In the 17th century, Coney Island Creek was a small waterway that ended near what is now Cropsey Avenue. It was then dug into a straight that connected Sheepshead Bay to Gravesend Bay, making Coney Island an actual island. Because it was unnavigable, there was talk of widening it into a canal for shipping, but that never happened—once the five boroughs consolidated in 1898, this area lost its economic importance so there was no reason to turn it into a major shipping area. The creek was broken up by landfills over the years, then, in the 1950s, filled in and closed off for the construction of Shore Parkway—today, it is the two remaining inlets at either end.

It seems fitting that Coney Island Creek, home to an improbable collection of ghost ships, a stranded submarine and other haunting nautical detritus, was once known as Gravesend Creek. Over the years, not only ships have wound up in this watery grave, but many souls as well. In 1900, two women, ejected from a trolley for refusing to pay their fare, were run over on the trestle above the Creek, and fell in, dead. Accident-prone excursionists, strangulation victims, capsized picnickers and the downtrodden elite alike met their ends here. In 1895, a bereft Calvert Vaux, designer of Central Park, went for a walk along the water and was later found floating. Was it accident or suicide? We’ll never know.

Coney Island Creek has been the site of not only ghostly, but earthly sordid activity, as well. During Prohibition, Rum Row was a flotilla of schooners sitting off shore from Atlantic City up to Martha’s Vineyard, full of liquor from Canada, the Caribbean and Europe. It was brought into the city by big time mafia bootleggers like Frank Castello, head of Luciano crime family, and Big Bill Dwyer, who owned, among other sports teams, the Brooklyn Dodgers football team and controlled all rum-running in New York. Frankie Yale—the Undertaker—who owned a Coney Island dive at the waters’ edge where Al Capone had his first job, assisted the rum runners and was later gunned down by a rival on Crospey Ave. Many small time operators made rum-runs, too, with the same boats they used for fishing expeditions, helping liquor disperse into Long Island before it ever made it to the rest of the city. In the 1920s, we could have stood on this shore and watched rum-runners speed by being chased by the Coast Guard or hijackers.

From the 1890s to the 1950s, Brooklyn Borough Gas produced gas beside Coney Island Creek leeching pollution into it. People would bring their boats here to clean them with the corrosive sludge from the bottom of the creek. When the Verrazano Bridge was being built in the early sixties, excavated debris from the construction was dumped in the Creek. Area locals also remember that time as when the ghost ships started to turn up there. It was an anonymous dumping ground for these ships—some of them are said to be whaling ships—whose owners wanted to be rid of their bones. They’d either leave them to rot or burn them down to the waterline. Although the Army Corps of Engineers has studied ships abandoned in other parts of the city, it hasn’t been profitable to do it here, so these ships remain unidentified. These days, the creek is so polluted that the city is wary of moving the wrecks for fear of unleashing dormant toxins in the sludge around them.

And what of the Creek’s most famous denizen, the yellow submarine? It is one shipwreck begotten by another. In 1956, the ocean liner Andrea Doria collided with a second ship and never made it to the Port of New York, sinking in the Atlantic along with its valuable cargo. A decade later, Brooklyn dreamer and shipyard worker Jerry Bianco set out to claim some of that treasure for himself. Using repurposed material, bargain yellow paint and his maritime know-how, Bianco built a submarine on the banks of Coney Island Creek. Sadly, without enough ballast to keep it level, the submarine tipped and became stuck. After several further attempts, a storm quashed Bianco’s ambitions, tearing the submarine from the shore and lodging it in the mud, where it still sits, forty years later.

Today, gulls nest in the ribs of whalers, blue crabs scuttle in and out of the submarine and, atop of a submerged barge, enough debris has accumulated to form a brand new island. As so often happens in New York City, life perseveres in Coney Island Creek alongside all of the ghosts.

Underwater New York led an exploration of The Ghost Ships of Coney Island Creek for Obscura Day 2011. Documentation of that trip is forthcoming. In the meantime, check outphotographs by UNY’s own Adrian Kinloch, who has long been inspired by the Creek. This recent one of the island growing from a submerged barge at night is particularly stunning. Several historical, and hilarious, articles about Coney Island Creek appear on this site–to hear even more, visit Underwater New York under the Featured tab on Broadcastr.

BIBLIOGRAPHY
“Coney Island Creek Park.” www.nycgovparks.org. Web 27 March 2011
Lamb, Jonah Owen. “The Ghost Ships of Coney Island Creek.” New York Times. 6 August 2006. Web 27 March 2011.
Moynihan, Colin. “In Coney Island Creek, Hulk of Yellow Submarine Sticks Out.” New York Times. 9 November 2007. Web 27 March 2011.
“Two Women Killed by Car.” New York Times. 22 June 1900. Web 27 March 2011.
“The Yellow Submarine of Coney Island Creek.” forgotten-ny.com. Web 27 March 2011.

Mr. Loan Lost His Horse. He Lost His Companion Also, but She Was Found Again

The New York Times

Published: February 6, 1886

A man with a nose like an August sunset and cheeks like the roses that bloom in the Spring drove up to Kelly’s Hotel, on the Ocean Parkway Boulevard near the King’s Highway station on the Prospect Park and Coney Island Railroad, at midnight on Thursday and called for a drink. He gave his horse to the care of a stable boy and assisted a bundle of cloaks and scarfs and hoods to alight from the sleigh and walk into the hotel. In the parlor, when part of these numerous articles of wearing apparel had been laid on a chair, the bundle resolved itself into a young woman of prepossessing appearance with an affinity for hot lemonade. The man repeated his call for a drink several times with great success, for he soon got thawed out, and the crimson hue of his face gradually softened to the color of an underdone tenderloin of beef. Every time the wind whistled around the corner of the hotel he called for a drink, and on each occasion he took whiskey. He remarked casually that it was a cold night and that he needed something bracing. Before calling for a drink he invariably commented with a reckless increase of adjectives upon the abnormal condition of the weather. At the sixth drink it was the coldest night on record.

After a time the man took another drink, the woman concealed herself in many swathings of clothes, and the pair went forth into an atmosphere 8 degrees below zero. Relieved of the bustle and confusion incident to the call for drinks, the hotel drowsed back into its normal condition. An hour later the strange man, covered with snow from head to foot, walked into the hotel alone and called for a drink. He seemed stupefied, and to all appearances was under the influence of liquor.

“Where’s your horse and sleigh?” the bartender asked.

The man looked at him stupidly for a moment, and replied: “In Coney Island Creek, I guess.”

The bartender did not question him through fear of rousing his anger. After warming himself at the stove for a few minutes the man walked out of the hotel and disappeared. The bartender spoke to John Kelly, the proprietor of the place, about the man’s conduct, and subsequently started down toward Coney Island Creek to find the woman. On the embankment near the bridge which spans the creek he saw cutter tracks leading down to the creek, and in peering about in the faint light he found the horse and cutter in a big hole in the ice in the bed of the creek. He spoke to the horse but the animal did not move. Then walking out on the ice he found that the horse was frozen stiff. A woman’s woolen scarf was in the sleigh, and a small shawl lay on the ice. No trace of the woman could be found.

The accident was reported to the Gravesend police early yesterday morning, and was telephoned from Coney Island to Brooklyn. Several detectives were sent out on the case. A Fourth Precinct officer called at the house of William Loan, at No. 145 Classon-avenue, Brooklyn, late in the afternoon.

“Billy,” said the officer, “did you lose a horse and cutter last night?”

“Yes, I did,” returned Mr. Loan.

“Do you know where they are?”

“Yes. They are in Coney Island Creek!” Mr. Loan then explained that while driving down the Boulevard his horse had become unmanageable, and swerving from the road had fallen off the bridge into the creek. The ice broke and let the horse into the water. Loan tried to get the horse out, but failed. He did not know what became of the woman with him, but not seeing her anywhere about, concluded that she had either been drowned or had sought a place of safety. He refused to give the name of the woman to the officer, but said that he had learned upon reaching home yesterday morning that she had returned home at about 4 oclock in the morning.

It was learned last evening that the woman was Mrs. Jennie Williams of No. 205 Marcy-avenue, Brooklyn. Mrs. Williams is about 30 years of age, and has been separated from her husband for some time. She said that when the sleigh struck the ice she was thrown out and partially stunned. She was confused for a time by the struggles of the horse, and when she regained her presence of mind she was alone. The horse struggled desperately for a while, and then lay still. Mrs. Williams then climbed up to the road and wandered about until she found a man who for the minor consideration of $20 consented to take her to Brooklyn. Upon arriving home, she found that her nose, ears, and toes were frostbitten. She was put to bed for medical treatment. She was called upon during the afternoon by Mr. Loan, who, she said, seemed both surprised and pleased to find that she had returned in safety.

Mr. Loan is a boss stevedore of some means. He does a thriving business on the Wallabout docks, keeping about 25 horses employed most of the time. He is about 40 years old, and has a wife and family. The horse that he drove into Coney Island Creek was Mollie Brannagan, a young trotter which he purchased in Danbury, Conn., a year ago for $1,000. The animal was a good roadster, with a record of 2:30 on a heavy track. She was a vicious beast, and was fond of running away. She had run away with Loan three times, on one occasion injuring him severely.

He Was Her Husband's Friend

New York Times

Published: February 7, 1886

Mrs. Jennie Williams, of No. 205 Marcy-avenue, Brooklyn, who had such an unpleasant experience in Coney Island Creek on Thursday night in company with Mr. William Loan was seen at her home by a Times reporter yesterday. She introduced the reporter to a tall, broad-shouldered gentleman about 30 years of age, whom she said was her husband. He is in the same business as Mr. Loan and the two are friends. Her husband, Mrs. Williams explained, was not able to own a horse and sleigh, so when Mr. Loan asked her to take a drive he was perfectly willing to let her go. The lady felt hurt that some of the accounts of the story represented her as being divorced from her husband, which she denied.