User:VanishedUser 23asdsalkaka/is stupid

The towns and cities of Downstate New York were created by the US state of New York as municipalities in order to give residents more direct say over local government. New York experimented with different types of municipalities before settling upon the current format of towns and cities occupying all the land in a county, and all previous forms were transformed into towns (or divided into multiple towns) in 1788 when all of the state of New York was divided into towns. Some early forms of government in earlier years included land patents with some municipal rights, districts, precincts, and boroughs. Present-day Westchester, Bronx, New York, Richmond, Kings, Queens, Nassau, and Suffolk counties were part of York Shire from 1664-August 1673 and again from February 1674 until 1683 at which point the Province of New York was divided into counties. From August 1673 to February 1674 New York was under Dutch control and English political units were suspended, then restored under English rule. York Shire was divided into three divisions called ridings, the East, West, and North ridings. In 1683 the state eliminated shires and ridings in favor of counties, the East Riding becoming Suffolk County, West Riding the counties of Richmond and Kings, while the North Riding as the counties of Westchester (including present-day Bronx), New York, and Queens (including present-day Nassau).

The following is a time-line showing the creation of the current towns from their predecessors stretching back to the earliest municipal entity over the area. The timelines only represent from which town(s) a particular town was created from and does not represent annexations of territory to and from towns that already existed. All municipalities are towns unless otherwise noted as patent, township, borough, district, or city.