This Wednesday, July 27, the Municipal Art Society will present a walking tour of the Brooklyn waterfront from DUMBO through below the Heights, covering Brooklyn Bridge Park as well as the remnants of the commercial and industrial waterfront that preceded it. For most of the 20th century, the site of Brooklyn Bridge Park was a […]
Archive | History RSS feed for this section
St. Ann’s Warehouse: Thanks For Your Support, ‘No Winners’ In This Saga
In an email sent to their mailing list, St. Ann’s Warehouse Artistic Director Susan Feldman thanked everyone for their support during the Tobacco Warehouse saga, indicated that they would be leaving DUMBO but have several options elsewhere, and that this is all due to the ‘callousness’ of the neighborhood and preservation organizations such as the […]
Brooklyn Heights History: Urban Renewal Part 2
The postwar brought the great era of modernism and social engineering. A nation flush with victory and wealth thought it could solve any problem and enthusiastically looked forward to, and even worshipped, the future (probably because the immediate past had been so bad). A bright, modernist future beckoned. At the same time there was a […]
BHA Takes a Tobacco Warehouse Victory Lap
A dispatch was sent out earlier today by Brooklyn Heights Association president Jane McGroarty in response to Judge Eric Vitaliano of the Federal District Court for the Eastern District of New York reaffirming his injunction against the transfer of the Tobacco Warehouse in the Fulton Ferry Historic to St. Ann’s Warehouse. Planners had hoped that […]
Court Nixes St. Ann’s Use of Tobacco Warehouse
Last April, Judge Eric Vitaliano of the Federal District Court for the Eastern District of New York issued a preliminary injunction against the transfer of the Tobacco Warehouse in the Fulton Ferry Historic to St. Ann’s Warehouse as a new home for its theater and performing arts space. On Tuesday, as expected, he reaffirmed his […]
And So It Begins…Columbia Heights Sgraffito Restoration Project
The Columbia Heights Sgraffito Restoration Project officially has begun! As mentioned a couple of times before here at Brooklyn Heights Blog, the building’s co-op board had been looking to restore the unique sgraffito façade for years.
Brooklyn Heights History: Urban Renewal Part 1
In 1931 the Brooklyn Eagle reported that a scheme had been developed by the Regional Plan Association to build a high-rise apartment development atop the bluff at Columbia Heights. The implementation of the sort of slash-and-burn urban planning advocated by Robert Moses would have ruined the area. Clearly, the dominant opinion was that the old […]
Be a History Sleuth for the Brooklyn Museum
Reader Nancy alerted us to this item in Carol Vogel’s “Inside Art” column in yesterday’s Times: The New York Times: SOMEWHERE IN BROOKLYN: The Brooklyn Museum is digitizing its collections, and trying to solve a few mysteries along the way. One such effort is to identify the locations in thousands of photographs taken of Brooklyn […]
BHS Offers Tours of Its Historic Building
The Brooklyn Historical Society, 128 Pierrepont Street (corner of Clinton), is offering guided tours of its historic building, completed in 1881 and designed by architect George B. Post, whose other commissions include the New York Stock Exchange and the Wisconsin State Capitol. In addition to the architecture, the tour will reveal the “hidden history” of […]
Ghost of Brownstoners Past – 1970’s The Landlord
Hal Ashby’s 1970 film The Landlord explores the “brownstoner” movement through the eyes of a naive dreamer played by Beau Bridges. Its climax takes place on Columbia Heights as seen in the photo above. While we discuss the brownstoners of yesterday and today at the Brooklyn Bugle, we thought it would be fun to talk […]
Nabe Chatter