The Brooklyn Historical Society, 128 Pierrepont Street (corner of Clinton) will present a screening of Nancy Buirski’s film, The Loving Story, a love story about a couple whose wedding set the stage for the Supreme Court’s decision, in Loving v. Virginia, that struck down statutes prohibiting interracial marriage.

The show begins at 3 p.m. Saturday, and there will be a discussion with Buirski afterward. The event is free with museum admission, which is free for BHS members; for non-members it is $6 for adults, and $4 for seniors over 62, teachers, and students 12 and over (college students must have ID; children under 12 are free).

Don’t forget Theater 2020′s Comedy of Errors, with performances tonight (Friday) and Saturday at 8:00 p.m., and Sunday at 3:00 p.m. More details at the linked post.

Finally, weather permitting, get a view of an astronomical double treat, a “Supermoon” and the eta aquarid meteor shower tomorrow (Saturday) evening. (Image: NASA.)

This past Wednesday your correspondent took his customary walk around Pier 1, Brooklyn Bridge Park, and got this photo of Rosa rugosa in bloom again. With luck, they’ll be around through November. As reader Stuart noted in a comment then: “[T]he rugosas are tough as nails. They can take anything, even salt. [T]he rose hips they produce are the ones used in pharmacology.”

Senator Squadron’s Community Convention is Sunday afternoon. MTA head Joseph Lhota will discuss transit issues, you can learn more about new plans for Brooklyn Bridge Park and there will be discussion groups on many other topics of community interest. More details & RSVP here.

Learn about local bird life Sunday morning at Pier 1, Brooklyn Bridge Park.

Anytime you want, head to Brooklyn Bridge Park and take photos (see your correspondent’s contribution above) for BBP’s Bluebell photo contest.

Alas, Homer Fink’s Hidden Heights Walking Tour tomorrow morning is sold out. Watch BHB for announcement of the next tour.

The heaps of brown stuff you may have noticed distributed along the Promenade—or as in this photo at the Montague Street entrance—are mulch to be used on the Promenade gardens. Promenade Gardener Jonanthan Landsman advises us that it will be distributed Saturday morning by a large volunteer group.

(Photo: M. Foley for BHB)

The forecast for this weekend is for temperatures reaching the 70s and little, if any, chance of showers, so it should be a very good time to see spring blossoms and foliage in Brooklyn Bridge Park (photo), in gardens well tended by Jonathan Landsman and crew beside the Promenade, or in window boxes and gardens along the streets of Brooklyn Heights.

On Sunday, April 15 (you get an extra day two days–thank you, Karl, and the District of Columbia’s Emancipation Day holiday–to file tax returns this year) the Brooklyn Symphony Orchestra will present a concert at St. Ann and the Holy Trinity Church, Clinton and Montague streets (enter from Clinton) starting at 3:00 p.m. The program includes Mussorgsky’s “Songs and Dances of Death”, featuring bass-baritone Mark Peters; Greenhoe’s “Sojourn”; and Rachmaninoff’s “Symphony Number Two in e-minor”. Admission is free, but with a suggested donation of $15.

Brooklyn Heights’ resident Rick Elkins, who works as an art director and editorial/advertising photographer, shared with BHB a series of eight stunning photographs from his portfolio. To see his Flickr photostream, click here, and here for a set of 131 NYC-centric pics. (See large images below the jump.)

Elkins tells us, “Six of these were taken in Brooklyn Heights proper. The ballerina is in DUMBO, but it shows the Brooklyn Bridge, which is a really big part of our neighborhood. And the one of the harbor taken from up on the Bridge shows the area we see from our neighborhood, just from a different angle.”

Rick Elkins’ website is here. Below: Umbrellas On Brooklyn Heights Promenade, Atlantic Avenue, New York Harbor From Brooklyn Bridge, Promenade Fog, Remsen Street, Promenade Sunset, Lightning Storm From The Promenade, and Brooklyn Bridge Ballerina.

Enjoy this sunny Sunday! A high in the mid-60s is expected for the afternoon. (Photo: Chuck Taylor/Cadman Plaza)

Brooklyn Bridge Park has created a guide to plants growing on Pier 1 (the pier accessed from the foot of Old Fulton Street).

Each year the vernal equinox heralds the start of the spring season. At Brooklyn Bridge Park, springtime is celebrated by the returning blossoms found in planting beds, along the edges of lawns and in the wide variety of trees planted just two years ago. Whether it is the large, fragrant flowers of the Saucer Magnolia, the small, buttery clouds of the Corneliancherry Dogwood, or the much anticipated first-bloom of our 8,000 Spanish Bluebells, spring in the park is exceptionally eye-catching and colorful. In homage to the start of spring and the beauty that it brings, Brooklyn Bridge Park is pleased to release our inaugural Spring Plant Guide.

The guide contains information about fourteen species of plants that blossom in spring, and includes a handy map to find them. Go to the Park’s website and follow the link to download the Guide.

Another harbinger of a spring that has arrived early, this migrant from the South was spotted between Piers 1 and 2, in Brooklyn Bridge Park, resting on a branch of what appears to be sumac, with drupes. Click on photo to enlarge.

Early spring-like weather has been propitious for flowering plants, both in gardens and window boxes, around the Heights. The flowers in the photo at left are in front of the residence of garden designer Catherine Fitzsimmons on Joralemon Street between Hicks and Willow Place. More photos and text after the jump.

These pansies are blooming just across Joralemon from Ms. Fitzsimmons’ place.

While it’s not a flower, I couldn’t resist photographing this splendid example of ornamental kale on Remsen Street near Montague Terrace.

Here are forsythia, emblematic of early spring, on the Montague Street side of St. Ann and the Holy Trinity Church.

Daffodils, crocuses, and red berries brighten the scene at the Montague Street entrance to the Promenade.

This in from Promenade Gardener Jonathan Landsman:

This Thursday at 12:30 PM, the Promenade Gardeners are hosting the first of our winter gatherings: Plant Trivia from Brooklyn and Beyond. We’d love to invite interested members of the public to join us for this first class and snacks. We sit, chat, look at photos of plants, and Koren and I ask some tough and not-so-tough questions about plants we interact with in daily life in literature, medicine, popular culture, and our walks on the Promenade. Half of the 90 minute meeting is devoted to plants of the Promenade, with a special emphasis on what was bought and planted last year using funds raised by the Promenade Gardens Conservancy and through our bake sales. Joining the group will give one an early taste of spring and a little extra appreciation for plants in our day to day life. Those who’d like to come should RSVP to the hostess, Koren Volk, at volkkoren@hotmail.com and she will provide location details.

BHB reader “Alex” sent us this photo of what appears to be a City Hawk hanging out over Pierrepont Playground this weekend.  Hopefully he’s more mellow than the big fella we spotted chewing up a pigeon last year and more like the laid back chap who came to visit in the snow back in December 2010.

An open backyard on Henry Street has become an all-you-can-eat smorgasbord for rats and other vermin, with piles of trash, discarded furniture, construction remnants, bottles, bags and broken glass overrunning the one-time manicured outdoor space.

Located behind Montague Street’s Andy’s Chinese restaurant, Dashing Diva nail salon and the Heights Vision Center, and across from Corcoran real estate on Henry, the cluttered dump is easily accessed through an open iron gate. For years, residents have been complaining to landlords and business owners, to no avail, as it continues to accumulate garbage strewn & stacked at liberty.

In the Brooklyn Paper this week, writer Kate Briquelet quotes Brooklyn Heights Assn. executive director Judy Stanton: “It’s third-world disgusting. Everyone walking by can see it from Henry Street. “It’s a dumping ground.”

Longtime neighbor Andrew Porter told the Paper that the shared courtyard is rampant with critters at night, and that passersby apparently regard the grounds as a public landfill. “A few days ago there was a sofa there,” Porter said. “I just wish someone would clean it up.”

Neighbors claim that calls to 311 and business managers have gotten no response, while queries by the Brooklyn Paper to the landlords of the three adjoining businesses—including major Coney Island developer Thor Equities, which owns the salon building— were ignored.

In the 1980s, the grounds housed a memorial garden and fountain honoring the former landlord’s son—until the family moved away. The fountain remains today… stacked with refuse.

Bobby Cruz, former owner of the UPS Store building on Montague Street, took it upon himself to bag some of the garbage earlier this month, in hopes of opening a tapas and wine bar beneath Heights Vision this spring. His intention is to turn part of the yard into outdoor seating for the business. He says he’ll continue to clean, with hopes that flowers will soon replace shards of glass.

A BHB reader sent us this comment and photo:

It’s interesting that someone mentioned on the open thread last week that our hood could use a Xmas tree composting station. I was going to suggest that the dead end at Middagh St. would be a good open space to set it up. Well, apparently the neighbors have agreed to xmas tree disposal here as well, but this was not exactly what i was thinking!

Just because Christmas has faded to black doesn’t mean that the Brooklyn Heights Promenade doesn’t still offer some of the most organic beauty in all of New York. Taken Monday, December 26, just before dusk.

A year ago last June the intrepid Karl Junkersfeld toook a stroll around Pier 1 in Brooklyn Bridge Park and made the acquaintance of Rosa rugosa. Yesterday morning your correspondent took a similar stroll and found some of the flowers still in bloom, along with the rose hips that look like small tomatoes.

The view Sunday at dusk’s peak from a Montague Street rooftop (nope, photo is not edited, colored or digitally manipulated one iota).

Your correspondent went leaf-peeping yesterday. Above is the view from the crest of the mound on Pier 1, Brooklyn Bridge Park. More photos after the jump.

Seen from the path connecting Pier 1 to Pier 6, a row of bushes on the south end of Pier 1 provide a colorful accent to the view of the Brooklyn Bridge.

The view looking up from Pier 1 towards the Heights and Cadman Plaza.

This Friday, October 21 and Sunday, October 23, from 11:00 to 11:45 a.m. both days, Brooklyn Bridge Park will present a Fall Colors Tour.

Autumn is especially beautiful at Brooklyn Bridge Park! Join Rebecca McMackin, the park horticulturalist, for a walk on Pier 1 and see the beautiful fall colors in the park’s flowers, trees and perennials. Ms. McMackin will talk about the park’s diverse planting palette, the organic maintenance of the landscape and the role of bees and birds in pollinating these striking specimens.

The tours are free, but attendance is limited, so please reserve in advance by e-mailing to brooklynbridgepark@bbpnyc.org . Tours begin at the entrance to Pier 1, near the foot of Old Fulton Street; there will be a tent.

To counter allegations by Pinnacle Group, which seeks to remove the trees in the courtyard between the A.T. White Riverside Apartments and the BQE to build an underground parking garage, that the trees are of recent growth, Bill Ringler, President of the Riverside Tenants’ Association, has done some sleuthing and found this photo, dating from the early 1900s and published in Hayes Historical Journal — A Journal of the Gilded Age, Volume IX, Number 1 (Fall 1989).

According to Mr. Ringler:

The photo was taken from the South of the fountain facing North to the rear of 24 Joralemon Street. The buildings on the left were demolished in the 50′s to construct the BQE. These trees are the same ones that exist today. It is evident by the limbs on the trees.

The photo is of the teachers and students of the Willow Place Chapel Kindergarten of the First Unitarian Church.

Addendum: Below is another photo taken at the same occasion, as it appeared on the cover of the Journal:

The flag has 45 stars, a configuration which lasted from 1896 to 1907.

80 Joralemon Street (at Hicks), October 9, 2011. Photo by Claude Scales for BHB.

A monarch butterfly, on its annual migration to Mexico, pauses on Pier 1.

More photos and text after the jump.

Max Pelzmann’s Canopy, formerly white, became bright red just before the DUMBO Arts Festival. You can find it near the park entrance at the foot of Main Street.

The East Tower of the Brooklyn Bridge from a new perspective, the lawn just south of Jane’s Carousel.

Has this been contributing to my wife’s and daughter’s sneezing? Goldenrod on Pier 1.

At least it’s keeping the bees busy making late-season honey.

A profusion of fall flowers on the landward side of Pier 1.

The schooner Clipper City heading out on a tourist cruise from the Seaport Museum, as seen from the pedestrian path near the south end of Pier 1.

Showy blossoms and berries, landward side of Pier 6.

Photos by Claude Scales for BHB.

The touch of fall in the air today is corroborated by red leaves on sumac, Brooklyn Bridge Park, Pier 1.

It’s still three days away, and the path it follows changes continually, but the current (Thursday afternoon) “center” track of Hurricane Irene is now projected to pass through Brooklyn and Manhattan, and the eye could potentially go right over the Brooklyn Heights Area. The current expectation is that the Hurricane (it may be a less-powerful tropical storm by the time it gets here) will arrive sometime on Sunday, but the initial impact of wind and rain could hit the neighborhood earlier. The NYC Office of Emergency Management has announced that it will decide shortly whether to call for evacuations of low-lying areas prone to flooding, including One Brooklyn Bridge Park, Fulton Ferry, DUMBO and Vinegar Hill (the orange, yellow and green bands on the map show potential flood areas based on an increasingly strong storm impact; NYC Technical College and Brooklyn Tech HS have been identified as potential evacuation sites).

Residents in the path of a hurricane or tropical storm should be prepared to either evacuate or shelter in place at home or in designated shelters, with adequate food, water, batteries for flashlights and radios, and other necessary supplies. Information on preparing for a hurricane is available at OEM’s website. Information on the status of the hurricane will also be posted on the Brooklyn CB2 CERT Team website.

Check to FEMA Flood Zone Map to see if how at risk your block is here.

NYS Senator Daniel Squadron offers Hurricane Irene related links here.

Sparrow outside La Traviata, Montague Street.

This year’s severe weather is taking its toll on Brooklyn Heights foliage. Last evening’s squall brought this limb down on the Promenade.

Your correspondent took his morning walk today along Brooklyn Bridge Park from Pier 6 to DUMBO, and got some photos along the way. Here is the East River Ferry passing Pier 1 on its northbound run, making haste from downtown Manhattan to Fulton Ferry Landing. More photos and text follow the jump.

Plants along the pond at the southeastern edge of Pier 1 have grown considerably over the past month, and blossomed.

Seen from Brooklyn bridge Park in DUMBO, a catamaran yacht sails under the Brooklyn Bridge heading up the East River.

Pier 1, Brooklyn Bridge Park.

Pier 1, Brooklyn Bridge Park, July 8, 2011.

Plentiful rainfall this spring has made for lush foliage on Pier 1 of Brooklyn Bridge Park. On my morning walk through the park (I’ve taken to alternating my long walk over the Bridge with a shorter one down Squibb Hill to Pier 1, around the pier then back up to the Promenade) I noticed how easy it was in some places (ignoring the sound of BQE traffic and the occasional helicopter) to imagine oneself far from the city; for example, looking down toward the small pond near the park entrance at the foot of Old Fulton Street. (More photos and text after the jump.)

Spectacular floral displays are found near the pathways.

An abundance of sumac sometimes arches over the path. Here we see its red fruit, or drupes, used to make spice in the Middle East.

Could this swamp be home to something more sinister than Dodger the muskrat?

Here are more showy summer blossoms.

What’s that in the distance–could it be the fabled lost Isle of Manhattan?