Pitkin Avenue at Shepherd Avenue, September 8, 1963. The entrance to the Shepherd Street station of the IND Fulton Street line is visible at far left. The station was one of four East New York stations on today's A/C line to open on November 28, 1948.

East New York once had a thriving Jewish community. Immigrants and second generation populations moved east as they left the early Jewish enclaves of the Lower East Side and Williamsburg. By the middle of the 20th century though, they were moving away from East New York as well and leaving behind their many religious buildings. This former Orthodox synagogue was Congregation Sons of Judah, a community organized in 1908. The building housed the short lived American Theatre between 1914 and 1916. The synagogue moved in by 1916 after the structure was converted for religious uses. In 1918 the congregation had 60 members though the building could hold more than 400. The synagogue moved out by 1965 and the building has been used as a church since then. The Jewish iconography on the exterior has been removed and Christian crosses now dominate the facade.

St. Barnabas Episcopal Church, September 8, 1963. The church was dedicated on Palm Sunday 1932, thirteen years after its crypt was erected on this site. The leftmost entrance to the building at the northwest corner of Belmont Avenue and Elton Street (left) is a dentist's office.

(Church: 1920-22, supporting buildings:1897-1956) St. Michael’s Roman Catholic Church has served its community for over 150 years, during which time its campus grew to occupy almost the entire block between Atlantic and Liberty Avenues and Jerome and Warwick Streets. In 1860, a group of German immigrants received authorization from John Loughlin, the first Bishop of the Diocese of Brooklyn, for the construction of a Roman Catholic Church in New Lots. A wood frame structure was erected that same year, with Bishop Loughlin himself dedicating the site. Soon after, a school and rectory building was constructed next door. In 1897, a larger brick elementary school was constructed at the corner of Warwick Street and Liberty Avenue. The campus continued to expand with the enlargement of the rectory and the construction of more educational facilities on Warwick Street. By 1920, the growing parish was in need of a larger worship space, so a grand Romanesque Revival style church with an elegant bell tower was planned to take the old church’s place. The new church extended the width of the block to Warwick Street, where it also extended northward to accommodate a new monastery. In 1956, a high school was built at Jerome Street and Liberty Avenue. While the church originally served a German congregation, its demographics shifted over the years to serve Irish, Polish and Italians, and later African Americans, Puerto Ricans, Dominicans and Mexicans. Today, its congregation is predominately Spanish-speaking. In 2006, the church merged with St. Malachy Roman Catholic Church, a historically Irish parish in East New York, to form the new parish of St. Michael-St. Malachy.

Pubic School 64, ca. 1905. The original Public School 64 was a wood-frame structure constructed prior to 1892. As the community of East New York grew at the end of the 19th century and became a part of the greater New York City, a larger school, created by the now city-wide Board of Education, was desired. The large brick schoolhouse see here was completed in 1901. (The former school was moved a few blocks to New Lots Avenue where it served as St. Gabriel's Church for the next 50 years.) The 1901 school remained open until 1974. The building was demolished in the mid 1980s and replaced with a housing complex.

St. Michael's Roman Catholic Church was originally built in 1860 on a plot of land that was bought for $500 by Jacob H. Sackman. The church has ran a school in the lot adjacent to it on Jerome Street since 1867.

Pitkin Avenue, north side, east from Shepherd Avenue, September 14, 1940.