"The Excelsior Brewing Co., ca. 1910. Excelsior was founded in 1896, when its owners took over a brewery facility on Pulaski Street from the Frederick Hower Brewing Company. Like many beer producers, Excelsior struggled to stay afloat during Prohibition by selling “near beer” — while also smuggling the real stuff to bootleggers. In August 1930, “dry squad” agents discovered a pipe connecting the brewery to a garage across Pulaski Street, where kegs could be filled with real, albeit off-label, Excelsior suds. The brewery survived, as authorities weren’t able to determine who was responsible for the scheme. Two years later, Excelsior was forced to shut down, selling the facility to Kings Brewery Company, who in 1935 became the first city brewery to offer its beer in cans. Kings closed in 1938, leaving the building abandoned until its demolition during the 1950s."

Throop Avenue Presbyterian Church, ca. 1905. The Throop Avenue Presbyterian Church was founded in 1852 and their original church building was completed in 1867.The congregation grew over the next few decades and by the 1880s the leaders had decided a new building was needed. Architects Fowler & Hough were commissioned for the new church, and they designed a Romanesque Revival brick building with a tall bell tower. Constructed began in 1889 but disaster struck a few months into the project. On a cold and windy morning in January of 1890 a gust of wind picked up the entire brick wall of one side of the church (no roof had been constructed yet) and tossed it onto the wood-frame house next door. The house was destroyed and two children were killed with a number of other family members injured. The church paid for the funerals and all related costs. The church was completed following the disaster and dedicated in 1891. The church suffered a massive fire in 1910 and the community decided against rebuilding on the plot that had already seen so much tragedy. The congregation moved to a new location at 257 Macon Street in Stuyvesant Heights before finally moving to Rosedale, Queens where the church is now known as Throop Memorial Church.

L\&F Groceries at the corner of Sumner (Marcus Garvey Boulevard) and Park Avenues, October 19, 1958. The NYCHA Sumner Houses are visible at right. The thirteen-building housing development opened in April of that year.

St. John's College, 1954. Designed by the Diocese of Brooklyn favorite architect, Patrick Keely, for their own institution of higher education, St. John’s College was built between 1870 and 1872. The Romanesque Revival structure had all the trappings of a Victorian pile: fancy brickwork, mansard roof, turrets and towers, dormers, bays, bows, and a domed cupola. The college remained here, becoming St. John's University, before moving to Queens in the 1950s. Following this relocation, the building has been home to a variety of Catholic schools and community service organizations.

St. John the Baptist Church, east of Lewis Avenue, September 9, 1932.

"When Prohibition was introduced, I hoped that it would be widely supported by public opinion... I have slowly and reluctantly come to believe that this has not been the result. Instead, drinking has generally increased; the speakeasy has replaced the saloon; a vast army of lawbreakers has appeared; many of our best citizens have openly ignored Prohibition." –– John D. Rockefeller