Big Apple
"The Big Apple" was popularized as a name for New York City by John J. Fitz Gerald in a number of horse-racing articles for the "New York Morning Telegraph" in the 1920s. The earliest of these was a casual reference on 3rd May, 1921:
History of New York City (1898–1945)
The Great Depression, which was to affect the rest of the world, began with the Stock Market Crash of 1929. The recently completed Empire State Building would be known as the "Empty State Building" for many years because it could not attract sufficient tenants in the bleak business climate. When New York Governor Franklin Roosevelt became president, the Hooverville shacks named after his predecessor dotted city parks. The city became a showcase for New Deal spending, especially through the Public Works Administration and the Works Progress Administration. There were massive building projects including highways, bridges, public housing, new schools, and expansion of the Brooklyn Navy Yard.
Parkway planner Robert Moses took charge of building many bridges, parks, public housing units, and parkways with mainly federal money. Moses was a great proponent of automobile-centered modernism whose legacy of massive construction projects is still controversial. He opposed the massive subway expansions proposed in 1929 and 1939. However, the last large expansion of the subway system, combined with the merger of privately owned Interborough Rapid Transit and Brooklyn–Manhattan Transit subway companies with the city-owned Independent Subway System under city ownership, made the subway largely what it is today.