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
Brooklyn Spar Company
In 1921, the Brooklyn Spar Company advertised in The Marine Journal that it sold wooden masts and posts for derricks and flag poles, which the company made at its waterfront facility at the foot of…
NYCHA information - Management Offices, Residents Associations, Sandy recovery & resiliency plans
The NYCHA public housing in Red Hook is the largest NYCHA development in Brooklyn, and the second largest in New York City. It is where the overwhelming majority of Red Hook residents live. The NYCHA…
Oral History: Sunny Balzano: Beloved barkeep and community figure. 2016
Sunny Balzano was the beloved owner of a legendary bar, some 90 years old, which became known as Sunny’s. Born in 1935, Sunny grew up in Red Hook where his father run the family bar at the foot of…
Random Items
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…
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…
Tug Talk: Mariners' Names for Red Hook
Tug captains use landmarks (points on land visible from the water) to tell other mariners and the Coast Guard VTS (Vessel Traffic Service - the harbor equivalent of air traffic controllers) where they…
Erie Basin: The Photography of Jenny Young Chandler, 1890-1915
Newly married and recently widowed in 1890, Jennie Chandler Young began working as a photojournalist to support herself and her two-month old son. Using the moniker "Brooklyn Girl," she worked until…