Ownership and Control of Brooklyn Waterfront In 1708, Governor Cornbury granted New York City control of the lands on the Brooklyn shore from the low to the high water marks, even though Brooklyn at this time was an independent village. The grant...
Erie Basin photo, 1920
An aerial view of Erie Basin taken in 1920 by Perry Loomis Sperr. In the crook of the breakwater that protects the basin's piers is Thos. A. Crane's Sons' dry dock. The white building at the center rear of the view is the New York State Barge Canal...
Crane's Shipyard and Dry Docks
Crane’s Shipyard and Dry Docks, established in 1867, was located in Erie Basin. A history of the company is provided in George Weiss’s America’s Maritime Progress , published in 1920, and in the 1922 Pilot Lore . According to Weiss, Theo. A....
Three Norwegian Sailors to Sail Around Globe in Lifeboat: 1921
Three Brooklyn sailors of Norwegian descent planned to sail around the world in a modified wooden lifeboat in 1921. Captain Mimer Tonning, Otthar Petterson, and Helge Westerling, members of the Norwegian Masters and Mates Association, planned the...
The Atlantic Lifeboat Company
The Atlantic Lifeboat Company, located at Richards and Delevan Streets, was founded in 1914. In addition to making lifeboats—important safety equipment on ships—the company made speedy powerboats.
Brooklyn Spar Company, 1921
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 Columbia Street. In O.R. Pilat's 1929 article, John...
Map: Clinton Wharf, ca. 1884
Clinton Wharf is on the southwest side of Atlantic Basin. It was probably named in honor of DeWitt Clinton, governor of New York and father of the Erie Canal. The three piers shown [indicated in yellow] were all covered. Funk-Edye & Co.,...
American Molasses - Sucrest - Revere Sugar
Until 2007, a towering, distintive icon of Red Hook was here and was so visible across the harbor that captain's used it as a navigation aid: the conical silo of the sugar refinery. The entire refinery was demolished that year, levelling an...
Song Celebrating the SS Carolina
The SS Carolina, was the means of migration for many Puerto Ricans, from 1906 to 1918. 1906 was the year the New York and Porto Rico Steamship Company purchased the vessel and made Pier 35 in Red Hook's Atlantic Basin her homeport. ...
1958 aerial view showing Bush Terminal and Erie Basin
1958 aerial view. Erie Basin is in the background.