Barren Island

jack: 3rd Aug 2007 - 15:05 GMT

too dirty and trashy, i was there many years ago when it was an ok place to run around, floyd bennett had air shows that were spectacular, the beaches were clean, breezy point was nice and clean and the water was not yet pollutted, time changes everything, people have to believe they want change and must take responsibility and clean up their act.

jack: 3rd Aug 2007 - 15:07 GMT

good pic's cart. nice to see that area again. thanks, perhaps we will run into each other taking pictures and we will know by our cameras or the big letters on my tee shirt that say's, "smile, your on citinoise".

CartLegger: 3rd Aug 2007 - 15:32 GMT

great idea Jack! A CityNoise T-shirt. I love it.

kayak girl: 3rd Aug 2007 - 19:15 GMT

Barren Island is the coolest. At the height of the rendering plants' days they had their own schools, hospitals, etc. It was a real community and had a majority of African American citizens. Some of the other islands in Jamaica Bay were also habitated. Ruffle Bar, for instance, had hotels, Oystering companies as well as some houses - the children that lived there had to row to the Rockaways for school. That island is also very good for finding remants from the past. I have found intact clay pipes and lots and lots of bottles. I reach the island by kayak, out of the Sebago Canoe Club in Canarsie, we're on Paerdegat Basin. Look us up: www.sebagocanoeclub.org. Cheers!

CartLegger: 3rd Aug 2007 - 21:46 GMT

here's some more historical background, compliment's of PBS POV program--the Spambot won't let me attach a link, so read below:

Barren Island, which appears on few modern maps, holds a special place in the city's garbage history. In the late 1850s, the first of many factories opened on this previously uninhabited island and began turning menhaden, an oily herring-like fish caught in local waters, into fertilizer

Scheming city politicians soon arranged to send household garbage this way, too. In the busy season, laborers unloaded seven or eight scows -- large, flat-bottomed boats with square ends -- a day, a total of 3,000 tons of refuse from Manhattan, Brooklyn and the Bronx, in addition to the daily horse boat, which held as many as fifty dead horses, plus cows, cats, dogs and pigs. Workers picked through the garbage for valuables, then boiled or steamed the rest in fifteen-foot-high steel cylinders

By 1860, writes Benjamin Miller in Fat of the Land, the island had "the largest concentration of offal industries in the world," producing 50,000 tons of oils, and tens of thousands of tons of grease, fertilizer and other products (bone black, hides, iron and tin) worth more than $10 million a year.

Politics and economics closed manufacturing plants through the 1920s, and by 1935 the single remaining factory on Barren Island was dismantled.

In 1936, the city planner Robert Moses evicted the last residents of Barren Island in order to build his Marine Park Bridge, which brought motorists over the Bay to the Rockaway Peninsula

BelRoC: 3rd Aug 2007 - 22:30 GMT

I never knew about this.
Sounds like my kind of place.
Thanx!!

colavitos ghost: 3rd Aug 2007 - 23:57 GMT

jack: you say this beach is "too dirty and too trashy"...

do you believe you want change? if so, go clean up this beach!

in related news, all cleveland area readers: this sunday i'm organizing a beach sweep at the old perkins beach (to the west of edgewater). anyone who believes they want change is welcome to come help clean up! just email me at acn222@gmail.com for details.

steve di pierdomenico: 7th Aug 2007 - 22:03 GMT

I arrived at Barren Island in 1929 as a 5 yr old. In the late "30rs,as a teen.I would screen the old dumps, and many summers dig up a coffee can of gold--from baby rings to chains which we sold. Commish. Moses moved us all out of there in about 1939 to make room for Floyd Bennet NAS.

CartLegger: 8th Aug 2007 - 12:00 GMT

Thanks so much for writing. I did not know I was joining in a local tradition. Too bad I did not find any gold!

But there is still so much else there to be found, and not just in the sands, but in the folks who dug there. If you have any other memories, please consider sharing them here.

steve : 10th Aug 2007 - 00:24 GMT

Cartlegger; I'll try to be brief with some details. Please don't hold me to the exact dates because I am going back from memory and not researching. Barren Island as we knew it was bordered by the south boundary of Floyd Bennett Field and east of Flatbush Avenue. Halfway between the airport fence and the ferry slip(before the Marine Parkway Bridge) there was a road about a mile long that went from Flatbush Avenue east to Jamaica Bay. That was called Main Street. It must have been the only Main Street in Brooklyn because we received our mail as Main Street, Brooklyn. Prior to 1936 there were many families who lived on Barren Island. You said that the city planner, Robert Moses, moved the people out of Barren Island. What he did was move only half of them out. We lived at 49 Main Street which was about the eviction line, and we moved farther east to #3 Main Street. So between 1936 and 1939 there were about 30 families still on Barren Island. Our school --P.S.120 (I remember 2 teachers, the principal, Miss Shaw, and another teacher named Miss Contillo) -- was torn down in or about 1936 when the west half of the island was evicted. Our church was left and used by the remaining people. After P.S. 120 was torn down we had to walk to Flatbush Ave to catch the bus that took us to P.S. 207 or 208. At that time, about 1936 they also tore down the remaining "horse" factory that was near the ferry slip. The "garbage" factory (that received hotel garbage from NYC)was closed down right before the expansion of Floyd Bennett Field, about 1929. This garbage from the city hotels was rendered to recover the oils and fats. In the garbage there was much silverware and other refuse from the hotels which included many coins and good jewelry. Most silverware and larger items were picked out by the workers on its way to the rendering. Many coins and jewelry went thru the rendering process and then were dumped out in an area called the "dumps". It was in this area, as a teenager, I would screen the dirt for "valuables." From Indianhead pennies, to gold pieces and even diamond pins. When reading the comments from others, I sense that we are talking about 2 different garbage "dumps." After the oil factory shut down in the late 20's, Barren Island was very, very clean. No garbage sites! So the garbage that is talked about along the beaches has to be manmade in the past few years! If you have any specific questions, I will try to answer them.

CartLegger: 11th Aug 2007 - 05:44 GMT

STeve: I think this makes sense. As I have heard people refer to BI as a dump in the 30s-50s. I wrongly assumed this was a continuity from an earlier time, but I see I am wrong. Thanks for illuminating my misunderstanding, and letting me know that we are bigger slobs than I suspected!

viola grand-daughter of carl willis: 4th Sep 2007 - 03:19 GMT

Steve:
My sisters and I are trying to find the burial site of our great-grandfather, Smith Foster. It is rumored that Miss Shaw (P.S. 120) gave permission for him to be buried in her plot. We are trying to find out where she died and where she is buried. We have reached so many dead ends...can you help us? Please email me directly ay vmor@aol.com and please cc my sister Vicki at lucky13duo@yahoo.com. If anyone reading this blog has any information to help us we would appreciate your information. Thanks!

Flo Lindstrom: 4th Jan 2008 - 23:52 GMT

my mother was born in 1912 and raised on Barren Island. I'm 68 yrs old and my earliest memory is of a being attacked by a "giant" chicken. In retrospect, since I was only 2 yrs old, guess the chicken was normal size. From what I can remember being told, when the island was turned into Floyd Bennet Field, all existing graves were exhumed and moved. My mother had a brother buried there.

Barbara Schneider: 2nd Feb 2008 - 11:09 GMT

My Grandparents had the first store on Barron Island the Hilinski General store and butcher shop. in the early 1900's. I have and old picture of it, but I have heard there is a picture of it in a book about Barron Island I want to find the book. All of my family settle on Barren Island, The Hilinski, The Schneider's & The Gunyans. My other grandfather was a captin of his own tug boat. If any one has any information on this please leave a msg. thanks

Ronald V. Regan, Sr.: 12th Feb 2008 - 22:12 GMT

My mother (Paula/Polla) Zelius (married nams Regan) was born on BArren Island in 1906. HEr mother was Genevive, and dad was Vincente' Zelius.
There were a total of five children in the Zelius family. By age they was Benjiman (Benny)... a real fisherman and newspaper figure and great stripped Bass sportsman, those many years ago. When he died, the Long Island Daily Press wrote a nice article on him. Then there was Josie, More on her later... then Polla (my Mother) who ran away from home at age 14 as a baby-sitter for a U.S. Navy Lieutenant and his wife and three siblings. Mom traveled on U.S. Navy ships from Brooklyn, Philedelphia, to Hawaii... Later to unmapped ___ Island. When she returned some 4 years later, she was always asked about her journey. Even her Dad and Mom forgave her unsolicited travels.
The remainder of the siblings consisted of sister Bertha, and Vincente' Jr. (known as Willie to everyone).

There is so much and I fail to read any good info on Barren Islanders. Your recent group had a few neat and informative pieces of information on the fish/horse rendering business (Pew !) But the Zelius clan loved the life there until they were told to move !

Thanks

Ronald V. Regan (Old Glendale, L.I. boy)

(oldsarge.1@netzero.com)

Linda Larson Brooks: 19th Feb 2008 - 04:34 GMT

I grew up in Flatlands Bay. Some of the people from Barren Island moved to the bay. Schnieder sounds familiar. I know the Lissenden's moved there too. My uncle Bud Ackermann delivered groceries from Rolston's on Flatbush Av. to the island. The whole area is no longer, thanks to Robert Moses!!!

Lorraine whitford: 26th Feb 2008 - 00:23 GMT

My grandfather grew up on barren Island. My grandmother worked at her aunts candy store during the summers.My graet grandmother bought the jailhouse on Barron Island and moved it to bergen beach. I grew up in that old jail house. I would love to find pictures of life on BI back in the day!