Clinton Hill, Brooklyn

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Template:Short description Template:Use American English Template:Use mdy dates Template:Infobox settlement

Clinton Hill is a neighborhood located in the north-central portion of the New York City borough of Brooklyn. It is bordered by the Brooklyn Navy Yard and Flushing Avenue to the north, Williamsburg to the northeast, Classon Avenue and Bedford–Stuyvesant to the east, Atlantic Avenue and Prospect Heights to the south and southwest and Vanderbilt Avenue and Fort Greene to the west.<ref name=encnyc /><ref>Template:Cite brookneighb, p.xxxi</ref>

"The Hill", as the general area was known – with a maximum elevation of Template:Convert, the highest in the area<ref name=encnyc /> – was believed to have health benefits because many people believed that disease was more prevalent in low-lying areas. The area is named after Clinton Avenue, which in turn was named in honor of New York Governor DeWitt Clinton (1769–1828).<ref name="twnchsr">Template:Cite web</ref> The main thoroughfare is DeKalb Avenue.<ref name=encnyc /> The affluent<ref name=encnyc>Rawson, Elizabeth Reich. "Clinton Hill" in Template:Cite enc-nyc2, p.272</ref> neighborhood's mixture of apartment buildings, mansions, brownstone and brick rowhouses, and the Pratt Institute and St. Joseph's College, built at various times in a number of different styles, is a great part of its charm.<ref name=nycland />

Clinton Hill is part of Brooklyn Community District 2, and its primary ZIP Codes are 11205 and 11238.<ref name="NYCPlanning"/> It is patrolled by the 88th Precinct of the New York City Police Department.

History

Charles Millard Pratt House, 241 Clinton Avenue

The area’s European history began in the 1640s, when Dutch colonists laid tobacco plantations near Wallabout Bay. Bedford Corners, situated just southeast of Clinton Hill, was incorporated in 1663, and the settlers (both Dutch and French Huguenot) purchased surrounding lands from the native Lenape in 1670.<ref name="twnchsr"/>

On August 27, 1776, the "Road to Jamaica" (approximately Atlantic Avenue, the southern edge of today’s neighborhood) was used by the British army in a surprise overnight march to outflank the American army, which was forced to retreat toward Gowanus Creek, and two nights later, to Manhattan. After the war, the Dutch continued to build on the land, which sloped toward the East River and offered great views of the water and of Manhattan.<ref name="twnchsr"/>

The tree-lined Clinton Avenue was laid out as a boulevard along the crest of the hill in 1832,<ref name=encnyc /> and by the 1840s, Clinton Hill and neighboring Fort Greene had become fashionable neighborhoods for the wealthy of Brooklyn, who could commute to Manhattan by way of stagecoach to the Fulton Ferry. The area was originally devised as a rural get-away for those "determined to escape from the closeness of city life", as Walt Whitman, editor of the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, put it in 1846. George Washington Pine had bought up the land in the area and broke it into lots, selling them to those who wanted to lead a quiet life not too far from the conveniences of the Navy Yard.<ref name="twnchsr"/> Whitman, a 28-year resident of Brooklyn, had lived for less than a year in the area in 1855, where he completed his masterpiece Leaves of Grass. The 1995 New Yorker article "Walt Whitman’s Ghost"<ref>Berman, Paul. "Walt Whitman's Ghost" Template:Webarchive The New Yorker (June 12, 1995)</ref> identified the address as 99 Ryerson Street, which still stands.<ref name="twnchsr"/>

In the 1860s, after the Civil War, Clinton Hill was developed with row houses,<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> which dominated the street scene by the 1880s.<ref name=encnyc /> These attracted affluent professionals.<ref name=encnyc />

The area's development continued after Charles Pratt, an oil executive, built a mansion at 232 Clinton Avenue, which is now part of the Brooklyn campus of St. Joseph's College's. Pratt also built houses there for his sons, which he gave to them as wedding gifts; other mansions followed,<ref name=encnyc /> part of the general migration of merchants from New York City (Manhattan) to Brooklyn,<ref>Template:Cite gotham, p.972</ref> and the area became known as Brooklyn's "Gold Coast".<ref name=nycland /> Pratt founded the Pratt Institute in 1887, and its campus remains a focus of the neighborhood.<ref name=encnyc />

After the late 1870s, Clinton Hill was one of the stops on the Brooklyn, Flatbush and Coney Island Railway (BF&CI, now part of the Brighton subway line), an excursion line which would bring families from the neighborhood to Brighton Beach for a day of recreation, and allow them to be home "at a reasonable hour". Entire families would use the BF&CI to relocate to the newly built Brighton Beach Hotel – owned by the same men who built the railroad – for the summer months, while the paterfamilias commuted to New York via ferry to work.<ref>Template:Cite gotham, p.1135</ref>

By 1900, apartment buildings were being built on Clinton Avenue, which replaced the mansions there and on Washington Avenue by the 1920s and 40s. In addition some of the remaining mansions were converted into rooming houses in the following decades, and urban renewal, part of Robert Moses' relentless rebuilding of the city, cleared five blocks south of the Pratt Institute, destroying the brownstones there. This was followed in the 1970s by the brownstone revival, in which many of the remaining brownstones were restored.<ref name=encnyc /> In the 2000s, the neighborhood became somewhat gentrified, with generally wealthier people moving into the area.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> New construction included an apartment building of passive house design at 283 Greene Avenue.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Demographics

Based on data from the 2020 United States census, the population of Clinton Hill was 28,647, an increase of 19.3% from 24,014 for the same area in 2010.<ref name=":0">Template:Cite web</ref>

The racial makeup of the neighborhood was 44.8% White, 26.4% Black, 9.5% Asian, 5.7% from two or more races, and 1.5% from other races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 12.1% of the population.<ref name=":0" />

Residents include many "artists, architects, photographers, and craftspeople". In the 21st century, the neighborhood has experienced a notable increase in population, with increased gentrification and a growing upper-middle-class population.<ref name="encnyc" />

As according to the 2020 census data from New York City Department of City Planning, there were between 10,000 to 19,999 White residents and 5,000 to 9,999 Black residents, meanwhile each the Hispanic and Asian populations were each less than 5,000 residents.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Landmarks

The Clinton Hill Historic District was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1985. The district includes the mansions of Clinton Avenue, built in the 1870s and 1880s. The most prominent of these are linked to Charles Pratt, who built a mansion for himself at 232 Clinton Avenue in 1874, the year his Charles Pratt & Company was acquired by Standard Oil,<ref name="twnchsr"/> and one each as wedding presents for three of his four sons. These four mansions can be seen on Clinton Avenue between DeKalb and Willoughby. The rest of the historic district is noted for its prominent Italianate and Beaux-Arts rowhouses.<ref name="nris">Template:NRISref</ref> The Clinton Hill South Historic District was listed in 1986.<ref name="nris"/> James William Elwell built the wood-framed Italianate villa at 70 Lefferts Place that is in the Clinton Hill district. The house is one of the two oldest houses on Lefferts Place and became designated a landmark by the Landmarks Preservation Commission on December 12, 2006.<ref name="Elwell">Template:Cite web</ref>

St. Mary's Episcopal Church at 220 Classon Avenue in Clinton Hill, built Template:Circa, and the Mechanics Temple, which was built at 67 Putnam Avenue as the Lincoln Club in 1889, are both part of the historic district.<ref name=encnyc /><ref name=aia /> Other buildings in the Historic District include a Gothic Revival wooden house at 284 Clinton Avenue, built c.1854; an Italianate brick and stone villa dating from Template:Circa at 447 Clinton Avenue, intact runs of mid-19th century rowhouses on Grand Avenue, St. James Place and Cambridge Place as well as on DeKalb Avenue and Waverly Avenue; mansions from the "Gold Coast" era in the 200 to 400 blocks of Clinton Avenue;<ref group=note>At 229, 232, 241, 245, 278, 284, 300, 315, 321, 356, 380, 384, 404 & 406, 405, 410, 415, 443, 447, 457, 463 and 487 Clinton Avenue</ref> and at 367 Washington Avenue; and apartment houses on Clinton Avenue.<ref name=nycland /><ref name=aia>Template:Cite aia5</ref>

On Lafayette Avenue are both the Emmanuel Baptist Church, completed in 1887, and the Joseph Steele or Steele-Skinner House of 1812. Clinton Avenue contains the Church of St. Luke and St. Matthew, completed in 1891, and the Royal Castle Apartments, completed in 1912. All are individually landmarked.<ref name=encnyc /><ref name=nycland>Template:Cite nycland</ref><ref name=aia />

Many of Pratt Institute's buildings are landmarked, or of architectural interest, and St. Joseph's College utilizes several of the former Pratt family mansions on Clinton Avenue.<ref name=aia />

The brick building at 275 Park Avenue was built in the 1890s as a chocolate factory which produced and distributed Tootsie Rolls throughout the United States. In 2002, the building was converted into loft apartments.<ref>Maurer, Mark. "Clinton Hill chocolate factory-turned-rentals sells for $68M; HK Organization closes on 184K sf site, which was converted in 2002" Template:Webarchive, The Real Deal (magazine), September 12, 2014. Accessed May 21, 2016. "The 123-unit, seven-story brick property at 255-275 Park Avenue was constructed as a Tootsie Roll factory in 1890s and later converted into lofts in 2002."</ref>

Education

Institutions

Pratt Institute, founded by Charles Pratt in 1887, is in Clinton Hill. Pratt began as an engineering school, designed to train immigrants in then-novel sciences.<ref name="twnchsr"/> Today the school has programs in architecture, graphic design, interior design, and industrial design.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

The Brooklyn campus of St. Joseph's College is in Clinton Hill.<ref>Clinton Hill Campus Template:Webarchive, St. Joseph's College (New York). Accessed May 21, 2016. "St. Joseph’s Brooklyn Campus is in the heart of the historic Clinton Hill section of Brooklyn, one of the trendiest fusion neighborhoods outside of Manhattan."</ref>

By 2021 the interim location of the German School of Brooklyn (GSB) was the former Coop School in the Bedford Stuyvesant and Clinton Hill area. In 2021 the school moved all levels to its permanent site at 9 Hanover Place in Downtown Brooklyn.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Library

The Brooklyn Public Library (BPL)'s Clinton Hill branch is located at 380 Washington Avenue near Lafayette Avenue. It opened in 1973.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Transportation

The Clinton–Washington Avenues station on the IND Crosstown Line

Clinton Hill is served by the New York City Subway's IND Fulton Street Line (Template:NYCS trains), with a stop at Clinton–Washington Avenues station, as well as the IND Crosstown Line (Template:NYCS trains), with stops at Classon Avenue and Clinton–Washington Avenues. Several New York City Transit local bus routes provide service to the neighborhood, including the Template:NYC bus link. Starting in the 1880s, the Myrtle Avenue and Lexington Avenue elevated lines served the area. The Lexington Avenue line followed Grand Avenue south from Myrtle. The last train on the Lexington Avenue line ran on October 13, 1950; dismantling of the elevated tracks began on November 1.<ref name="twnchsr"/>

Clinton Hill is served by NYC Ferry's Astoria route, which stops at the Brooklyn Navy Yard.<ref name="astoria">Template:Cite web</ref> The Brooklyn Navy Yard stop opened on May 20, 2019.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Notable residents

Notable residents over the years have included:

Walt Whitman

References

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