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From: "Dool" <>
Subject: Re: [NYKings] Re: Brooklyn in 1888
Date: Mon, 3 Nov 2003 22:27:38 -0500
References: <MFMBM028JG4aqEBw1Cl00000e81@mfmbm028.myfamilycorp.local>


For those that enjoy the history of Flatbush I took the time to retype this
article from the Brooklyn Eagle. The article alludes to the coming
unfettered growth that Brooklyn was about to experience in the coming
decades, it also tells some of the history of Brooklyn and Flatbush up to
1888. I was also able to determine when my ancestors (sir name FRENCH)
emigrated from Ireland - none of which I knew before I read this article.

Credit must be given to the Brooklyn Public Library for making this
wonderful resource available to all that appreciate history:

Brooklyn Eagle, December 9, 1888 Page 10.

STROLLS UPON OLD LINES
________________________

Crow Hill and Some of Its Suggestions.

The Bedford Hills - A Region Now Traced By
The Eastern Parkway - The Genesis of the
Name - French's Stopping Place.

There was a rhyme in one of the children's magazine not very long ago which
ran somewhat in this wise:
Oh, sunflower tall,
Leaning over the wall,
You think jolly Tim is exceedingly small:
But jolly Tim knows
That he grows and he grows,
Else how would he ever keep up with his clothes?

Likening the great city of New York to the sunflower, it no doubt feels, as
it looks across the East River, that jolly Tim Brooklyn is exceedingly
small, yet it knows, and so do we all, that " it grows and it grows, else
how would it ever keep up with its" boundaries, as laid out by the
enterprising dealer in city lots. It is no windy inflation, either, nor
does its corpulence come from beer, but from a good wholesome diet of flesh
and blood in the shape of natural increase and new immigration. Brooklyn
real estate may be held in some high places, but under no probable
contingency will it ever be worth less.

Brooklyn started in at Het Veer, now Fulton Ferry; it grew up to Breucklen
at the present City Hall; it reached over and absorbed Waalboght and
Krenpellbosch; it crept down the coast to Gowanus; it climbed the hills to
Bedford and , gaining strength, it reached out its arms and gathered in
Williamsburgh, Greenpoint and Bushwich, and finally East New York and New
Lots
have been taken into its capacious maw; and though its boundaries have thus
been continually extended, "it grows and it grows,: and consequently "keeps
up with its clothes."

There is one section of Brooklyn which has not, for obvious reasons, grown
so rapidly as those parts along the highways, but which is now being filled
up. I refer to the Bedford Hills. Two centuries ago the Green Mountains
extended up the coast from Gravesend Bay, across the present Geenwood
Cemetery and Prospect Park and on in an easterly direction to East New York,
the Cemetery of the Evergreens and thence continuing to the northeast over
Long Island to Oyster Bay. Those hills in Revolutionary days were covered
with woods and, the woodland within the limits of the present City of
Brooklyn having been apportioned to the different towns years before, the
name of the range had been changed and different sections of the Green
Mountains were known by different names. The high hill just east of the park
entrance was known as Mount Prospect and the hills generally ceased to be
the Green Mountains and became the Mount Prospect range. That portion of
the woodland adjoining Bedford which extended from the park to the Rockaway
footpath, which passed through what is now known as the Bedford Hills, while
those hills east of the footpath were known during the Revolution as
Bushwick Hills.
As time passed on the Bedford Hills were divided into sections and had
different names applied to each. The Battle Pass, in Prospect Park, became
Valley Grove. Then came Prospect Hill and Bedford Hills. The Clove Road
cut through the range just east of what is now Nostrand Avenue, and down in
this hollow, just north of the southern city line, Ralph Malbone, a well
know citizen of Brooklyn, laid off a number of city lots and started what
was subsequently known as Malboneville, along in the thirties.
The exact boundaries of this section it seems impossible to obtain, but it
may be set down as including the section between the Eastern Parkway and the
city line, and from Nostrand to New York Avenue, although the territory as
far west as Rogers and as far east as Brooklyn Avenue was sometimes
included.

Bedford Hills followed the line of the Eastern Parkway, on both sides, until
about Buffalo Avenue, when the trend was more directly east than the
Parkway - which followed a course slightly south of east - and up to and
around the west and north side of East New York. The Bedford Hills
included, in a general way, all the territory between Atlantic Avenue and
the southern boundary line of the city, from Prospect Hill to east of
Buffalo Ave, where the hills, as stated, did not extend south of the
Parkway.

East of Malboneville come Crow Hill, extending to about Schenectady Avenue.
The Weeksville covered the territory to Buffalo Avenue, and beyond the
Hunterfly Road to East New York was known as Carrsville. These divisions
have existed for about fifty years. It is only possible to give these
divisions in a general way, as the "oldest inhabitants" do not agree in
laying out the boundaries, and it is a question it the lines were ever very
decidedly fixed. As to the location of Crow Hill for instance, it seems
almost impossible to definitely locate it. Some persons go so far as to
include the whole range from Bedford to Buffalo Avenue in Crow Hill, but
this is obviously wrong, for the Clove Road cuts deeply into the range and
would make it necessary to speak of it as Crow "Hills" to be correct.
Others say it was on both sides of the Clove Road near the Penitentiary; or
in other words, that it occupied the territory known as Malboneville.
Why any one should call a gulch or valley Crow Hill is a mystery. Still
others locate this will o' the wisp in the 4 blocks between Buffalo and
Utica Avenues, St Marks Avenue and Park Place and assign as a reason for its
name that a great many Negroes used to live there. That this latter section
was within the limits of Weeksville there appears to be no question among
those familiar with the neighborhood, and this supposed origin of the
neighborhood does not hold good. After diligent inquires I have come to the
conclusion that the limits lay down by Bartley FRENCH, who was born in
Malboneville comes nearest to the correct boundaries. They include the hill
from Brooklyn Avenue to Schenectady. John Jennison, a horse trader on
Fulton Street, who used live near the Clove Road, unravels the mystery of
the name, or at least gives the only plausible reason for it. He says there
used to be a bone factory on the hill and the name came from the large
number of crows that flocked there. Probably the best know locality of those
mentioned, the earliest to be laid off in lots, and likely to be the last to
come prominently into the market is Malboneville.

Along about the commencement of the present century Ralph Malbone kept a
grocery on Fulton Street, on the point made by the junction of Willoughby
Avenue and now occupied by the Jones Building. He made money and invested
in real estate, and about 1830, he had a real estate office where the city
hall now stands. He bought land of the Clove Road, near the southern city
line, and laid out lots, which was the origin of Malboneville. About the
year 1833, he built a house fronting on the Clove Road between what is now
Crown and Montgomery Streets, which subsequently became well known to all
sporting men, far and near as French's. Tom French came from Ireland about
1830 and engaged in peddling. He first had a grocery where the
penitentiary stands, but subsequently bought the house on Clove Road from
Malbone and had his store there. French used to keep groceries, dry goods
and liquors and, in fact, a little of everything that goes to make up the
stock of a general county store. Mrs. French kept the store, while Tom
traveled around the country peddling his wares. Subsequently the house
became a regular roadside tavern and was a great resort for the sporting
gentry previous to the Civil War. In ante bellum times, there was a stage
line from Fulton Ferry to Bedford and thence, via the old Clove Road, to
Canarsie, then, as now, a great resort for fishermen. French's was a
stopping place of the stages. It was also the half way house for the
farmers from the neighborhood of Canarsie, Flatlands, Flatbush, Sheepshead
Bay, Coney Island, etc., and it was no uncommon thing in those days to see
100 farm wagons and other vehicles grouped in the neighborhood of French's

The house is one story and a half and has a basement. It is arranged with
two large rooms an the basement, which were formerly used as store and
kitchen, there being doors leading into them fro the front of the house, on
either side of the high stoop. On the first floor is a hall, with a large
room on either side, one of which was used as a barroom, the other as a
reception room, while on the upper floor are five bedrooms. A distinction
used to be made in customers. The cheaper class of customers, who went into
the grocery for their drinks, got them (whisky) for 3 cents a glass, while
the more aristocratic of the sporting men and farmers, who patronized the
bar upstairs, paid 6 cents a glass for the same liquor. So much for style.

On the Fourth of July, Thanksgiving Day, Christmas and New Year's and other
holidays, French's wa a great resort for games. Crowds would congregate
there for the city, and the county too, and participate in shooting matched,
raffles, cock fights, foot and horse races and similar amusements. They
used
to tie a chicken to a stake and then charge boys 10 cents a shot. The 100
yard horse or foot race, "two wet and two dry," used to be a favorite
amusement. That is to day, the parties would make up the race and bet $2 on
the result, "two wet and two dry" meaning that the winner should keep his
own
$2 and treat the crowd with the winnings.

But this once noted hostelry lost its claim to patronage when the old Clove
Road ceased to be a thoroughfare, and for the past twenty years has been a
private dwelling. It is now occupied by Tom French's only surviving
daughter, Mrs. Welsh. The outbuilding of the tavern still stand: the old
pump remains in front, where horsed can be watered as of yore, though the
road had been closed at the Eastern Parkway and ceased to be traveled, and a
row of trees in front and one to the south indicates what used to be the
tavern plaza. Out of eleven children or Tom French but five remain: Mrs.
Welsh, mentioned above; Captain Henry French, of the police force; William,
who is Supervisor of the Twenty-fourth Ward; Thomas, inspector for the Board
of Health, and Bartley, who keeps a sale and exchange stable.

To the east of Malboneville, in the neighborhood of what would be Brooklyn
Avenue, there used to be odd localities, with odder characters inhabiting
them. Most of the middle aged men of to-day who were reared within the city
limits at Bedford or south thereof can remember Snake Hollow, Kelley's Hill
and Stony Hill, and can recall Snake Mary, the Indian half breed; Papoose
Indian, the fortune teller, and Peg Riley, the Queen of the Wards. The fair
Peggy had a house that was on the Flatbush line at what would be the
terminus of Brooklyn Avenue. It was half in the city and half in Flatbush,
and when the officers would get after her for violations of the law in
regard to liquor she would retire to the security of the end of her house
across the line.

But the march of improvement is going on. The Eastern Parkway, frequently
called the Boulevard, swept through the Bedford Hills and leveled a great
portion of them; gradually the great banks are being cut away and the
hollows are being filled; the hill east of Bedford is almost gone; the
reminder of the Clove Road down about Malboneville is being obliterated;
Crow Hill is losing its crown and the streets are being cut through it; the
hill is being dumped into the hollow, and there is a general leveling going
on. Now is positively the last exhibition of those different localities in
anything like their natural form, for the level, the compass and the carts
are at work. Within the next five years the Bedford Hills will have nearly
disappeared, and inside of ten years there will be nothing left of them, and
where they stood will be graded streets and thousands of dwellings, a part
of this magically growing city.

H. J. S.





----- Original Message -----
From: <>
To: <>
Sent: Monday, November 03, 2003 9:44 PM
Subject: [NYKings] Re: "Roode family"


> This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list.
>
> Classification: Query
>
> Message Board URL:
>
> http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/an/RUB.2ACI/3345.1.1.1.1.1
>
> Message Board Post:
>
> Thanks again Mary!
> I would be every interested in the following:
> History of the City of Brooklyn, New York 3
> New York Times 1881-1900/1905-06 1
> Middletown Daily Argus (Middletown, New York) 1
> [NOTE, the Middletown "match" is an OCR error.]
> and:
> Fred Roode found in:
> Census Microfilm Records: Connecticut, Rhode Island, 1900
> Lived in: Winchester, Litchfield County, Connecticut
> Series: T623 Microfilm: 141 Book: 1 Page: 291
> I will try and give you some more of the info that I have.
> thanks Kurt
>
>
> ==== NYKINGS Mailing List ====
> Kings County (Brooklyn), New York - NYGenWeb
> http://community.webtv.net/shamrockroots/kingsny
>
> ==============================
> To join Ancestry.com and access our 1.2 billion online genealogy records,
go to:
> http://www.ancestry.com/rd/redir.asp?targetid=571&sourceid=1237
>


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