Posts Tagged ‘Meeker Avenue’
very small
Fall Foliage, in today’s post.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
First off, a brief grammatical note: the word “foliage” is pronounced thusly – foal-e-ajj or “foalyaj”- not “foylyaj.” This is something that drives one such as myself crazy, much like the common mispronunciation (favored by a certain recent President) of the word nuclear which renders it as “nookular.”
At any rate, as it is fall foliage season, when autumnal sprites splash the crimson and oranges about – your humble narrator delivers with a seasonal scene. Of course… it’s me, so I went to the overgrown Meeker Avenue Street end at the Newtown Creek for my foliage.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Not living cheek by jowl with the waterway as so many do is certainly a luxury to be enjoyed, just ask anyone in Manhattan.
This pleasure isn’t experienced by the folks who live over in Greenpoint, of course, but there you go. One has been taking a bit of a break from hanging around the Newtown Creek for the last month or so, allowing a bit of detoxification to take place. An interesting anecdote, which several of us that spend a lot of time around the place have commented to each other about, is that we tend not to get sick as often as other people during cold and flu season. Spouses might be on Day 3 of a flu, but we’re fine.
Is Newtown Creek a cure all, or is it merely an antibiotic?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
By antibiotic, I mean anti life in the same sense that the DC Comics villain Darkseid would infer, of course. Best guess would be “environmental adaptation,” presuming that constant exposure to those sewage borne pathogens which find themselves in the Newtown Creek have jacked up our collective immune systems. Whenever I submit blood tests to a Doctor, I always ask if my white cell count seems unusually high.
The answer has been categorically “no,” but I keep on hoping.
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amidst marshes
Now & Then on Newtown Creek.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The shot above depicts the scene on Newtown Creek, as witnessed from the site of the Brooklyn side landing of the long dismantled Meeker Avenue or Penny Bridge, as it appeared in March of 2014. This is the very edge of the borough, where Meeker ends its long northward trek across the infinity of Brooklyn at Newtown Creek. Its kind of a forgotten spot, with Blissville in Queens occupying most of the image.
– photo by Percy Loomis Sperr
This shot, found in the collections of the New York Public Library, depicts the same scene back in 1939 from nearly the same spot. The well ensconced oil industry is quite active, as evinced by the abundance of chimneys. Notice that you can’t see Manhattan’s skyline in this one. Could be weather, or the choices made by the photographer, Percy Loomis Sperr. It’s probably because of the pall of smoke, smog, and industrial emissions in which Newtown Creek was famously cloaked during its heyday.
There are two public Newtown Creek walking tours coming up, one in Queens and one that walks the currently undefended border of the two boroughs.
DUPBO, with Newtown Creek Alliance and MAS Janeswalk, on May 3rd.
Click here for more info and ticketing.
Modern Corridor, with Brooklyn Brainery, on May 18th.
Click here for more info and ticketing.
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The Newtown Pentacle 