Hello
I Just got back from my walk. Today I walked down toward Beach Meadows and on my way back I went down a new road where a one time Brooklyn native is planning to build a house. Its a nice walk down the road through the hard woods and pregnant cat spruce. I call them pregnant because they have them big carbunkles on them like many cat spruce do along the shore.
Once on the shore there are some nice ledges running out into the harbor there are also tidal ponds to play around in . Good places to look for crabs especially hermit crabs and other sea friends. I use to love doing that when it was easier for me to get around in rough areas and learning about all the sea critters. There is so much to be seen in these little tidal ponds but and you can spend hours finding wonderful creatures who live there
In this particular area when I was a kid there were tree stumps sticking out of the mud flats as if the sea had taken the land over in the last couple hundred years. The trees had been cut off by people living along the shore many years ago. Eventually the land got undermined or sunk and the tide came in over the area. This is also where the Clara Friend an American fishing boat ran ashore and many men were lost. We discussed that on here not to long ago.
This is the area called the creek it runs in behind the Clam flats for those who know the area. I did a lot of diving in this creek as its where the remains of a ship wreck sticks out of the muddy bottom. It is also the area where the black folks of Brooklyn lived many years ago they were "Neils" and the ledges off there are known as Neils Ledges. Many lives have been lost on Neils ledges over the years. Its nice to walk in these kind of places when you know its history.
So you see I was for a part of my walk back in time to the 1700 and 1800 hundreds. Folks then built there houses on the shore as boats were their means of traveling here and there. I know where most of these houses were and I use to scratch around the old foundations looking for relics. Some of the older folks in my time use to go down there digging looking for buried treasure - I doubt if any was found. Most villages had stories of buried treasures as that was the entertainment to sit around nites and tell stories --- no radios or tv's back then. Some story tellers were very good at it and could convince their followers that the stories were true.
Queens county has a lot of history and most areas you travel when out for your walks have stories to tell of characters and things that took place in the past. I did not write this to be published but I will pass it on to Heather Kelly and she can post it if she wishes to do so.
OL BUGGER (down on the shore of Liverpool Bay)
Thanks Lanny. I gotta get me down there to Beach Meadows. Haven't been since I was a kid. I will definitely see it in a new light.
ReplyDeletevery interesting story and memories..thanks
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