Fort Greene, Brooklyn - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Fort Greene is a neighborhood in the New York City borough

Borough (New York City)

New York City, one of the largest cities in the world, is composed of five boroughs. Each borough now has the same boundaries as the county it is in. County governments were dissolved when the city consolidated in 1898, along with all city, town, and village governments within each county...

of Brooklyn

Brooklyn

Brooklyn is the most populous of New York City's five boroughs, with nearly 2.6 million residents, and the second-largest in area. Since 1896, Brooklyn has had the same boundaries as Kings County, which is now the most populous county in New York State and the second-most densely populated...

. Part of Brooklyn Community Board 2

Brooklyn Community Board 2

Brooklyn Community Board 2 is a local governmental body in the New York City borough of Brooklyn that encompasses the neighborhoods of Downtown Brooklyn, Brooklyn Heights, DUMBO, Vinegar Hill, Fulton Mall, Boerum Hill, Fort Greene, Brooklyn Navy Yard, Fulton Ferry, and Clinton Hill...

, Fort Greene is listed on the New York State Registry and on the National Register of Historic Places

National Register of Historic Places

The National Register of Historic Places is the United States government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures, and objects deemed worthy of preservation...

, and is a New York City-designated Historic District. It is located in northwest Brooklyn, above Prospect Park

Prospect Park (Brooklyn)

Prospect Park is a 585-acre public park in the New York City borough of Brooklyn located between Park Slope, Prospect-Lefferts Gardens, Kensington, Windsor Terrace and Flatbush Avenue, Grand Army Plaza and the Brooklyn Botanic Garden...

.

The neighborhood is named after an American Revolutionary War

American Revolutionary War

The American Revolutionary War , the American War of Independence, or simply the Revolutionary War, began as a war between the Kingdom of Great Britain and thirteen British colonies in North America, and ended in a global war between several European great powers.The war was the result of the...

era fort that was built in 1776 under the supervision of General Nathanael Greene

Nathanael Greene

Nathanael Greene was a major general of the Continental Army in the American Revolutionary War. When the war began, Greene was a militia private, the lowest rank possible; he emerged from the war with a reputation as George Washington's most gifted and dependable officer. Many places in the United...

of Rhode Island

Rhode Island

The state of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, more commonly referred to as Rhode Island , is a state in the New England region of the United States. It is the smallest U.S. state by area...

(McCullough 2005). General Greene aided General George Washington

George Washington

George Washington was the dominant military and political leader of the new United States of America from 1775 to 1799. He led the American victory over Great Britain in the American Revolutionary War as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army from 1775 to 1783, and presided over the writing of...

during the Battle of Long Island

Battle of Long Island

The Battle of Long Island, also known as the Battle of Brooklyn or the Battle of Brooklyn Heights, fought on August 27, 1776, was the first major battle in the American Revolutionary War following the United States Declaration of Independence, the largest battle of the entire conflict, and the...

in 1776. Fort Greene Park

Fort Greene Park

Fort Greene Park is a municipal park in Brooklyn, New York, comprising 30.2 acres .The park includes the high ground where the Continental Army built Fort Putnam during the American Revolutionary War. The site was chosen and the construction supervised by General Nathanael Greene...

, originally called Washington Park

Washington Park (disambiguation)

-Communities:* Washington Park, Florida* Washington Park, Illinois* Washington Park, North Carolina* Washington Park, Roanoke, Virginia* Washington Park, Seattle, Washington-Community areas and parks:in the United States...

and Brooklyn's first, is also derived from General Greene's name and the neighborhood. In 1864, Fort Greene Park was redesigned by Frederick Law Olmsted

Frederick Law Olmsted

Frederick Law Olmsted was an American journalist, social critic, public administrator, and landscape designer. He is popularly considered to be the father of American landscape architecture, although many scholars have bestowed that title upon Andrew Jackson Downing...

and Calvert Vaux

Calvert Vaux

Calvert Vaux , was an architect and landscape designer. He is best remembered as the co-designer , of New York's Central Park....

. The park notably includes the Prison Ship Martyrs' Monument

Prison Ship Martyrs' Monument

The Prison Ship Martyrs' Monument in Fort Greene Park, in the New York City borough of Brooklyn, is a memorial to the more than 11,500 prisoners of war who died in captivity, known as the prison ship martyrs. The remains of a small fraction of all those who died on the ships are in a crypt below...

and crypt

Crypt

In architecture, a crypt is a stone chamber or vault beneath the floor of a burial vault possibly containing sarcophagi, coffins or relics....

, which honors some 11,500 patriots who died aboard British prison ships during the American Revolution.

Fort Greene contains many superb examples of mid-19th century Italianate

Italianate architecture

The Italianate style of architecture was a distinct 19th-century phase in the history of Classical architecture. In the Italianate style, the models and architectural vocabulary of 16th-century Italian Renaissance architecture, which had served as inspiration for both Palladianism and...

and Eastlake architecture, most of which is well preserved. It is known for its many graceful, tree-lined streets and elegant low-rise housing. Fort Greene is also home to the Williamsburgh Savings Bank Tower

Williamsburgh Savings Bank Tower

The Williamsburgh Savings Bank Tower at 1 Hanson Place is the second tallest building in the borough of Brooklyn, New York City and a familiar Brooklyn landmark....

, which for over 80 years was the tallest building in Brooklyn. The neighborhood is close to the Atlantic Terminal train station and has access to most major subway lines.

Fort Greene is also home to several important cultural institutions including the Brooklyn Academy of Music

Brooklyn Academy of Music

Brooklyn Academy of Music is a major performing arts venue in Brooklyn, a borough of New York City, United States, known as a center for progressive and avant garde performance....

, the Brooklyn Music School

Brooklyn Music School

The Brooklyn Music School is a community school for the performing arts in the Fort Greene neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York. The school was founded in 1912 as the Brooklyn Music School Settlement. It owns and operates a four-story building located at 126 St. Felix St. that contains twenty-four...

, The Paul Robeson

Paul Robeson

Paul Leroy Robeson was an American concert singer , recording artist, actor, athlete, scholar who was an advocate for the Civil Rights Movement in the first half of the twentieth century...

Theater, The Museum of Contemporary African Diasporan Arts

Museum of Contemporary African Diasporan Arts

MoCADA, or the Museum of Contemporary African Diasporan Arts, is a museum of contemporary art in the New York City borough of Brooklyn. It is the first museum of its kind to be opened in New York. Its mission is to foster a greater awareness and appreciation of the arts and cultures of the African...

(MoCADA), BRIC Arts|Media|Bklyn, UrbanGlass, 651 Arts performing center for African-American presenters, The Irondale Center

Irondale Center

The Irondale Center for Theater, Education, and Outreach is a performance space in Brooklyn, New York. It was established in 2008 by the Irondale Ensemble Project in a space that had previously housed Sunday school classes for the Layfayette Church....

for Theater, Education, and Outreach, and Lafayette Church. It is home also to Brooklyn Technical High School

Brooklyn Technical High School

Brooklyn Technical High School, commonly called Brooklyn Tech or just Tech, and also administratively as High School 430, is a New York City public high school that specializes in engineering, math and science and is the largest specialized high school for science, technology, engineering, and...

, one of New York City's most competitive public schools. The world renowned Pratt Institute

Pratt Institute

Pratt Institute is a private art college in New York City located in Brooklyn, New York, with satellite campuses in Manhattan and Utica. Pratt is one of the leading undergraduate art schools in the United States and offers programs in Architecture, Graphic Design, History of Art and Design,...

, in neighboring Clinton Hill

Clinton Hill, Brooklyn

Clinton Hill is a neighborhood in the north-central portion of the borough of Brooklyn in New York City. It is bordered on the east by Bedford-Stuyvesant, on the west by Fort Greene, on the north by Wallabout Bay and on the south by Prospect Heights...

, is one of the leading art schools in the United States.

Fort Greene is bounded by Flushing Avenue to the north, Flatbush Avenue to the west, Vanderbilt Avenue to the east and Atlantic Avenue

Atlantic Avenue (New York City)

Atlantic Avenue is an important street in the New York City boroughs of Brooklyn and Queens. It stretches from the Brooklyn waterfront on the East River all the way to Jamaica, Queens...

to the south. Its main arteries are Fulton Street above St. Felix Street and DeKalb Avenue. The neighborhood is served by the New York City Subway

New York City Subway

The New York City Subway is a rapid transit system owned by the City of New York and leased to the New York City Transit Authority, a subsidiary agency of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority and also known as MTA New York City Transit...

at DeKalb Avenue ( trains), Atlantic Avenue – Pacific Street ( trains), Lafayette Avenue

Lafayette Avenue (IND Fulton Street Line)

Lafayette Avenue is a local station on the IND Fulton Street Line of the New York City Subway, located at Lafayette Avenue and Fulton Street in Brooklyn. It is served by the C train at all times except late nights, and the A train during late nights....

( trains), and Fulton Street

Fulton Street (IND Crosstown Line)

Fulton Street is a station on the IND Crosstown Line of the New York City Subway, located on Lafayette Avenue between South Portland Avenue and Fulton Street in Brooklyn. It is served by the G train at all times....

( train). The LIRR

Long Island Rail Road

The Long Island Rail Road or LIRR is a commuter rail system serving the length of Long Island, New York. It is the busiest commuter railroad in North America, serving about 81.5 million passengers each year. Established in 1834 and having operated continuously since then, it is the oldest US...

's Atlantic Terminal station is also here, and the neighborhood is served by the NYPD's 88th Precinct.

Early history

In approximately 800 A.D. a gradual movement of Native Americans

Native Americans in the United States

Native Americans in the United States are the indigenous peoples in North America within the boundaries of the present-day continental United States, parts of Alaska, and the island state of Hawaii. They are composed of numerous, distinct tribes, states, and ethnic groups, many of which survive as...

advanced from the Delaware

Delaware

Delaware is a U.S. state located on the Atlantic Coast in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It is bordered to the south and west by Maryland, and to the north by Pennsylvania...

area into lower New York

New York

New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...

, ultimately settling as part of the Canarsie tribe among 13 tribes of the Algonquin

Algonquian peoples

The Algonquian are one of the most populous and widespread North American native language groups, with tribes originally numbering in the hundreds. Today hundreds of thousands of individuals identify with various Algonquian peoples...

Nation. In 1637, Walloon

Walloons

Walloons are a French-speaking people who live in Belgium, principally in Wallonia. Walloons are a distinctive community within Belgium, important historical and anthropological criteria bind Walloons to the French people. More generally, the term also refers to the inhabitants of the Walloon...

(now Belgian

Demographics of Belgium

This article is about the demographic features of the population of Belgium, including ethnicity, education level, health of the populace, economic status, religious affiliations and other aspects of the population...

) Joris Jansen Rapelje

Joris Jansen Rapelje

Joris Jansen Rapelje was a member of the Council of Twelve Men in the Dutch West India Company colony of New Netherland...

purchased 335 acres (1.4 km²) of Native American land from Dutch West India Company

Dutch West India Company

Dutch West India Company was a chartered company of Dutch merchants. Among its founding fathers was Willem Usselincx...

in the area of Brooklyn that became known as Wallabout Bay

Wallabout Bay

Wallabout Bay is small body of water in Upper New York Bay along the northwest shore of the New York City borough of Brooklyn, between the present Williamsburg and Manhattan bridges, opposite Corlear's Hook on Manhattan to the west, across the East River...

(from Waal Boght or "Bay of Walloons"). This is the area where the Brooklyn Navy Yard

Brooklyn Navy Yard

The United States Navy Yard, New York–better known as the Brooklyn Navy Yard or the New York Naval Shipyard –was an American shipyard located in Brooklyn, northeast of the Battery on the East River in Wallabout Basin, a semicircular bend of the river across from Corlear's Hook in Manhattan...

now stands on the northern border of Fort Greene. An Italian

Italian people

The Italian people are an ethnic group that share a common Italian culture, ancestry and speak the Italian language as a mother tongue. Within Italy, Italians are defined by citizenship, regardless of ancestry or country of residence , and are distinguished from people...

immigrant named Peter Caesar Alberti

Pietro Cesare Alberti

Pietro Cesare Alberti was a Venetian immigrant to Dutch colony of New Amsterdam, commonly regarded as the first Italian American.-Background:...

started a tobacco plantation near the bay in Fort Greene in 1649 but was killed six years later by Native Americans. In 1776, under the supervision of General Nathanael Greene

Nathanael Greene

of Rhode Island

Rhode Island

The state of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, more commonly referred to as Rhode Island , is a state in the New England region of the United States. It is the smallest U.S. state by area...

the American Revolutionary War

American Revolutionary War

era Fort Putnam was constructed. Later renamed after Greene, the fort was a star-shaped earthwork that mounted six 18-pound cannons, and was the largest on Long Island

Long Island

Long Island is an island located in the southeast part of the U.S. state of New York, just east of Manhattan. Stretching northeast into the Atlantic Ocean, Long Island contains four counties, two of which are boroughs of New York City , and two of which are mainly suburban...

. After the American defeat in the Battle of Long Island

Battle of Long Island

, George Washington

George Washington

withdrew his troops from the Fort under the cover of darkness, a brilliant move that saved the outnumbered American army from total defeat by the British

Kingdom of Great Britain

The former Kingdom of Great Britain, sometimes described as the 'United Kingdom of Great Britain', That the Two Kingdoms of Scotland and England, shall upon the 1st May next ensuing the date hereof, and forever after, be United into One Kingdom by the Name of GREAT BRITAIN. was a sovereign...

. Although the fort was repaired in advance of an expected attack on Brooklyn by the British during the War of 1812

War of 1812

The War of 1812 was a military conflict fought between the forces of the United States of America and those of the British Empire. The Americans declared war in 1812 for several reasons, including trade restrictions because of Britain's ongoing war with France, impressment of American merchant...

, it thereafter slowly deteriorated.

19th century

In 1801 the US government purchased land on Wallabout Bay for the construction of the Brooklyn Navy Yard

Brooklyn Navy Yard

, stimulating some growth in the area. Ferry

Ferry

A ferry is a form of transportation, usually a boat, but sometimes a ship, used to carry primarily passengers, and sometimes vehicles and cargo as well, across a body of water. Most ferries operate on regular, frequent, return services...

service linking Manhattan

Manhattan

Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...

and Brooklyn launched in 1814, and Brooklyn's population exploded from 4,000 to nearly 100,000 by 1850. Fort Greene was known as The Hill and was home to a small commuter population, several large farms - the Post Farm, the Spader farm, the Ryerson Farm, and the Jackson farm - and a burial ground. As early as the 1840s the farms' owners began selling off their land in smaller plots for development. Country villa

Villa

A villa was originally an ancient Roman upper-class country house. Since its origins in the Roman villa, the idea and function of a villa have evolved considerably. After the fall of the Roman Republic, villas became small farming compounds, which were increasingly fortified in Late Antiquity,...

s, frame row houses

Row houses

The Row at Stanford University is made up of 36 student-managed houses, from the Cowell Cluster to the Lake Houses and all along Mayfield Avenue, with a total population of a little over 1600 students. Houses range in occupancy from 22 to 59...

, and the occasional brick row house dotted the countryside, and one of them was home to poet Walt Whitman

Walt Whitman

Walter "Walt" Whitman was an American poet, essayist and journalist. A humanist, he was a part of the transition between transcendentalism and realism, incorporating both views in his works. Whitman is among the most influential poets in the American canon, often called the father of free verse...

, editor of the Brooklyn Eagle
Brooklyn Eagle
The Brooklyn Daily Bulletin began publishing when the original Eagle folded in 1955. In 1996 it merged with a newly revived Brooklyn Daily Eagle, and now publishes a morning paper five days a week under the Brooklyn Daily Eagle name...

newspaper.

Since the early 19th century, African American

African American

African Americans are citizens or residents of the United States who have at least partial ancestry from any of the native populations of Sub-Saharan Africa and are the direct descendants of enslaved Africans within the boundaries of the present United States...

s have made significant contributions to Fort Greene's development. New York State outlawed slavery

Slavery

Slavery is a system under which people are treated as property to be bought and sold, and are forced to work. Slaves can be held against their will from the time of their capture, purchase or birth, and deprived of the right to leave, to refuse to work, or to demand compensation...

in 1827 and 20 years later "Coloured School No. 1," Brooklyn's first school for African-Americans, opened at the current site of the Walt Whitman Houses. Abolitionists formed the Lafayette Avenue Presbyterian Church

Lafayette Avenue Presbyterian Church

Lafayette Avenue Presbyterian Church is a historic Presbyterian church complex located at 875 Elmwood Ave, Buffalo in Erie County, New York. The complex consists of the large cruciform-plan church building that was built in 1894 with an attached rear chapel. Adjoining them is the Community House...

in 1857, and hosted speakers such as Frederick Douglass

Frederick Douglass

Frederick Douglass was an American social reformer, orator, writer and statesman. After escaping from slavery, he became a leader of the abolitionist movement, gaining note for his dazzling oratory and incisive antislavery writing...

and Harriet Tubman

Harriet Tubman

Harriet Tubman Harriet Tubman Harriet Tubman (born Araminta Harriet Ross; (1820 – 1913) was an African-American abolitionist, humanitarian, and Union spy during the American Civil War. After escaping from slavery, into which she was born, she made thirteen missions to rescue more than 70 slaves...

and also aided in the work of the Underground Railroad

Underground Railroad

The Underground Railroad was an informal network of secret routes and safe houses used by 19th-century black slaves in the United States to escape to free states and Canada with the aid of abolitionists and allies who were sympathetic to their cause. The term is also applied to the abolitionists,...

. Skilled African-American workers fought for their rights at the Navy Yard during the tumultuous Draft Riots of 1863 against armed hooligan bands. The principal of P.S. 67 in the same year was African American, and Dr. Phillip A. White became the first black member of Brooklyn's Board of Education

Board of education

A board of education or a school board or school committee is the title of the board of directors or board of trustees of a school, local school district or higher administrative level....

in 1882. By 1870, more than half of the blacks in Brooklyn lived in Fort Greene, most of them north of Fort Greene Park.

In the 1850s Fort Greene's growth spread out from stagecoach lines on Myrtle Avenue

Myrtle Avenue (New York City)

Myrtle Avenue in New York City is a street that runs from Flatbush Avenue Extension in Downtown Brooklyn to Jamaica Avenue in Richmond Hill, Queens.-In Queens:...

and Fulton Street

Fulton Street (Brooklyn)

Fulton Street, named after engineer Robert Fulton, exists mainly in two parts in what are today two boroughs of New York City which Fulton linked by his steam ferries, and each segment has its own distinct identity. This entry deals with Fulton Street in Brooklyn, which now begins at the...

that ran to Fulton Ferry

Fulton Ferry, Brooklyn

Fulton Ferry is a neighborhood in the New York City borough of Brooklyn. The neighborhood is named for a prominent ferry line crossing the East River between Manhattan and Brooklyn, and is also the name of the ferry slip on the Brooklyn side...

, and The Hill became known as the home of prosperous professionals, second only to Brooklyn Heights

Brooklyn Heights, Brooklyn

Brooklyn Heights is a culturally diverse neighborhood within the New York City borough of Brooklyn. Originally referred to as 'Brooklyn Village', it has been a prominent area of Brooklyn since 1834. As of 2000, Brooklyn Heights sustained a population of 22,594 people. The neighborhood is part of...

in prestige. During the 1850s and 1860s, blocks of Italianate brick

Brick

A brick is a block of ceramic material used in masonry construction, usually laid using various kinds of mortar. It has been regarded as one of the longest lasting and strongest building materials used throughout history.-History:...

and brownstone

Brownstone

Brownstone is a brown Triassic or Jurassic sandstone which was once a popular building material. The term is also used in the United States to refer to a terraced house clad in this material.-Types:-Apostle Island brownstone:...

row houses were built on the remaining open land to house the expanding upper and middle class population. The names of the most attractive streets (Portland, Oxford, Cumberland, Carlton, and Adelphi) came from fine London terraces and streets of the early 19th century. By the 1870s construction in the area had virtually ended, and the area still maintains hundreds of Italianate, Second Empire, Greek Revival, Neo-Grec

Neo-Grec

Neo-Grec is a term referring to late manifestations of Neoclassicism, early Neo-Renaissance now called the Greek Revival style, which was popularized in architecture, the decorative arts, and in painting during France's Second Empire, or the reign of Napoleon III, a period that lasted...

, Romanesque

Romanesque architecture

Romanesque architecture is an architectural style of Medieval Europe characterised by semi-circular arches. There is no consensus for the beginning date of the Romanesque architecture, with proposals ranging from the 6th to the 10th century. It developed in the 12th century into the Gothic style,...

and Renaissance

Renaissance

The Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th to the 17th century, beginning in Italy in the Late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe. The term is also used more loosely to refer to the historical era, but since the changes of the Renaissance were not...

row houses of virtually original appearance.

As Manhattan became more crowded, the poor as well as the well-off made Fort Greene their home, and the unoccupied areas of Myrtle Avenue became a shanty town

Shanty town

A shanty town is a slum settlement of impoverished people who live in improvised dwellings made from scrap materials: often plywood, corrugated metal and sheets of plastic...

known as "Young Dublin". In response to the horrible conditions found there, Walt Whitman called for a park to be constructed and stated in a column in the Eagle, "[as] the inhabitants there are not so wealthy nor so well situated as those on the heights...we have a desire that these, and the generations after them, should have such a place of recreation..." The park idea was soon co-opted by longtime residents to protect the last open space in the area from development.

Washington Park, renamed Fort Greene Park

Fort Greene Park

in 1897, was established as Brooklyn's first park in 1847 on a 30 acres (121,405.8 m²) plot around the site of the old Fort. In 1864, Frederick Law Olmsted

Frederick Law Olmsted

and Calvert Vaux

Calvert Vaux

Calvert Vaux , was an architect and landscape designer. He is best remembered as the co-designer , of New York's Central Park....

, by now famous for their design of Central Park

Central Park

Central Park is a public park in the center of Manhattan in New York City, United States. The park initially opened in 1857, on of city-owned land. In 1858, Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux won a design competition to improve and expand the park with a plan they entitled the Greensward Plan...

, were contracted to design the park, and constructed what was described in 1884 as "one of the most central, delightful, and healthful places for recreation that any city can boast." Olmsted and Vaux's elegant design featured flowering chestnut trees

Chestnut oak

Quercus prinus , the chestnut oak, is a species of oak in the white oak group, Quercus sect. Quercus. It is native to the eastern United States, where it is one of the most important ridgetop trees from southern Maine southwest to central Mississippi, with an outlying northwestern population in...

along the periphery, open grassy spaces, walking paths, a vine-covered arbor

Arbor

Arbor or arbour may refer to:*Arbor , a landscape structure*Arbor or mandrel*Arbor, California*Arbor, a counterweight-carrying device found in theater fly systems...

facing a military salute ground, a permanent rostrum

Podium

A podium is a platform that is used to raise something to a short distance above its surroundings. It derives from the Greek πόδι In architecture a building can rest on a large podium. Podia can also be used to raise people, for instance the conductor of an orchestra stands on a podium as do many...

for speeches, and two lawns used for croquet

Croquet

Croquet is a lawn game, played both as a recreational pastime and as a competitive sport. It involves hitting plastic or wooden balls with a mallet through hoops embedded into the grass playing court.-History:...

and tennis

Tennis

Tennis is a sport usually played between two players or between two teams of two players each . Each player uses a racket that is strung to strike a hollow rubber ball covered with felt over a net into the opponent's court. Tennis is an Olympic sport and is played at all levels of society at all...

. The park's success prompted the creation of the larger Prospect Park

Prospect Park (Brooklyn)

. At the highest point of the park, The Prison Ship Martyrs Monument and vault was erected in 1908 to house the bones of some of the 12,000 Revolutionary soldiers and civilians whose bodies were thrown off British prison ships and later washed ashore. The monument, designed by the firm of McKim, Mead, and White

McKim, Mead, and White

McKim, Mead & White was a prominent American architectural firm at the turn of the twentieth century and in the history of American architecture. The firm's founding partners were Charles Follen McKim , William Rutherford Mead and Stanford White...

, was the world's largest Doric column at 143 feet (43.6 m) tall, and housed a bronze urn at its apex. Restoration work on the monument was completed in the late 2000s.

On April 24, 1888, the Fulton Street Elevated

Fulton Street Line (elevated)

The Fulton Street Line, also called the Fulton Street Elevated or Kings County Line, was an elevated rail line mostly in Brooklyn, New York City, United States...

began running from Fulton Ferry to Nostrand Avenue

Nostrand Avenue

Nostrand Avenue is a major street in Brooklyn, New York, that runs north from Emmons Avenue in Sheepshead Bay to Flushing Avenue in Williamsburg, where it continues as Lee Avenue. From Flushing Avenue to Farragut Road, Nostrand Avenue is a two-lane street...

, shortening the commute of Fort Greene residents, while also blocking light and adding street noise to residents facing Fulton Street. Elevated lines also ran along Lafayette Avenue and Myrtle Avenue

Myrtle Avenue (New York City)

Myrtle Avenue in New York City is a street that runs from Flatbush Avenue Extension in Downtown Brooklyn to Jamaica Avenue in Richmond Hill, Queens.-In Queens:...

20th century

Fort Greene in the early 20th century became a significant cultural destination. After the original Brooklyn Academy of Music
Brooklyn Academy of Music
Brooklyn Academy of Music is a major performing arts venue in Brooklyn, a borough of New York City, United States, known as a center for progressive and avant garde performance....

in Brooklyn Heights burned down in 1903, the current one was built in Fort Greene, and opened in 1908 with a production of Charles Gounod

Charles Gounod

Charles-François Gounod was a French composer, known for his Ave Maria as well as his operas Faust and Roméo et Juliette.-Biography:...

's Faust
Faust (opera)
Faust is a drame lyrique in five acts by Charles Gounod to a French libretto by Jules Barbier and Michel Carré from Carré's play Faust et Marguerite, in turn loosely based on Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's Faust, Part 1...

featuring Enrico Caruso and Geraldine Farrar

Geraldine Farrar

Geraldine Farrar was an American soprano opera singer and film actress, noted for her beauty, acting ability, and "the intimate timbre of her voice." She had a large following among young women, who were nicknamed "Gerry-flappers".- Early life and opera career :Farrar was born in Melrose,...

(Caruso suffered a throat hemorrhage while singing at BAM in 1920 and died several days later). At the time, BAM was the most complexly designed cultural center in Greater New York

New York metropolitan area

The New York metropolitan area, also known as Greater New York, or the Tri-State area, is the region that composes of New York City and the surrounding region...

since the construction of Madison Square Garden

Madison Square Garden

Madison Square Garden, often abbreviated as MSG and known colloquially as The Garden, is a multi-purpose indoor arena in the New York City borough of Manhattan and located at 8th Avenue, between 31st and 33rd Streets, situated on top of Pennsylvania Station.Opened on February 11, 1968, it is the...

15 years earlier. Fort Greene also showcased two stunning movie theaters, built in the 1920s: The Paramount Theater has been converted into Long Island University

Long Island University

Long Island University is a private, coeducational, nonsectarian institution of higher education in the U.S. state of New York.-History:...

's Brooklyn Campus; and the Brooklyn Fox Theatre on Flatbush Avenue

Flatbush Avenue (Brooklyn)

Flatbush Avenue is one of the major avenues in the New York City Borough of Brooklyn. It runs from the Manhattan Bridge south-southeastward to Jamaica Bay, where it joins the Marine Parkway Bridge, which connects Brooklyn to the Rockaway Peninsula in Queens...

at Fulton Street which was demolished in 1971. Built from 1927–1929, the Williamsburgh Savings Bank Tower

Williamsburgh Savings Bank Tower

The Williamsburgh Savings Bank Tower at 1 Hanson Place is the second tallest building in the borough of Brooklyn, New York City and a familiar Brooklyn landmark....

, one of Brooklyn's tallest buildings, is considered one of the 10 greatest skyscrapers in New York. It is located next to the Brooklyn Academy of Music

Brooklyn Academy of Music

Brooklyn Academy of Music is a major performing arts venue in Brooklyn, a borough of New York City, United States, known as a center for progressive and avant garde performance....

. Brooklyn Technical High School

Brooklyn Technical High School

, one of New York's most selective public high schools began construction on Fort Greene Place in 1930.

The poet Marianne Moore

Marianne Moore

Marianne Moore was an American Modernist poet and writer noted for her irony and wit.- Life :Moore was born in Kirkwood, Missouri, in the manse of the Presbyterian church where her maternal grandfather, John Riddle Warner, served as pastor. She was the daughter of mechanical engineer and inventor...

lived and worked for many years in an apartment house on Cumberland Street. Her apartment, which is lovingly recalled in Elizabeth Bishop's essay, "Efforts of Affection", has been preserved exactly as it existed during Moore's lifetime—though not in Fort Greene. To see the Moore apartment you need to travel to Center City Philadelphia

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Philadelphia is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the county seat of Philadelphia County, with which it is coterminous. The city is located in the Northeastern United States along the Delaware and Schuylkill rivers. It is the fifth-most-populous city in the United States,...

, to the Rosenbach Museum & Library

Rosenbach Museum & Library

The Rosenbach Museum & Library is located within two 19th-century townhouses at 2008 and 2010 Delancey Place in Philadelphia. The historic houses contain the collections and treasures of Philip Rosenbach and his younger brother Dr. A. S. W. Rosenbach...

. After her death, the furnishings and contents of Marianne Moore's apartment were purchased by the Rosenbach brothers, renowned collectors of literary ephemera. These pieces were then painstakingly reassembled in the top floor of their Philadelphia townhouse. Richard Wright

Richard Wright (author)

Richard Nathaniel Wright was an African-American author of sometimes controversial novels, short stories, poems, and non-fiction. Much of his literature concerns racial themes, especially those involving the plight of African-Americans during the late 19th to mid 20th centuries...

wrote Native Son
Native Son
Native Son is a novel by American author Richard Wright. The novel tells the story of 20-year-old Bigger Thomas, an African American living in utter poverty. Bigger lived in Chicago's South Side ghetto in the 1930s...

while living on Carlton Avenue in Fort Greene.

During World War II, the Brooklyn Navy Yard employed more than 71,000 people. Due to the resulting demand for housing, the New York City Housing Authority

New York City Housing Authority

The New York City Housing Authority provides public housing for low- and moderate-income residents throughout the five boroughs of New York City. NYCHA also administers a citywide Section 8 Leased Housing Program in rental apartments...

built 35 brick buildings between 1941 and 1944 ranging in height from six to fifteen stories collectively called the Fort Greene Houses. Production at the yard declined significantly after the war and many of the workers either moved on or fell on hard times. In 1957-1958 the houses were renovated and divided into the Walt Whitman Houses and the Raymond V. Ingersoll Houses. One year later Newsweek
Newsweek
Newsweek is an American weekly news magazine published in New York City. It is distributed throughout the United States and internationally. It is the second-largest news weekly magazine in the U.S., having trailed Time in circulation and advertising revenue for most of its existence...

profiled the housing project as "one of the starkest examples" of the failures of public housing

Public housing

Public housing is a form of housing tenure in which the property is owned by a government authority, which may be central or local. Social housing is an umbrella term referring to rental housing which may be owned and managed by the state, by non-profit organizations, or by a combination of the...

. The article painted a picture of broken windows, cracked walls, flickering or inoperative lighting, and elevators being used as toilets. Further depressing the area was the decommissioning of the Navy Yard in 1966 and dismantling of the Myrtle Avenue elevated train in 1969 which made the area much less attractive to Manhattan commuters.

From the 1960s through the 1980s, Fort Greene fought hard times that came with city-wide poverty, crime and drugs. While some houses were abandoned, artists, preservationists and Black professionals began to claim and restore the neighborhood in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Herbert Scott Gibson, a resident of the street called Washington Park, organized the Fort Greene Landmarks Preservation Committee which successfully lobbied for the establishment of Historic District

Historic district

A historic district or heritage district is a section of a city which contains older buildings considered valuable for historical or architectural reasons. In some countries, historic districts receive legal protection from development....

status. The New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission

New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission

The New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission is the New York City agency charged with administering the city's Landmarks Preservation Law. The Commission was created in April 1965 by Mayor Robert F. Wagner following the destruction of Pennsylvania Station the previous year to make way for...

designated two districts, the Fort Greene and BAM Historic Districts, in 1978. The Committee is now known as the Fort Greene Association. Spike Lee

Spike Lee

Shelton Jackson "Spike" Lee is an American film director, producer, writer, and actor. His production company, 40 Acres & A Mule Filmworks, has produced over 35 films since 1983....

established his 40 Acres & A Mule Filmworks

40 Acres & A Mule Filmworks

40 Acres & A Mule Filmworks is the production company of noted American filmmaker Spike Lee .The company is named after a famous episode of early Reconstruction. In 1865, General Sherman issued "Special Field Order 15", which ordered the distribution of lots of to some freed black families on the...

company in Fort Greene in the mid 1980s, further strengthening the resurgence of the neighborhood. The Fort Greene Historic District

Fort Greene Historic District

Fort Greene Historic District is a national historic district in Fort Greene, Brooklyn, New York, New York. It consists of 1,158 contributing buildings, two contributing sites, one contributing object, and two contributing structures...

was listed on the National Register of Historic Places

National Register of Historic Places

The National Register of Historic Places is the United States government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures, and objects deemed worthy of preservation...

in 1983 and expanded in 1984.

Recent history

The late 1990s and early 2000s saw the influx of many new residents and businesses to Fort Greene. While issues of gentrification are raised, Fort Greene stands to many as one of the best examples of a truly racially and economically diverse neighborhood with what The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...

referred to as a "prevailing sense of racial amity that intrigues sociologists and attracts middle-class residents from other parts of the city." GQ describes it in this way: "one of the rare racial mucous membranes in the five boroughs — it's getting white-ified but isn't there yet, and so is temporarily integrated."
The controversial Atlantic Yards

Atlantic Yards

The Atlantic Yards is a mixed-use commercial and residential development project of 16 high-rise buildings, under construction in Prospect Heights, adjacent to Downtown Brooklyn and Fort Greene in Brooklyn, New York City...

project to build a stadium for and relocate the New Jersey Nets

New Jersey Nets

The New Jersey Nets are a professional basketball team based in Newark, New Jersey. They are members of the Atlantic Division of the Eastern Conference in the National Basketball Association...

(which will become the Brooklyn Nets in 2012) along with a complex of large commercial and residential high-rises on the border of Fort Greene and Prospect Heights

Prospect Heights, Brooklyn

Prospect Heights is a neighborhood in the northwest of the New York City borough of Brooklyn. The traditional boundaries are Flatbush Avenue to the west, Atlantic Avenue to the north, Eastern Parkway to the south, and Washington Avenue to the east...

- the "Barclays Center" has garnered opposition from many neighborhood residents including Councilwoman Letitia James

Letitia James

Letitia A. "Tish" James is an American lawyer, activist and politician in the Working Families Party. She is the current New York City Council member for Brooklyn's 35th Council District. Elected in November 2003, she represents the neighborhoods of Clinton Hill, Fort Greene, parts of Crown...

and author Jhumpa Lahiri.

Fort Greene/Clinton Hill has recently garnered attention for The Local, its experimental Hyperlocal blog produced by The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...

in collaboration with CUNY Graduate School of Journalism
CUNY Graduate School of Journalism
The City University of New York Graduate School of Journalism is a public graduate journalism school located in New York City. One of the 23 institutions comprising the City University of New York, or CUNY, the school opened in 2006...

. It relies much on community participation, as seen from contributions by locals, crowdsourcing
Crowdsourcing
Crowdsourcing is the act of sourcing tasks traditionally performed by specific individuals to a group of people or community through an open call....

opportunities and their Virtual Assignment Desk. Much of its content is written by CUNY students and members of the community.

Urban development in 1858

New York Times, 1858, "Homes of the Poor" "The poverty stricken condition of the inhabitants residing in the Fort Green (sic)/Clinton Hill district] of Brooklyn render it almost an unknown land,". Focusing on a certain section of the east Brooklyn area defined as "between Flushing and Dekalb Avenues, as far east as Classon Avenue and as far west as Ryerson, extending across Fulton Avenue," the Times item said the real estate boom has resulted in class conflict among a majority of the area's longtime residents (identified as "renters or squatters") and its new neighbors—middle to upper income homeowners (identified as out-priced Manhattanites attracted to the spatial wealth of Brooklyn and able to afford the high price of its grand scale Neo-Gothic brownstones.) The paper further explained the conflict as one that had existed for some time, evidenced perhaps by a letter to the editor of a local Brooklyn paper published prior to the Times profile. The author, a new homeowner, wrote "Perchance there are but few places about more desirable for residences, or more pleasant for our evening walks...(but) on every side filthy shanties are permitted to be erected from which issue all sorts of offensive smells...It is indeed a fact that many of the inmates of these hovels keep swine, cattle, etc. in their cellars and not an unusual circumstance to witness these animals enjoying side by side with their owners the cheering rays of the sun; whilst offal and filth of the assorted family is suffered to collect about their premises and endanger the lives of those in their neighborhood by its sickening and deadly effluvia."

Politicians

Councilmember
New York City Council
The New York City Council is the lawmaking body of the City of New York. It has 51 members from 51 council districts throughout the five boroughs. The Council serves as a check against the mayor in a "strong" mayor-council government model. The council monitors performance of city agencies and...

Letitia James
Letitia James
Letitia A. "Tish" James is an American lawyer, activist and politician in the Working Families Party. She is the current New York City Council member for Brooklyn's 35th Council District. Elected in November 2003, she represents the neighborhoods of Clinton Hill, Fort Greene, parts of Crown...
State Senator
New York State Senate
The New York State Senate is one of two houses in the New York State Legislature and has members each elected to two-year terms. There are no limits on the number of terms one may serve...

Velmanette Montgomery
Velmanette Montgomery
Velmanette Montgomery represents District 18 in the New York State Senate, which comprises Fort Greene, Boerum Hill, Red Hook, Bedford-Stuyvesant, Sunset Park, Gowanus, and Park Slope, among other neighborhoods located within the borough of Brooklyn.Elected in 1984, Senator Montgomery is the Chair...
Assemblymen
New York State Assembly
The New York State Assembly is the lower house of the New York State Legislature. The Assembly is composed of 150 members representing an equal number of districts, with each district having an average population of 128,652...

Hakeem Jeffries
Hakeem Jeffries
-Early career:Jeffries holds a degree from New York University School of Law as well as a Master's Degree in Public Policy from Georgetown University and a Bachelor's in Political Science from Binghamton University where he graduated with honors for outstanding academic achievement...

and Joseph Lentol
Joseph Lentol
Joseph Lentol represents District 50 in the New York State Assembly, which comprises Greenpoint, Williamsburg and Fort Greene, among other neighborhoods located in the northern portion of the New York City borough of Brooklyn....
U.S. Congressman Edolphus Towns.

All of Fort Greene's representatives are Democrats, although Letitia James was elected on the Working Families Party

Working Families Party

The Working Families Party is a minor political party in the United States founded in New York in 1998. There are "sister" parties to the New York WFP in Connecticut, Massachusetts, South Carolina, Delaware, Pennsylvania, Vermont and Oregon, but there is as yet no national WFP...

line.

Writers

Poet Walt Whitman
Walt Whitman
Walter "Walt" Whitman was an American poet, essayist and journalist. A humanist, he was a part of the transition between transcendentalism and realism, incorporating both views in his works. Whitman is among the most influential poets in the American canon, often called the father of free verse...

, who was influential in the creation of Fort Greene Park in 1843
Poet Marianne Moore
Marianne Moore
Marianne Moore was an American Modernist poet and writer noted for her irony and wit.- Life :Moore was born in Kirkwood, Missouri, in the manse of the Presbyterian church where her maternal grandfather, John Riddle Warner, served as pastor. She was the daughter of mechanical engineer and inventor...
Novelist Richard Wright
Richard Wright (author)
Richard Nathaniel Wright was an African-American author of sometimes controversial novels, short stories, poems, and non-fiction. Much of his literature concerns racial themes, especially those involving the plight of African-Americans during the late 19th to mid 20th centuries...

wrote Native Son
Native Son
Native Son is a novel by American author Richard Wright. The novel tells the story of 20-year-old Bigger Thomas, an African American living in utter poverty. Bigger lived in Chicago's South Side ghetto in the 1930s...

while living at 175 Carlton Ave.
Novelist John Steinbeck
John Steinbeck
John Ernst Steinbeck, Jr. was an American writer. He is widely known for the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Grapes of Wrath and East of Eden and the novella Of Mice and Men...

's first apartment when he moved to New York in 1925 was on Fort Greene Place.
Novelist Jhumpa Lahiri
Jhumpa Lahiri
Jhumpa Lahiri is a Bengali American author. Lahiri's debut short story collection, Interpreter of Maladies , won the 2000 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, and her first novel, The Namesake , was adapted into the popular film of the same name. She was born Nilanjana Sudeshna, which she says are both...
Novelist/Poet/Playwright/Recording Artist Carl Hancock Rux
Carl Hancock Rux
‎Carl Hancock Rux is an award winning writer and performer; former Head of the MFA Writing for Performance Program at the California Institute of the Arts and has taught or been in residence at University of California–San Diego, Stanford University, University of Massachusetts Amherst,...
Novelist/TV host/Music Journalist Touré
Touré
Touré is an American novelist, essayist, music journalist, cultural critic, and television personality based in New York City. He is the host of Fuse's Hiphop Shop and On The Record...
Music Journalist/Novelist Nelson George
Nelson George
Nelson George is an African American author, columnist, music and culture critic, journalist, and filmmaker. He has been nominated twice for the National Book Critics Circle Award....
Playwright Michael Weller
Michael Weller
Michael Weller is a Brooklyn-based playwright who is best known for his plays Moonchildren and Loose Ends. Weller is one of the founders of the Cherry Lane Theatre's acclaimed Mentor Project, which pairs pre-eminent playwrights with emerging playwrights for a season-long mentorship...
Novelist Colson Whitehead
Colson Whitehead
Colson Whitehead is a New York-based novelist. He is best known as the author of the 2001 novel John Henry Days. In 2002, he received a MacArthur Fellowship.-Early life:...
Novelist Colin Channer
Colin Channer
Colin Channer is a Jamaican writer, often referred to as "Bob Marley with a pen," due to the spiritual, sensual, social themes presented from a literary Jamaican perspective. Indeed, his first two full length novels, Waiting in Vain and Satisfy My Soul, bear the titles of well known Marley songs...
Novelist Jennifer Egan
Jennifer Egan
Jennifer Egan is an American novelist and short story writer who lives in Fort Greene, Brooklyn. Egan's novel A Visit From the Goon Squad won the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and National Book Critics Circle Award for fiction....
Harlem Renaissance writer/artist Gwendolyn Bennett
Novelist Truman Capote
Truman Capote
Truman Streckfus Persons , known as Truman Capote , was an American author, many of whose short stories, novels, plays, and nonfiction are recognized literary classics, including the novella Breakfast at Tiffany's and the true crime novel In Cold Blood , which he labeled a "nonfiction novel." At...

(17 Clifton Pl., 1946)
Novelist Karan Mahajan
Karan Mahajan
Karan Mahajan is a Joseph Henry Jackson Award-winning Indian novelist. Mahajan was born in Stamford, Connecticut, and grew up in New Delhi, India. He studied English and Economics at Stanford University. He currently lives in Fort Greene, Brooklyn...
Novelist Amitav Ghosh
Amitav Ghosh
Amitav Ghosh , is a Bengali Indian author best known for his work in the English language.-Life:Ghosh was born in Calcutta on July 11, 1956, to Lieutenant Colonel Shailendra Chandra Ghosh, a retired officer of the pre-independence Indian Army, and was educated at The Doon School; St...
Writer and music critic for The New Yorker
The New Yorker
The New Yorker is an American magazine of reportage, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons and poetry published by Condé Nast...

Sasha Frere-Jones
Sasha Frere-Jones
Sasha Frere-Jones is an American writer, music critic, and musician. He has written for Pretty Decorating, ego trip, Hit It And Quit It, Mean, Slant, The New York Post, The Wire, The Village Voice, Slate, Spin, and The New York Times...

Artists

Photographer Robert Mapplethorpe
Robert Mapplethorpe
Robert Mapplethorpe was an American photographer, known for his large-scale, highly stylized black and white portraits, photos of flowers and nude men...
Artist Chris Ofili
Chris Ofili
Chris Ofili is a Turner Prize winning British painter best known for artworks referencing aspects of his Nigerian heritage, particularly his incorporation of elephant dung. He was one of the Young British Artists, and is now based in Trinidad.-Early life:Ofilli was born in Manchester. He had a...
Photographer Ken Schles
Photographer Gertrude Kasebier
Gertrude Käsebier
Gertrude Käsebier was one of the most influential American photographers of the early 20th century. She was known for her evocative images of motherhood, her powerful portraits of Native Americans and her promotion of photography as a career for women.-Early life :Käsebier was born Gertrude...
Artist/Theater Director Robert Wilson
Robert Wilson (director)
Robert Wilson is an American avant-garde stage director and playwright who has been called "[America]'s — or even the world's — foremost vanguard 'theater artist'". Over the course of his wide-ranging career, he has also worked as a choreographer, performer, painter, sculptor, video...

Musicians

El-P (underground hip hop artist and founder of Definitive Jux Records). His critically acclaimed album "I'll Sleep When You're Dead
I'll Sleep When You're Dead
-Credits:*Executive Producers: El-P and Amaechi Uzoigwe*Mastering: Michael Sarsfield*Mixing, engineering: Joey Raia*Layout and design: Brad Smith*Photography: Timothy Saccenti*Project Manager: Jesse Ferguson-External links:***...

" was recorded at his residence in Fort Greene
Ol' Dirty Bastard
Ol' Dirty Bastard
Russell Tyrone Jones was an American rapper and occasional producer, who went by the stage name Ol' Dirty Bastard or simply ODB...

, rapper (deceased)
Digable Planets
Digable Planets
Digable Planets is an American alternative hip hop trio based in New York City, composed of Ishmael "Butterfly" Butler , Mary Ann "Ladybug Mecca" Vieira and Craig "Doodlebug" Irving . They released their debut album Reachin' in 1993, and their follow-up album Blowout Comb in 1994...

, hip-hop group
Free Murda, rapper, cousin of ODB and RZA
Popa Wu, Patriarch of the Wu-Tang Clan
Just-Ice
Just-Ice
Just-Ice A former bouncer at punk clubs, Ice was one of the first of the New York MCs to embrace hardcore rap, and when he burst out of Fort Greene, Brooklyn, as Just-Ice, he gained instant notoriety. Muscle-bound, tattooed, aggressive—he resembled Mike Tyson in more than just looks—and with a...

, rapper
Erykah Badu
Erykah Badu
Erica Abi Wright , better known by her stage name Erykah Badu , is an American singer-songwriter, record producer, and actress. Her work includes elements from R&B, hip hop and jazz. She is best known for her role in the rise of the neo soul sub-genre, and for her eccentric, cerebral musical...
Betty Carter
Betty Carter
Betty Carter was an American jazz singer renowned for her improvisational technique and idiosyncratic vocal style...
Cecil Taylor
Cecil Taylor
Cecil Percival Taylor is an American pianist and poet. Classically trained, Taylor is generally acknowledged as one of the pioneers of free jazz. His music is characterized by an extremely energetic, physical approach, producing complex improvised sounds, frequently involving tone clusters and...
Branford Marsalis
Branford Marsalis
Branford Marsalis is an American saxophonist, composer and bandleader. While primarily known for his work in jazz as the leader of the Branford Marsalis Quartet, he also performs frequently as a soloist with classical ensembles and has led the group Buckshot LeFonque.-Biography:Marsalis was born...
Gary Bartz
Gary Bartz
Gary Bartz is an American alto and soprano saxophonist and clarinetist.Bartz graduated from the Baltimore City College high school and The Juilliard School...
Patti Smith
Patti Smith
Patricia Lee "Patti" Smith is an American singer-songwriter, poet and visual artist, who became a highly influential component of the New York City punk rock movement with her 1975 debut album Horses....
Rev. Hezekiah Walker(Walt Whitman Houses on Myrtle Ave)
Lester Bowie
Lester Bowie
Lester Bowie was an American jazz trumpet player and composer. He was a member of the AACM, and cofounded the Art Ensemble of Chicago.-Biography:...
Steve Coleman
Steve Coleman
Steve Coleman, born , is an African American saxophone player, spontaneous composer, composer and band leader. His music and concepts have been a heavy influence on contemporary jazz.-Chicago:...
Bill Stephney of The Bomb Squad
The Bomb Squad
The Bomb Squad is an American hip hop production team, known for their work with the rap group Public Enemy. The Bomb Squad are noted for their dense, distinct, innovative production style, often utilizing dozens of samples on just one track...
Vernon Reid
Vernon Reid
Vernon Reid is an English-born American guitarist, songwriter, composer, and bandleader. Best known as the founder and primary songwriter of the heavy metal band Living Colour, Reid was named #66 on Rolling Stone magazine's 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time.Critic Steve Huey writes, "[Reid's]...

of Living Colour
Living Colour
Living Colour is an American rock band from New York City, formed in 1984. Stylistically, the band's music is a creative fusion influenced by free jazz, funk, neo-psychedelia, hard rock, and heavy metal...
Citizen Cope
Citizen Cope
Clarence Greenwood is an American songwriter and producer. His eclectic mix of blues, laid-back rock, soul, and folk has a large and profoundly dedicated following, built over the past decade of touring due to solid word of mouth....
Lisa Fischer
Lisa Fischer
Lisa Fischer is an American R&B singer and songwriter. She rose to fame in 1991 with her debut album So Intense, which produced the Grammy Award winning hit single "How Can I Ease the Pain". Known for her high notes, which extends into the whistle register, Fischer has been recognized as one of...
Dana Dane
Dana Dane
Dana McLeese, better known by his stage name Dana Dane, is an American hip hop recording artist known for performance of humorous lyrics and for his fashion sense.-Early life:...
Bill Lee
Bill Lee (musician)
William James Edwards "Bill" Lee III is an American musician. He has played the bass for many artists including Cat Stevens, Harry Belafonte, Chad Mitchell Trio, Gordon Lightfoot, Aretha Franklin, Odetta, Simon and Garfunkel, and Bob Dylan...
Slide Hampton
Slide Hampton
Locksley Wellington "Slide" Hampton is an American jazz trombonist, composer and arranger.He was a 1998 Grammy Award winner for "Best Jazz Arrangement Accompanying Vocalist", as arranger for "Cotton Tail" performed by Dee Dee Bridgewater...

lived at 245 Carlton Avenue where he rented rooms to Eric Dolphy
Eric Dolphy
Eric Allan Dolphy was an American jazz alto saxophonist, flutist, and bass clarinetist. On a few occasions he also played the clarinet and baritone saxophone. Dolphy was one of several multi-instrumentalists to gain prominence in the 1960s...

, Freddie Hubbard
Freddie Hubbard
Frederick Dewayne "Freddie" Hubbard was an American jazz trumpeter. He was known primarily for playing in the bebop, hard bop and post bop styles from the early 1960s and on...

, Wes Montgomery
Wes Montgomery
John Leslie "Wes" Montgomery was an American jazz guitarist. He is widely considered one of the major jazz guitarists, emerging after such seminal figures as Django Reinhardt and Charlie Christian and influencing countless others, including Pat Martino, George Benson, Russell Malone, Emily...

, and Wayne Shorter
Wayne Shorter
Wayne Shorter is an American jazz saxophonist and composer.He is generally acknowledged to be jazz's greatest living composer, and many of his compositions have become standards...

. John Coltrane
John Coltrane
John William Coltrane was an American jazz saxophonist and composer. Working in the bebop and hard bop idioms early in his career, Coltrane helped pioneer the use of modes in jazz and later was at the forefront of free jazz...

was also a frequent visitor.
Carla Cook
Carla Cook
-Biography:A Detroit, Michigan native, music seized hold of Cook at an early age. As a student at Cass Technical High School she played string bass in the school orchestra, studied piano and voice on weekends, and sang in her church’s choir...
Toshi Reagon
Toshi Reagon
Toshi Reagon is an American folk/blues musician. She is the daughter of Freedom Singers co-founders Dr. Bernice Johnson Reagon, founder of Sweet Honey in the Rock, with whom she has sometimes collaborated on musical projects and of Cordell Hull Reagon, a leader of the civil rights movement in...
John Wesley Harding
John Wesley Harding (singer)
Wesley Stace is a folk/pop singer-songwriter and author who goes by the stage name John Wesley Harding. He has called his style of music folk noir and gangsta folk...
Rapper Talib Kweli
Talib Kweli
Talib Kweli Greene , better known as Talib Kweli, is an American hip-hop artist and poet from Brooklyn, New York. His first name in Arabic means "student" or "seeker" ; his in Swahili means "true"...
Actor/Rapper Mos Def
Mos Def
Dante Terrell Smith is an American actor and Emcee known by the stage names Mos Def and Yasiin Bey. He started his hip hop career in a group called Urban Thermo Dynamics, after which he appeared on albums by Da Bush Babees and De La Soul. With Talib Kweli, he formed the duo Black Star, which...
John Flansburgh
John Flansburgh
John Conant Flansburgh is an American musician. He is half of the longstanding Brooklyn, New York-based alternative rock duo They Might Be Giants, for which he writes, sings and plays rhythm guitar...

and John Linnell
John Linnell
John Sidney Linnell is an American musician, is known primarily as one half of Brooklyn, New York alternative rock duo They Might Be Giants...

of the band They Might Be Giants
They Might Be Giants
They Might Be Giants is an American alternative rock band formed in 1982 by John Flansburgh and John Linnell. During TMBG's early years Flansburgh and Linnell were frequently accompanied by a drum machine. In the early 1990s, TMBG became a full band. Currently, the members of TMBG are...
Rapper Chubb Rock
Chubb Rock
Chubb Rock is a New York-based rapper who released several commercially successful hip hop albums in the early 1990s...
Rap Duo Fort Greene Assassins

Actors, directors, and producers

Academy Award nominated actor Rosie Perez
Rosie Perez
Rosa María "Rosie" Pérez is an American actress, dancer, choreographer, director and community activist.- Early life :...
Film director and cinematographer Ernest Dickerson
Ernest Dickerson
Ernest Roscoe Dickerson A.S.C. is an American film and television director and cinematographer. He directed generally urban films sometimes with supernatural stories like Juice, Tales from the Crypt Presents Demon Knight, Bones and Never Die Alone...
Saul Williams
Saul Williams
Saul Stacey Williams is an American poet, writer, actor and musician known for his blend of poetry and alternative hip hop and for his leading role in the 1998 independent film Slam.-Biography:...
Academy award nominated actor Terrence Howard
Terrence Howard
Terrence Dashon Howard is an American actor. Having his first major role in the 1995 film Mr. Holland's Opus, which subsequently led to a number of roles in films and high visibility among African American audiences. Howard broke into the mainstream with a succession of well-reviewed television...
Roger Guenveur Smith
Roger Guenveur Smith
Roger Guenveur Smith is an American actor, director, and writer.-Early life:Smith was born in Berkeley, California, the son of Helen Guenveur, a dentist, and Sherman Smith, a judge...
Adrian Grenier
Adrian Grenier
Adrian Grenier is an American actor, musician and director. He is best known for his lead role on the HBO original series, Entourage, as Vincent Chase.-Early life:...
Keri Russell
Keri Russell
Keri Lynn Russell is an American actress and dancer. After appearing in a number of made-for-television films and series during the mid-1990s, she came to fame for portraying the title role of Felicity Porter on the series Felicity, which ran from 1998 to 2002, and for which she won a Golden Globe...
Jeffrey Wright
Screenwriter and producer Alan Ball
Alan Ball (screenwriter)
Alan E. Ball is an American writer, director, actor and producer for film, theatre and television.-Early life:Ball was born in Atlanta, Georgia, to Frank and Mary Ball, an aircraft inspector and a homemaker...

, creator and writer of Six Feet Under
Six Feet Under
Six Feet Under is an American drama television series created and produced by Alan Ball. It premiered on the premium cable network HBO in the United States on June 3, 2001 and ended on August 21, 2005, spanning five seasons and 63 episodes. The show was produced by Actual Size Films and The...

and True Blood
True Blood
True Blood is an American television series created and produced by Alan Ball. It is based on The Southern Vampire Mysteries series of novels by Charlaine Harris, detailing the co-existence of vampires and humans in Bon Temps, a fictional, small town in the state of Louisiana...
Spike Lee
Spike Lee
Shelton Jackson "Spike" Lee is an American film director, producer, writer, and actor. His production company, 40 Acres & A Mule Filmworks, has produced over 35 films since 1983....

maintains his movie studio 40 Acres & A Mule Filmworks
40 Acres & A Mule Filmworks
40 Acres & A Mule Filmworks is the production company of noted American filmmaker Spike Lee .The company is named after a famous episode of early Reconstruction. In 1865, General Sherman issued "Special Field Order 15", which ordered the distribution of lots of to some freed black families on the...

there. Several of his films, including She's Gotta Have It
She's Gotta Have It
She's Gotta Have It is a 1986 American comedy-drama film written and directed by Spike Lee. It was also Lee's first feature-length film. The film stars Tracy Camilla Johns, Tommy Redmond Hicks and John Canada Terrell. Also appearing are cinematographer Ernest Dickerson as a Brooklyn resident and...

, and She Hate Me
She Hate Me
She Hate Me is a 2004 independent comedy-drama film directed by Spike Lee and starring Anthony Mackie, Kerry Washington, Ellen Barkin, Monica Bellucci, Brian Dennehy, Woody Harrelson, Bai Ling and John Turturro....

were partially shot in Fort Greene.
Chris Rock
Chris Rock
Christopher Julius "Chris" Rock III is an American comedian, actor, screenwriter, television producer, film producer and director. He was voted in the US as the 5th greatest stand-up comedian of all time by Comedy Central...
Gregory Simmons (actor, stage Director) www.gregorysimmonsonline.com
Jim Niesen (director, founder) Irondale Ensemble Project
Malik Yoba (Stars in many of Tyler Perry's Movies)

Non arts-related fields

Dr. Susan McKinney Stewart 1847-1918: the first African American woman to receive a medical degree in New York State and the third in the U.S.

Nicky Cruz
Nicky Cruz
Nicky Cruz is a Christian evangelist, the founder of Nicky Cruz Outreach, an evangelistic Christian ministry. He was also once the director of Teen Challenge, serving under David Wilkerson before founding another ministry home himself in California...

(December 6, 1938 in San Juan, Puerto Rico
San Juan, Puerto Rico
San Juan , officially Municipio de la Ciudad Capital San Juan Bautista , is the capital and most populous municipality in Puerto Rico, an unincorporated territory of the United States. As of the 2010 census, it had a population of 395,326 making it the 46th-largest city under the jurisdiction of...

) Former leader of a notorious New York City gang
Gang
A gang is a group of people who, through the organization, formation, and establishment of an assemblage, share a common identity. In current usage it typically denotes a criminal organization or else a criminal affiliation. In early usage, the word gang referred to a group of workmen...

, The Mau-Maus
Mau Maus
Mau Maus was the name of a 1950s street gang in New York. The book and the adapted film The Cross and the Switchblade and biography Run Baby Run document the life of its most famous leader, Nicky Cruz. Their name was derived from the Mau Mau Uprising in Kenya.-History:The Mau Maus were a Brooklyn...

; he later became a world renowned religious minister.

Kelvin Martin
Kelvin Martin
Kelvin Darnell Martin , known to the underworld as 50 Cent, was an American criminal who grew up in the Bronx, New York, but later moved to Brooklyn, New York and was known as a stick-up kid in a Public Housing Project in Fort Greene, Brooklyn.Throughout the 1980s, Martin became a well-known robber...

an infamous robbery expert (stick up kid) and criminal. Also known as the original 50 Cent
50 Cent
Curtis James Jackson III , better known by his stage name 50 Cent, is an American rapper, entrepreneur, investor, record producer, and actor. He rose to fame with the release of his albums Get Rich or Die Tryin and The Massacre . Get Rich or Die Tryin has been certified eight times platinum by...

.

Bernard King
Bernard King
Bernard King is a retired American professional basketball player at the small forward position in the NBA...

former NBA player.

Albert King
Albert King (basketball)
Albert King is a retired American professional basketball player. King played at Fort Hamilton High School in Brooklyn and is regarded as one of the nation's greatest high school players of all time. He was rated the top prep player in the nation over Magic Johnson and Gene Banks during his senior...

former NBA player, younger brother of Bernard King
Bernard King
Bernard King is a retired American professional basketball player at the small forward position in the NBA...

External links

Fort Greene Association
Fort Greene Park Conservancy
Downtown Brooklyn Partnership
Fort Greene Brooklyn
http://www.brooklynrail.org/2005/12/local/rich-man-poor-man-a-history-of-fort-gree
http://www.fultonareabusiness.org

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