Boiler Installation in Sunset Park, NY

Though modern-day Brooklyn is coextensive with Brooklyn, this was not always the case. South Brooklyn, an area in central Brooklyn extending to the former Brooklyn city line near Green-Wood Cemetery’s southern border, was originally settled by the Canarsee, one of several indigenous Lenape peoples who farmed and hunted on the land. The Canarsee had several routes that crossed Brooklyn, including a path from Fulton Ferry along the East River that extended southward to Gowanus Creek, South Brooklyn (present-day Sunset Park), and Bay Ridge. The Canarsee traded with other indigenous peoples, and by the early 17th century, also with Dutch and English settlers.

The first European settlement occurred in 1636 when Willem Adriaenszen Bennett and Jacques Bentyn purchased 936 acres (379 ha) between 28th and 60th Streets, in what is now Sunset Park. However, after the land was purchased in the 1640s by Dutch settlers who laid out their farms along the waterfront, the Canarsee were soon displaced, and had left Brooklyn by the 18th century. The area comprising modern Sunset Park was divided between two Dutch towns: Brooklyn to the northwest and New Utrecht to the southeast, divided by a boundary that ran diagonally from Seventh Avenue/60th Street to Ninth Avenue/37th Street. The Dutch created long, narrow farms in the area. When New Netherland was conveyed to the English in 1664, the latter improved the waterfront pathway in the town of Brooklyn as part of a Gowanus (Coast) Road, which ran southwest to an east-west trail called Martense’s Lane, then southward to the boundary with New Utrecht. These roads would be used during the American Revolutionary War in the Battle of Long Island.

During the American Revolution, the area was mostly owned by the descendants of Hans Hansen Bergen, an early immigrant from Norway. They owned two homesteads, the DeHart-Bergen House close to 37th Street and the Johannes Bergen House around 55th Street; the former was used by the British during the Revolution. In addition, the Bergens owned several slaves, as indicated in the 1800 United States Census, where 19 slaves and 8 free non-whites were recorded living at the two Bergen houses. After New York abolished slavery in 1827, there were 55 African Americans living in the area. Similar to Dutch farms, the farms in modern Sunset Park occupied long, narrow plots.