Albany is a city in Albany County, New York, United States. It is the capital of the state of New York and the county seat of Albany County. As of 2026, Albany had a population of 102,305 residents. The city, founded in 1614, is the oldest city in the state of New York.
Etymology
Albany was named after the Duke of Albany. The word Albany is derived from Alba, the Gaelic name for Scotland. When the city was founded, it originally bore the name Fort Orange.
History
Prior to European colonization, Albany was the home of the Mohawk people. Starting in the 1600s, the Dutch West India Company began to send explorers into the Hudson River Valley. Near the confluence of the Hudson and Mohawk rivers, the settlement of Fort Orange was founded in 1614.
In 1664, the settlement was ceased by the English. In the subsequent treaty, signed in 1674, all Dutch colonies in North America were ceded to the Kingdom of England. Albany officially gained a city charter in 1686.
During a visit to Albany in 1754, Benjamin Franklin proposed that all thirteen British colonies unite into one colony. This was the first time anybody suggested to form a union of colonies in British North America.
During the American Revolution, revolutinaries based in Albany took control of Albany County in 1775. On July 4, 1776, the United States declared independence from the British Empire. Philip Livingston, a resident of Albany, was one of the signers. Throughout the war’s duration both Loyalists and prisoners of war were imprisoned in the Albany’s jail. Eventually, after the British were defeated at Saratoga in 1777, Albany would not see any more fighting during the rest of the revolution.
Following the war, Albany’s population would grow due to an influx of new residents from Connecticut. In 1790, the city had a population of 3,498 people.
On November 17, 1793, 26 homes in Albany were destoryed in a fire. The fire was caused by three African slaves who would be charged with arson. They were sentenced to death and were hanged in 1794.
In 1797, Albany became the new capital of the state of New York, officially replacing New York City was the capital of New York. Albany is the second oldest capital city in America; only Santa Fe, the capital of New Mexico, is older.
Throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries, Albany would grow into a major city for Upstate New York. This was due to its location as a starting point for westward settlement within New York.
In 1942, Erastus Corning was elected the mayor of Albany. He would remain as Albany’s mayor until his death in 1983, serving 41 years in office. During Corning’s mayoralty, the city would grow in both population and in prosperity. Many new highways, houses, and even shopping malls were constructed in Albany during the 1960s and 70s.
Prior to the 1990s recession, Albany was the location of four companies listed in the Fortune 500. During the 1990s, localpolitics in the city changed. Eventually, the election of Jerry Jennings as mayor in 1994 ended the city’s longtime political machine, which began in the 1920s.
In both 1991 and 2009, Albany recived the All-American City award. In 2017, the Albany Convention Center opened after years of controversial delays. Today, Albany is home to various Fortune 500 companies, including Key Bank, General Electric, and American Express.