In a normal year, over 1 million people pack into New York City's Times Square to revel in the new year. This year, however, the event is going virtual.
2021 marks the 114th anniversary of the ball drop, the tradition of watching a glowing ball — technically it's an icosahedral geodesic sphere— slide down a pole until midnight.
Take a look at how the celebration has evolved since the first ball drop in 1907.
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Time balls like the one dropped on New Year's Eve have been around long before the Times Square celebration.
Time balls have been used to show the passing of time since long before the first New Year's Eve celebration in Times Square.
The first time ball was installed on the roof of Flamsteed House at the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, in England in 1833, according to the Times Square ball's website. It falls every day at 1 p.m. and was created so the captains of naval ships could accurately set their chronometers and also so that people could accurately set their watches.
New Year's celebrations in Times Square began in 1904.
In the early years, crowds gathered in Times Square to celebrate the new year, but it wasn't until 1907 that the ball officially started making its slow drop from the flagpole atop One Times Square.
New York had its first ball drop in 1907; the 700-pound ball had 100 bulbs, was made of iron and wood, and appeared every year until 1920.
In 1904, Adolph Ochs, publisher of The New York Times — for which Times Square is named after — planned a New Year's Eve party featuring fireworks in an attempt to lure revelers away from Wall Street where they rang in the new year with the ring of Trinity Church's bells, according to The New Yorker. Three years later when Ochs couldn't secure a permit for fireworks, he had the first New Year's Eve ball created and the tradition has stuck ever since.
There have been seven versions of the New Year's Eve ball. In 1920, the second version of the ball was introduced.
The new 1920 ball weighed 400 pounds and was made completely of wrought iron. It didn't feature any of the flashy decorations synonymous with today's New Year's ball.
As the grandeur of the celebration grew, so did the crowd.
Over the next few decades, the number of spectators swelled. This was the crowd of about 500,000 people ringing in the new year in 1940.
When the US entered World War II, the fire department started ramping up security. Because of wartime blackouts, 1942 and 1943 were the only two years without ball drops.
Instead of a ball drop, crowds gathered in 1942 and '43 rang in the New Year with a minute of silence followed by the sound of chimes played from a sound truck at the base of the Times Tower, a nod to the original New Year's celebration at Trinity Church.
As televisions became more mainstream in the 1960s, people began tuning in to watch the city's celebration.
Thousands more citizens across the US would begin watching the Times Square celebration in 1972 thanks to the inaugural installation of "Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve."
It's estimated that about 1 billion people tune into the TV special every year now.
In 1955, the third ball, made partially of aluminum, was introduced.
The city used the new aluminum ball until 1998 — though it was renovated several times over that period. Notable changes include aluminum skin, rhinestones, strobes, and computer controls in 1995.
In honor of the "I Love New York" campaign, the 1981 New Year's ball included red lights and a green "stem" to make it look like an apple.
That was also the final year Russ Brown, the superintendent of One Times Square, managed the ball dropping after 16 years.
In 1982, four bombs exploded at government buildings in New York on New Year's Eve. The next year, the city bought a series of $20,000 robots that could handle bombs, wield shotguns, and drag fallen officers out of danger. They monitored the 1983 celebration.
For the 1983 New Year's celebration, the city bought a series of $20,000 robots that could handle bombs, wield shotguns, and drag fallen officers out of danger according to the 1991 book "Break-ins, Death Threats and the FBI."
In the 1990s, special guests started activating the ball. The first was the philanthropist Oseola McCarty, later followed by Muhammad Ali, Mary Ann Hopkins from Doctors Without Borders, and others.
The tradition was started by New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani in 1996 as an initiative to honor community heroes on one of the world's largest stages.
Before the ball was lowered automatically, it descended down its pole in a pretty old-school way.
According to a 2009 New York Times article, prior to 1995, the New Year's Eve ball, which weighed hundreds of pounds, was simply lowered by "six guys with ropes and a stopwatch." Nowadays the ball drop relies on a laser-cooled atomic clock located in Colorado, according to The New Yorker.
In 2000, the ball was redesigned again for the millennium celebration at the Crossroads of the World.
The New Year's Eve ball got a makeover from Waterford Crystal and Philips Lighting in 2000 that brought it into the new millennium. The crystal ball measured six feet in diameter, weighed 1,070 pounds, and featured 168 lightbulbs.
Following the September 11 attacks in 2001, the police department tightened security in Times Square even more. Bomb-sniffing dogs and 7,000 officers with handheld metal detectors were on duty.
In recent years the New York City Police Department has deployed additional tactics to prevent bombers from attacking Times Square during the celebration, including a quadcopter drone and 200 blocker trucks filled with sand, according to a 2018 article from The Verge.
In 2007, the ball was updated again for the celebration's 100th anniversary.
Waterford Crystal and Philips Lighting once again crafted a new crystal ball and replaced the old incandescent and halogen bulbs with brand new Philips Luxeon LED lighting technology. The upgrade allowed for event planners to program some pretty spectacular light patterns and effects for the celebration.
In 2008, New York barred cars from Times Square. Pedicabs began driving the ball's numeral fixtures instead.
Each year the new numbers displayed below the Times Tower are delivered via pedicab.
In 2009, the ball got its final major renovation, making it a permanent year-round attraction.
Dubbed the "Big Ball," the latest variant of the ball weighs nearly 6 tons and measures 12 feet in diameter. It has an impressive 2,688 Waterford Crystal triangles, which are illuminated by 32,256 Philips Luxeon LED lights. The ball is now weatherproof and towers above Times Square year-round so if you don't feel like fighting the throngs of people for a spot on New Year's, you can snap a picture with it any day of the year.
After midnight on New Year's, the Department of Sanitation performs massive cleanups to clear the confetti and other debris. In 2014, 190 workers cleared over 50 tons of trash from Times Square.
Although it may make the night's celebrations all the more magical, a staggering amount of confetti and other debris has to be cleaned up after the event.
The ball got some extra bling ahead of the New Year's celebration Thursday night.
According to the Times Square Official Website, the ball got an additional 129 Waterford Crystal triangles featuring a "Gift of Happiness" pattern represented "by a sunburst of bright cuts radiating outward like a beautiful sunny day bringing warm smiles and happiness."
The 2021 ball drop will be completely virtual.
In a statement to Fox News, Times Square Alliance President Tim Tompkins said that because of the coronavirus pandemic, there will be no crowd of people present to ring in the new year. Instead, the celebrations will take place online.
"But this year there will be significantly new and enhanced virtual, visual and digital offerings to complement whatever limited live entertainment or experiences – still in development – will take place in Times Square," Tompkins told Fox in September.
Despite this, there will still be live musical performances from artists including Andra Day and Gloria Gaynor. Performances for "Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve," include Jennifer Lopez, Billy Porter, Cyndi Lauper, Jimmie Allen, and Machine Gun Kelly.
There is a 2021 New Year's Eve app and website allowing people around the world to partake in the festivities.
According to the Times Square Official Website:"On December 31, viewers can tune in for a live broadcast where they can choose from multiple camera feeds to direct their own New Year's Eve show. Plus, viewers will also get a chance to see other celebrations from around the globe, and hear messages from local leaders and people from dozens of cities from around the world."
- Read more:
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- 18 reasons why New Year's Eve is the worst holiday of the year
- Here's how the Times Square ball — which used to be made of iron and wood — has evolved over its 111-year history