This author thinks so but I notice that he didn't include the story of my own ancestors, French Huguenots who landed with the Dutch at the tip of Manhattan in
2 years ago
Monday, October 20, 2008
The 10 Worst Real Estate Deals in History?
This author thinks so but I notice that he didn't include the story of my own ancestors, French Huguenots who landed with the Dutch at the tip of Manhattan in1630 or so 1658 and promptly turned their back on that island and moved on to Staten Island Brooklyn. We've been blowing real estate deals ever since.
This author thinks so but I notice that he didn't include the story of my own ancestors, French Huguenots who landed with the Dutch at the tip of Manhattan in
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Actually, the Fountains went from Manhattan to Brooklyn, two years after arriving in 1658 (happy 350th anniversary!), to what is now the lovely neighborhood of Bushwick (there's still today a Fountain Avenue running through a particularly dismal stretch of it), in search of better farmland. Gov. Peter Stuyvesant gave them and other Huguenots land in exchange for their serving as human buffers between the Indians of Long Island and his East River estate. There they prospered for nearly a hundred years before eventually moving to Staten Island (wisely waiting until the poor Indians were finally driven out).
Incidentally, you mentioned in an earlier posting Gideon Fountain, the union-hating builder and architect. Delving into the online archives of the New York Times, his name constantly pops up in reports on real estate transactions taking place throughout the city in the late nineteenth century. That leads me to believe he made his real money (as did so many in New York back then) in land speculation. 'Tis a pity it's all gone now, eh?
Brooklyn, eh? Just proves my point: we could have bought that Goddamned bridge!
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