North Brother Island
Encyclopedia
East River
The East River is a tidal strait in New York City. It connects Upper New York Bay on its south end to Long Island Sound on its north end. It separates Long Island from the island of Manhattan and the Bronx on the North American mainland...
situated between the Bronx
The Bronx
The Bronx is the northernmost of the five boroughs of New York City. It is also known as Bronx County, the last of the 62 counties of New York State to be incorporated...
and Riker's Island. Its companion, South Brother Island
South Brother Island
South Brother Island is one of a pair of small islands in the East River situated between the Bronx and Riker's Island, New York City and containing of land. The other island, larger and better known, is North Brother Island. It is uninhabited. Until 1964, South Brother Island was part of Queens...
, is a short distance away. Together, the two Brother Islands, North and South, have a land area of 20.12 acres (81,422.8 m²).
History
The island was uninhabited until 1885, when Riverside Hospital moved there from Blackwell's Island (now known as Roosevelt IslandRoosevelt Island
Roosevelt Island, known as Welfare Island from 1921 to 1973, and before that Blackwell's Island, is a narrow island in the East River of New York City. It lies between the island of Manhattan to its west and the borough of Queens to its east...
). Riverside Hospital was founded in the 1850s as the Smallpox
Smallpox
Smallpox was an infectious disease unique to humans, caused by either of two virus variants, Variola major and Variola minor. The disease is also known by the Latin names Variola or Variola vera, which is a derivative of the Latin varius, meaning "spotted", or varus, meaning "pimple"...
Hospital to treat and isolate victims of that disease. Its mission eventually expanded to other quarantinable
Quarantine
Quarantine is compulsory isolation, typically to contain the spread of something considered dangerous, often but not always disease. The word comes from the Italian quarantena, meaning forty-day period....
diseases.
The island was the site of the wreck of the General Slocum
General Slocum
The PS General Slocum was a passenger steamboat built at Brooklyn, New York, in 1891. The General Slocum was named for Civil War officer and New York Congressman Henry Warner Slocum. She operated in the New York City area as an excursion steamer for the next thirteen years under the same ownership...
, a steamship which burned on June 15, 1904. Over 1,000 people died either from the fire on board the ship or from drowning before the ship was beached on the island's shores.
Typhoid Mary
Mary Mallon
Mary Mallon , also known as Typhoid Mary, was the first person in the United States identified as an asymptomatic carrier of the pathogen associated with typhoid fever. She was presumed to have infected some 53 people, three of whom died, over the course of her career as a cook...
was confined to the island for over two decades until she died there in 1938. The hospital closed shortly thereafter.
After World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, the island housed war veterans who were students at local colleges, along with their families. After the nationwide housing shortage abated, the island was once again abandoned.
In the 1950s a center opened to treat adolescent drug addicts. The facility claimed to be the first to offer treatment, rehabilitation, and education facilities to young drug offenders. Heroin addicts were confined to this island and locked in a room until they were clean. Many of them believed they were being held against their will (as one person wrote on the wall). By the early 1960s widespread staff corruption and patient recidivism
Recidivism
Recidivism is the act of a person repeating an undesirable behavior after they have either experienced negative consequences of that behavior, or have been treated or trained to extinguish that behavior...
forced the facility to close.
The island is currently abandoned and off-limits to the public. Most of the original hospitals' buildings still stand, but are heavily deteriorated and in danger of collapse. A dense forest conceals the ruined hospital buildings and supports one of the area's largest nesting colonies of Black-crowned Night Heron
Black-crowned Night Heron
The Black-crowned Night Heron commonly abbreviated to just Night Heron in Eurasia, is a medium-sized heron found throughout a large part of the world, except in the coldest regions and Australasia .-Description:Adults are...
.
Legacy
North Brother Island was featured in episode 8 ("Armed and Defenseless") of Life After PeopleLife After People
Life After People is a television documentary series where scientists and other experts speculate about what the Earth might be like if humanity no longer existed, as well as the impact humanity's disappearance might have on the environment and the artificial aspects of civilization...
on the History Channel. It was used as an example of what would happen to structures after 45 years without humans.
Further reading
- Seitz, Sharon & Miller, Stuart. (2003) The Other Islands of New York. ISBN 0-88150-502-1.
- http://factfinder.census.gov/servlet/DTTable?_bm=y&-show_geoid=Y&-tree_id=4001&-_caller=geoselect&-context=dt&-errMsg=&-all_geo_types=N&-mt_name=DEC_2000_SF1_U_P001&-redoLog=true&-transpose=N&-search_map_config=|b=50|l=en|t=4001|zf=0.0|ms=sel_00dec|dw=0.05330623177477046|dh=0.030289650719350046|dt=gov.census.aff.domain.map.EnglishMapExtent|if=gif|cx=-73.88421800202333|cy=40.79177413228427|zl=3|pz=3|bo=318:317:316:314:313:323:319|bl=362:393:358:357:356:355:354|ft=350:349:335:389:388:332:331|fl=381:403:204:380:369:379:368|g=01000US&-PANEL_ID=p_dt_geo_map&-_lang=en&-geo_id=100$10000US360050005009000&-CONTEXT=dt&-format=&-search_results=100$10000US360050001009001&-ds_name=DEC_2000_SF1_UNorth Brother and South Brother Islands: Block 9000, Block Group 9, Census Tract 5, Bronx County, New York] United States Census Bureau
External links
- A historical article about the island accompanied by 60 recent photographs
- Brothers: NYC's worst maritime tragedy
- Photos of the islands in 2004, and images of the General SlocumGeneral SlocumThe PS General Slocum was a passenger steamboat built at Brooklyn, New York, in 1891. The General Slocum was named for Civil War officer and New York Congressman Henry Warner Slocum. She operated in the New York City area as an excursion steamer for the next thirteen years under the same ownership...
from Forgotten New York. - NYC Audubon Harbor Herons Project
- Harbor Herons Nesting Survey -recent reports on wading bird and gull nesting activity at North Brother Island
- Photos of the abandoned hospital Photographs and history of the abandoned Riverside Hospital
- A second gallery of images taken by urban explorers
- New York Times Lens Blog - The Places We Don't See