikely that Mrs. Murray would have known that Putnam was escaping on Manhattan's west side, given that the farm was on the island's east side. Furthermore, Robert Murray traded with both Continental and British Army soldiers. Nevertheless, the Murrays' actions during the war inspired at least two Broadway shows.; The Daughters of the American Revolution placed a plaque in 1926 near the site of the Murray mansion, commemorating the family's wartime actions.

From 1776 to 1783, when the British Army occupied New York, British soldiers often visited Inclenberg. After the end of British occupation, the Murray family was associated with unpatriotic acts during the war, and one son, Lindley Murray, moved to England. Robert Murray died in 1786 and bequeathed different portions of his estate to his five children. His daughter Susannah was bequeathed the farm, along with some lots in Gold Street in Lower Manhattan. Her husband Gilbert Colden Willett, once a Loyalist general in the Revolutionary War, jointly ran Willett & Murray with Susannah's uncle John Murray. Willett bought the farm from the New York City government in 1799 for 907 pounds. His business shuttered the next year and, as part of the bankruptcy settlement, John Murray bought the farm from the Willetts.

19th century

Initial development