Jacob Duryea house, Flatbush Avenue, 1892. This wood-frame farmhouse once stood about 100 feet south of the entrance to the Kings Theatre. In the late 18th century, it was the homestead of Dr. James J. van Beuren, a descendent of a family of Dutch doctors active in Flatbush and New York. According the Brooklyn Medical Journal, van Beuren died in 1802. The house later passed to the family of Jacob Duryea, for whom nearby Duryea Place is named. By the late 19th century, the property was surrounded by tracks and structures associated with the Brooklyn City Railroad's Vernon Avenue car barn. The homestead was razed between 1898-1906.

Aftermath of a cave-in during subway construction on Nostrand Avenue, north of Beverly Road, July 14, 1916. Runoff from heavy rains on the afternoon of July 13 overwhelmed the Nostrand Avenue sewer system, destabilizing the pillars supporting the temporary wooden roadway. A BRT streetcar — carrying only four people, including crew, thanks to a timely evacuation order — fell through the roadway into the excavation cut.

Subway construction and operation is and has always been a complicated undertaking. Accidents happen, either through human error or mechanical failure. This collection looks at some of the transit system's early mishaps. 🚆💥

Ebinger Baking Plant, 1951. In 1898 George and Catherine Ebinger opened their Ebinger's Bakery on Flatbush Avenue near Cortelyou Road. Specializing in German sweets and pastries, their best-known confection was the Brooklyn Blackout Cake, a chocolate layer cake with chocolate fudge layers, and chocolate frosting covered with chocolate cake crumbs. Though likely produced in the early 20th century, the cake got its famous name during World War II when the city experienced blackout drills. Brooklyn became obsessed with Ebinger Bakery and the business expanded to more than 50 outlets. This large factory space in Flatbush was a complex constructed over 20 years. The first building, which fronts Snyder Avenue was completed in 1912 with an addition a year later. This building, at the corner of Bedford Avenue and Albemarle Road, was completed in the circa 1930. The business thrived through the early mid-century but came under fire for discriminatory hiring practices. The company declared bankruptcy and closed in 1972. Today this building is a storage facility.

🍰🍪🍰🍪 In 1898 George and Catherine Ebinger opened their Ebinger's Bakery on Flatbush Avenue near Cortelyou Street. Specializing in German sweets and pastries, their best-known confection was the Brooklyn Blackout Cake, a chocolate layer cake with chocolate fudge layers, and chocolate frosting covered with chocolate cake crumbs. Though likely produced in the early 20th century, the cake got its famous name during World War II when the city experienced blackout drills. Brooklyn became obsessed with Ebinger's Bakery, and the business expanded to more than 50 outlets in Brooklyn, Queens, and Nassau County. The business thrived through the early mid-century but came under fire for discriminatory hiring practices in the 1960s, and in the same decade, many of their longtime customers moved out of the city. The company declared bankruptcy and closed in 1972, though rumor has it that Entenmann's purchased their recipes.

The last quarter of the nineteenth century brought rapid changes to many parts of Brooklyn, not least to the town of Flatbush and its environs. Flatbush (from the Dutch vlacke bos, flat forest or wooded plain) was one of the original 6 towns making up the city of Brooklyn, and became part of that city in 1894. Four years later Brooklyn would become part of the consolidation of Greater New York City. This story is by Deborah Tint, Special Collections Cataloger, Brooklyn Public Library

Suydam-Ditmas House was built about 1700 and torn down in 1911. Hendrick Suydam, born in 1731, purchased the farm in 1759 from the heirs of Jacobus Lott. The house was owned by the Ditmas family until 1909.

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).

William Fox Albemarle Theatre, ca.1920. Designed in a modest French Renaissance Revival style, the building was created by Arthur Carlson and Harrison Wiseman, experienced theatre architects. Wiseman designed at least 22 theatres in New York City including a number of Yiddish venues on Second Avenue. A vaudeville and motion picture house, it was managed, initially, by producer William Fox. The movie house remained a single screen venue until a fire in 1984 heavily damaged the building. The theatre closed, was purchased by Jehovah’s Witnesses, and soon reopened as an Assembly Hall, which it remains today.