Some background via forgotten ny:

Vinegar Hill is about a four or five block square neighborhood in Brooklyn located just north of dumbo. It's a charming little area marked by brownstone buildings and Belgian-block streets. Vinegar Hill is all that is left of a rather more extensive brownstoned area. But it was gradually decimated by the construction of the nearby Brooklyn-Queens Expressway and the Farragut Houses south of York Street in the 40s and 50s. Most of the residences were built between the late 1810s - 1850s, the latter ones reflect the Italianate style.

 

The story of how Vinegar Hill got its name is an unusual one. For one thing, it's not named for vinegar at all.

 

In 1800, a John Jackson purchased the land on which the neighborhood would later arise from the Sands brothers, for whom Sands Street is named. Jackson hoped to attract Irish immigrants and named the tract Vinegar Hill after the site of a fierce battle in the Irish rebellion of 1798. In Ireland, the name "Vinegar Hill" was an English transliteration of a Gaelic (Irish) term meaning "hill of the wood of the berries". Thus, Vinegar Hill has also been known as Irish Town in the past.

 

First you gotta get to VH -- some stuff north of jay st you can see while heading over to from DUMBO

 

Basically more warehouses, except not as obviously gentrified (although all signs are there)

 

I mean come on. The sneakers are gold.  :roll:

 

A renovation in progress – or more likely slowed to a crawl these days

 

This one is my new screen saver

 

 

 

The city landmark commission’s pdf file map:

http://www.nyc.gov/html/lpc/downloads/pdf/maps/vinegar_hill.pdf

 

 

 

The VH neighborhood is surrounded by warehouses to the south, a cliff that drops off into the Brooklyn navy yard to the north, the Farragut houses to the east and con ed to the west.

 

 

 

A private gated old alley

 

VH has some great fronts and is probably the last place that still looks like olde Brooklyn

 

Nice use of an old garage roof

 

If these are some kind of hidden gentrified they’re doing a good job?!  :?

 

I don’t know why the garages caught my attention?

 

This is the northern end of VH, the mansion on the left is the gated commandant’s house (1807)

Naturally it overlooks the Brooklyn navy yard from up on Vinegar Hill

 

Yeah of course I peeked thru the gate…!  :wink:

 

Hudson ave hides and winds around the commandants house on the hill. Forgotten ny sez:

 

Hudson Avenue

 

Hudson Avenue is a true Brooklyn anachronism. It formerly extended south from the East River in a continuous route all the way to Fulton Street near its junction with Flatbush Avenue, as one of the community's main streets--even boasting an el, as the Fifth Avenue el shadowed it on its way down to Park Slope and then Bay Ridge. However, most of Hudson Avenue was obliterated after the el came down in 1940 by the construction of a series of housing projects, the Farragut, the Ingersoll and the University Towers Houses; only its Vinegar Hill stretch and a short block between DeKalb Avenue and Fulton Street remain. Ah, why'd they name a road that goes to rthe East River Hudson Avenue, anyway?

 

 

A VH resident noted that this corner one was built between 1828-41

 

Neocrapic infill  :-P

 

There is one warehouse in the VH neighborhood

 

More serious & obvious gentrification is encroching

 

A former cinderblock used car corner lot is now a Buddhist temple

 

the last surviving VH brownstone row  :|

 

 

These are across the street from the row

 

Looking south back at dumbo

 

This is next to the Buddhist temple, I wonder if the art is Chinese?

 

Patina near the Farragut houses

 

The best looking warehouse in the area is here next to the PJ’s

 

The ornamentation is colorful

 

*** that’s what’s left of the rather isolated historic Vinegar Hill, Brooklyn neighborhood***

 

 

that graffiti is amazing

Thanks!

Kind of amazing a place that close to Manhattan is still that gritty. Fantastic photos.

Great stuff, fascinating neighborhood!

Cool hood

Don't hear about this 'hood too often.

Nice set, and an interesting looking neighborhood.

thank you.

 

Gritty and off the beaten path. This compliments the Detroit neighborhoods I'm looking at nicely.

This area has changed.

 

I remember when I lived in Brooklyn Hts, it was pretty rare for a person to walk past old fulton.

 

The area near the York street train station.....whhhoooooooo 

Hi,

 

I really enjoyed viewing your photos.  Although many of the buildings shown were nice (or spectacular) the final 2 pictures really got me to thinking.  I just started to wonder what the initials "M T or T M" that were cast into the building ornamentation stood for.  After searching the net for a while I came up with the following link: http://www.myrtleavenue.org/WallaboutCulturalResourceSurvey.pdf  This document has some really interesting history of the area that you photographed.  On Page 33 was the answer to the "T M" initials: "This patented system was marketed in the United States and there is an exceptional example of a concrete building erected with the Hennebique system located a few blocks west of Wallabout – the Thomson Meter Company Building at 102-110 Bridge Street, designated a city landmark in 2004 (Wallace)."  Now I can stop wondering and get some sleep.

 

Steve

^ thx & thx for the internets detective work too, steve.

 

is anybody familiar with the hennebique system? thats a new one on me, i take it's about the ornamentation?

 

anyway, the rest of the former thompson meter company hq buildings are nearby to this colorful warehouse. nowadays they are converted over to residential/retail of course, but you can still see them here in the middle of the dumbo thread:

 

http://www.urbanohio.com/forum2/index.php/topic,18451.0.html