Named after John Jacob Astor, at one time the richest person in the United States.
Once known as Art Street, the street was renamed after Astor, who owned land here; his fortune came from the beaver-pelt trade. Some accounts date the change to soon after his death in 1848, but the Gotham Center gives 1840, and the Astor Place Opera House already bore the name when it opened in 1847. His bequest paid for the nearby Astor Library, opened in 1854.