From the Archives
Meredith Wisner
4 weeks ago
USS Missouri on Launching Day, January 28, 1944
The USS Missouri is one of the Yard's most storied warships. An Iowa-class battleship, she was known for speed as well as her impressive secondary anti-aircraft batteries. Throughout her long career she earned 11 stars for service, though she is probably best know as the site of the Japanese surrender in Tokyo Bay that marked the end of WWII. An interesting side note: photographs from the ceremony show a 31-star flag in the background that was flown over Commodore Matthew Perry's flagship when he led the Far East Squadron that opened Japan's ports to foreign trade. The presence of that flag was an additional point of pride to Yard workers since Perry was the Brooklyn Navy Yard's eighth Commandant. The eight-minute United News clip below shows the ceremony.
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From the Archives
Meredith Wisner
1 month ago
Walloon Church, Site of the Wedding of Joris Jansen Rapelje and Catalyntje Trico
As the story goes, on January 21, 1624 Joris Jansen Rapelje and his bride-to-be Catalyntje Trico married hastily in the Walloon Church of Amsterdam. Four days later they would board a ship departing for the New World. After a brief stay in Fort Orange (now Albany, New York), where Joris found work with the Dutch West India Company, and another move to Fort Amsterdam on the Island of Manhattan, the Rapeljes became the first settlers of this area; a small oyster bed called Rinnegackonck that was later renamed Wallabout bay.
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From the Archives
Meredith Wisner
1 month, 1 week ago
Photo by Adrienne Murray (left to right): Meredith Wisner, Daniella Romano, Emelie Evans, Aileen Chumard and Adrienne Murray (not pictured) take a trip into the Dry Docks
Sometimes we forget just how awe inspiring the Navy Yard can be. In terms of scale it almost can't be beat--and that's saying something considering the magnitude of the city we live in. Still, it is possible to become inured to it all. Those of us who are residents of this fair city may relate to having friends in from out of town and taking them to that neighborhood joint that just happens to serve the best chicken adobo (or what have you), followed by artisanal cocktails at the speakeasy down the street. Your friends are dazzled, and you are given the gift of see with fresh eyes just how amazing your city can be. We imagine this is how the folks at GMD Shipyard felt as we frolicked through their dry dock a few weeks ago.
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From the Archives
Meredith Wisner
1 month, 3 weeks ago
Navy Yard tenant, Thomas Witte, installed for us yesterday an amazing group of paintings that reinterpret archival photographs from the Brooklyn Navy Yard's collection onto salvaged glass found around our 300 acres (adaptive reuse was never so inspiring!). We really love how he's taken these utilitarian photographs--once used to document advancements at the Yard during the post WWI, WPA and WWII period--and made them evoke more palpably the human experience of life on the Yard. Yesterday we posted the source photos on our Facebook page, and through that post The L Magazine responded with an amusing piece on Brooklyn's first hipster.
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From the Archives
Meredith Wisner
2 months ago
We at the BNY Blog will be home for Christmas, but we wanted to leave you with this Navy Yard themed Christmas story we found in the December December 23rd 1955 issue of The Shipworker. Enjoy!
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