THE STRAY PATH OF A BROOKLYN BULLET (1894)
******************************************************************************************************************************** Brownstone Detectives investigates the history of our clients’ homes. The story you are about to read was composed from research conducted in the course of one of those investigations. Do you know the history of YOUR house? ******************************************************************************************************************************** Henry J. Hartig was no law-breaker. As a machinist, he had invented one of the first successful gas engines and patented numerous governor designs over his lifetime. An industrious German-born American citizen, well-known and loved throughout his Fort Greene neighborhood, Hartig was a law-abiding family man who would go on to sire five children with his wife, Emma. He started the Hartig Standard Gas Engine Company, manufacturing his engines – which used illuminating gas for fuel – from the early 1890s and well into the 20th century. And so, possessing the intense interest in creating, tinkering and experimenting that drives all serious inventors, his hunger for learning drew him into a variety of fields that sparked his interest. One of them was guns. Hartig owned at least one firearm – a Flobert Remington “Cadet” .22 rifle – with which he enjoyed taking target practice in his backyard. But when a stray bullet from that weapon struck an innocent man one lazy summer afternoon, it looked as though Hartig would lose it all. “CULLOM WAS HALF ASLEEP WHEN HE FELT A SHARP TWINGE…” Of course it was an accident, and many Brooklynites were owners of firearms in the 1890s – it was that kind of place back then. But then again, the […]
WHALE HUNTING AT THE NAVY YARD (1887)
******************************************************************************************************************************** Brownstone Detectives investigates the history of our clients’ homes. The story you are about to read was composed from research conducted in the course of one of those investigations. Do you know the history of YOUR house? ******************************************************************************************************************************** When the Navy Yard sailors spotted the mass floating in the mill pond-like waters of the Wallabout Bay they could hardly believe their eyes. Never had anyone before seen a fish of this size enter the Navy Yard’s Whitney Basin, let alone a gargantuan the size of this whale. Old-timers had talked about the ones they’d hunted, going on about their supreme strength and how dangerous a prey they had been to hunt. Everyone watching braced themselves for the inevitable feats of strength it was preparing to perform. No noise nor movement, however, emitted from the beast. This whale’s attitude seemed to be comparable to the peaceful musings of a cat with a ball of yarn. “It was a big black whale forty feet long,” the papers noted, and it floated listlessly near the entry of the Whitney Basin. As a great crowd gathered to watch the monstrous fish, it was quickly decided to “man one of the old whale boats to capture the monster.” Many a Starbuck was born that day, as the sailors raced to prepare the rigging and launch their craft. But something was wrong – something just didn’t seem right with the beast. It was at that point an old sailor with “a keen olfactory organ caught […]
