Welcome to 400+ years of Red Hook history! Here are many forgotten stories from our evocative neighborhood, and NYC’s maritime story in microcosm. Explore:
- A digital museum about our waterfront past and present
- Red Hook retail, arts, non-profits, schools, recreation
- Resiliency and flood prep info
It’s a resource for locals, tourists, history buffs, urban-planners, educators, investors, flaneurs. Explore via menus, the search window or the interactive map. On the map, click the colored, numbered dots to zoom in to multiple items in that location. Then click on a pin to explore that item. Anchor icons mean sites of major importance.
Click empty spot on map to activate it
Featured Item
New York Harbor Observing and Prediction System (NYHOPS) Red Hook Recording Station
Wondering about Red Hook water conditions like currents, tide height, salinity? And how those relate to storms?Red Hook is home to a high-tech water monitoring device overseen by the Davidson…
Paul Morris Art: Ikea Pier
From the artist:
I'm a NYC based photographic artist who is reconstructing reality. As I see these images, my mind immediately starts to restructure and rearrange them. Photography is my way of…
Shaft Alley Saloon
"We have mostly men here - very few women. No unattached women permitted at the bar. That’s a simple way of preventing trouble."One of the best known watering holes in Red Hook was the Shaft Alley…
Random Items
Title Fight: Louis Heineman vs. William Beard
"No man ever, perhaps, got so much the best of old Beard as did Louis Heineman, the housemover of the Twelfth ward.”
(The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, July 19, 1891)
When Louis Heineman died in 1904, he…
How the Hamilton Avenue Ferry got started, 1846
The Hamilton Avenue Ferry was established in 1846. It was run by the Union Ferry Company, who also ran the Fulton Ferry at that time. A major destination was a new upmarket cemetery. The ferry…
New York Harbor Observing and Prediction System (NYHOPS) Red Hook Recording Station
Wondering about Red Hook water conditions like currents, tide height, salinity? And how those relate to storms?Red Hook is home to a high-tech water monitoring device overseen by the Davidson…
Red Hook Building Company
In 1838, a proposal was printed and addressed to the newly formed board of the Red Hook Building Company. It was aimed at getting more support for the publicly owned real estate development concern…Select text from the Proposal. (A pdf of the full original is linked below)
"The advantages of Brooklyn as a place of residence, as well as for commercial purposes - in view of its proximity to the…