Gravesend, Brooklyn has changed a lot in its almost 400-year history.
Founded in the 1640s by a group of religious dissenters, it went from colonial-era English town to farm community to the site of late 19th century beach resorts and a racetrack—then a suburban-like neighborhood by 1930, states The Encyclopedia of New York City.
In View Across Gravesend Bay to Seagate, a 1905 painting by Thomas Satterwhite Noble, the shabby wooden pier and debris-strewn beach give this stretch of Gravesend the appearance of a sleepy fishing village.
Today, this beach might be part of Calvert Vaux Park, named for the designer of Central Park who mysteriously died off these waters.
Tags: Brooklyn history, Brooklyn paintings, Calvert Vaux death, Calvert Vaux Park, Gravesend Brooklyn, Gravesend resort, Seagate, six towns of Brooklyn, Thomas Satterwhite Noble
Ephemeral New York 
May 1, 2013 at 7:23 pm |
having lived there almost all of my life, fished off the pier, almost drowned in the waters, this does not look like my gravesend, coney island of my childhood. Oh to be a child again!
Phyllis B
May 16, 2013 at 6:23 am |
[…] A sleepy, beachy view across Gravesend Bay […]