Bushwick to Greenport on the 9am express

Four and twenty Yankees, feeling very dry,
Went across the border to get a drink of rye.
When the rye was opened, the Yanks began to sing,
"God bless America, but God save the King!" (Canadian Drinking Song 1920 at the onset of prohibition)

We are guessing that this picture dates from about 1900 as the road (Main St. Greenport) is dirt and there are no cars - just horse drawn wagons.  There are, in the distance clear signs of utility poles and we note that in 1900 several dozen businesses had phones so let's leave it at that.

We found interesting that on the roof of Claudio's Restaurant there is an "Ulmer's Beer" sign, plain as day. That set us in motion as Ulmer's Beer isn't in our memory and some of us grew up in the Midwest where it seemed every big town had a brewery or ten so Ulmer stumped us. 

With a little digging we found the Ulmer Brewery was founded in the Bushwick section of Brooklyn about 1870 at 31 Belvidere Street and pictures of it are extant. The building is on the historical tour and for good reason as a grand building it was.  Technology being what it is, we can spot that selfsame building from the air although it is clearly a shadow of its former self.  The "main office" under the flag to the left still stands and is on the tour if you care to find where the tour starts.

We checked and found that it is 95.88 miles from Ulmer to Greenport and on roads that probably didn't exist back then.  And then it hit us.  Why would the Ulmer Brewery, a fairly small time operation compared to Colonel Ruppert's Brewery and dozens of others, get a foot hold in Greenport.  By the picture, trucks were scarce and our minds finally focused on the fact that Greenport was the end of the main line of the Long Island Railroad and that the main station out west in metropolitan New York was - and you guessed it - not far from Ulmer. Not far at all. Why beer brewed and kegged in the morning could be on tap by 3pm in the afternoon and fresh as a daisy.

Now that we have settled that mystery, such as it was, we can go about our day.  Perhaps something from YouTube that is in keeping before you wander off.

Fog and Mist

Betcha betcha betcha you didn't know right off the top of your head what the difference is between fog and mist.  I didn't. It is all in the density and therefore the visibility.  Mist reduces visibility to >1 KM or 5/8 or so of a mile.  Fog reduces visibility to under <1 KM or less than 5/8ths of a mile.

Got it now.

I'm all set.

A-O'K.

Occasional Anomalies

We don't want to make too much of this but an anomaly is an anomaly.

Just sayin'.

Christoffa Corombo

 This is your day Chris.  Actually tomorrow is but that really isn't right. There was an "old calendar and a new calendar" and dates are difficult but it was October 12 what ever that means. Consider it a birthday present I guess...it appears that we have several weeks to go in his case (October 31 is reported) but there are old calendars and new calendars and some city-states in Italy recorded births and deaths on the last day of the month for ease of record keeping.  No one cared anyway.  Ships logs are good for this as their should be a daily entry but they, like everything else, can get rewritten. Nevertheless he showed up and led to the traffic jams and taxes we now endure so thanks.

There is every reason to believe that Columbus had no idea what he found or where he found it.  Supposedly he had a map..something of the forerunner of the Piri Reis map of 1513 but it is hard to say and he isn't talking.  One thing fairly certain, South America - the Atlantic Coast anyway - is very well drawn by 1513 and considering the issues in navigation at the time (read a book called Longitudes and Latitudes sometime) it is pretty amazing stuff.

As this was still the era of the flat earth for the most part, sailing west was something of an act of faith as if you would, very unexpectedly sail right off a cliff if the superstitious and perhaps the catholic church were correct.  Columbus on the other hand was interested in gold and power and his great tales of what he found made good reading back in Spain.  However, and much to the bad fortune of the natives who were in absolutely the wrong place at the wrong time, the Spanish  eventually came by the boatload and didn't do anyone much good...but this is your day Chris so we will re-write history a bit, gloss over your governorship which ended with your arrest, and just let you rest in peace.

Lying just under the surface.....

We think about things swimming under the water's surface - when we think about them at all - as mostly a jellyfish or a crab and since we in the north don't have the crystal clear water of the southern seas, we just have to imagine what really goes on down there. Happily there are cameras that make exquisite pictures of these things we never see in person.
We are particularly fond of the work "Carnival of the Animals" by the French composer Saint Saens who wrote the piece and his captivation with the aquarium - all the rage in France in the late 19th century (1886 actually). 

 

Ogden Nash supplied the sublime narrative.

THE AQUARIUM
Some fish are minnows,
Some are whales,
People like dimples,
Fish like scales,
Some fish are slim,
And some are round,
They don’t get cold,
They don’t get drowned,
But every fishwife
Fears for her fish,
What we call mermaids
They call merfish.

The Floyds

A hundred years or more ago - actually since 1840 - Greenport was the "end of the main line" of the Long Island Railroad and this was our railroad yard. By any measure it was a substantial and bustling area and a stalwart of commercial interests. 

The railroad didn't show up here by accident. Greenport has a deep water harbor, safely shielded from Nor'easters and winter storms, at that time a thriving boating and whaling industry, and pretty abundant farmland that produced 7 inbound to NYC trains a day full of passengers and goods. It was a pretty good deal for those in trade as it was another day's sail at best to New York and their taxes and tariffs so to put into Greenport, offload and ship by rail the rest of the way made a lot of sense.

David Geltson Floyd was the grandson of William Floyd, a signer of the Declaration of Independence and with the building of the LIRR out to Greenport, moved here in 1840, opened a Ships Chandlers with a fellow named Skillman, owned and maintained three whaling ships and generally prospered like crazy.  Brecknock Hall was the family home - now a center for all kinds of wondrous things.  He was also father to 4 daughters, one of whom was Grace who, among other things, built the Floyd Memorial Library in David's memory.  Her husband also designed the stained glass in the Episcopal Church.  It can well be imagined that there are any number of "Floyd" touches in the village, long forgotten, but just under a few coats of paint or a new facade.

In a time, now, when civic largess is a something of what we might politely describe as a "lull" it is pretty good to remember the Floyd family and this town.  Great Grandfather William Floyd sat with Franklin, Adams and Jefferson and signed our foundation document.  His son served in the War of 1812 which had more than some action in this very area.  His son came here and put some enterprises together, did well and GAVE BACK..or his family did... that that is probably because that is what people do.  

He also took time to play a game with his grand daughter.

Les parfums de la nuit

Six months ago there was ample snow...replaced now by pending ample rain and leaves.

Have you noticed that winter doesn't really smell like anything and that fall smells so much? Such a difference between now and and those early days of the year- or early spring for that matter.  We are right on the water - ocean - bay and there was the barest hint of the water going back to winter clear the other day...we could smell the salt....bits, whisps of scents... and in the evening....night perhaps....perfumes...

 

Sometimes we envy our pets their sense of smell. The "madelines and tea" of Proust, the kitchen on Thanksgiving morning, the woods after a rain - so many things that are big and obvious but our pets; well they smell in nuance and remember in detail.