Brooklyn Army Terminal
April 30th, 2008 -
The Brooklyn Army Terminal was built in 1919 and designed by architect Cass Gilbert. At completion, it was 5 million square feet in size and covered 97 acres of Sunset Park waterfront. It was used during WWII to ship out over 3 million troops, including Elvis. Today it is owned by New York City and used by over 70 tenants. Like Bush Terminal and the South Brooklyn Marine Terminal to the north and the Bay Ridge freight tracks directly south, the Brooklyn Army Terminal is managed by the New York City Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC), a corporation responsible for much of the recent redevelopment of New York City's waterfront.
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For more photo essays from Brooklyn's Sunset Park please visit Bush Terminal (2007), the South Brooklyn Marine Terminal (2009), Empire Electric (2009), S & S Machinery (2010) and the 68th Police Precinct (2011).
Great stuff Nate - I've been meaning to check that place out for some time. Looks pretty killer!
ReplyDeleteBack in the early 80's there was a huge artist performance in this space with exhibitions everywhere and a vocal performance with Meredith Monk which we all sang from the balconies different vowel sounds in random pattern bursts. Wild day. I will look for the program and try to reproduce it.
ReplyDeleteI work here (building B)...it truly is a massive space...I didn't know about the performance here. This layout, especially the atrium in building B (where it sounds like Monk was) could lend itself to some amazing ideas...
ReplyDeletelines, curves, shadows.. its pretty amazing once you caught this on camera. the interpretation and the creativity really comes out. its really nice.
ReplyDeleteI have to note that while Elvis may have shipped out of here, it wasn't for WWII, which ended when he was 10. Apparently they were still drafting people for peacetime tours in 1957.
ReplyDeleteIn 1966 I got my first job going to sea here ... I was hired by the Military Sea Transportation Service (now the Military Sealift Command)as an engineer aboard ships taking troops to Vietnam. These photos bring back lots of old memories.
ReplyDeleteCool photos. Right after graduating from high school, I spent the summer of 1968 working for the U.S. Post Office -- which at the time was using a sizeable portion of the Brooklyn Army Terminal as a sorting facility for international mail.
ReplyDeleteAs decrepit as the facility was during that period, that central atrium seemed strangely futuristic in a 1930s "Flash Gordon" kind of way. The entire place stayed surprisingly tolerable in the July heat and humidity, too, despite the total lack of air conditioning.