A city opens its doors to the world: New York and the United Nations

Born from the ashes of the Second World War, the dream of a more peaceful and fairer world drew nations together in 1945 under a new vision for humanity: the United Nations.

Eight decades on, the aspiration for peace, dignity and equality still resonates as the UN marks 80 years of its existence in New York City - a place now inseparable from the organization's global identity…but not always destined to be its home.

Hunter (now Lehman) college in the New York borough of The Bronx was one of the UN's initial temporary headquarters and the location of the first UN Security Council meeting on US soil on 25 March 1946.

Where else has the Security Council met outside its current location?

The basketball gym at Hunter College was refurbished as the UN Security Council chamber in just three weeks. Journalists were accommodated in a converted swimming pool. One of the first issues the Council discussed was Iran.

Listen to audio from the first Security Council meeting at Hunter College.

Hunter College was never large enough to accommodate the UN staff needed to run the organization, not to mention the delegates from the then 51 countries or Member States of the United Nations, so a new temporary headquarters was established in a Second World War munitions factory at Lake Success on Long Island.

In 1946 - as is the case today - UN staffers came from a multicultural and international background. Newspaper reports marvelled at the uniqueness of seeing women in saris and men in traditional Thawb robes.

At Lake Success, meetings were recorded and broadcast globally, representing an unprecedented moment in worldwide broadcast history.

UN Radio was established in 1946 and an early interviewee was Eleanor Roosevelt (centre), a US delegate (and former First Lady of the United States) who was the driving force behind the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

World Radio Day is marked every 13 February - the day UN Radio first hit the airwaves, 80 years ago this year.

Watch here a UN video profile of Eleanor Roosevelt.

Soon the UN needed more space and a deal was struck to hold meetings of the General Assembly at the former World's fair site at Flushing Meadows in the New York borough of Queens. The Security Council and other UN activities remained at Lake Success.

Flushing Meadows was cold and windy, and it showed: delegates often wore coats inside. One usher appeared in a padded Mandarin coat, and Indian delegates added wool wraps over their saris. A UN nurse was on hand to treat many colds, proving that even world diplomacy had to brave a New York chill.

Despite the cold, Secretary-General Lie called the building and the surrounding park a powerful symbol of the warmth of the friendship between the UN and its host city.

Listen to Rula Hinedi, the chief of Guided Tours at the UN talk about Flushing Meadows.

A skating arena was converted into the General Assembly Hall which met there until 1950, by which time the UN had expanded to 60 Member States. (Today there are 193).

The logistics behind organizing international meetings of a scale never seen before fell to the staff of the UN Secretariat, the administrative and executive body of the UN which keeps the organization running.

Here, a UN staff member prepares the nameplates for the countries taking part in a UN General Assembly meeting at Flushing Meadow.

Behind the scenes, hundreds of communication and PR officers worked on making sure the issues debated in the General Assembly and Security Council reached the widest possible audience. Verbatim reports of meetings were compiled by press officers (pictured below) in English and French, the working languages of the UN and then distributed globally.

While the UN continued its work in Flushing Meadow, efforts were stepped up to find a permanent location for the world body.

New York City faced competition from Boston, Philadelphia, San Francisco and Fairfield County in the state of Connecticut as well as Westchester County in New York State.

A gift of $8.5 million from the American industrialist and probably the richest man in the world at the time John D Rockefeller, secured the 17-acre site that UN Headquarters currently occupies on the East River in Manhattan.

Here the then UN Secretary-General, Trygve Lie (centre) accepts the gift from John D Rockefeller Jr. (right) with the Mayor of New York City, William O'Dwyer, also in attendance.

Work began on clearing the site which 300 years previously had been a tobacco field but had most recently served as meat-packing warehouses.

A UN Radio reporter visited the site and interviewed a bystander:

What fascinates you about looking at this?

Bystander: I'm interested in these guys down here digging a hole.

Reporter: What is your feeling as a New Yorker, as an American, as a person who belongs to one of the nations of the United Nations. What is your honest, your candid feeling about the whole thing?

Bystander: I think it's pretty wonderful. I think if the United Nations works, it'll be the most wonderful thing that ever happened to us.

Reporter: I noticed that you qualified your statement. What do you think might make it not work?

Bystander: Only us, only people.

Reporter: That's the best answer I've ever had.

Listen to the interview here.

The construction of UN Headquarters in Manhattan led by an international team of renown architects including Le Corbusier and Oscar Niemeyertook about three years.

Staff began moving into the building in 1951 and when it was finally completed in 1952 there was office space for some 3,000 people.

The UN's relationship with New York City now stretches back 80 years and historian Chris McNickle says he has "no doubt that the United Nations is where it belongs.

"New York City is the great immigrant city of the world. It's a statement that the city makes that people from all walks of life, from all parts of the world, every race, every colour, every creed, every religion, that we can all work together and get along, and I think it remains true today."

Listen to the conversation here.

The US, a founding member of the UN, was a driving force behind the idea and the physical enactment of the organization.

US Ambassador Warren R. Austin, the chairman of the committee which was responsible for developing the UN campus said that the "United Nations is built upon principles that will outlast the steel and stone of any structure. The United Nations stands, held in God's law, as the foremost man-made instrument for the solution of problems and for unifying the peoples of the world."