Yonkers, New York Population 2024

Yonkers is located in Westchester County, New York on the Hudson River. This inner suburb of New York City is located just north of the Bronx and Manhattan. Yonkers is the fourth largest city in New York after New York City, Rochester, and Buffalo.

Diversity

Like New York City, Yonkers is an incredibly diverse city with 31% of residents born outside of the United States and 46% of households speaking a language other than English at home. The city has residents from more than 100 nationalities and ethnicities.

Hispanics represent a large share of the population, especially those from Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic. Yonkers is also home to a prominent African-American community, a Slavic community that dates back to the mid-20th century when many people immigrated from Croatia, Russia, Czechoslovakia, Ukraine, and Poland; a large Italian-American community, and an Irish-American community. There is also a sizable Arab population in Yonkers, many of whom came from Palestine, Lebanon, and Jordan. Yonkers once had a large Jewish population but its size has reduced over the last few decades.

Yonkers also has a young population with 25% of Yonkers residents under the age of 18.

Yonkers was originally part of a large land grant known as Colen Donck that ran from the Manhattan-Bronx border to the north and from the Bronx River to the Hudson River. In 1645, the land was granted to Adriaen van der Donck who was known in the area as the Jonker or Jonkheer, a derivation of the old Dutch words for young and lord. The name Yonkers is derived from the name.

Yonkers was a small farming community on the waterfront for more than 200 years. By the 19th century, it became a center for developing industry. Yonkers was incorporated first as a village in 1854 then as a city in 1872. Just two years later, a section of Yonkers was annexed by New York City and became the Bronx. Yonkers voted to remain independent and not consolidate with New York City although residents still call it the Sixth Borough of New York City thanks to its urban atmosphere and nearby proximity.