Lexington Avenue is named after the Battle of Lexington in the Revolutionary War.
The avenue was not part of the 1811 street grid. In 1832 the lawyer and developer Samuel Ruggles petitioned the state legislature for a new avenue between Third and Fourth Avenues. Its northern section opened in 1836 and was named after the battle; the southern part he named Irving Place, after his friend Washington Irving. The station was formerly called simply Lexington Avenue.