South of Union Square logo
South of Union Square
Address
Near 485 East 21st Street

Posts & Stories(6)

John Vanderveer Farm image

John Vanderveer Farm
Post

The Vanderveer Windmill, east of Flatbush Avenue, ca. 1875. Fittingly, Kings County's foremost windmill was located on the farm of a prominent Dutch family in the Dutch-settled town of Flatbush. Likely built in the first decade of the 19th century (sources vary on the exact yet; some suggest decades earlier), farmer John C. Vanderveer's windmill was originally equipped with 26-foot "sails." Around the early 1830s, the sails were removed and the mill was converted for simple grain storage. Vanderveer's windmill played an unlikely role in the Draft Riots of 1863. Concerned that violence directed at African-Americans would spread from riots in Manhattan to Brooklyn and beyond, black residents of Flatbush took shelter in the windmill as a precautionary measure. Sixteen years later, on March 4, 1879, the windmill caught fire in the early morning hours in a blaze visible from Brooklyn City Hall (now known as Borough Hall).
1010 Ocean Avenue image

1010 Ocean Avenue
Post

This large Colonial Revival building was constructed in 1899 as the home for Thomas Brush, a Brooklyn builder. The architects were a Connecticut architectural firm of brothers George and Charles Palliser. They designed this home to compliment the one at 1000 Ocean Avenue next door, the home of Thomas Brush's son-in-law. The home was so lauded when built that it was written up in the magazine Scientific American, which detailed the sculptures by famed Boston sculptor Charles Emmel and the silver plated exposed pipes in the bathrooms. The original owner lost the home in 1913 when it when into foreclosure, and then it went through a series of owners until 1929 when it was bought by a Jewish congregation. Temple Beth Ohr owned and used the building until the mid 1990s when it was sold again, this time to a Pentecostal church. During their ownership the building deteriorated greatly. But since 2008 it has been restored and it houses a number of doctors offices.

Photos(130)

Rialto Theatre image

Rialto Theatre

Rialto Theater Caption: "The Fred Irwin Big Show ... in 1907 ... shows the company as it was when burlesque was clean entertainment. Among those in the photo are the famous Watson Sisters who are still in the ring and going strong. The Bennet Sisters -- Murray Livingston -- Uncle Jim Harkins (for many years with Fred Allen), Smiling Gertie DeMilt (A Brooklyn girl), Florence Bennett (Original Gibson Girl), Walsh Lynch and Co. (Huckin's Run), Nettie Mc Glocklin (McGlocklin and Evans), two more Brooklynites. And last but not least -- Brady and Mahoney, a couple of Brooklyn boys who tried to make good -- Mahoney is the guy on the left of photo looking like an undertaker (with high hat) and Brady is the schmo sitting down front opposite the late Harry Campbell (with the Dutch chin-piece and inflated stomach). Those were the happy daze." Signed, "Joe Brady, Century's Rialto Theater." The theater was located at 1085 Flatbush Avenue. It opened, presumably, around the turn of the century and it closed circa 1977.