|
Results for Brooklyn
|
On this page:
|
A borough of New York City in southeast New York on western Long Island. Dutch colonists first settled the area in 1636 and 1637 and in 1645 established the hamlet of Breuckelen near the present-day site of Borough Hall. Renamed Brooklyn by the English, the expanded community became part of Greater New York City in 1898. Population: 2,510,000.
Brooklynite Brook'lyn·ite' (-lə-nīt') n.
For more information on Brooklyn, visit Britannica.com.
Brooklyn, known as "Meryckawick" (sandy place) by its original Algonquin inhabitants, is one of the five boroughs of New York City. It is located at the southwestern end of Long Island, adjacent to but separated from Manhattan Island by the East River. The first European settlers in the region were the Dutch, who, through a total of some two hundred purchases, began settling Brooklyn in 1636. The flat, relatively low-lying lands of Brooklyn proved attractive to these settlers. Under Dutch rule, six mostly agricultural towns were settled. One of these, Gravesend, was founded in 1643 by the controversial Lady Deborah Moody, who had been exiled from the Massachusetts Bay Colony. In 1664, the British challenged the Dutch for supremacy over their North American holdings and, by 1674, Brooklyn, along with the rest of what had been New Netherland, passed definitively into English hands and became part of the colony of New York.
Brooklyn long resisted consolidation with New York City. It was a slow but probably inevitable event. In 1834, Brooklyn was granted city status, over the opposition of New York City. But in 1857, the state combined Brooklyn's and New York City's basic health and safety services into joint boards. Through a series of charters dating from the late seventeenth century, Manhattan gained dominance over the region's waterways at Brooklyn's expense. Over the course of the nineteenth century, an extensive network of transportation links between the two areas was put into place. A Manhattan farmer began the first ferry service linking Brooklyn to Manhattan in 1642. In 1814, the introduction of the steamboat ferry provided the first regular and rapid transportation between Manhattan and Brooklyn; the trip took fifteen minutes. Bridges and tunnels were added, and, finally, the first subway line reached Brooklyn in 1908. Most significant to the consolidation process was the completion of the Brooklyn Bridge in 1883. On 1 January 1898, Brooklyn officially became one of the five boroughs comprising New York City.
Brooklyn's population has always been diverse. By the nineteenth century, Holland, Germany, France, and England were all well represented. In addition, there were significant numbers of both free and enslaved African Americans, as illustrated by the incorporation of Brooklyn's first black church in 1794. By 1855, almost half the population was foreign-born, and, by 1860, Brooklyn was the third-largest city in the United States (behind New York and Philadelphia). Its shift to manufacturing began in 1825 with the opening of the Erie Canal and encouraged a new wave of immigration, most notably by the Irish. However, soon after the end of the Civil War (1861–1865) and into the first quarter of the twentieth century, large numbers of Italians and Jews, among others, settled in Brooklyn to live and work.
From the 1950s through the 1970s, Brooklyn's fortunes and population declined as manufacturing plants deserted the area and the borough lost residents to nearby suburbs. However, new waves of immigrants, most notably from the West Indies, South America, and Asia, helped bring about a population resurgence. In addition, after the 1980s, many of Brooklyn's brownstone neighborhoods again became popular and were gentrified.
Brooklyn has produced numerous well-known artists, writers, singers, actors, and politicians. Among them are poet Walt Whitman, writers Bernard Malamud and Arthur Miller, politician Shirley Chisholm, and singers Barbra Streisand and Richie Havens. It is also home to such important entertainment and cultural institutions as the Coney Island amusement park, the Brooklyn Academy of Music, and the Brooklyn Museum. Brooklyn was home to the much beloved Brooklyn Dodgers, established as a major league baseball team in 1884. From 9 April 1913 until the Dodgers abandoned Brooklyn for Los Angeles in 1957, the team played at the now-defunct Ebbets Field. In 1947, the Dodgers made history by signing on Jackie Robinson, the first African American to play in the major leagues.
Bibliography
Burrows, Edwin G., and Mike Wallace. Gotham: A History of New York City to 1898. New York: Oxford University Press, 1999.
Glueck, Grace, and Paul Gardner. Brooklyn: People and Places, Past and Present. New York: Abrams, 1991.
Snyder-Grenier, Ellen M. Brooklyn: An Illustrated History. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1996.
Stiles, Henry Reed. A History of the City of Brooklyn. Reprint, Bowie, Md.: Heritage Books, 1993.
Weld, Ralph Foster. Brooklyn Village, 1816–1834. New York: Columbia University Press, 1938.
—Faren R. Siminoff
Neighborhoods and Points of Interest
Brooklyn is a borough of well-defined neighborhoods, from the gentrified brownstone communities of Park Slope and Cobble Hill to Bedford-Stuyvesant, the largest African-American neighborhood in the city. Brighton Beach has a large community of Russian Jews, and there are also neighborhoods of Caribbean blacks, Hispanics, Italians, Poles, Hasidic Jews, Arabs, Chinese, and others.
Among educational institutions in the borough are Brooklyn College of the City Univ. of New York, Polytechnic Institute of New York, Pratt Institute, St. Joseph's College, and Long Island Univ. Near Prospect Park, scene of fighting in the American Revolution (see Long Island, battle of), is the main building of the Brooklyn Public Library. Nearby are the Brooklyn Museum of Art, the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, and the renowned, innovative Brooklyn Academy of Music.
In the “City of Churches,” the Plymouth Church of the Pilgrims, where Henry Ward Beecher preached, is perhaps best known. Other points of interest include Coney Island, with its beach, amusement park, and New York Aquarium; Green-Wood Cemetery; and the Lefferts Homestead (1777). Fort Hamilton (1831) overlooks the Narrows of New York Bay. Marine Park and parts of Jamaica Bay are included in Gateway National Recreation Area.
History
The Dutch and English settled the area (previously home to the Canarsie) in 1636 and 1637; about nine years later Dutch farmers established the hamlet of Brueckelen, near the present Borough Hall. By 1664, six towns had been established: Breuckelen (later anglicized to Brooklyn), Bushwick, Flatbush, Nieuw Amersfoort (Flatlands), Gravesend, and New Utrecht. Kings county was established in 1683; the Brooklyn Ferry area was incorporated as the village of Brooklyn in 1816, and the entire town was chartered as a city in 1834. In the 1830s Brooklyn Heights became perhaps the first modern suburb, accessible to New York City by ferry.
Brooklyn steadily absorbed neighboring settlements. After annexing Williamsburg and Bushwick in 1854, it became the third largest city in the United States, and continued to absorb other towns, including Flatbush, New Utrecht, and Gravesend, until it became coextensive with Kings County in 1896. In 1898, when it became a New York City borough, its population was 830,000. Immigration doubled its population in the next twenty years.
The New York Naval Shipyard (popularly, the Brooklyn Navy Yard) was located on the East River from 1801 until its closing in the late 1960s, when Brooklyn was declining as a port. The Daily Eagle, published in Brooklyn from 1841 until 1955, had Walt Whitman as one of its early editors. The borough is also famed as home to the Brooklyn Dodgers (at Ebbets Field), until the baseball team moved to Los Angeles in 1957.
Bibliography
See H. C. Syrett, The City of Brooklyn, 1865–1898 (1944, repr. 1968); R. F. Weld, Brooklyn Is America (1950, repr. 1967) and Brooklyn Village, 1816–1834 (1932, repr. 1970); D. W. McCullogh, Brooklyn (1983); E. Willensky, When Brooklyn Was the World (1986); K. Jackson, The Neighborhoods of Brooklyn (1998); M. Linder and L. S. Zacharias, Of Cabbages and Kings County (1999).
One of the five boroughs that make up New York City.
 M/CLEAR |
Temperature: 76°F /
24°C
RealFeel Temperature™: 71°F / 21°C Humidity: 59% Winds: S 24 mph / 39 kmh Pressure: 29.89" Visibility: 10 mi. / 16 km |
| Saturday |
|
HI:
88°F /
31°C LO: 69°F / 20°C |
| Sunday |
|
HI:
87°F /
30°C LO: 69°F / 20°C |
| Monday |
|
HI:
88°F /
31°C LO: 74°F / 23°C |
| Tuesday |
|
HI:
83°F /
28°C LO: 72°F / 22°C |
| Wednesday |
|
HI:
84°F /
28°C LO: 71°F / 21°C |
| Location | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Brooklyn, highlighted in yellow. | |
| Government | |
| County: | Kings |
| Borough president: | Marty Markowitz |
| Demographics[22] | |
| Population: | |
| Population density: | /sq mi (/km²) |
| Geography | |
| Area: | sq mi ( km²) |
| Land: | sq mi ( km²) |
| Water: | sq mi ( km²) |
| Coordinates: | |
Brooklyn (named after the Dutch town Breukelen) is one of the five boroughs of New York City. An independent city until its consolidation into New York in 1898, Brooklyn is New York City's most populous borough, with nearly 2.5 million residents.[1] Brooklyn is coterminous with Kings County, which is the most populous county in New York State, and the second most densely populated county in the United States (after New York County, which is the borough of Manhattan).[2]
Though a part of New York City, Brooklyn maintains a character of its own. Brooklyn is characterized by cultural diversity, an independent art scene, distinct neighborhoods, and a unique architectural heritage.
The Dutch were the first Europeans to settle the area on the western edge of
Dorie named the bourough. The Dutch lost Breuckelen in the British conquest of New Netherland in 1664. In 1683, the British reorganized the Province of New York into 12 counties, each of which was sub-divided into towns. Over time, the name evolved from Breuckelen, to Brockland, Brocklin, Brookline, and eventually Brooklyn.[3] Kings County was one of the original 12 counties, and Brooklyn was one of the original six towns within Kings County. The county was named in honor of King Charles II of England.
In August and September 1776, the Battle of Long Island (occasionally now called, anachronistically, the "Battle of Brooklyn") was fought in Kings County. It was the first major battle in the American Revolutionary War following the Declaration of Independence, and the largest battle of the entire conflict. New York, and Brooklyn along with it, gained independence from the British with the Treaty of Paris in 1783.
The first half of the 19th century saw urban areas grow along the economically strategic East River waterfront, across from New York City. The county had two cities: the City of Brooklyn and the City of Williamsburgh. Brooklyn annexed Williamsburgh in 1854, which lost its final "h." It took until 1896 for Brooklyn to annex all other parts of Kings County.
The building of rail links such as the Brighton Beach Line in 1878 heralded explosive growth, and in the space of a decade the City of Brooklyn annexed the Town of New Lots in 1886, the Town of Flatbush, the Town of Gravesend, and the Town of New Utrecht in 1894, and the Town of Flatlands in 1896.
Brooklyn had reached its natural municipal boundaries at the ends of Kings County. The question was now whether it was prepared to engage in the still-grander process of consolidation now developing throughout the region.
In 1898, Brooklyn residents voted by a slight majority to join with Manhattan, The Bronx, Queens and Richmond (later Staten Island) as the five boroughs to form modern New York City. Kings County retained its status as one of New York State's counties.
Brooklyn is located on the westernmost point of Long Island and shares its only land boundary with Queens to the northeast. The westernmost section of this boundary is defined by Newtown Creek, which flows into the East River.
Brooklyn's waterfront faces different bodies of water. Northern Brooklyn's coast is defined by the East River, while middle Brooklyn adjoins Upper New York Bay. This area of the waterfront features the Red Hook peninsula and the Erie Basin. Buttermilk Channel separates this part of the waterfront from Governors Island. Southwest is Gowanus Bay, connected to the Gowanus Canal. At its south westernmost section, Brooklyn is separated from Staten Island by the Narrows, where Upper and Lower New York Bay meet.
Brooklyn's southern coast includes the peninsula on which stretch Coney Island, Brighton Beach and Manhattan Beach. The southeastern coast lies on island-dotted Jamaica Bay.
The highest point in Brooklyn is the area around Prospect Park and Green-Wood Cemetery, rising approximately 200 feet (60 m) above sea level. There is also a minor elevation in Downtown Brooklyn known as Brooklyn Heights.
According to the United States Census Bureau, the County has a total area of 251.0 km² (96.9 mi²). 182.9 km² (70.6 mi²) of it is land and 68.1 km² (26.3 mi²) of it is water. 27.13% of the total area is water.
Populations of wild Monk Parakeets, also known as the Quaker Parrot, live in Green-Wood Cemetery, Midwood, Flatbush, Marine Park, Bensonhurst, and Bay Ridge.
Brooklyn has many well-defined neighborhoods, many of which developed from distinct towns and villages that date back to its founding in the Dutch colonial era in the early 1600s.
Today, Downtown Brooklyn is the third-largest central business district in New York City, after Midtown Manhattan and Lower Manhattan[4]. It has many commercial towers and a rapidly increasing number of residential buildings.
The northwestern neighborhoods between the Brooklyn Bridge and Prospect Park, including Boerum Hill, Brooklyn Heights, Carroll Gardens, Cobble Hill, Clinton Hill, Vinegar Hill, DUMBO (an acronym for "Down Under the Manhattan Bridge Overpass"), Fort Greene, Gowanus, Park Slope, Prospect Heights, and Red Hook, are characterized by many nineteenth century brick townhouses and brownstones. These neighborhoods include some of the most gentrified and affluent neighborhoods in Brooklyn, along with ample subway lines, cultural institutions, and high-end restaurants.
Further North along the East River lie Williamsburg and Greenpoint. Traditionally working class communities with a vibrant cultural mix, many artists and hipsters have moved into the area since the late 1990s. Further changing the area, the city completed an extensive rezoning of the Brooklyn waterfront in 2005 which will allow for many new residential condominiums. As prices have risen, redevelopment has moved eastward away from the waterfront into Bushwick along the L subway line.
Central and southern Brooklyn contains many more architecturally and culturally distinct neighborhoods, some of which grew rapidly in the late 19th and early 20th century as upwardly-mobile immigrants moved out of tenement buildings in Manhattan neighborhoods like the Lower East Side. Borough Park is largely Orthodox Jewish; Bedford-Stuyvesant is the largest black neighborhood in the country; Bensonhurst is historically Italian. Dyker Heights is an affluent Italian neighborhood. East Flatbush and Fort Greene is home to a large number of middle-class black professionals. Brighton Beach is home to many Russians. Since 1990, Brooklyn has seen a rise in new immigration to neighborhoods like Sunset Park, home to flourishing Mexican and Chinese American communities.
Since consolidation with New York City in 1898, Brooklyn has been governed by the New York City Charter that provides for a "strong" mayor-council system. The centralized New York City government is responsible for public education, correctional institutions, libraries, public safety, recreational facilities, sanitation, water supply, and welfare services in Brooklyn.
The office of Borough President was created in the consolidation of 1898 to balance centralization with local authority. Each borough president had a powerful administrative role derived from having a vote on the New York City Board of Estimate, which was responsible for creating and approving the city's budget and proposals for land use. In 1989, the Supreme Court of the United States declared the Board of Estimate unconstitutional on the grounds that Brooklyn, the most populous borough, had no greater effective representation on the Board than Staten Island, the least populous borough, a violation of the Fourteenth Amendment's Equal Protection Clause pursuant to the high court's 1964 "one man, one vote" decision.[5]
Since 1990 the Borough President has acted as an advocate for the borough at the mayoral agencies, the City Council, the New York state government, and corporations. Brooklyn's Borough President is Marty Markowitz, elected as a Democrat in 2001 and re-elected in 2005.
| Year | GOP | Dems |
|---|---|---|
| 2004 | 24.3% 167,149 | 74.9% 514,973 |
| 2000 | 15.7% 96,605 | 80.6% 497,468 |
| 1996 | 15.1% 81,406 | 80.1% 432,232 |
| 1992 | 22.9% 133,344 | 70.7% 411,183 |
| 1988 | 32.6% 230,064 | 66.3% 368,518 |
| 1984 | 38.3% 285,477 | 61.3% 328,379 |
| 1980 | 38.4% 200,306 | 55.4% 288,893 |
| 1976 | 31.1% 190,728 | 68.3% 419,382 |
| 1972 | 49.0% 373,903 | 50.8% 387,768 |
| 1968 | 32.0% 247,936 | 63.1% 489,174 |
| 1964 | 25.0% 229,291 | 74.8% 684,839 |
| 1960 | 33.5% 327,497 | 66.2% 646,582 |
| 1956 | 45.2% 460,456 | 54.7% 557,655 |
The Democratic Party holds the majority of public offices. 69.7% of registered voters in Brooklyn are Democrats. Party platforms center on affordable housing, education and economic development. The most controversial political issue is over the proposed Brooklyn Nets Arena, a large development project. Pockets of Republican influence exist in Bay Ridge and Dyker Heights.
Each of the city's five counties (coterminous with each borough) has its own criminal court system and District Attorney, the chief public prosecutor who is directly elected by popular vote. Charles J. Hynes, a Democrat, has been the District Attorney of Kings County since 1989. Brooklyn has 16 City Council members, the largest number of any of the five boroughs. It also has 18 administrative districts, each served by a local Community Board. Community Boards are representative bodies that field complaints and serve as advocates for local residents.
Brooklyn has not voted for a Republican in a national presidential election in the last 50 years. In the 2004 presidential election Democrat John Kerry received 74.9% of the vote in Brooklyn and Republican George W. Bush received 24.3%.
Brooklyn is split between five congressional districts, three of which are based in the borough. 10th Congressional district, which covers Fort Greene, Bedford Stuyvesant, Brownsville, East New York, and Canarsie is represented by Democrat Ed Towns. Yvette Clarke represents the 11th Congressional District encompassing Park Slope, Crown Heights, Flatbush, East Flatbush and Prospect Heights. It was created by the 1965 Voting Rights Act with the intention of increasing African-American representation in the United States Congress. In 1968 the district elected Shirley Chisholm, the first African-American woman to hold a seat in the Congress and a founding member of the Congressional Black Caucus. The district's population of 654,361 is 57% black, 24% white, and 12% Latino.[6].
In the 12th district Nydia Velazquez represents Bushwick, Williamsburg, Red Hook, and Sunset Park, as well as Manhattan's Lower East Side and parts of western Queens.
The 9th district, represented by Democrat Anthony Weiner, includes Bergen Beach, Brighton Beach, Gerritsen Beach, Kensington, Manhattan Beach, Marine Park, Midwood, Mill Basin and Sheepshead Bay in southeast Brooklyn, as well as portions of Queens.[7]
The midtown Manhattan-based 8th District, represented by Democrat Jerry Nadler, includes Coney Island, Boro Park and parts of Bensonhurst and Bay Ridge. The Staten Island-based 13th district, represented by Republican Vito Fossella, includes some of the more conservative areas of the borough, including most of Bay Ridge and Bensonhurst and all of Gravesend and Dyker Heights.
Brooklyn's official motto is Een Draght Mackt Maght. Written in the (old) Dutch language, it is inspired by the motto of the United Dutch Provinces and translated as In Unity There is Strength. The motto is displayed on the borough seal and flag, which also feature a young robed woman bearing fasces, a traditional emblem of republicanism.[8] Brooklyn's official colors are blue and gold.[9]
| Party | 2005 | 2004 | 2003 | 2002 | 2001 | 2000 | 1999 | 1998 | 1997 | 1996 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Democratic | 69.7 | 69.2 | 70.0 | 70.1 | 70.6 | 70.3 | 70.7 | 70.8 | 70.8 | 71.0 |
| Republican | 10.1 | 10.1 | 10.1 | 10.1 | 10.2 | 10.5 | 10.9 | 11.1 | 11.3 | 11.5 |
| No affiliation | 16.5 | 16.9 | 16.1 | 16.2 | 16.3 | 16.5 | 15.9 | 15.5 | 15.4 | 15.2 |
| Other | 3.7 | 3.9 | 3.8 | 3.6 | 2.9 | 2.8 | 2.5 | 2.8 | 2.3 | 2.3 |
Brooklyn's job market is driven by three main factors: the performance of the national/city economy, population flows, and the borough's position as a convenient back office for New York's businesses.[10]
Forty-four percent of Brooklyn's employed population, or 410,000 people, work in the borough; more than half of the borough's residents work outside its boundaries. As a result, economic conditions in Manhattan are important to the borough's jobseekers. Strong international immigration to Brooklyn generates jobs in services, retailing and construction.[10]
In recent years Brooklyn has benefited from a steady influx of financial back office operations from Manhattan, the rapid growth of a high-tech/entertainment economy in DUMBO, and strong growth in support services such as accounting, personal supply agencies and computer services firms.[10]
Jobs in the borough have traditionally been concentrated in manufacturing, but since 1975, Brooklyn has shifted from a manufacturing-based economy to a service-based economy. In 2004, 215,000 Brooklyn residents worked in the services sector, while 27,500 worked in manufacturing. Although manufacturing has declined, a substantial base has remained in apparel and niche manufacturing concerns such as furniture, fabricated metals, and food products.[11] The pharmaceutical company Pfizer has a manufacturing plant in Brooklyn that employs 990 workers. First established as a shipbuilding facility in 1801, the Brooklyn Navy Yard employed 70,000 people at is peak during World War II and was then the largest employer in the borough. The Missouri, the ship on which the Japanese formally surrendered, was built there, as was the iron-sided Civil War vessel the Monitor, and the Maine, whose sinking off Havana led to the start of the Spanish-American War. The Navy Yard is now a hub for industrial design firms, food processing businesses, and artisans, along with a growing film and television production industry. About 230 private-sector firms providing 4,000 jobs are at the Yard.
Construction and services are the fastest growing sectors.[12] Most employers in Brooklyn are small businesses. In 2000, 91% of the approximately 38,704 business establishments in Brooklyn had fewer than 20 employees.[13]
The unemployment rate in Brooklyn in March 2006 was 5.9%.
| Brooklyn Compared | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| 2000 Census | Brooklyn | NY City | NY State |
| Total population | 2,465,326 | 8,008,278 | 18,976,457 |
| Population density | 34,920/mi² | 26,403/mi² | 402/mi² |
| Median household income (1999) | $32,135 | $38,293 | $43,393 |
| Per capita income | $16,775 | $22,402 | $23,389 |
| Bachelor's degree or higher | 22% | 27% | 24% |
| Foreign born | 38% | 36% | 20% |
| White | 41% | 45% | 67% |
| Black | 36% | 27% | 16% |
| Hispanic (any race) | 20% | 27% | 15% |
| Asian | 8% | 10% | 6% |
According to 2005 U.S. Census Bureau estimates, there are 2,486,235 people (up from 2.3 million in 1990), 880,727 households,
and 583,922 families residing in Brooklyn.
In 2000, 41.20% of Brooklyn residents were white; 36.44% were black; 7.54% were Asian; 0.41% were Native American; 0.06% Pacific Islander; 10.05% were of other races; and 4.27% were from two or more races. People of Hispanic or Latino origin, who may be of any race, comprised 19.79% of the population. 18.00% of the population reported speaking Spanish at home, 5.95% Russian, 4.19% French or a French-based creole, 3.92% Chinese, 3.10% Yiddish, 2.10% Italian, 1.42% Polish, 1.13% Hebrew, 1.09% Arabic and 0.68% Urdu.[15]
Of the 880,727 households in Brooklyn, 38.6% were married couples living together, 22.3% had a female householder with no husband present, and 33.7% were non-families. 33.3% had children under the age of 18 living in them. Of all households 27.8% are made up of individuals and 9.8% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.75 and the average family size was 3.41.
In Brooklyn the population was spread out with 26.9% under the age of 18, 10.3% from 18 to 24, 30.8% from 25 to 44, 20.6% from 45 to 64, and 11.5% who are 65 years of age or older. The median age was 33 years. Brooklyn has more women, with 88.4 males for every 100 females.
The median income for households in Brooklyn was $32,135, and the median income for a family was $36,188. Males had a higher median income of $34,317 than females, whose median income was $30,516. The per capita income was $16,775. About 22% of families and 25.1% of the population were below the poverty line, including 34% of those under age 18 and 21.5% of those age 65 or over.
Brooklyn has long been a magnet for immigrants, and has become New York City's most ethnically diverse and most populous borough.[citation needed] It presently has substantial populations from many countries, including China, Jamaica, Trinidad, Guyana, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Russia. The borough also attracts people previously residing in the United States. Of these, most come from Chicago, San Francisco, Washington DC/Baltimore, Boston, and Seattle. An overwhelming majority of those who leave Brooklyn go to the Broward, Dade, Palm Beach, and Orange Counties of Florida. The Brooklyn population continues to grow because there is more immigration than emigration.[16]
Brooklyn has played a major role in American letters. Walt Whitman wrote of the Brooklyn waterfront in his classic poem Crossing Brooklyn Ferry. Betty Smith's 1943 book A Tree Grows In Brooklyn, and the 1945 film based on it, are among the best-known early works about life in Brooklyn. William Styron's novel Sophie's Choice is set in Flatbush, just off Prospect Park, during the summer of 1947. Arthur Miller's 1955 play A View From the Bridge is set in Brooklyn. Paule Marshall's 1959 novel, Brown Girl, Brownstones, about Barbadian immigrants during the Depression and World War II is also set in Brooklyn. More recently, Brooklyn-born author Jonathan Lethem has written several books about growing up in the borough, including Motherless Brooklyn and The Fortress of Solitude. The neighborhood of Park Slope is home to many contemporary writers, including Jonathan Safran Foer, Jhumpa Lahiri, Jonathan Franzen, Rick Moody, Jennifer Egan, Kathryn Harrison, Paul Auster, Franco Ambriz, Nicole Krauss, Colson Whitehead, Darin Strauss, Siri Hustvedt and Suketu Mehta, among others. So many writers live in the area that Brooklyn-based band One Ring Zero released an album with lyrics written mainly by Brooklyn-based writers. The Discovery Kids show Time Warp Trio is also set in Brooklyn.
The borough has had a part in theater and film as well. Lynn Nottage's play Crumbs from the Table of Joy is set in post-World War II Brooklyn and deals with the hopes and frustrations of an African American family recently arrived from Florida. The John Travolta movie Saturday Night Fever was set in Bay Ridge, an Italian neighborhood in south Brooklyn. Neil Simon's 1983 play "Brighton Beach Memoirs" is set in 1937 Brooklyn. In the late 1980s Brooklyn achieved a new cultural prominence with the films of Spike Lee, whose She's Gotta Have It and Do The Right Thing were shot in Brooklyn neighborhoods. The 2005 film The Squid and the Whale, by Noah Baumbach, the son of novelist Jonathon Baumbach and Village Voice film critic Georgia Brown, examined the family life of the Park Slope intelligentsia.
The Brooklyn Museum, opened in 1897, is among the world's premier art institutions with
a permanent collection that includes more than 1.5 million objects, from ancient Egyptian masterpieces to contemporary art. The
Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM), a complex including the 2,109-seat Howard
Gilman Opera House, the 874-seat Harvey Lichtenstein Theater, and the art house BAM Rose Cinemas are notable venues. BAM is
recognized internationally as a progressive cultural center well known for The Next Wave Festival, which began in
1983. Artists who have presented their works there include Philip
Glass, Peter Brook, Laurie Anderson,
Lee Breuer, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan,
Steve Reich, Robert Wilson,
Ingmar Bergman, The Whirling Dervishes and the
Kirov Opera directed and conducted by Valery
Gergiev among others. Founded in 1863, the Brooklyn Historical
Society (BHS) is a museum, library, and educational center dedicated to preserving and encouraging the study of Brooklyn's
rich 400-year past, while reflecting upon the future of the culturally rich borough. BHS houses a treasure trove of materials
relating to the founding of the U.S. and the history of Brooklyn and its people. The BRIC Rotunda Gallery, founded in 1981, is
the oldest not-for-profit gallery dedicated to presenting contemporary art work by artists who are from, live, or work in the
borough. The Gallery, located in Brooklyn Heights, presents contemporary art of all media, public events and an innovative arts
education program. The Gallery's aim is to increase the visibility and accessibility of contemporary art while bridging the gap
between the art world and global culture in Brooklyn and the world beyond. BRIC Rotunda Gallery is the visual arts program of
BRIC Arts|Media|Bklyn, a multi-disciplinary arts and media non-profit, dedicated to presenting visual, performing and media arts
programs that are reflective of Brooklyn's diverse communities and to supporting the creative process.
Brooklyn is home to one of the most vibrant Jewish communities outside of Israel. Some estimates have the Jewish population in Brooklyn at as high as three-quarters of a million, with many living in Borough Park, Williamsburg, Crown Heights, and other sections of Brooklyn. Much of the Jewish community, most notably the Hasidic and Hareidi Jews, are fluent in Yiddish and often use it as their first language. Moreover, many Orthodox Jews have very large families, so the Jewish community is experiencing tremendous growth.
Variously called the "City of Trees," "City of Homes," or the "City of Churches" in the 19th century, Brooklyn is now often styled the "Borough of Homes and Churches".
As a promotional gesture by the current borough administration, distinctive traffic signs are posted along major traffic arteries at Brooklyn’s border crossings. They incorporate colorful expressions associated with Brooklyn, including: "Fugheddaboudit," "Oy vey!," and "How Sweet It Is." One sign identifies the borough as: "Home to Everyone From Everywhere!"
Brooklyn and Red Hook feature in Arthur Miller's play "A View From The Bridge" which is a tragedy set in 1940-50s New York about an Italian American Family.
Brooklyn has three local newspapers, the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, the Brooklyn Paper and Courier-Life Publications. Courier-Life Publications is Brooklyn's largest chain of newspapers, with a weekly readership exceeding more than one million. Courier-Life publishes newspapers reaching every sector of the borough, in addition to its myriad supplements. Bay Currents is a bi-weekly newspaper published in south Brooklyn. The Brooklyn Rail is a glossy monthly magazine emphasizing arts and literary criticism and winner of the Utne Independent Press Award in 2002 and 2003 for Best Local/Regional Coverage. Brooklyn is also served by the major New York dailies, including The New York Times, The New York Daily News, and The New York Post. HelloBrooklyn.com is Brooklyn's largest portal with more than 10,000 links[17].
Brooklyn has a thriving ethnic press. Major ethnic publications include the Brooklyn-Queens Catholic paper The Tablet, "Hamodia" an orthodox Jewish daily, as well as several Haitian newspapers including The Haitian Times, Haiti Observateur, and Haiti Progress. Many nationally-distributed ethnic newspapers are based out of offices in Brooklyn. Over 60 ethnic groups, writing in 42 languages, publish some 300 non-English language magazines and newspapers in New York City.
The City of New York also has an official television station, run by the NYC Media Group, which features programming based in Brooklyn. There is also Brooklyn Cable Access Television, the borough's public access channel.
Southern Brooklyn was once the premier resort destination for New York City. Coney Island developed as a playground for the rich in the early 1900s, when wealthy New Yorkers would bet on horses at the Gravesend or Sheepshead Bay Race Track and dined at high-class restaurants and seaside hotels. No trip to Sheepshead Bay would be complete without a stop at the docks and then dinner at Lundy's Restaurant. The introduction of the subway made Coney Island a vacation destination for the masses, and it evolved into one of America's first amusement grounds. The Cyclone rollercoaster, built in 1927, is on the National Register of Historic Places. The 1920 Wonder Wheel and other rides are still operational at Astroland. Coney Island went into decline in the 1950s, but is undergoing a renaissance. The annual Coney Island Mermaid Parade is a hipster costume-and-float parade which honored David Byrne, pre-punk music guru, as the head merman in 1998. Coney Island also hosts the annual Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest.
Green-Wood Cemetery, founded by the social reformer Henry Evelyn Pierrepoint in 1838, is both one of the most significant cemeteries in the United States and an expansive green space encompassing 478 acres (1.9 km²) of rolling hills and dales, several ponds, and a baroque chapel. Still in use, the cemetery is the burial ground of some of the most famous New Yorkers, including Albert Anastasia (1903-1957), mobster, "Lord High Executioner" for "Murder Inc."; Jean-Michel Basquiat (1960-1988), artist; Leonard Bernstein (1918-1990), composer; Louis Moreau Gottschalk (1829-1869), New Orleans-born pianist and composer; Laura Jean Libbey (1862-1924), best-selling "dime-store" novelist; Samuel F.B. Morse (1791-1872), inventor of the telegraph; Edward R. Murrow (1908-1965), journalist; Martha Bulloch Roosevelt (1834-1884), mother of U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt; Margaret Sanger (1879-1966), birth control advocate; F.A.O. Schwarz (1836-1911), toy store founder; William M. "Boss" Tweed (1823-1878), notorious boss of the New York political machine.
The New York Transit Museum is a museum which displays historical artifacts of the New York City Subway and bus systems; it is located in the unused Court Street subway station in Brooklyn Heights. The Brooklyn Children's Museum was the world's first museum for children and has many exhibits on culture and zoology. The 52 acre (210,000 m²) Brooklyn Botanic Garden includes a cherry tree esplanade, a one acre (4,000 m²) rose garden, a Japanese hill and pond garden, a fragrance garden for the blind, a water lily pond esplanade, several conservatories, a rock garden, a native flora garden, a bonsai tree collection, and children's gardens and discovery exhibits.
Brooklyn has a storied sports history. It has been home to many famous sports figures such as Joe Paterno, Joe Pepitone, Joe Torre, Larry Brown, Mike Tyson, Vitas Gerulaitis, Herbie Kronowitz, Paul Lo Duca, John Franco, Stephon Marbury, John Halama, Rico Petrocelli, Michael Jordan Vince Lombardi and Arianit Spahiu. Parks throughout the borough such as Prospect Park, Marine Park<
