The Ming Dynasty did not revolutionize

Chapter 428: Prosperity and Worry in New York
In the midsummer of the 29th year of Tiangong, a passenger ship carrying fifteen Ming princes arrived at New York City, the core city on the east coast of America.

According to the principles originally formulated by Zhu Jianxuan, early industrial areas were built as close to the seaside as possible to reduce pollution and damage to inland lakes.

With its superior geographical location and special status as a dominion of the United States, New York naturally became the industrial center of eastern America.

Especially after the completion of the Qinglong Lake Dam, the actual outlet of the Great Lakes water system became the Hudson River in New York City.

The vast inland space in the Great Lakes basin also directly became the inland hinterland of New York Port.

Ten thousand ton ships can enter the Great Lakes directly from New York.

New York's natural conditions on the east coast of America have gone from being relatively superior to being unique.

Meanwhile, on both sides of the Atlantic, New York holds a very special position.

New York is a city directly governed by Zhu Jianxuan, and Long Island is Zhu Jianxuan's private territory. It also has an inland hinterland directly governed by the Ming Dynasty court.

This is something that many cities in Europe and Africa do not have, so New York can get the highest level of policy support.

Most of the land along the Atlantic coast of Europe and Africa was under the jurisdiction of vassal states.

Although most areas of Linzhou are directly under the jurisdiction of the imperial court, the core area has been incorporated into the Ming court for very short time, only ten years.

Linzhou's industrial construction has just begun and is still in the stage of construction and accumulation of strength, and has not released its industrial production capacity.

At the same time, Linzhou's location on the world's shipping routes is relatively remote.

The east and west sides of America are Europe and the Ming Dynasty, while the east and west sides of Linzhou are only Africa and Australia, and the commercial potential is an order of magnitude different.

New York is not only a key route node in the Americas, but also a key route node between the Americas and Europe.

Therefore, the Ming Dynasty court directly stepped in to organize industrial infrastructure in the New York area by setting up state-owned factories in America.

It quickly laid the foundation for basic industries such as steel, machinery, shipbuilding, electrical appliances, textiles, furniture, clothing, fertilizers, and food.

New York's industrial products will not only be sold to other dominions in America, but also to inland areas around the Great Lakes.

The influence of some industries has even gone far beyond New York and the Americas, and is already able to supply users in Africa and Europe.

In particular, New York City's shipbuilding and shipping-related industries have formed a very complete and mature industrial chain.

Changdao Shipyard is the largest shipbuilding base outside the Ming Dynasty.

There is also a shipbuilding industry in Taiping Prefecture and Baihu Prefecture in the inland Americas, but the shipyards in inland cities mainly build special ships for inland rivers and lakes.

The New York City shipyard mainly builds large civilian ocean-going vessels.

Perhaps one-third of the civilian ships sailing on the Atlantic are produced by shipyards in New York and its surrounding areas.

Other industrial products from New York City also flowed into the hands of hundreds of millions of users on both sides of the Atlantic along with these increasing number of merchant ships.

Within the vast system of the Ming Dynasty, the development of New York City was many times faster than in history.

Over the past thirty years, New York has rapidly expanded from a small city with a population of only tens of thousands to a megacity with a population of more than two million.

Moreover, this population is still expanding rapidly, with no sign of where its upper limit will be in the future.

In Zhu Jianxuan's previous life, New York's population expanded rapidly at a terrifying rate of 100,000 people per year in the forty years from the late 19th century to the early 20th century.

In forty years, the population increased by nearly four million, which is extremely rare in human history.

New York City, now under the Meiji era, has entered this state of rapid expansion eighty years earlier than in history.

Anyone who comes to New York does not need to understand any profound economic knowledge, nor does they need to understand various data about New York City and its surrounding areas.

With just a short stroll around New York City, you can intuitively feel the city's surging and endless vitality.

New York is already very prosperous now, but it will definitely become more prosperous in the future.

The ever-expanding industrial and commercial industry has an almost endless ability to devour the population, constantly attracting all kinds of people from both sides of the Atlantic to come here to fight.

More than thirty years ago, before the great expansion of New York.

After Zhu Jianxuan took over the city of New York, he distributed land to the soldiers who followed him in New York, and personally allocated 100 acres of land to the soldiers who stayed in New York.

These soldiers witnessed New York's transformation from a small rural town into a megacity, and the ordinary rural land they originally owned was transformed into urban land where every inch of land is worth a lot of money.

The rapid expansion of the city, the rapid appreciation of urban land, and Zhu Jianxuan's special guidance meant that most of the original soldiers did not sell their land.

Rather, it is because we expect continued appreciation in the future, so we adopt the mentality of long-term stability and try to operate in the form of leasing as much as possible.

Unless you are in big trouble or need money urgently, you will not sell the land directly.

These soldiers are now in their fifties, and the officers are even older. They have long retired and become wealthy men.

They have a comradeship relationship, similar and close assets, highly convergent core interests, and naturally form interest groups.

In New York, an almost "new" city, these soldiers who have been here for more than 30 years have become "locals" of New York.

The tens of thousands of European immigrants who arrived earlier were marginalized during the urban expansion.

Because there were so many immigrants sent directly from the Ming Dynasty, New York quickly became a new city with a high degree of Ming Dynasty characteristics.

Although many European immigrants continued to arrive in America and New York was the preferred destination for European immigrants, the trend could not be changed.

In the 29th year of Tiangong, among the total population of more than two million in New York City, only a little more than a quarter were of European descent.

When the passenger ship carrying the princes entered the New York Bay, the nobles, officials, and more powerful businessmen living in New York City all received the news and came out to greet them.

Ordinary people also learned through newspapers that their emperor's sons were coming to visit New York.

The area around New York Bay, which was already very lively, has become even more lively in the past two days, with crowds of people everywhere inside and outside.

The bay is crowded with ships, the shore is crowded with buildings, the distance is crowded with chimneys, and the streets are crowded with pedestrians.

The sounds of ship whistles, train whistles, car horns, street broadcasts, and the noise of the crowd all mixed together in a mess.

These exceptionally rich images and sounds indicate that this is an exceptionally lively and vibrant modern city.

The eldest prince Zhu Jingkun stood in the cabin and looked at the scene on the shore through a telescope. Then he was quite surprised and exclaimed in his heart:
"This New York City looks more lively than Taiping Prefecture, and it's not much less lively than Guangzhou Prefecture in China." This may be because Taiping Prefecture is located deep inland, and some of the city's functions have been dispersed, with private industries placed in Yongxing Prefecture.

"Most of the various industries in Taiping City itself are run by the imperial court.

“It’s not like New York where everything is mixed together.”

Manhattan Island in the middle of New York Bay, sometimes simply called New York Island, belonged to New York County in the administrative divisions of the Ming Dynasty.

The prefecture to which New York County belongs was originally named Meiping Prefecture.

However, the seat of the Meiping Prefecture is in New York County, and New York's original urban built-up areas are all in New York County. The name New York County is more commonly used both officially and privately.

Later, both the official and private sectors simply called it New York City.

Zhu Jianxuan later built the royal palace in the front and central part of Manhattan Island. Subsequent New York government agencies and US government agencies were also built on Manhattan Island.

Ordinary residents on Manhattan Island were relocated to New Jersey on the other side of the island.

As for Long Island on the east side of Manhattan, it is the private territory of King Zhu Jianxuan and does not belong to the dominion of New York and New Jersey.

Most of the factories and businesses invested by the Ming Dynasty court and the Ming royal family later located their factories on Long Island, making it easier for the court to directly manage them without having to deal with the dominions.

Factories and businesses built in New York by private investors such as the Ming Dynasty, Europe, and local businessmen are mostly concentrated in New Jersey on the west side of New York Bay.

This arrangement lasted for thirty years, and New York City roughly formed an overall pattern of "officials in the east, people in the west, and the king's government in the center."

The passenger ship carrying the princes of the Ming Dynasty, led by Zhu Jingkun, docked at the Manhattan pier. Accompanied by local officials and nobles, they took cars to the Palace of the Kingdom of America.

After the princes arrived at the palace, the local officials and nobles dispersed to allow the princes to have a good rest before they would meet formally the next day.

The secretaries of the princes who were responsible for investigating the situation also left the palace to investigate the situation among the people.

At the very least, we should buy newspapers from the past few days so that the princes can read them at any time.

The next morning, after the princes got up for breakfast, they flipped through the newspapers brought back by their subordinates, and then they discovered something a little unexpected again.

There are two hotly debated issues in the Southern free states: increasing the freedom of the free states or converting them into dominions.

In various newspapers in New York City, it took on a completely different and highly specific form.

Support the transformation of Pennsylvania, Delaware, Connecticut, Rhode Island, and Massachusetts into dominions, or oppose their transformation into dominions.

It can be seen from this that the American Kingdom's imperial court, the American Legation Office, and the several free states mentioned in the newspapers are now seriously discussing this issue.

And overall there is more support because these free states are adjacent to New York and New Jersey, or are across the sea from them.

These neighboring regions have established very deep economic relations.

The two dominions of New York and New Jersey have different jurisdictions from these free states, which has led to various unnecessary troubles in cross-regional investment and construction issues.

Most of the businessmen in the relevant dominions and free states supported turning these free states into dominions to solve these problems.

There were relatively few voices of opposition, because of the concern that with the increase in the number of dominions, New York and New Jersey would lose their uniqueness and receive less support in the kingdom and the imperial court.

Concerned that Philadelphia and Boston would take away more investment and business opportunities from New York.

However, even the articles, whether supporting or opposing, did not have a good position in major New York newspapers, and the number of articles was not large.

In no way can it be compared with the situation in the Southern Dominions.

On the contrary, the visit of these princes to America was much more popular than any other topic and basically appeared on the front page headlines.

At the same time, this also led to other issues: the relationship between the American Kingdom and the American Legation, and the status of the American Kingdom within the Ming Empire.

The "America Residency" under the Ming Dynasty court was seen by ordinary people in the American free states and dominions as the court of the American Kingdom.

The concept of the "Great Ming American Kingdom" has been in normal use within the free states and dominions, as well as in the daily lives of local people.

"The Great Ming American Kingdom" is a concept in the public's perception, while "America Liaison Office" is a name used only by court officials.

Whether immigrants from the Ming Dynasty or from Europe, they are much more familiar with the concept of the Ming Dynasty American Kingdom than the American Liaison Office.

It’s just that the understanding of the concept of the Ming Dynasty American Kingdom in the minds of Ming Dynasty immigrants and European immigrants is different.

In the eyes of Ming Dynasty immigrants, the Ming Dynasty American Kingdom was a kingdom without a king, and ordinary people speculated whether there would be a prince to become the king in the future.

European immigrants believed that the King of the United States was concurrently the Emperor of the Ming Dynasty, but they also believed that the Emperor of the Ming Dynasty might arrange for a prince to succeed him.

Although only a quarter of New York's residents are of European descent, the number is over half a million, and there are even more Europeans in the neighboring free states.

The Ming Dynasty immigrants and European immigrants lived together for a long time, and their understanding of each other became deeper. The Ming Dynasty immigrants also gradually learned about the situation of multi-title monarchs in Europe.

Now both Ming Dynasty immigrants and European immigrants are worried because it has been nearly thirty years since the Ming Emperor ascended the throne and he has never come to America again.

This is understandable in Ming culture. The emperor rarely leaves the capital for inspection, which is a good thing that does not waste people's time and money.

But if the lord does not inspect the fiefdom at all, it will appear that he does not attach much importance to this fiefdom.

Although the Ming Dynasty court invested a lot in America, there has not been any trouble in America, but the outward attitude is equally important.

They feel uneasy when they seem to be ignored, and worry that the current situation cannot continue for long.

Now the emperor has arranged for the princes to tour North America, which has calmed the emotions a little, but it has also put the issue of arranging someone else to be king on the table.

This is where the problem lies. Arranging for the prince to be king, or even allowing him to stay in America and be king.

Is this a good thing or a bad thing for America, the American Empire, and the people of New York?
Someone wrote an article in the newspaper expressing concern that after America had its own king in the future, trade with the Ming Dynasty would be restricted.

The key is, how much ability can the person who becomes king have of the Emperor of the Ming Dynasty and the King of Justice?

Will he act recklessly in New York and America, making reckless reforms according to his immature ideas, and destroy New York's existing supreme prosperity?
All in all, New Yorkers are satisfied with the current situation in New York and are worried about future changes.

Whether it was the emperor's lack of attention, the changes in the prince serving as king, or the changes in the status of several surrounding free states.

(End of this chapter)