Schenectady, city, seat (1809) of Schenectady county, east-central New York, U.S., on the Mohawk River and New York State Canal System. With Albany and Troy, it forms an urban-industrial complex. Founded as a Dutch settlement in 1662, it took its name from the nearby Mohawk village of Schaunactada, probably meaning “over,” or “across the pine plains.” In 1690 the village was virtually destroyed in the Schenectady Massacre by the French and Indians. With an influx of English settlers in the early 1700s the site (above a series of waterfalls) was fortified and developed as the terminus of the portage between Albany, on the Hudson, and the Mohawk. The prosperous transshipment business declined after 1825 with the opening of the Erie Canal. Economic recovery for the city was stimulated by the arrival of the Mohawk and Hudson Railroad in 1831 and the establishment of a locomotive works in 1848.
In 1886 the Edison Machine Works were moved from New York City to Schenectady, and by a series of mergers in 1892 the General Electric Company was created with its main administrative offices in the city. Later, plants manufacturing a wide range of electrical equipment and experimental laboratories, eventually including nuclear research centres, were established. Chemicals are also manufactured. Union College of Union University was founded (1795) in Schenectady and includes the 16-sided Nott Memorial building and Jackson’s Garden on its 100-acre (40-hectare) campus. Schenectady County Community College of the State University of New York system was established in 1967. The city’s colonial past survives in its downtown Historic Stockade area. Inc. borough, 1765; city, 1798. Pop. (2000) 61,821; Albany-Schenectady-Troy Metro Area, 825,875; (2010) 66,135; Albany-Schenectady-Troy Metro Area, 870,716.