Brooklyn

Huguenot Pirates on the Barbary Coast and the Mapping of New Amsterdam

October 5, 2020 by Jaap Harskamp Leave a Comment

Huguenots were followers of Jean Calvin’s teachings for which they were persecuted in Catholic France. Many were forced to leave the country and settled in the Netherlands, Switzerland, England, and South Africa.

Nicolas Martiau was one of a number of refugees who made their way to America (Virginia) via England. A surveyor and engineer in the service of Henry Hastings, 5th Earl of Huntington, he was an ancestor of George Washington. [Read more…] about Huguenot Pirates on the Barbary Coast and the Mapping of New Amsterdam

Garnet Douglass Baltimore: Troy’s Landscape Master

September 7, 2020 by Suzanne Spellen 2 Comments

By the middle of the 19th century, Americans realized that parks provided a spot of nature and greenery amidst an increasingly busy and industrialized world. Many men, women and children worked six days a week, and never had the time or resources to get away.

Yes, parks were beautiful, but they were also very important for mental and physical health. Cities that wanted to thrive began looking for space and funding for public parks. [Read more…] about Garnet Douglass Baltimore: Troy’s Landscape Master

Brooklyn’s Monkey Trial of 1906

September 3, 2020 by David Fiske 3 Comments

You may be familiar with the “Scopes Monkey Trial.” In 1925, teacher Thomas Scopes was brought into court for violating a Tennessee law that forbade the teaching of evolution. Scopes was defended by famed lawyer Clarence Darrow, who actually asked the jury to find his client guilty in order that the case could be appealed to a higher court.

In 1927, Scopes’ guilty verdict was reversed on a technicality, without addressing the issue of the law’s constitutionality. (That matter was not resolved until 1968, when the United States Supreme Court struck down – on First Amendment issues – a similar law in Arkansas.)

Years earlier, Brooklyn, New York had a monkey trial – but one that was entirely different. The Brooklyn case did not involve Darwin’s theory of evolution in any way – it concerned an actual living, breathing, in-the-flesh monkey. [Read more…] about Brooklyn’s Monkey Trial of 1906

Brooklyn Museum Reopening September 12th

August 31, 2020 by Editorial Staff Leave a Comment

The Brooklyn Museum is set to reopen to the public on September 12th.

The Museum’s first and fifth floor galleries will be open Wednesdays-Sundays, 11 am to 6 pm, with new extended hours on Fridays and Saturdays, to 8 pm.

A community day will be held September 9, with Member preview days following on September 10th and 11th. [Read more…] about Brooklyn Museum Reopening September 12th

Green-Wood Cemetery Digitizing 1840-1937 Burial Registry

July 22, 2020 by Editorial Staff Leave a Comment

The National Endowment for the Humanities has awarded The Green-Wood Historic Fund a prestigious Humanities Collections and Reference Resources grant to create a digitized and searchable database of the hand-written records of all interments at Green-Wood in its first century of operation. [Read more…] about Green-Wood Cemetery Digitizing 1840-1937 Burial Registry

Danny Kaye In The Catskills

June 3, 2020 by John Conway Leave a Comment

It has often been said that the first play Danny Kaye ever saw, he was in.

That would have been in June 1929, at the White Roe Lake House in Livingston Manor, Sullivan County, NY, where the soon-to-be legendary performer got his professional start, and refined his trademark comedy routine. [Read more…] about Danny Kaye In The Catskills

Geographies of Gender at Brooklyn Museum

March 3, 2020 by Editorial Staff Leave a Comment

The Brooklyn Museum is set to celebrate their exhibit Out of Place: A Feminist Look at the Collection during Women’s History Month on March 7th, as part of their First Saturday programs.

Throughout the evening, women and nonbinary artists from across Brooklyn explore how gender maps onto our bodies, our histories, and our political movements. Highlights include an artist talk with Naima Green, a Night Market, and music from Sammus. [Read more…] about Geographies of Gender at Brooklyn Museum

Collections Mystery: The Emancipator Newspaper in 1888

December 22, 2019 by Ed O’Shaughnessy Leave a Comment

It has long been the conventional wisdom that the Irish in America trend Democratic in their voting tendencies. This was more true in the late 19th Century and in the 1880s, Republican Party election committees were hell-bent on mitigating that trend.

The large Irish population, concentrated as it was in several northeastern cities, made it relatively easy for political parties to ‘segment the market’ and target voters. New York State, with its 36 electoral college votes, was seen as the make-or-break state – a strategic objective for campaign planners.

By the campaign of 1880 senior Irish American Republicans were determined to facilitate an ‘Irish bolt’ from the Democratic party. In New York State, Republican party operatives were especially challenged in this as they had to confront the formidable power of Tammany. Dirty campaign tactics, muckraking, and bigotry contributed to the voter coercion and vote manipulation widely practiced by both parties. [Read more…] about Collections Mystery: The Emancipator Newspaper in 1888

African Arts–Global Conversations Opening in Brooklyn

December 12, 2019 by Editorial Staff Leave a Comment

The Brooklyn Museum has announced African Art–Global Conversations, a new exhibit set to be on view from February 14th through November 15th, 2020.

The exhibition presents diverse African works throughout the Museum’s vast collections, putting African arts in its rightful place within the global art historical canon. [Read more…] about African Arts–Global Conversations Opening in Brooklyn

Decades After Closure, Brooklyn Navy Yard Sails On

November 11, 2019 by Randall Whitestone 2 Comments

A decidedly unglamorous black-hulled cargo barge plying the turbid waters off Staten Island represents the last working evidence of two centuries of New York history. McAllister Towing & Transportation Co.’s Atlantic Trader, a 300-foot container-carrying barge which entered service in 1977 appears to be the last vessel built from the ground up at the Brooklyn Navy Yard.

The plodding, anonymous Atlantic Trader had many famous Navy Yard forebears, including the USS Arizona, destroyed at Pearl Harbor where the Second World War began for the United States on Dec. 7, 1941, and the USS Missouri, where the war ended 45 months later with the formal Japanese surrender on her polished teak deck in Tokyo Bay. Other warships built in Brooklyn included the USS Maine, whose 1898 destruction in Havana Harbor helped launch the Spanish-American War; the USS Ohio, a 74-gun ship-of-the-line launched in 1820 that saw action in the Mexican-American War; and eight battleships and eight aircraft carriers completed between 1911 and 1961. Ships built at the yard saw service in every major American conflict from the War of 1812 to Operation Iraqi Freedom. [Read more…] about Decades After Closure, Brooklyn Navy Yard Sails On