Gowanus/Park Slope area c. 1609

Before Dutch colonization of Brooklyn, the Lenape and Canarsee Native Americans inhabited the land, which was mostly a rolling green landscape with abundant wildlife. The neighborhood’s original name, Gowanes Creek – named after Chief Gowane of the local Canarsee tribe – was an inlet of small creeks in the saltwater marshland of south Brooklyn. In 1636 Gowanus was made into one of the first Brooklyn hamlets, extending back then to Sunset Park (which encompasses where I live now, 19^th st. and 5^th ave.). Dutch settlers would fish for large oysters and send them back to Europe, which became Brooklyn’s first export. Weird to think of this “creek” as anything other than the polluted canal it is today.