By The Red Hook WaterStories team
Near Christmas time, 1915, a female reporter and an illustrator for the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, visited a few of the many canal boats and barges moored for the winter in Erie Basin “in search of a story about holiday preparations and winter life.”...
By The Red Hook WaterStories team
The GENERAL SLOCUM ended service as a sinking fireball June 15, 1904, killing over 1,000, most of them women and children. 1,300 were aboard. That made the SLOCUM famous. Her fame was then forgotten and re-remembered by most of the City over the...
By The Red Hook WaterStories team
Brooklyn Life reporter Addison Steele, describes in 1897 the harvesting and pickling of mussles growing on the ramains of ship in Erie basin: A large part of the bull of the sunken Ailsa has been removed from the spot where she went...
By The Red Hook WaterStories team
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 1915 for the New York Herald as a...
By The Red Hook WaterStories team
In 1890, Mrs. A. M. Hamilton, a widow, was interviewed in Atlantic Basin, and celebrated by the Brooklyn Daily Eagle as being equal to any man running a canal boat. Beginning in the mid-1820s, canal boats brought produce from the nation's...
By The Red Hook WaterStories team
Industries that would have never considerred hiring women for any sort of job quickly changed their tune during WWII. While men were overseas fighting, women of Brooklyn were contributing to the war effort, and their own financial needs, by making...
By The Red Hook WaterStories team
Scroll to the bottom to hear PortSide's interview with Sunny Balzano. Sunny Balzano was the beloved owner of a legendary bar, some 90 years old, which became known as Sunny’s. He died March 10, 2016 which prompted an outpouring of grief,...
By The Red Hook WaterStories team
The racing yacht VALKYRIE , was the unsuccessful British challenger of the ninth America's Cup race in 1895 against American yacht DEFENDER. While in dry dock in Erie Basin, being redied for the race, she was a popular attraction....
By The Red Hook WaterStories team
In 1922, New York City Mayor John F. Hylan, a strong advocate for expanding the subways, held public hearings on the topic. George T. McQuade of Coastwise Lumber & Supply Co. supported a line that would run down Hicks and Lorraine Streets in Red...
By The Red Hook WaterStories team
The New York City Draft Riots took place between July 13 and July 16 of 1863. The violent insurrection was a reaction to conscription into military service during the Civil War. African Americans became the target of the rioters' anger and an...
