Brooklyn (/ˈbrʊklɨn/) is the most populous of New York City's five boroughs, with a Census-estimated 2,621,793 people in 2014.[1] It is geographically adjacent to the borough of Queens at the western end of Long Island. Since 1896, Brooklyn has had the same boundaries as Kings County, the most populous county in the State of New York and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, after New York County (Manhattan).[2] With a land area of 71 square miles (180 km2) and water area of 26 square miles (67 km2), Kings County is the fourth-smallest county in New York State by land area and third-smallest by total area, though it is the second-largest among New York City's five boroughs.[3] Today, if it were an independent city, Brooklyn would rank as the fourth most populous city in the U.S., behind only the other boroughs of New York City combined, Los Angeles, and Chicago.

Brooklyn was an independent incorporated city (and previously an authorized village and town within the provisions of the New York State Constitution), until January 1, 1898, when, after a long political campaign and public relations battle during the 1890s, according to the new Municipal Charter of "Greater New York", Brooklyn was consolidated with the other cities, boroughs and counties to form the modern "City of New York" surrounding the Upper New York Bay with five constituent boroughs. It continues, however, to maintain a distinct culture, as befitting the former second or third largest city in America during the later 19th Century. Many Brooklyn neighborhoods are ethnic enclaves where particular ethnic and nationality groups and cultures predominate. Brooklyn's official motto is Eendraght Maeckt Maght, which translates from early modern Dutch to "In unity, there is strength". The motto is displayed on the Borough seal and flag, which also feature a young robed woman bearing a bundle of bound rods known as a "fasces", a traditional emblem of Republicanism.[4] Brooklyn's official colors are blue and gold.[5]
History
See also: Timeline of Brooklyn
Currier and Ives print of Brooklyn, 1886.
Brooklyn Museum - Hooker's Map of the Village of Brooklyn

The history of European settlement in Brooklyn spans more than 350 years. The settlement began in the 17th century as the small Dutch-founded town of "Breuckelen" on the East River shore of Long Island, grew to be a sizable city in the 19th century, and was consolidated in 1898 with New York City (then confined to Manhattan and part of the Bronx), the remaining rural areas of Kings County, and the largely rural areas of Queens and Staten Island, to form the modern City of New York.
Colonial era
Six Dutch towns
[show]New Netherland series
A typical dining table in the Dutch village of Brooklyn, c. 1664, from The Brooklyn Museum.

The Dutch were the first Europeans to settle the area on the western edge of Long Island, which was then largely inhabited by the Lenape, a Native American people who are often referred to in contemporary colonial documents by a variation of the place name "Canarsie". The "Breuckelen" settlement, named after Breukelen in the Netherlands, was part of New Netherland, and the Dutch West India Company lost little time in chartering the six original parishes (listed here first by their later, more common English names):[6]

Gravesend: in 1645, settled under Dutch patent by English followers of the Anabaptist, Lady Deborah Moody, possibly after Gravesend, England, or 's-Gravenzande, Netherlands
Brooklyn: as "Breuckelen" in 1646, after the town now spelled "Breukelen", Netherlands
Flatlands: as "New Amersfoort" in 1647
Flatbush: as "Midwout" in 1652
New Utrecht: in 1657, after the city of Utrecht, Netherlands
Bushwick: as "Boswijck" in 1661

Many incidents and documents relating to this period are in Gabriel Furman's early (1824) compilation.[7]

The capital of the colony, New Amsterdam across the East River, obtained its charter later than the village of Brooklyn did, in 1653.

The neighborhood of Marine Park was home to the first tidal mill in North America. This mill was built by the Dutch, and the foundation can be seen today. However, the area was not formally settled as a town.
Six townships in an English province
Village of Brooklyn and environs, 1766

What is today Brooklyn left Dutch hands after the final English conquest of New Netherland in 1664, in a prelude to the Second Anglo–Dutch War. New Netherland was taken in a naval action, and the conquerors renamed their prize in honor of the overall English naval commander, James, Duke of York, brother of the Monarch, King Charles II of England and future king himself as King James II of England and James VII of Scotland; Brooklyn became a part of the new English and later British colony, the Province of New York.

The English reorganized the six old Dutch towns on southwestern Long Island as Kings County on November 1, 1683,[8] one of "Original Twelve Counties" then established in New York Province. This tract of land was recognized as a political entity for the first time, and the municipal groundwork was laid for a later expansive idea of Brooklyn identity.

Lacking the patroon and tenant farmer system established along the Hudson River Valley, this agricultural county unusually came to have one of the highest percentages of slavery among the population in the "Original Thirteen Colonies" along the Atlantic Ocean eastern coast of North America.
Revolutionary War
Further information: Battle of Long Island and New York and New Jersey campaign
The Battle of Long Island was fought across Kings County.

On August 27, 1776, the Battle of Long Island (also known as the Battle of Brooklyn) was the first major engagement fought in the American Revolutionary War after independence was declared, and the largest of the entire conflict. British troops forced Continental Army troops under George Washington off the heights near the modern sites of Green-Wood Cemetery, Prospect Park, and Grand Army Plaza.[9]

Washington, viewing particularly fierce fighting at the Gowanus Creek from his vantage point atop a hill near the west end of present-day Atlantic Avenue, was famously reported to have emotionally exclaimed: "What brave men I must this day lose!".[10]

The fortified American positions at Brooklyn Heights consequently became untenable and were evacuated a few days later, leaving the British in control of New York Harbor. While Washington's defeat on the battlefield cast early doubts on his ability as the commander, the subsequent tactical withdrawal of all his troops and supplies across the East River in a single night is seen by historians as one of his most brilliant triumphs.[10]

The surrounding region was controlled by the British for the duration of the war, as New York City was soon occupied and became their military and political base of operations in North America for the remainder of the conflict. The British generally enjoyed a dominant Loyalist sentiment from the remaining residents in Kings County who did not evacuate, though the region was also the center of the fledgling — and largely successful — American intelligence network, headed by Washington himself.

The British set up a system of notorious prison ships off the coast of Brooklyn in Wallabout Bay, where more American patriots died of intentional neglect than died in combat on all the battlefields of the American Revolutionary War, combined. The Treaty of Paris in 1783 resulted, in part, in the evacuation of the British from New York City, celebrated by residents into the 20th century.
Post-colonial era
Urbanization
A preindustrial Winter Scene in Brooklyn, c. 1819–20, by Francis Guy (Brooklyn Museum).

The first half of the 19th century saw the beginning of the development of urban areas on the economically strategic East River shore of Kings County, facing the adolescent City of New York confined to Manhattan Island. The New York Navy Yard operated in Wallabout Bay (border between Brooklyn and Williamsburgh) for the entire 19th century and two thirds of the 20th century.

The first center of urbanization sprang up in the Town of Brooklyn, directly across from Lower Manhattan, which saw the incorporation of the Village of Brooklyn in 1816. Reliable steam ferry service across the East River to Fulton Landing converted Brooklyn Heights into a commuter town for Wall Street. Ferry Road to Jamaica Pass became Fulton Street to East New York. Town and Village were combined to form the first, kernel incarnation of the City of Brooklyn in 1834.

In parallel development, the Town of Bushwick, a little farther up the river, saw the incorporation of the Village of Williamsburgh in 1827, which separated as the Town of Williamsburgh in 1840, only to form the short-lived City of Williamsburgh in 1851. Industrial deconcentration in mid-century was bringing shipbuilding and other manufacturing to the northern part of the county. Each of the two cities and six towns in Kings County remained independent municipalities, and purposely created non-aligning street grids with different naming systems.

But the East River shore was growing too fast for the three-year-old infant City of Williamsburgh, which, along with its Town of Bushwick hinterland, was subsumed within a greater City of Brooklyn in 1854.

By 1841, the growing city across the East River from Manhattan, boasted its own highly regarded newspaper with the appearance of the The Brooklyn Eagle, and Kings County Democrat published by Alfred G. Stevens.[11] It later became the most popular and highest circulation afternoon paper in America. The publisher changed to L. Van Anden on April 19, 1842,[12] and the paper was renamed The Brooklyn Daily Eagle and Kings County Democrat on June 1, 1846.[13] On May 14, 1849, the name was shortened to The Brooklyn Daily Eagle.[14] On September 5, 1938, the name was further shortened, to Brooklyn Eagle.[15] The establishment of the paper in the 1800s set a tone for the developing separate identity for Brooklynites in the next century along with its famous National League baseball team, the Brooklyn Dodgers. Both major institutions were lost in the 1950s, when the paper closed in 1955 after unsuccessful attempts at a sale following a reporters' strike and the baseball team decamped for Los Angeles in a realignment of major league baseball in 1957.

Agitation against Southern slavery was stronger in Brooklyn than in New York, and under Republican leadership the city was fervent in the Union cause in the Civil War. After the war the Henry Ward Beecher Monument was built downtown to honor a famous local abolitionist. A great victory arch at what was then the south end of town celebrated the armed forces, the place now being called Grand Army Plaza.

The city had a population of 25,000 in 1834, but the police department only comprised 12 men on the day shift and another 12 at night. Every time a rash of burglaries broke out, officials blamed burglars coming in from New York City. Finally in 1855, a modern police force was created, employing 150 men. Voters complained of inadequate protection and excessive costs. In 1857 the state legislature merged the Brooklyn force with that of New York City.[16]
Civil War
"Any Thing for Me, if You Please?" Post Office, 1864

Fervent in the Union cause, the city of Brooklyn played a major role in supplying troops and materiel for the American Civil War. The most well known regiment to be sent off to war from the city was the 14th Brooklyn "Red Legged Devils". They fought from 1861 to 1864 and wore red the entire war.

They were the only Regiment named after a city, and President Lincoln called them into service personally, making them part of a handful of 3 year enlisted soldiers in April 1861. Unlike other regiments during the American Civil War, the 14th wore a uniform inspired by that of the French Chasseurs, a light infantry used for quick assaults on the enemy.

As both a seaport and a manufacturing center, Brooklyn was well prepared to play to the Union's strengths in shipping and manufacturing. The two combined in shipbuilding; the ironclad Monitor was built in Brooklyn.
Twin city
The Twin cities of Brooklyn and New York in 1866, showing wards.

Taking a thirty-year break from municipal expansionism, this well-situated coastal city established itself as the third-most-populous American city for much of the 19th century. Brooklyn is referred to as a twin city of New York in the 1883 poem, "The New Colossus" by Emma Lazarus, which appears on a plaque inside the Statue of Liberty. The poem calls New York Harbor "the air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame". As a twin city to New York, it played a role in national affairs that was later overshadowed by its century-old submergence into its old partner and rival.

Economic growth continued, propelled by immigration and industrialization. The waterfront from Gowanus Bay to Greenpoint was developed with piers and factories. Industrial access to the waterfront was improved by the Gowanus Canal and the canalized Newtown Creek. The USS Monitor was only the most famous product of the large and growing shipbuilding industry of Williamsburg. After the Civil War, trolley lines and other transport brought urban sprawl beyond Prospect Park and into the center of the county.

The rapidly growing population needed more water, so the City built centralized waterworks including the Ridgewood Reservoir. The municipal Police Department, however, was abolished in 1854 in favor of a Metropolitan force covering also New York and Westchester Counties. In 1865 the Brooklyn Fire Department (BFD) also gave way to the new Metropolitan Fire District.

Throughout this period the peripheral towns of Kings County, far from Manhattan and even from urban Brooklyn, maintained their rustic independence. The only municipal change seen was the secession of the eastern section of the Town of Flatbush as the Town of New Lots in 1852. The building of rail links such as the Brighton Beach Line in 1878 heralded the end of this isolation.
Brooklyn Bridge in 1883, by Currier and Ives

Sports became big business, and the Brooklyn Bridegrooms played professional baseball at Washington Park in the convenient suburb of Park Slope and elsewhere. Early in the next Century they brought their new name of Brooklyn Dodgers to Ebbets Field, beyond Prospect Park. Racetracks, amusement parks and beach resorts opened in Brighton Beach, Coney Island and elsewhere in the southern part of the county.

Toward the end of the 19th century, the City of Brooklyn experienced its final, explosive growth spurt. Railroads and industrialization spread to Bay Ridge and Sunset Park. In the space of a decade, the city annexed the Town of New Lots in 1886, the Town of Flatbush, the Town of Gravesend, the Town of New Utrecht in 1894, and the Town of Flatlands in 1896. Brooklyn had reached its natural municipal boundaries at the ends of Kings County.
Mayors of the City of Brooklyn

Brooklyn elected a mayor from 1834 until consolidation in 1898 into the City of Greater New York, whose own second mayor (1902–1903), Seth Low, had been Mayor of Brooklyn from 1882 to 1885. Since 1898, Brooklyn has, in place of a separate mayor, elected a Borough President. See the List of mayors of New York City and the list of Brooklyn Borough Presidents.
Mayors of the City of Brooklyn[17] Mayor Party Start year End year
George Hall Democratic-Republican 1834
Jonathan Trotter Democrat 1835 1836
Jeremiah Johnson Whig 1837 1838
Cyrus P. Smith 1839 1841
Henry C. Murphy Democrat 1842
Joseph Sprague 1843 1844
Thomas G. Talmage 1845
Francis B. Stryker Whig 1846 1848
Edward Copland 1849
Samuel Smith Democrat 1850
Conklin Brush Whig 1851 1852
Edward A. Lambert Democrat 1853 1854
George Hall 1855 1856
Samuel S. Powell Democrat 1857 1860
Martin Kalbfleisch 1861 1863
Alfred M. Wood Republican 1864 1865
Samuel Rooth 1866 1867
Martin Kalbfleisch Democrat 1868 1871
Samuel S. Powell 1872 1873
John W. Hunter 1874 1875
Frederick A. Schroeder Republican 1876 1877
James Howell Democrat 1878 1881
Seth Low Republican 1882 1885
Daniel D. Whitney Democrat 1886 1887
Alfred C. Chapin 1888 1891
David A. Boody 1892 1893
Charles A. Schieren Republican 1894 1895
Frederick W. Wurster 1896 1897
New York City borough
Further information: History of New York City (1898–1945)
Brooklyn in 1897

In 1883, the Brooklyn Bridge was completed, transportation to Manhattan was no longer by water only, and the City of Brooklyn's ties to the City of New York were strengthened.

The question became whether Brooklyn was prepared to engage in the still-grander process of consolidation then developing throughout the region, whether to join with the county of New York, the county of Richmond and the western portion of Queens County to form the five boroughs of a united City of New York. Andrew Haskell Green and other progressives said Yes, and eventually they prevailed against the Daily Eagle and other conservative forces. In 1894, residents of Brooklyn and the other counties voted by a slight majority to merge, effective in 1898.[18]

Kings County retained its status as one of New York State's counties, but the loss of Brooklyn's separate identity as a city was met with consternation by some residents at the time. The merger was called the "Great Mistake of 1898" by many newspapers of the day, and the phrase still denotes Brooklyn pride among old-time Brooklynites.
Government and politics
See also: Government and politics in Brooklyn
Brooklyn Borough Hall

Since consolidation with New York City in 1898, Brooklyn has been governed by the New York City Charter that provides for a "strong" mayor-council system. The centralized New York City government is responsible for public education, correctional institutions, libraries, public safety, recreational facilities, sanitation, water supply, and welfare services.

The office of Borough President was created in the consolidation of 1898 to balance centralization with local authority. Each borough president had a powerful administrative role derived from having a vote on the New York City Board of Estimate, which was responsible for creating and approving the city's budget and proposals for land use. In 1989, the Supreme Court of the United States declared the Board of Estimate unconstitutional because Brooklyn, the most populous borough, had no greater effective representation on the Board than Staten Island, the least populous borough, a violation of the Fourteenth Amendment's Equal Protection Clause pursuant to the high court's 1964 "one man, one vote" decision.[19]

Since 1990 the Borough President has acted as an advocate for the borough at the mayoral agencies, the City Council, the New York state government, and corporations. Brooklyn's current Borough President is Eric Adams, elected as a Democrat in November 2013 with 90.8% of the vote. Adams replaced popular Borough President Marty Markowitz, also a Democrat, who partially used his office to promote tourism and new development for Brooklyn.

The Democratic Party holds the majority of public offices. As of 2005, 69.7% of registered voters in Brooklyn were Democrats. Party platforms center on affordable housing, education and economic development. The most controversial political issue is the proposed Atlantic Yards, a large housing and sports arena project. Pockets of majority Republican influence exist in Gravesend, Bensonhurst, Bay Ridge, Dyker Heights and Midwood by U.S. House Representative Michael Grimm & New York State Senator Marty Golden.

Each of the city's five counties (coterminous with each borough) has its own criminal court system and District Attorney, the chief public prosecutor who is directly elected by popular vote. The current District Attorney of Kings County is Kenneth P. Thompson, a Democrat elected in 2013. Brooklyn has 16 City Council members, the largest number of any of the five boroughs. Brooklyn has 18 of the city's 59 community districts, each served by an unpaid Community Board with advisory powers under the city's Uniform Land Use Review Procedure. Each board has a paid district manager who acts as an interlocutor with city agencies.
Economy
See also: Economy of New York City
The USS North Carolina, launched at Brooklyn Navy Yard, June 1940
Newer buildings near East River State Park

Brooklyn's job market is driven by three main factors: the performance of the national and city economy, population flows and the borough's position as a convenient back office for New York's businesses.[20]

Forty-four percent of Brooklyn's employed population, or 410,000 people, work in the borough; more than half of the borough's residents work outside its boundaries. As a result, economic conditions in Manhattan are important to the borough's jobseekers. Strong international immigration to Brooklyn generates jobs in services, retailing and construction.[20]

Since the late 20th century, Brooklyn has benefited from a steady influx of financial back office operations from Manhattan, the rapid growth of a high-tech and entertainment economy in DUMBO, and strong growth in support services such as accounting, personal supply agencies, and computer services firms.[20]

Jobs in the borough have traditionally been concentrated in manufacturing, but since 1975, Brooklyn has shifted from a manufacturing-based to a service-based economy. In 2004, 215,000 Brooklyn residents worked in the services sector, while 27,500 worked in manufacturing. Although manufacturing has declined, a substantial base has remained in apparel and niche manufacturing concerns such as furniture, fabricated metals, and food products.[21] The pharmaceutical company Pfizer was founded in Brooklyn in 1869 and had a manufacturing plant in the borough for many years that once employed thousands of workers, but the plant shut down in 2008. However, new light-manufacturing concerns packaging organic and high-end food have sprung up in the old plant.[22]

First established as a shipbuilding facility in 1801, the Brooklyn Navy Yard employed 70,000 people at its peak during World War II and was then the largest employer in the borough. The Missouri, the ship on which the Japanese formally surrendered, was built there, as was the Maine, whose sinking off Havana led to the start of the Spanish–American War. The iron-sided Civil War vessel the Monitor was built in Greenpoint. From 1968–1979 Seatrain Shipbuilding was the major employer.[23] Later tenants include industrial design firms, food processing businesses, artisans, and the film and television production industry. About 230 private-sector firms providing 4,000 jobs are at the Yard.

Construction and services are the fastest growing sectors.[24] Most employers in Brooklyn are small businesses. In 2000, 91% of the approximately 38,704 business establishments in Brooklyn had fewer than 20 employees.[25] As of August 2008, the borough's unemployment rate was 5.9%.[26]

Brooklyn is also home to many banks and credit unions. According to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, there were 37 banks and 21 credit unions operating in the borough in 2010.[27][28]
Demographics
Main article: Demographics of Brooklyn
Brooklyn has been New York City's most populous borough since the mid-1920s. (Key: Each borough's historical population in millions. The Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Queens, Staten Island)
Historical population
Year Pop. ±%
1731 2,150 —
1756 2,707 +25.9%
1771 3,623 +33.8%
1786 3,966 +9.5%
1790 4,549 +14.7%
1800 5,740 +26.2%
1810 8,303 +44.7%
1820 11,187 +34.7%
1830 20,535 +83.6%
1840 47,613 +131.9%
1850 138,822 +191.6%
1860 279,122 +101.1%
1870 419,921 +50.4%
1880 599,495 +42.8%
1890 838,547 +39.9%
1900 1,166,582 +39.1%
1910 1,634,351 +40.1%
1920 2,018,356 +23.5%
1930 2,560,401 +26.9%
1940 2,698,285 +5.4%
1950 2,738,175 +1.5%
1960 2,627,319 −4.0%
1970 2,602,012 −1.0%
1980 2,230,936 −14.3%
1990 2,300,664 +3.1%
2000 2,465,326 +7.2%
2010 2,504,700 +1.6%
2014 2,621,793 +4.7%
1731–1786[29]
U.S. Decennial Census[30]
1790–1960[31] 1900–1990[32]
1990–2000[33] 2010–2014[1][34]

Since 2010, the population of Brooklyn was estimated by the Census Bureau to have increased 3.5% to 2,592,149 as of 2013, representing 30.8% of New York City's population, 33.5% of Long Island's population, and 13.2% of New York State's population.[35]
2010

According to the United States Census 2010, the demography of Brooklyn was as follows:

49.5% White (35.8% non-Hispanic White)
35.8% African American
1.0% Native American
11.3% Asian
0.1% Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander
2.2% Two or more races
8.9% Other races
19.8% Hispanic or Latino (of any race)

2009 and 2012 estimates

According to the 2009 American Community Survey, Brooklyn's population was 46.6% white, of which 36.9% were non-Hispanic whites. Blacks made up 34.2% of the population, of which 32.9% were non-Hispanic blacks. Native Americans represented 0.3% of the population, while Asians made up 9.5% of the populace. Pacific Islanders comprised just 0.1% of the population, and Multiracial Americans made up 1.4% of the population. Hispanics and Latinos made up 19.6% of Brooklyn's population.

According to the 2012 U.S. Census Bureau estimates, there are 2,565,635 people (up from 2.3 million in 1990), 880,727 households, and 583,922 families living in Brooklyn.[36][37] The population density was 34,920/square mile (13,480/km²). There were 930,866 housing units at an average density of 13,180/square mile (5,090/km²).

Of the 880,727 households in Brooklyn, 38.6% were married couples living together, 22.3% had a female householder with no husband present, and 33.7% were non-families. 33.3% had children under the age of 18 living in them. Of all households 27.8% are made up of individuals and 9.8% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.75 and the average family size was 3.41.

In Brooklyn the population was spread out with 26.9% under the age of 18, 10.3% from 18 to 24, 30.8% from 25 to 44, 20.6% from 45 to 64, and 11.5% who are 65 years of age or older. The median age was 33 years. Brooklyn has more women and girls, with 88.4 males for every 100 females. Brooklyn's lesbian community is the largest out of all the New York City boroughs.[38]

The median income for households in Brooklyn was $32,135, and the median income for a family was $36,188. Males had a median income of $34,317, which was higher than females, whose median income was $30,516. The per capita income was $16,775. About 22% of families and 25.1% of the population were below the poverty line, including 34% of those under age 18 and 21.5% of those age 65 or over.
[hide]Racial composition 2014[39] 2010[40] 1990[41] 1950[41] 1900[41]
White 49.3% 49.5% 46.9% 92.2% 98.3%
—Non-Hispanic 35.8% 35.8% 40.1% n/a n/a
Black or African American 35.2% 35.8% 37.9% 7.6% 1.6%
Hispanic or Latino (of any race) 19.5% 19.8% 20.1% n/a n/a
Asian 12.1% 11.3% 4.8% 0.1% 0.1%
Languages

Brooklyn has a high degree of linguistic diversity. As of 2010, 54.12% (1,240,416) of Brooklyn residents age 5 and older spoke English at home as a primary language, while 17.16% (393,340) spoke Spanish, 6.46% (148,012) Chinese, 5.31% (121,607) Russian, 3.47% (79,469) Yiddish, 2.75% (63,019) French Creole, 1.35% (31,004) Italian, 1.20% (27,440) Hebrew, 1.01% (23,207) Polish, 0.99% (22,763) French, 0.95% (21,773) Arabic, 0.85% (19,388) various Indic languages, 0.70% (15,936) Urdu, and African languages were spoken as a main language by 0.54% (12,305) of the population over the age of five. In total, 45.88% (1,051,456) of Brooklyn's population age 5 and older spoke a mother language other than English.[42]
Neighborhoods
See also: List of Brooklyn neighborhoods and New York City ethnic enclaves
Landmark 19th-century rowhouses on tree-lined Kent Street in Greenpoint Historic District
Park Slope
150–159 Willow Street, three original red-brick early 19th-century Federal Style houses in Brooklyn Heights
Middagh Street, Brooklyn Heights

Brooklyn's neighborhoods are ever-changing as populations move in and out. For example, during the early to mid-20th century, Brownsville had a majority of Jewish residents; since the 1970s it has been majority African American. Midwood during the early 20th century was filled with ethnic Irish, then filled with Jewish residents for nearly 50 years, and is slowly becoming a Pakistani enclave. Brooklyn's most populous racial group, white, declined from 97.2% in 1930 to 46.9% by 1990.[41]

With gentrification, many of Brooklyn's neighborhoods are becoming increasingly mixed, with an influx of immigrants integrating its neighborhoods. What started as a trend may now be the permanent equilibrium. Brooklyn and Queens have been a worldwide example of poor immigrants getting along most of the time, often with better results than in their home countries. Presently, they have substantial populations from many countries. The borough also attracts people previously living in other cities in the United States. Of these, most come from Chicago, Detroit, San Francisco, Washington, D.C., Baltimore, Philadelphia, Boston, Cincinnati, and Seattle.[43][44][45][46][47][48][49]

Brooklyn contains dozens of distinct neighborhoods, representing many of the major ethnic groups found within the New York City area. The borough is home to a large African American community. Bedford-Stuyvesant is home to one of the most famous African American communities in the city, along with Brownsville, East New York, and Coney Island. "Bed-Stuy" is a hub for African American culture, often referenced in hip hop and African American arts. Brooklyn's African American and Caribbean communities are spread throughout much of Brooklyn.

Brooklyn is also home to many Russians and Ukrainians, who are mainly concentrated in the areas of Brighton Beach and Sheepshead Bay. Brighton Beach features many Russian and Ukrainian businesses. Because of the large Ukrainian community, it has been nicknamed "Little Odessa". However, recently, it has been renamed to "Little Russia" because of the overwhelming presence of the Russian population. Originally these were mostly Jews; however, it is now the non-Jewish Russian and Ukrainian communities of Brighton Beach that represent various aspects of Russian and Ukrainian culture.

Bushwick is the largest hub of Brooklyn's Hispanic American community. Like other neighborhoods in New York City, Bushwick's Hispanic population is mainly Puerto Rican, with many Dominicans and peoples from several South American nations as well. As nearly 80% of Bushwick's population is Hispanic, its residents have created many businesses to support their various national and distinct traditions in food and other items. Sunset Park's population is 42% Hispanic, made up of these various ethnic groups. Brooklyn's main Hispanic groups are Puerto Ricans, Mexicans, Dominicans, and Panamanians; they are spread out throughout the borough. Puerto Ricans and Dominicans are predominant in Bushwick, Williamsburg, and East New York, while Mexicans are predominant in Sunset Park and Panamanians in Crown Heights.

Italian Americans are mainly concentrated in the neighborhoods of Bensonhurst, Dyker Heights and Bay Ridge, where there are many Italian restaurants and pizzerias. Italian Americans live throughout most of southern Brooklyn, including Bath Beach, Gravesend, Marine Park, Mill Basin, and Bergen Beach. The Carroll Gardens area, as well as the northern half of Williamsburg, also have long-standing Italian-American communities.
Brooklyn is a major center for Orthodox Judaism and is about 23% Jewish overall.[50]
The Brooklyn Chinatown (布鲁克林華埠 唐人街) in Sunset Park.

Orthodox Jews and Hasidic Jews have become concentrated in Borough Park, Williamsburg, and Flatbush, where there are many yeshivas, synagogues, and kosher delicatessens, as well as many other Jewish businesses. Kosher restaurants, synagogues, Jewish schools and yeshivas can be found all over New York City, and many parts as well as in Brooklyn. Other notable religious Orthodox and Hasidic Jewish neighborhoods are Kensington, Midwood, Canarsie, Sea Gate, and Crown Heights. Many hospitals in Brooklyn were started by Jewish charities, including Maimonides Medical Center in Borough Park and Brookdale Hospital in Brownsville.[51][52] Many non-religious Jews are concentrated in Ditmas Park, Windsor Terrace and Park Slope. Brooklyn's Polish are largely concentrated in Greenpoint, which is home to Little Poland. They are also scattered throughout the southern parts of Brooklyn.

Brooklyn's West Indian community is concentrated in the Crown Heights, Flatbush, East Flatbush, Kensington, and Canarsie neighborhoods in central Brooklyn. Brooklyn is home to one of the largest communities of West Indians outside of the Caribbean, being rivaled only by Toronto, Miami, Montreal,and London. Although the largest West Indian groups in Brooklyn are mostly Jamaicans, Guyanese and Haitians, there are West Indian immigrants from nearly every part of the Caribbean. Crown Heights and Flatbush are home to many of Brooklyn's West Indian restaurants and bakeries. Brooklyn has an annual, celebrated Carnival in the tradition of pre-Lenten celebrations in the islands. Started by Trinidadians, West Indian Labor Day Parade, takes place every Labor Day on Eastern Parkway.

Brooklyn's Greek Americans live throughout the borough, but their businesses today are concentrated in Downtown Brooklyn near Atlantic Avenue. Greek-owned diners, like El-Greco on Sheepshead Bay, are also throughout the borough, but many Greeks have re-located off of Atlantic Avenue due to demographic shift.

Chinese Americans live throughout the southern parts of Brooklyn, in Sunset Park, Bath Beach, Bensonhurst, Gravesend, and Homecrest. The largest concentration is in Sunset Park along 8th Avenue, which is known for Chinese culture. It is called "Brooklyn's Chinatown". Many Chinese restaurants can be found throughout Sunset Park, and the area hosts a popular Chinese New Year celebration.

Irish Americans can be found throughout Brooklyn, in low to moderate concentrations in the neighborhoods of Bay Ridge, Marine Park, Gerritsen Beach, and Vinegar Hill. Many moved east on Long Island in the mid-twentieth century.

Today, Arab Americans and Pakistanis along with other Muslim communities have moved into the southwest portion of Brooklyn, particularly to Bay Ridge, where there are many Middle Eastern restaurants, hookah lounges, halal shops, Islamic shops and mosques. Coney Island Avenue is home to Little Pakistan as Church Avenue is to Bangladeshis. Jay Street Borough Hall (Downtown Brooklyn) is little Arabia. Pakistani Independence Day is celebrated every year with parades and parties on Coney Island Avenue. Earlier, the area was known predominately for its Irish, Norwegian, and Scottish populations. There are also many Middle Eastern, particularly Yemeni, businesses, mosques, and restaurants on Atlantic Avenue west of Flatbush Avenue, near Brooklyn Heights.
The Brooklyn Heights Promenade (lower center, above the Brooklyn–Queens Expressway) and Brooklyn Bridge Park (in front of the promenade) along the East River (foreground). Brooklyn Heights can be seen in the background.
Culture
See also: Culture of New York City and Media of New York City
The Brooklyn Museum on Eastern Parkway
Brooklyn Botanic Garden
The Soldiers' and Sailors' Arch at Grand Army Plaza
Cultural attractions
Main article: Culture of Brooklyn

Brooklyn has played a major role in various aspects of American culture including literature, cinema and theater. The Brooklyn accent is often portrayed as "typical New York" in American television and film.

Brooklyn hosts the world-renowned Brooklyn Academy of Music, the Brooklyn Philharmonic, and the second largest public art collection in the United States, housed in the Brooklyn Museum.

The Brooklyn Museum, opened in 1897, is New York City's second-largest public art museum. It has in its permanent collection more than 1.5 million objects, from ancient Egyptian masterpieces to contemporary art. The Brooklyn Children's Museum, the world's first museum dedicated to children, opened in December 1899. The only such New York State institution accredited by the American Alliance of Museums, it is one of the few globally to have a permanent collection – over 30,000 cultural objects and natural history specimens.

The Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM) includes a 2,109-seat opera house, an 874-seat theater, and the art house BAM Rose Cinemas. Bargemusic and St. Ann's Warehouse are located on the other side of Downtown Brooklyn in the DUMBO arts district. Brooklyn Technical High School has the second-largest auditorium in New York City (after Radio City Music Hall), with a seating capacity of over 3,000.[53]
Media
Local periodicals

Brooklyn has several local newspapers: The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, Bay Currents (Oceanfront Brooklyn), Brooklyn View, The Brooklyn Paper, and Courier-Life Publications. Courier-Life Publications, owned by Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation, is Brooklyn's largest chain of newspapers. Brooklyn is also served by the major New York dailies, including The New York Times, the New York Daily News, and the New York Post.

The borough is home to the bi-weekly cultural guide The L Magazine and the arts and politics monthly Brooklyn Rail, as well as the arts and cultural quarterly Cabinet.

Brooklyn Magazine is one of the few glossy magazines about Brooklyn. Several others, that are now defunct, include: BKLYN Magazine (a bimonthly lifestyle book owned by Joseph McCarthy, that saw itself as a vehicle for high-end advertisers in Manhattan and was mailed to 80,000 high-income households), Brooklyn Bridge Magazine, The Brooklynite (a free, glossy quarterly edited by Daniel Treiman), and NRG (edited by Gail Johnson and originally marketed as a local periodical for Clinton Hill and Fort Greene, but expanded in scope to become the self-proclaimed "Pulse of Brooklyn" and then the "Pulse of New York").[54]
Ethnic press

Brooklyn has a thriving ethnic press. El Diario La Prensa, the largest and oldest Spanish-language daily newspaper in the United States, maintains its corporate headquarters at 1 MetroTech Center in downtown Brooklyn.[55] Major ethnic publications include the Brooklyn-Queens Catholic paper The Tablet, Hamodia, an Orthodox Jewish daily and The Jewish Press, an Orthodox Jewish weekly. Many nationally distributed ethnic newspapers are based in Brooklyn. Over 60 ethnic groups, writing in 42 languages, publish some 300 non-English language magazines and newspapers in New York City. Among them the quarterly "L'Idea", a bilingual magazine printed in Italian and English since 1974. In addition, many newspapers published abroad, such as The Daily Gleaner and The Star of Jamaica, are available in Brooklyn. Our Time Press published weekly by DBG Media covers the Village of Brooklyn with a motto of "The Local paper with the Global View".
Television

The City of New York has an official television station, run by the NYC Media Group, which features programming based in Brooklyn. Brooklyn Community Access Television is the borough's public access channel.
Events

The annual Coney Island Mermaid Parade (mid-to-late June) is a costume-and-float parade.[56]
Coney Island also hosts the annual Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest (July 4).[56]
The annual Labor Day Carnival (also known as the Labor Day Parade or West Indian Day Parade) takes place along Eastern Parkway in Crown Heights.

Parks and other attractions
See also: Tourism in New York City
Kwanzan Cherries in bloom at Brooklyn Botanic Garden.
Astroland in Coney Island.

Brooklyn Botanic Garden: located adjacent to Prospect Park is the 52-acre (21 ha) botanical garden, which includes a cherry tree esplanade, a one-acre (0.4 ha) rose garden, a Japanese hill and pond garden, a fragrance garden, a water lily pond esplanade, several conservatories, a rock garden, a native flora garden, a bonsai tree collection, and children's gardens and discovery exhibits.
Coney Island developed as a playground for the rich in the early 1900s, but it grew as one of America's first amusement grounds and attracted crowds from all over New York. The Cyclone rollercoaster, built in 1927, is on the National Register of Historic Places. The 1920 Wonder Wheel and other rides are still operational at Astroland. Coney Island went into decline in the 1970s, but is currently undergoing a renaissance: the new Luna Park opened in 2010.[57] The Associated Press (June 13, 2010).
Floyd Bennett Field: the first municipal airport in New York City and long closed for operations, is now part of the National Park System. Many of the historic hangars and runways are still extant. A variety of nature trails and diverse habitats are found within the park, including salt marsh and a restored area of shortgrass prairie that was once widespread on the Hempstead Plains.
Green-Wood Cemetery, founded by the social reformer Henry Evelyn Pierrepont[58] in 1838, is both one of the most significant cemeteries in the United States and an expansive green space encompassing 478 acres (190 ha) of rolling hills and dales, several ponds, and a baroque chapel. Still in use, the cemetery is the burial ground of many notable New Yorkers, such as F.A.O. Schwarz (1836–1911), toy store founder; William M. "Boss" Tweed (1823–1878), notorious boss of the New York political machine; and actor Frank Morgan (1890–1949), best known for his portrayal of the title character in the 1939 film The Wizard of Oz.
Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge: a unique Federal wildlife refuge straddling the Brooklyn-Queens border, part of Gateway National Recreation Area
New York Transit Museum displays historical artifacts of Greater New York's subway, commuter rail, and bus systems; it is located at Court Street, a former Independent Subway System station in Brooklyn Heights on the Fulton Street Line.
Prospect Park is a public park in central Brooklyn encompassing 585 acres (2.37 km2).[59] The park was designed by Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux, who created Manhattan's Central Park. Attractions include the Long Meadow, a 90-acre (36 ha) meadow, the Picnic House, which houses offices and a hall that can accommodate parties with up to 175 guests; Litchfield Villa, the home of Edwin Clark Litchfield, an early developer of the neighborhood and a former owner of a southern section of the park;[60] Prospect Park Zoo; a large nature conservancy managed by the Wildlife Conservation Society; the Boathouse, housing a visitors center and the first urban Audubon Center;[61] Brooklyn's only lake, covering 60 acres (24 ha); the Prospect Park Bandshell that hosts free outdoor concerts in the summertime; and various sports and fitness activities including seven baseball fields. Prospect Park hosts a popular annual Halloween Parade called the Halloween Haunted Walk, complete with a carnival for kids.

Sports
Main article: Sports in Brooklyn
Barclays Center, located in Pacific Park within Prospect Heights, is Brooklyn's major league sports venue.

Brooklyn's major professional sports teams are the NBA's Brooklyn Nets and the NHL's New York Islanders. The Nets and Islanders moved into the borough in 2012 and 2015, respectively, and both play their home games at Barclays Center in Prospect Heights. Previously, the Nets had played on Long Island and in New Jersey, while the Islanders had played on Long Island since their inception.

Brooklyn also has a storied sports history. It has been home to many famous sports figures such as Joe Paterno, Vince Lombardi, Mike Tyson, Joe Torre, and Vitas Gerulaitis. Basketball legend Michael Jordan was born in Brooklyn though he grew up in Wilmington, North Carolina.

In the earliest days of organized baseball, Brooklyn teams dominated the new game. The second recorded game of baseball was played near what is today Fort Greene Park on October 24, 1845. Brooklyn’s Excelsiors, Atlantics and Eckfords were the leading teams from the mid-1850s through the Civil War, and there were dozens of local teams with neighborhood league play, such as at Mapleton Oval.[62] During this “Brooklyn era”, baseball’s rules evolved into the modern game: the first fastball, first changeup, first batting average, first triple play, first pro baseball player, first enclosed ballpark, first scorecard, first known African-American team, first black championship game, first road trip, first gambling scandal, and first eight pennant winners were all in or from Brooklyn.[63]

Brooklyn's most famous historical team, the Brooklyn Dodgers, named for "trolley dodgers" played at Ebbets Field.[64] In 1947 Jackie Robinson was hired by the Dodgers as the first African-American player in Major League Baseball in the modern era. In 1955, the Dodgers, perennial National League pennant winners, won the only World Series for Brooklyn against their rival New York Yankees. The event was marked by mass euphoria and celebrations. Just two years later, the Dodgers moved to Los Angeles. Walter O'Malley, the team's owner at the time, is still vilified, even by Brooklynites too young to remember the Dodgers as Brooklyn's ball club.

After a 43-year hiatus, professional baseball returned to the borough in 2001 with the Brooklyn Cyclones, a minor league team that plays in MCU Park in Coney Island. They are an affiliate of the New York Mets.
Transportation
See also: Transportation in New York City

About 57 percent of all households in Brooklyn were households without automobiles. The citywide rate is 55 percent in New York City.[65]
Public transport
Coney Island – Stillwell Avenue subway station

Brooklyn features extensive public transit. Eighteen New York City Subway services, including the Franklin Avenue Shuttle, traverse the borough. Approximately 92.8% of Brooklyn residents traveling to Manhattan use the subway, despite the fact that some neighborhoods like Flatlands and Marine Park are poorly served by subway service. Major stations, out of the 170 currently in Brooklyn, include:

Atlantic Avenue – Barclays Center
Broadway Junction
DeKalb Avenue
Jay Street – MetroTech
Coney Island – Stillwell Avenue[66]

Proposed New York City Subway lines never built include a line along Nostrand or Utica Avenues to Marine Park,[67] as well as a subway line to Spring Creek.[68][69]

Brooklyn was once served by an extensive network of streetcars, many of which were replaced by the public bus network that covers the entire borough. There is also daily express bus service into Manhattan. New York's famous yellow cabs also provide transportation in Brooklyn, although they are less numerous in the borough. There are three commuter rail stations in Brooklyn: East New York, Nostrand Avenue, and Atlantic Terminal, the terminus of the Atlantic Branch of the Long Island Rail Road. The terminal is located near the Atlantic Avenue – Barclays Center subway station, with ten connecting subway services.
Roadways
See also: Brooklyn streets and List of lettered Brooklyn avenues
The Marine Parkway Bridge
Williamsburg Bridge, as seen from Wallabout Bay with Greenpoint and Long Island City in background

The great majority of limited-access expressways and parkways are located in the western and southern sections of Brooklyn. These include the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, the Gowanus Expressway (which is part of the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway), the Prospect Expressway (New York State Route 27), the Belt Parkway, and the Jackie Robinson Parkway (formerly the Interborough Parkway). Planned expressways that were never built include the Bushwick Expressway, an extension of I-78[70] and the Cross-Brooklyn Expressway, I-878.[71] Major thoroughfares include Atlantic Avenue, Fourth Avenue, 86th Street, Kings Highway, Bay Parkway, Ocean Parkway, Eastern Parkway, Linden Boulevard, McGuinness Boulevard, Flatbush Avenue, Pennsylvania Avenue, and Nostrand Avenue.

Much of Brooklyn has only named streets, but Park Slope, Bay Ridge, Sunset Park, Bensonhurst, and Borough Park and the other western sections have numbered streets running approximately northwest to southeast, and numbered avenues going approximately northeast to southwest. East of Dahill Road, lettered avenues (like Avenue M) run east and west, and numbered streets have the prefix "East". South of Avenue O, related numbered streets west of Dahill Road use the "West" designation. This set of numbered streets ranges from West 37th Street to East 108 Street, and the avenues range from A-Z with names substituted for some of them in some neighborhoods (notably Albemarle, Beverley, Cortelyou, Dorchester, Ditmas, Foster, Farragut, Glenwood, Quentin). Numbered streets prefixed by "North" and "South" in Williamsburg, and "Bay", "Beach", "Brighton", "Plumb", "Paerdegat" or "Flatlands" along the southern and southwestern waterfront are loosely based on the old grids of the original towns of Kings County that eventually consolidated to form Brooklyn. These names often reflect the bodies of water or beaches around them, such as Plumb Beach or Paerdegat Basin.

Brooklyn is connected to Manhattan by three bridges, the Brooklyn, Manhattan, and Williamsburg bridges; a vehicular tunnel, the Hugh L. Carey Tunnel (formerly the Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel); and several subway tunnels. The Verrazano-Narrows Bridge links Brooklyn with the more suburban borough of Staten Island. Though much of its border is on land, Brooklyn shares several water crossings with Queens, including the Kosciuszko Bridge (part of the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway), the Pulaski Bridge, and the JJ Byrne Memorial Bridge, all of which carry traffic over Newtown Creek, and the Marine Parkway Bridge connecting Brooklyn to the Rockaway Peninsula.
Waterways

Brooklyn was long a major shipping port, especially at the Brooklyn Army Terminal in Sunset Park. Most container ship cargo operations have shifted to the New Jersey side of New York Harbor, while the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal in Red Hook is a focal point for New York's growing cruise industry. The Queen Mary 2, one of the world's largest ocean liners, was designed specifically to fit under the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge, the longest suspension bridge in the United States. She makes regular ports of call at the Red Hook terminal on her transatlantic crossings from Southampton, England.

NY Waterway offers commuter services from the western shore of Brooklyn to points in Lower Manhattan, Midtown, and Long Island City, as well as tours and charters. SeaStreak also offers weekday ferry service between the Brooklyn Army Terminal and the Manhattan ferry slips at Pier 11 downtown and East 34th Street in midtown. A Cross-Harbor Rail Tunnel, originally proposed in the 1920s as a core project for the then new Port Authority of New York is again being studied and discussed as a way to ease freight movements across a large swath of the metropolitan area.
Manhattan Bridge
Manhattan Bridge seen from the Brooklyn Bridge Park.
Education
See also: Education in New York City and List of high schools in New York City

Education in Brooklyn is provided by a vast number of public and private institutions. Public schools in the borough are managed by the New York City Department of Education, the largest public school system.

Brooklyn Technical High School (commonly called Brooklyn Tech), a New York City public high school, is the largest specialized high school for science, mathematics, and technology in the United States.[72] Brooklyn Tech opened in 1922. Brooklyn Tech is located across the street from Fort Greene Park. This high school was built from 1930 to 1933 at a cost of about $6,000,000 and is 12 stories high. It covers about half of a city block.[73] Brooklyn Tech is noted for its famous alumni[74] (including two Nobel Laureates), its academics, and the large number of graduates attending prestigious universities.
Higher education
Public colleges

Brooklyn College is a senior college of the City University of New York, and was the first public coeducational liberal arts college in New York City. The College ranked in the top 10 nationally for the second consecutive year in Princeton Review’s 2006 guidebook, America’s Best Value Colleges. Many of its students are first and second generation Americans.

Founded in 1970, Medgar Evers College is a senior college of the City University of New York, with a mission to develop and maintain high quality, professional, career-oriented undergraduate degree programs in the context of a liberal arts education. The College offers programs both at the baccalaureate and associate degree levels, as well as Adult and Continuing Education classes for Central Brooklyn residents, corporations, government agencies, and community organizations. Medgar Evers College is a few blocks east of Prospect Park in Crown Heights.

CUNY's New York City College of Technology (City Tech) of The City University of New York (CUNY) (Downtown Brooklyn/Brooklyn Heights) is the largest public college of technology in New York State and a national model for technological education. Established in 1946, City Tech can trace its roots to 1881 when the Technical Schools of the Metropolitan Museum of Art were renamed the New York Trade School. That institution—which became the Voorhees Technical Institute many decades later—was soon a model for the development of technical and vocational schools worldwide. In 1971, Voorhees was incorporated into City Tech.

SUNY Downstate Medical Center, originally founded as the Long Island College Hospital in 1860, is the oldest hospital-based medical school in the United States. The Medical Center comprises the College of Medicine, College of Health Related Professions, College of Nursing, School of Public Health, School of Graduate Studies, and University Hospital of Brooklyn. The Nobel Prize winner Robert F. Furchgott was a member of its faculty. Half of the Medical Center's students are minorities or immigrants. The College of Medicine has the highest percentage of minority students of any medical school in New York State.
Private colleges
Brooklyn Law School. The 1994 new classical Fell Hall tower by NYC architect Robert A. M. Stern pictured.

Brooklyn Law School was founded in 1901 and is notable for its diverse student body. Women and African Americans were enrolled in 1909. According to the Leiter Report, a compendium of law school rankings published by Brian Leiter, Brooklyn Law School places 31st nationally for quality of students.[75]

Long Island University is a private university in Brookville on Long Island, with a campus in Downtown Brooklyn with 6,417 undergraduate students. The Brooklyn campus has strong science and medical technology programs, at the graduate and undergraduate levels.
Higgins Hall at the Pratt Institute.

Pratt Institute, in Clinton Hill, is recognized by U.S. News & World Report as being one of the top 20 colleges in the Regional Universities North category.[76] Pratt is a private college founded in 1887 with programs in engineering, architecture, and the arts. Many of Pratt's programs are ranked among the top ten in the country. Its graduate interior design program is ranked number one by U.S. News & World Report and by DesignIntelligence. The architecture program at Pratt is ranked as being one of the top ten in the country by DesignIntelligence. Kiplinger's Personal Finance also named Pratt as being one of the country’s best values in private colleges and universities.[77] It was included as one of the top values for academic quality and affordability out of more than 600 private institutions.[77] The school's Brooklyn campus has been named by Architectural Digest as being one of the top ten most architecturally significant, along with institutions such as Harvard, Princeton, and University of Virginia.[78] Pratt has over 4700 students, with most at its Brooklyn campus. Graduate programs include library and information science, architecture, and urban planning. Undergraduate programs include architecture, construction management, writing, critical and visual studies, the arts, in total encompassing over 25 programs in all.
NYU Poly (Wunsch Building)

The New York University Polytechnic School of Engineering, the United States' second oldest private institute of technology, founded in 1854, has its main campus in Downtown's MetroTech Center, a commercial, civic and educational redevelopment project of which it was a key sponsor. NYU-Poly is one of the 18 schools and colleges that comprise New York University (NYU).[79][80][81][82] NYU-Poly is considered one of the best engineering schools in the world.[83][84][85][86][87][88] Forbes.com regularly ranks NYU-Poly among the top 10 in its list of “Top Colleges for Getting Rich”.[89][90] NYU-Poly is regularly ranked among the top 4 in the nation for alumni with the highest mid-career salaries by CNNMoney.com[91] In 2012, NYU-Poly was ranked #21 by graduate engineering enrollment in the United States according to the American Society for Engineering Education.[92] As of 2013, NYU-Poly ranks #19 by graduate engineering enrollment in the United States according to U.S. News & World Report.[83] The Institute counts 5 Nobel Prize winners (2 Nobel Prize in Physics, 2 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, 1 Nobel Prize in Chemistry), 3 Putnam Mathematical Competition winners, 2 Wolf Prize in Physics winners, (1 Russ Prize, 3 Gordon Prize, 1 Draper Prize)(also known as Nobel Prizes of Engineering) winners, 2 Turing Award (also known as Nobel Prize of Nobel Prize of computing) winners, 2 W. Wallace McDowell Award (also known as Nobel Prize of Information Technology and Computer Engineering) winners, several National Inventors Hall of Fame inductees, several Congressional Gold Medal winners, 1 List of prolific inventors inductee, multiple Technology & Engineering Emmy Award winners, 3 Israel Prize winners and many Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Awards winners (including 2 IEEE Edison Medal winners and 1 IEEE Medal of Honor winner).

St. Francis College is a Catholic college located in Brooklyn Heights and was founded in 1859 by Franciscan friars. Today, there are over 2,400 students attending the small liberal arts college. St. Francis is considered by the New York Times as one of the more diverse colleges, and it has recently been ranked one of the best baccalaureate colleges by both Forbes magazine and U.S. News & World Report.[93][94][95]

Brooklyn also has smaller liberal arts institutions, such as Saint Joseph's College in Clinton Hill and Boricua College in Williamsburg.
Community colleges

Kingsborough Community College is a junior college in the City University of New York system, located in Manhattan Beach.
Brooklyn Public Library
The Central Library at Grand Army Plaza.

As an independent system, separate from the New York and Queens public library systems, the Brooklyn Public Library[96] offers thousands of public programs, millions of books, and use of more than 850 free Internet-accessible computers. It also has books and periodicals in all the major languages spoken in Brooklyn, including English, Russian, Chinese, Spanish, Hebrew, and Haitian Kreyol, as well as French, Yiddish, Hindi, Bengali, Polish, Italian, and Arabic. The Central Library is a landmarked building facing Grand Army Plaza.

There are 58 library branches, placing one within a half mile of each Brooklyn resident. In addition to its specialized Business Library in Brooklyn Heights, the Library is preparing to construct its new Visual & Performing Arts Library (VPA) in the BAM Cultural District, which will focus on the link between new and emerging arts and technology and house traditional and digital collections. It will provide access and training to arts applications and technologies not widely available to the public. The collections will include the subjects of art, theater, dance, music, film, photography and architecture. A special archive will house the records and history of Brooklyn's arts communities.
Partnerships with districts of foreign cities
See also: New York City § Sister cities

Anzio, Lazio, Italy – since 1990
Gdynia, Poland – since 1991[97]
Beşiktaş, Istanbul Province, Turkey – since 2005[98]
Leopoldstadt, Vienna, Austria – since 2007[99][100][101]
London Borough of Lambeth, United Kingdom
Bnei Brak, Israel

Hospitals and Healthcare

Brookdale University Hospital and Medical Center [102]

See also

General links:

NHRP listings in Kings County
List of people from Brooklyn
List of counties in New York
List of tallest buildings in Brooklyn

History of neighborhoods:

Bedford–Stuyvesant
Bushwick
Canarsie
Coney Island
Crown Heights

East Williamsburg
Gravesend
Greenpoint
New Utrecht
Park Slope
Williamsburg

General history:

Brooklyn Visual Heritage
History of New York City
List of former municipalities in New York City
Timeline of Brooklyn history

Flag of New York City.svgNew York City portal Flag of New York.svgNew York portal

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"Sam Pitroda to give inaugural address at NYU engineering school". Jagran Post. May 15, 2012. Retrieved October 19, 2012.
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[2]

Further reading
Published 1950–present

Curran, Winifred. "Gentrification and the nature of work: exploring the links in Williamsburg, Brooklyn." Environment And Planning A. 36 (2004): 1243-1258.
Curran, Winifred. "'From the Frying Pan to the Oven': Gentrification and the Experience of Industrial Displacement in Williamsburg, Brooklyn." Urban Studies (2007) 44#8 pp: 1427-1440.
Golenbock, Peter. Bums: An Oral History of the Brooklyn Dodgers (Courier Corporation, 2010)
Harris, Lynn. "Park Slope: Where Is the Love?" The New York Times May 18, 2008
Livingston, E. H. President Lincoln's Third Largest City: Brooklyn and The Civil War (1994)
McCullough, David W., and Jim Kalett. Brooklyn...and How It Got That Way (1983); guide to neighborhoods; many photos
McCullough, David. The Great Bridge: The Epic Story of the Building of the Brooklyn Bridge (2001)
Ment, David. The shaping of a city: A brief history of Brooklyn (1979)
Trezza, Frank J. "Brooklyn Navy Yard 1966–1986, the Yard was still a Shipyard not an Industrial Park"
Robbins, Michael W., ed. Brooklyn: A State of Mind. Workman Publishing, New York, 2001.
Snyder-Grenier, Ellen M. Brooklyn!: an illustrated history (Temple University Press, 2004)
Warf, Barney. "The reconstruction of social ecology and neighborhood change in Brooklyn." Environment and Planning D (1990) 8#1 pp: 73-96.
Wellman, Judith. Brooklyn's Promised Land: The Free Black Community of Weeksville, New York (2014)
Wilder, Craig Steven. A Covenant with Color: Race and Social Power in Brooklyn 1636-1990 (Columbia University Press, 2013)

Published until 1949

W. Williams (1850), "Brooklyn", Appleton's northern and eastern traveller's guide, New York: D. Appleton
Henry Reed Stiles (1867), A history of the city of Brooklyn, Brooklyn: Pub. by subscription
"Brooklyn", Appleton's Illustrated Hand-Book of American Cities, New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1876
Brooklyn Daily Eagle (1898). Almanac: 1898 (2nd ed.). Brooklyn.
Harrington Putnam (1899), "Brooklyn", in Lyman P. Powell, Historic towns of the middle states, New York: G. P. Putnam's sons, OCLC 248109
Ernest Ingersoll (1906), "Greater New York: Brooklyn", Rand, McNally & Co.'s handy guide to New York City, Brooklyn, Staten Island, and other districts included in the enlarged city (20th ed.), Chicago: Rand, McNally, OCLC 29277709
Edward Hungerford (1913), "Across the East River", The Personality of American Cities, New York: McBride, Nast & Company
Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Brooklyn". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.
Federal Writers’ Project (1940). "New York City: Brooklyn". New York: a Guide to the Empire State. American Guide Series. New York: Oxford University Press.

External links
Brooklyn

Official website of the Brooklyn Borough President
Brooklyn Tourism
Brooklyn Neighborhoods
All About Brooklyn

History:

Brooklyn Historical Society. Timeline
Digital Public Library of America. Items related to Brooklyn, various dates.
The Brooklyn Daily Eagle Online, 1841-1902 (from the Brooklyn Public Library)
Crossing Brooklyn Ferry by Walt Whitman
Historic Maps of Brooklyn hosted by the David Rumsey Historical Map Collection
The Brooklynites a photojournalism project about Brooklyn residents
See historic houses on amNY.com
Notes Geographical and Historical, relating to the Town of Brooklyn, in Kings County on Long-Island. (1824) An Online Electronic Text Edition. by Gabriel Furman
""Becoming Wards One By One" The Brooklyn Daily Eagle(May 4, 1894). p. 12.
Society of Old Brooklynites