Water, Water Everywhere

This week's Photo of the Week takes us to the intersection of Sutter and Saratoga Avenues in Brownsville in July 1923, when severe storms turned the borough's streets into rivers, flooded subway stations and basements, and caused guysers to erupt from manhole covers. Lightning blasted apart wood paving blocks on Cortelyou Road in Flatbush, threw a construction worker from his ladder on Ocean Avenue (thankfully, he was unhurt), and struck the steeple of Park Slope's Greenwood Baptist Church, damaging one of its stained glass windows, 

Still, Brooklynites—especially kids—can turn even waterlogged lemons into lemonade. In the 1923 storm, as streets three feet deep in water snarled traffic, the Brooklyn Daily Eagle reported that the unexpected waterways "filled the hearts of children with glee". And when severe summer rains flooded Bushwick streets in 1934, the photograph below ran with the caption, "Water, Water Everywhere—they love it".

Interested in seeing more photos from CBH’s collections? Visit our online image gallery, which includes a selection of our images, or the digital collections portal at Brooklyn Public Library. We look forward to inviting you to CBH in the future to research in our entire collection of images, archives, maps, and special collections. In the meantime, please visit our resources page to search our collections. Questions? Our reference staff is available to help with your research! You can reach us at [email protected].