Seneca Village was the largest African American landowning community in New York City until it was destroyed to build Central Park. Although it has largely been overlooked, Seneca Village reframes the early history of American capitalism at the intersection of race, freedom, and urban development, diversifying the narrative to place African American city-dwellers as actors at the center of the narrative. Real estate capitalism made Seneca Village possible, with residents using it as a means to social, political, and economic advancement, but it also destroyed Seneca Village. That paradox reveals how an emerging American urban commercial capitalism consolidated power in places Seneca Villagers could not access even when they tried. These men and women played critical, yet unacknowledged, roles as the whole nation struggled to navigate multiple visions of capitalism, their inherent inequalities, and their implications for the future.

塞内卡村（Seneca Village）是纽约市最大的非洲裔美国人土地拥有社区，直到被摧毁以建造中央公园为止。尽管塞尼卡村在很大程度上被忽略了，但它在种族，自由和城市发展的交汇处重塑了美国资本主义的早期历史，使叙事多样化，使非裔美国城市居民成为叙事的中心。房地产资本主义使塞内卡村成为可能，居民将其用作促进社会，政治和经济发展的手段，但它也摧毁了塞内卡村。这种悖论揭示了新兴的美国城市商业资本主义如何巩固了塞内卡村民即使尝试也无法获得的权力。这些男人和女人扮演着批判但未被承认的角色，