Times Square Ball

The tradition of the New Year's Eve ball drop began in 1907 as a direct alternative to the fireworks displays previously held at the site. Adolph Ochs, the owner of The New York Times, sought a new way to draw attention to the newspaper's headquarters at One Times Square after city officials banned the pyrotechnics. He commissioned a young immigrant metalworker named Jacob Starr to build a five-foot-wide sphere made of iron and wood, adorned with one hundred incandescent light bulbs. This initial design was inspired by maritime time balls used by ship captains at observatories to synchronize their chronometers for navigation.