Epidemics, New York in the mid-1800s knew them too well. Cholera was one of the city's biggest killers. The ports of New York Harbor were the economic engines of the region, but the all important shipping was also how outbreaks spread across the...

A shopping tour in Italian Red Hook included all types of food: snails, fresh vegetables, rabbit, squab, octopus, cheese, olive oil, beans, and garlic. Throughout the 1900s , Red Hook had a very large Italian population, many of whom earned their...

This is an article about Canopis, the dog. Born in Red Hook, he was owned by a local fish dealer who fed him a steady diet of fish. According the the article, this diet led to him develop webbed feet and other sea-creature-like deformities. One day,...

Ramberg Iron Works paid $650,000 to the receivers of the Atlantic Dock Company for eight and three quarter acres fronting the Buttermilk Channel at the foot of Coffey, Dykman, Sullivan and Wolcott Streets in 1918. The site was within the free...

A government sanctioned warehouse exclusively for fruit brandies was established at the Atlantic Dock January 1897.  The warehouse, located at Imlay and Commerce streets was said to have a capacity of  10,000 barrels.  Storage...

A Red Hook cat invaded the British steamship BADAGERY while the vessel was docked in Erie Basin and proceeded to terrorize the small members of the crew.  Katy Cockroach, the cook’s speckled hen, stopped laying eggs and became “lean and...

Zoltán Glück was a graduate student when Sandy hit, and he worked with Occupy Sandy doing recovery work in Red Hook, Brooklyn. Occupy Sandy, an offshoot of the Occupy Wall Street movement, was a major and innovative force for Sandy recovery in New...

Red Hook got walloped by Sandy on 10/29/12, but the spirit that was most visible at the one-year anniversary, the Sandyversary, was moxie and mirth. Cheeky illustrations popped up in a few places.  There are a lot of chicken coops in Red Hook,...