More from the archives . . . aerial of Pier 40 and the Holland Tunnel vent . . . photo said to be taken in 1955.
Photo said to be “three-masted schooner” in 1937. Clearly that’s not a schooner there with the GW Bridge in the background. Anyone know what sailing ship that might have been?
Photo by Sam Brody February 1938. Ferry Hackensack foreground with Jack Frost Sugars over on the Edgewater, NJ side.
Todd Shipyard, 1935-41 . . . Here’s a list of what was built there and an aerial view (you may have to scroll horizontally) of what it today is occupied by IKEA.
SS Normandie . . . headed for the North River piers.
City of Chattanooga December 1937.
Brooklyn docks as seen from Brooklyn Heights, November 1937. Here’s a Munson Lines flyer.
Here’s the schedule–sorry for all the repetition–for Wednesday evening’s documentary portion of the Art of Brooklyn Film Festival, where Graves of Arthur Kill will be shown. Gary and I will hang for a while at Park Plaza Bar after the show. It may be mobbed?
tugster: a waterblog 
6 comments
Comments feed for this article
May 5, 2014 at 9:11 am
eastriver
On the sailing ship — tough one. Cargo ship (no portholes forward of the poop,) very light in water, missing her spanker gaff(s) and boom, all sails sent down. Looks to be in lay-up. Very tidy. Royal over single topgallant, in that era, is quite training-shippy. Appear to be wooden topgallant-masts. She’s not one of the Scandinavian training ships — Danmark or Sorlandet. Not one of the Blohm + Voss sisters; they were barques. Does have the “look” of a Blohm + Voss ship. Wish I could see more of the hull.
May 5, 2014 at 11:14 pm
sfdi1947
Will,
In 1937 quite a few full rigged ships and steel barks were working, though many fewer than in 1920. The White Hull seems to indicate a training ship, and was most likely from Nor. or Den., Germany’s three training ships were all Steel Barks. Our own Peking and the other Flying P’s were still black hulled, to the best of my knowledge, Pamir was the only one to wear white.
May 8, 2014 at 11:42 am
Marion Olson
Not a guaranteed perfect match, but the Suomen Joutsen was the Finnish national training ship, and was in New York for a brief but well-publicized visit in 1937.
I can’t quite reconcile the lack of portholes, nor the proportions of the poop, but otherwise it seems about right. She’s now a museum in Turku, Finland and there are plenty of photos, although I haven’t found any from the New York trip. I wish this was a more complete photo, since Suomen Joutsen is fairly distinctive.
I don’t know the area at all, and I have no idea why they would have been docked up there by the GW Bridge, but maybe somebody else does.
May 8, 2014 at 2:43 pm
tugster
i just looked it up . . . she was indeed in new york on her sixth voyage, making new yoek after havana and before oslo. thanks, marion. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suomen_Joutsen
May 9, 2014 at 5:30 am
eastriver
Marion, she’s so close. But every image I see shows S.J. with split topgallantsails — and this “schooner” has single topgallants. She shows boats on quarter-davits in the 30s images I found, and the “schooner” has none. All the old images show a chart house / wheelhouse on the poop, the “schooner” has none on her (substantially) shorter poop deck.
Clearest old image I can find, from 1932: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Suomen_Joutsen_1932.jpg
But thanks — had never heard of Suomen Joutsen before!
May 9, 2014 at 9:41 am
Marion Olson
I agree, it’s not quite right. Changes could have been made in the five years between photographs, but I can’t see why they would have been. Nor why the Suomen Joutsen would have been put to bed during a fairly short ceremonial visit to NY.
What I’m really curious about, though, is what was going on in the location where the mystery ship is docked. I’m not a New Yorker and I don’t know the history of the area, but in a photograph I found, taken during construction of the bridge, there’s not much there:
That’s a fairly big boat to be laid-up so neatly in what seems like a rather random, non-commercial location.