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.
Ephemeral New York 
