Main Site | About BHS | Visitor Information | Exhibitions | Education | Library | Publications| Support BHS Press | Contact us | Site Map
 

Clinton Hill

...now browsing by tag

 
Architecture Archives Astroland Bedford-Stuyvesant Brooklyn Brooklyn Arts Council Brooklyn Bridge Brooklyn Dodgers Brooklyn Heights Brooklyn Navy Yard Brooklyn Past & Present Brooklyn photographs Brooklyn photos Clinton Hill Coney Island Coney Island History Project Dodgers Education Flatbush Fort Greene Historic Landmark In Our Own Words Interpreting Brooklyn Iraq Library Map of the Month maps Municipal Art Society Nelson George New York Times Oral History Oral History Highlights Park Slope Photographs photography Photography Collection Photo of the Week Podcast Portraits of Brooklyn Vietnam Veterans Prospect Park Public Perspectives Red Hook Studs Terkel Vietnam Women Veterans
 

Brooklyn History Photo of the Week: Children Playing in the “Old Swimming Hole”

Written by Kate Ludwig on June 1st, 2011
The Old Swimming Hole, Fort Greene, c. 1900-1925, v1973.6.311; Photography Collection; Brooklyn Historical Society.

The Old Swimming Hole, Fort Greene, c. 1900-1925, v1973.6.311; Photography Collection; Brooklyn Historical Society.

1915, Fort Greene Clinton Hill. Children are seen playing with an old Brooklyn fire hydrant, which was jokingly referred to as the “Old Swimming Hole.” The hydrant was located at the intersection of Myrtle Avenue and Ryerson Street in what is now Fort Greene Clinton Hill. Many children used hydrants to socialize and have fun, while others used them as a way to bathe themselves if they did not have running water in their homes. The first Brooklyn fire hydrants were installed on street corners in 1808 and were given the nickname “Johnny Pumps.” The originals were made of wood, but were quickly replaced with iron flip-lid style hydrants in 1817.

Each Thursday BHS emails a photograph of the week exclusively to our eNews subscribers. These images are culled from our collection of more than 50,000 photographs of Brooklyn and the New York City area. The photographs are also tweeted by BHS and displayed on our blog in a running series. Interested in seeing more photos from BHS’s collection? Visit our online image gallery. Use this database to search for individual photographs. Currently a small number of our images are available online, but we regularly add new photographs. You can also visit BHS’s Othmer Library Wed-Fri, 1-5 p.m. to search through our entire collection of images.

Posted in Brooklyn Past & Present | 3 Responses »
Tags: , , , , , ,

Fort Greene / Clinton Hill Audio Tour

Written by Sady on January 13th, 2011
Photo by Muemaphoto.com

Photo by Muemaphoto.com

To complement the Fort Greene / Clinton Hill Neighborhood & Architectural History Guide by Francis Morrone, the Brooklyn Historical Society presents a new audio tour of Fort Greene / Clinton Hill.

The tour is hosted by author, filmmaker, and longtime Fort Greene resident Nelson George.  It features excerpts from oral history interviews from the Brooklyn Historical Society’s collections: artists, community activists, and longtime residents both past and present including professional basketball player Albert King, WNYC’s Jad Abumrad, and former Freedomways managing editor Esther Cooper Jackson.

Historian Francis Morrone tells us about landmarks like the Prison Ship Martyrs Monument and Underwood Park as well as the poet Marianne Moore.  And we learn more about keystones of the neighborhood like BAM, Lafayette Avenue Presbyterian Church, and Pratt Institute from the inside.

You can listen here, or download the audio tracks via iTunes: Search the iTunes Store for the free Brooklyn Historical Society podcast.

  1. Fort Greene Park: Now the park is beautiful and safe, but for residents who remember the 1970s and 80s, it wasn’t always that way.

    2. Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

  2. Prison Ship Martyrs Monument: The soul of Fort Greene Park commemorates a sad moment in U.S. history.

    3. Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

  3. Fort Greene Houses: The Brothers King.

    4. Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

  4. Washington Park: Home to industrialists, artists, and organizers for social change.

    5. Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

  5. Richard Wrights’ Legacy: From Native Son to Do the Right Thing.

    6. Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

  6. Marianne Moore and more Poets: A city of churches, a city of trees.

    7. Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

  7. Lafayette Avenue Presbyterian Church: Abolitionists set the standard.

    8. Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

  8. Brooklyn Academy of Music: The oldest performing arts center in the country.

    9. Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

  9. Clinton Hill: The Hill.

    10. Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

  10. Underwood Park: Typewriters and Crack.

    11. Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

  11. Pratt Institute: When Pratt Center was accused of subversive activities.

    12. Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Music intros by Black Star, Mos Def, Living Colour, Betty Carter, Erykah Badu, Biggie Smalls, Talib Kweli, and  all outros by Bill Lee and The Natural Spirit Orchestra (with Branford Marsalis)

Produced by Sady Sullivan, Director of Oral History, Brooklyn Historical Society, with production help by Dorothy Saint Jean, Long Island University

Thank you to Nelson George, Ina Howard-Parker, Edward Lee, Spike Lee, Francis Morrone, and all the other artists heard here, for your time and creativity.  And to the New York Center for Visual History and the Media Arts Department at Long Island University.

Special thanks to Hillel Arnold, Alexis Taines-Coe, Ann Heppermann, and Selma Jackson who contributed interviews to the collection; and YouTube users dominoize and oojenoo who captured great footage of important events in Fort Greene: Soul Summit 2009 and 2010 and election night 2008.

And a very special thank you to the people of Fort Greene / Clinton Hill who shared their memories with the Brooklyn Historical Society’s oral history collections.  We’re so happy your voices are heard in this tour: Jad Abumrad, Marianne Engberg, Dr. Josephine English, Yolande Garcia, Hal Glicksman, Ruth Goldstein, Colvin Grannum, DK Holland, Karen Brooks Hopkins, Esther Cooper Jackson, Albert King, Irene Levy, Karla Murthy, Ron Shiffman, and Mary Elizabeth Smith.

Posted in Oral History | 1 Response »
Tags: , , , , , ,

Calling Fort Greene / Clinton Hill

Written by Sady on December 7th, 2010
buggin-out-3-new21

Image via scene-stealers.com

You know that part in Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing (1989) where Buggin Out tells the guy in a Larry Bird jersey to move back to Massachusetts?  That’s one of those highly charged interactions we’ve all had at some point with our neighbors, to both positive and negative effect.  Our neighborly confrontations may not be as heated as Buggin Out’s or directly address big topics like gentrification and race, as his does, but they still stick in our minds for a long time, replaying over and over — and when we share these moments, they say a lot about our neighborhoods and what it’s like to live nowadays…  Which is exactly the kind of cultural snapshot BHS is trying to capture and preserve.

I’ve been starting my day lately by reading The New York Times Opinionator blog Disunion, about the Civil War; they do a great job of bringing that time period to life in a dimensional way.  I like thinking about historians 100 years from now painting a picture of life in Brooklyn in 2010 and using the audio and video interviews BHS has collected with people (500+ people born as early as 1890 and as recently as 2004) to add authentic voices to their history-telling.  Imagine how amazing it would be if we could hear 500 people from Brooklyn in 186o talking about slavery, secession, and the abolitionist movement in their own words, unfiltered by news reports.

Which speaks to why BHS is asking people to call the new STORY HOTLINE: 718.222.4111 x203

Leave us a message with one story about your neighborhood.  We’re starting with Fort Greene / Clinton Hill because these messages will be included in the Fort Greene / Clinton Hill audio walking tour (forthcoming January 2011).  You can tell us your name, or not, it’s up to you.  You can share a story about neighborly confrontations, neighborly love, whatever defines the neighborhood for you.  It could even be a song or a sound…

We look forward to hearing from you!

718.222.4111 x203


Posted in Oral History | No Responses »
Tags: , , , , , ,

In Line with Jive Turkey

Written by Alli on November 25th, 2009
The line begins outside Jive Turkey

The line begins outside Jive Turkey

Thanksgiving in Clinton Hill just wouldn’t be the same without the around-the-block lines to Jive Turkey, leading up to the big day. This has been my second year witnessing the massive lines down Myrtle Ave., smelling the scent of cooked turkey from blocks away and watching as employees work late into the night as they pack hundreds of boxes with fried turkeys to ship around the country. This morning as I walked by folks were sitting in folding chairs, drinking coffee out of thermoses and chatting as they waited to be let into the store to claim their order. I’ve never tasted fried turkey before, but it seems to be a force to be reckoned with.

The instigator of this local turkey craze is Jive Turkey owner Aricka Westbrooks who was the recipient of a business grant from Bedford Stuyvesant Restoration Corporation. Ms. Westbrooks used the funds to open the business.

To hear more about Restoration’s diverse work check out BHS’ oral history collection of over 50 interviews with founding Board members, supporters, activists, artists, tenants and other community members who helped shape the organization’s work over the years.

Posted in Brooklyn Past & Present | 1 Response »
Tags: , ,

Park Slope Walking Tour

Written by Sady on October 27th, 2009

Park Slope, Brooklyn photo by wallyg on Flickr

photo courtesy wallyg on Flickr

In 2008, BHS published the Park Slope Neighborhood & Architectural History Guide, written by Francis Morrone.  We are currently working on a neighborhood guide about Fort Greene / Clinton Hill, so, stay tuned and please be in touch if there’s something BHS needs to know, someone BHS needs to interview, or you have other ideas for this forthcoming guide.

You can download a Walking Tour of Park Slope here.

And you can listen to voices from Park Slope to accompany the tour:

LIFE OF A BLOCK
 Produced by independent radio producer, Laura Starecheski

The Rubin Family: 3 Generations in Park Slope

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

The Rubin Family: Fire on Carroll Street

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

TALE OF TWO LIQUOR STORES
Interviews by Corie Trancho-Robie, Columbia Oral History Research Office

Red, White, and Bubbly: Darrin Siegfried

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

DeSilva South Brooklyn Liquors: Floyd DeSilva

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

COMMUNITY ORGANIZING
Interviews by Sady Sullivan, Brooklyn Historical Society

Park Slope Food Co-Op: Joseph Holtz

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Lesbian Herstory Archives: Maxine Wolfe

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

PARK SLOPE 2.O: THE BLOGGERS

Only the Blog Knows Brooklyn: Louise Crawford

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

The Declaration of Co-Dependence: The Blog That Must Not Be Named

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Narrated by Francis Morrone.
Recorded by Laura Starecheski, Sady Sullivan, and Corie Trancho-Robie.
Produced by Laura Starecheski for the Brooklyn Historical Society.
Thank you to everyone who was interviewed, and to the Borough of Manhattan Community College.


Posted in Brooklyn Past & Present, Oral History | 2 Responses »
Tags: , , ,

« Older Entries