Residential home Dakota apartments usually referred to simply as Dakota. This is one of the most prestigious houses in Manhattan – apartment in it can cost up to $ 30 million. Here lived the actress Judy garland, composer Leonard Bernstein, actor Boris Karloff, dancer Rudolf Nureyev, but the world knows Dakota not because of these famous names. World famous Dakota acquired, when it was killed John Lennon.

The building was built in 1884 for Edward Clark, head of the company "singer". It is believed the house was named so because he was far away from the then new York, but most of all, Clark just liked the names of the new Western States. The project was developed by the architectural firm of Henry Janua Hardenberg". High Gables, the roof with an abundance of skylights, balconies and balustrades are saying about the style of Northern German Renaissance, but inside the building shows the influence of French architecture.

65 apartments (from four - to dvadcatiminutnyj) with high (up to 4m) ceilings and floors of wood were bilateral – a novelty at the time. Apartments are individually designed, but bedrooms and living rooms always face the street, while other rooms in a quadrangular courtyard. The wide arch of the main entrance on 72nd West street was allowed to pass freely to the crews and their passengers to get in and out without hassle in case of rain or snow. In the house were the stables, power plant, Central heating, gym, tennis court. All the apartments were occupied immediately.

Dakota has always been in demand among wealthy new Yorkers. John Lennon and his wife Yoko Ono moved here in 1973 after their former apartment in Greenwich village was robbed. In a respectable Dakota, they believed, would be safer to live.

December 8, 1980 twenty-five year old mark David Chapman was waiting for Lennon outside the main gate of Dakota, in the shadow of the arch. About eleven in the evening John and Yoko entered the arch. Chapman five times shot Lennon in the back. The Dakota doorman, has pulled out from hands of the murderer the gun, shouted: "You know what I did? ". "Yes," said Chapman, "I shot John Lennon".

Later, Chapman said that he is enraged by the blasphemy Lennon when he said that more popular than Jesus, and the inconsistency of the lyrics and Imagine personal wealth Lennon. Maybe a penthouse in Dakota as evidence of this wealth also played a tragic role.

Yoko Ono still lives in the penthouse (large turret on the corner of 72nd and Central Park West). Chapman is still in prison. In 1985, when Lennon would have turned 45 years, a small territory in Central Park opposite the Dakota, was called "Strawberry fields" – "strawberry fields". Quiet area in hectares planted with trees, symbolically donated by various countries. Heart of Strawberry fields – a mosaic, a gift of Naples: strict pattern, and in the center the word Imagine. There are always flowers, most often arranged in the shape of a peace sign.