HISTORY OF BROOKLYN GREEN POINT- by Henry Stiles - 1869

from A History of the City of Brooklyn by Henry Stiles - 1869

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Isolated by its peculiar position between Newtown and Bushwick creeks, and occupied only by a few large farms, Green-Point or Cherry-Point, as it was formerly called, may be said to have enjoyed an almost separate existence from the rest of the old township of Bushwick. It contained, during the Revolutionary period, and for years after, only five (Dutch) families, each having its own dwelling house, its own farm and its own retinue of jolly negroes in field and kitchen.
I.
On the shore of Newtown creek, on present Clay street, between Union and Franklin avenues, resided Jacob Bennett; whose father, then quite an old man, owned and lived upon a farm, on the opposite side of the creek, which be subsequently gave to his son-in-law, Mr. Hunter, from whom it derived its present name of Hunter's Point. It is related of this Jacob Bennett, that he was awakened one night, during the war, by one of his father's negroes who had crossed the creek with news that a party of British marauders were robbing the old man's house. Calling to his aid his neighbor Abraham Meserole and John A., his son, together with all the negroes at hand, they hurried across the creek to the rescue; and, having cut off the enemy's retreat, by destroying their boats, they pursued them to the meadows, where they overtook them in a sinking condition, being much hampered with some $6,000 which they were endeavoring to carry off. Most of the plunderers escaped, but the officer in command was caught and deprived of his sword, which would have been the instrument of his instant decapitation at the hands of a negro of the party, had it not been for the timely interference of John A. Meserole, whose son, Archibald K. Meserole, still treasures the weapon as an interesting family relic. Some years after the war, another Bennett house was erected near the present bridge, and was subsequently sold to a Yankee by the name of Griffin, but this, likewise, has disappeared before the march of improvement.
II.
On the edge of the meadows near the north-east corner of present Oakland and Freeman streets, on premises since owned by James W. Valentine, stood the old Provost dwelling previously mentioned (page 323) as the original Capt. Peter Praa house. This venerable building, was built of stone, and, after its desertion by the family, about 1833, met an untimely fate by fire, caused by the carelessness of some negroes who had taken possession of it. The old Provost family burial place is still in existence, at the north-east corner of India and Oakland streets.
III.
On the river bank, on premises now owned by Mr. Neziah Bliss (between India and Java streets) was the old Abraham Meserole house, built over one hundred and fifty years ago, although the western portion of it is of more modern date, about 1775. The then proprietor, who was the grandfather of Archibald K. Meserole, was born in 1725, and died near the close of the century, leaving his son, John A., in possession. This John A., born in 1752, had the misfortune to experience the cruelties of the British as a prisoner in their dungeons at New York, during the Revolution. He survived its horrors, however, and reared a large family, dying at a ripe old age, in 1833. His family, also, suffered much from the Hessians, a troop of whom were quartered in the house, and made free with all the live stock upon the farm, with the exception of one cow, which the family succeeded in hiding back in the woods, in a nook, since occupied by S. D. Clark's grocery store.
Upon this estate was erected, in later times, a building known as the Baisley house, which was used for many years as a tenant house for the farm. It still stands on H, near Franklin street, and is occupied by Moore the marble man.
IV.
Just beyond the woods on the site of Mr. Samuel Sneeden's late residence (Colyer near and east of Washington street) stood the house of old Jacobus Colyer, the worthy ancestor of all of that name in this vicinity. He died in 1804, full of years, and remembered with respect by all who knew him. The house was, at one time, in possession of Purser Thomas, of the United States navy.
After the Revolution, a son of Peter Colyer built a house on the west side of Leonard, now Colyer street, and which was subsequently destroyed by fire.
V.
Next, and the last of the series of these originals, was the residence of Jacob Meserole, which yet stands near Bushwick creek (Lorimer street near Norman avenue) embosomed in trees and shrubbery, a pleasant memorial of the olden time, and is occupied by William M. and Adrian Meserole, the grandsons of the Revolutionary proprietor. They were the sons of Peter, and their uncle John, after the Revolution, erected a residence for himself on the same original farm, on Guernsey street, about one hundred and fifty feet south of Norman avenue. This house was burned afterwards.
These five buildings, with their barns and barracks, and the old slate-enclosed powder house, below the hill, (A bluff, some sixty feet higher than the present grade, and near the site of the present Francis's Metallic; Life-boat factory) on the spot since covered by Simonson's ship-yard, and which was afterwards removed as an undesirable neighbor, constituted the whole of GreenPoint settlement. It must have presented, in those far-off days, a charming picture of Arcadian simplicity and comfort. Shut out from the world, as it were, yet only separated from the city by the East river, the residents of this quiet farming district pursued their daily avocations, unambitious of office, oblivious of the rise of real estate and the advantages of town lots; sociable, hospitable, contented. We may fancy the hum of the spinning wheel; the ring of the harvest blades; the lowing of the sleek- cattle browsing in the meadows or cooling their sides at the edges of the creeks; the shrill blasts of the dinner horn calling the men from the field; the thwack of the flails upon the barn floor, keeping time to the whistle or the rude ditty of the negro; the long social evening chats around the open fire-place, where half a (modern) cord of wood blazed out its wondrous comfort; the receptions of the old domine and his vrouw, from Bushwick, when the best room was opened and the boys said their catechism in fear and trembling, while Cuffee gave the pony a round mess of oats from the lean to; the quilting parties and the frolics and suppers that followed, and the sparking of the young folks when the old folks had retired. All these things we can fancy; but the imagination is powerless to describe the smooth and mellifluous cadences of the language which gave life to these old tenements and sounded from neighbor to neighbor as, for example, "Hoe vaart gij? Zijt gij wel? Is uw huisgezin gezond? Ja, wij zijn allen wel. Welkom, vriend, wij zijn blijde u te zien. Kom in en groet mijn vrouw." How beautiful! ne'er shall we hear the like again-what a pity!
A peculiar lack of facilities for communication with the outside world, contributed largely to the isolation which we have mentioned as characteristic of Cherry Point. The only road from there to any place, began at old Abraham Meserole's barn, ran diagonally across, north-cast to the east end of F street, then past the Provost premises, then south to Willow Pond (now Metz's chemical factory, north side India, east of Union avenue), thence along the meadow to Wyckoffs woods, so to old Bushwick church to the Cross Roads, and from that point "round Robin Hood's barn" to Fulton Ferry, where the wearied traveler embarked in a ferryscow for Coenties slip, at the city, and was thankful if he arrived there in safety, it being a little more than he had reason to expect.
As for going to Astoria, it has been described as being something like taking a journey to the Moon, there being no road thither, until the erection of the penny-bridge in 1796, which let the people out into the mysteries of the island, and left them to feel their way around in the woods to Astoria. Each farmer, however, owned his boat with which he conveyed produce to the New York market; and, for all practical purposes of intercommunication with each other or with their friends in Newtown, Bushwick or Brooklyn, they used the boat much more frequently, perhaps, than the road.
The modern history of Green-Point dates from the year 1832, at which time there appeared in that quiet and almost forgotten neighborhood, a live Yankee, Neziah Bliss, by name, who married into one of the original Dutch families of the point; and, with the proverbial energy and tact of his race, soon began to develop the hitherto unimagined resources of that locality. Henceforth, the history of Green-Point was identical with that of Neziah Bliss.1
In the year 1832, he purchased, in connection with Dr. Eliphalet Nott, some thirty acres of the John A. and the Peter Meserole farm, and, in 1833, be bought the Griffin farm at auction. During the following year, he had the whole of Green-Point surveyed, at his own expense, laying it out in streets and lots, and running the lines so as to connect with the adjacent village of Williamsburgh. In 1835, be became the owner of the Hunter (Point) farm, having an eye to the projected removal of the United States Navy Yard from Brooklyn to Green-Point. These negotiations, at one time in a state of great forwardness, were finally frustrated; and, all but twelve acres of his Green-Point property was lost to Mr. Bliss by the manoeuvres of certain parties concerned with him in these transactions. Undaunted by these trials and untiring in his efforts to improve the condition of the place, he built, in 1838, a foot bridge, across Bushwick creek, at a cost of about $800, a considerable portion of which was furnished by himself. About the same time he secured a new survey of the point and the incorporation of a road sixty feet wide across the lower end of Green-Point, and along the line of present Franklin street, called the Ravenswood, Green-Point and Hallet's Cove turnpike, at an expense of $20,000, which was opened in 1839, and was subsequently continued to Williamsburgh. The road, however, was not, by any means, as level as the present Franklin Street; it had its ups and downs, some of them pretty formidable, so that, indeed, even as late as 1853, the reply given to the traveler inquiring for Williamsburgh might properly have been "over the hills, and far away". Still, the turnpike was the opening door to Green-Point's future growth. Then, and not before then, streets and house lots began to be a reality, on the basis (with the exception, much to be pitied, of the farms on the southern and south-western part of the point) of Mr. Bliss's Survey of 1834. The first house builder was John Hillyer, the mason, who boldly broke ground in the field, about forty rods from the present Dutch Reformed Church on I street, in November, 1839; the edifice, a substantial brick one, being sufficiently completed to admit of his occupying it with his family, in June of the following year. A few months after Mr. Brightson commenced building on two lots in J street, in the rear of Doan's present meat market; and almost simultaneously, three other buildings were begun (1) the house now occupied by Benton, the grocer. A colored man purchased sixteen lots therefore $50 a lot, put up the house and sold the whole premises, about 1842, for $2,300. The building soon became an inn, well remembered by the oldest inhabitants of Green-Point as Poppy Smith's tavern; (2) the residence of Mr. Archibald K. Meserole, on the hill (north side of Eagle street between Franklin and Washington Streets), since occupied by Colyer, the ship builder, and (3) the store house, afterwards Vogt's paint shop, built by Cother & Ford for A. K. Meserole. And now the dwellers in New York fairly got wind of Green-Point and its advantages, and the houses Came so thick and fast that it is entirely beyond the powers of the most active historian to keep track of their erection. Many of these houses stood up on stilts, bearing very much the appearance of having been commenced at the roof and gradually built downward, a sufficient number of stories being appended to reach the ground. This style of building, peculiarly characteristic of Green-Point in the earlier days, obtained mostly on the locality known by the people of that day as the Orchard, and, also, in J, Washington and Franklin streets, and was rendered necessary by the extreme depth of the mud, always the great drawback of the place.
Trade, also, put forth its initiatory efforts at the store house, before alluded to, as Vogt's paint shop. At this country Store, centered the literary, political and speculative interests of the point; it was, in short, the gossip-place. Its first proprietor retired from the store, in disgust, after two months experience; and was succeeded by David Swalm, whose success attracted, in November, 1843, the attention of some burglars, the first criminal event which the faithful historian of Green-Point must chronicle. The first coal yard was opened at the foot of F street, on the East river, at the projection of the shore, from which Green-Point originally derived its name. This coal establishment, in 1849, was purchased by Abraham Meserole, who transferred the business to the corner of J and Franklin streets, under the firm name of A. K. & A. Meserole. The coal yard was speedily followed by other lines of industry, and by various manufactories.
Religion brought its benign influences to bear upon the inhabitants of the rapidly increasing settlement, in the guise of a sabbath school, which was convened, during the fall of 1845, in the basement of Clark Tiebout's house in Franklin street, adjoining Doan's market. It was a union of all denominations, and exceedingly small at that, and its first superintendent was William Vernoon. It soon outgrew its original accommodations and was removed to the then new school house on the hill ; but the school trustees of the district, fearful, perhaps, of even an incipient union of church and state, refused the use of the building, and the sabbath school became, awhile, a traveling institution, locating for a season in the old Provoost barn (Freeman near Oakland street), and, finally, in 1846, in the loft of D. Swalm's store. Here regular sabbath services were held, under the auspices of the various evangelical denominations, except the Episcopalian, which had already made a beginning here in 1846. The Methodist, Baptist and Reformed Dutch commenced their distinctive church organizations in 1847, and were followed by the Universalists and Roman Catholics in 1855.
The honorable profession of medicine was first represented in Green-Point by Dr. Snell, a regular Dutchman, from Herkimer county, N. Y., who settled here in 1847. He was followed in 1850, by Dr. Job Davis, and he, in turn, by Doctors Peer and Hawley, Heath, Wells, and others.
The first squire and constable of which the place could boast, were appointed about 1843. Just in the nick of time, too; for, one day, the quiet of Green-Point was suddenly invaded by a large party of men and boys, bears and dogs, who had come over from New York, determined to have a regular bear fight for their own diversion and the instruction of this old fashioned community. The theatre selected for their sport was an old barn in the rear of the lot now occupied by David Morris in India street, and that gentleman, undertaking to order them off the premises, was set upon by the dogs, and forced to beat a hasty retreat. The stakes were finally driven down, and the bear fight enjoyed, in the field near the late residence of Harvey E. Talmadge in Eagle street. And the occasion was graced by the presence of the squire and the constable, with their staves of office, to see fair play.
Education found a pioneer in Green-Point in Mrs. Masquerier, who, in 1843, first collected some twenty or thirty of the little sprigs of humanity into her house, and taught their young ideas how to shoot. This kind hearted woman's ministrations were finally supplanted, by the public school system; and in 1846, a school-house was erected on the bill east of Union avenue between Java and Kent streets, and which was first presided over by Mr. B. R. Davis. This was the commencement of No. 22, which will be spoken of elsewhere and more at length.
Green-Point, also, has had its literary and social organizations, the most notable of which was the Social, Literary and Christian Union of the Reformed Dutch Church of Green-Point, which flourished about the year 1856. It was popularly known as the Dutch Baby, and was a lively infant while it lived. The Sewanhaka Club, of the present day, is an organization which has not neglected its opportunities of social enjoyment, or of generous beneficence to the needy and distressed.
In 1850, a ship yard was established by Mr. Eckford Webb (since Webb & Bell); and the first vessel constructed by them was a small steamer called the Honda, which was made to ply upon the Magdalena river of South America. Since that day, the talented builder has constructed many a vessel which has borne his reputation to various quarters of the globe. Other ship yards were established, until ten or twelve were at one time in active operation, turning out every variety of craft, from the humble skiff to the largest wood and iron steamers.
In September, 1852, the Francis' Metallic Life Boat Company was incorporated, with a capital of $250,000, and erected a large and commodious factory. They had a successful career, until the repeal, by congress, of that section of the steam boat law, respecting life-boats, when the demand fell off, and so did the company.
Returning, however, from our digressive remarks concerning the first outcroppings of civilization, social, political, commercial, educational and religious, which followed Mr. Bliss's creation of a turnpike communication with the rest of the world, we may state that having thus placed Green-Point en rapport with Williamsburgh and Bushwick, he next turned his attention to ferry accommodations. Previously all water communication with the city had been by means of skiffs, at a charge of four cents per passenger, but Mr. Bliss finally succeeded, after three years endeavor, in securing from the corporation of New York a lease dated in 1850. The ferry was established in 1852, and was soon after transferred to the hands of Mr. Shepard Knapp, who still retains it at its original location from the foot of Green-Point avenue to the foot of Tenth street, New York. Having purchased a large tract of land in Queens county, then called Dutch Kills, but now named Blissville, in his honor, Mr. Bliss next set on foot, the Green-Point and Flushing Plank Road from the ferry, which road was intended to be united with the Astoria and Flushing railroad, about half a mile this side of the latter place. In consequence, however, of the opposition of some Dutch farmers along the proposed route, the road was never finished according to the original design, but turned off and united with the Williamsburgh and Newtown road at the end of Calvary Cemetery. Its cost was over $60,000 (including the bridge), and it was first traveled in the summer of 1854. In 1853 the Green-Point Gas Light Company was incorporated, with a capital of $40,000; and the patronage, at the outset, of twenty-six customers! Mr. Bliss cooperated actively with the company in getting their works erected; and, in 1856, was chosen alderman (under the consolidation) for the purpose of furthering this and other matters of local interest in Green-Point, and held this position during 1857 and '68.
Previously to 1855, those who did not choose to walk to their homes on the point, from the Williamsburgh bridge, entrusted themselves to the mercies of an old omnibus, and generally found themselves, when the ruts were bad (as they generally were) pretty well shaken up before they reached their own doors. So, when the City Railroad Company ran their cars through Williamsburgh, to the bridge over Bushwick creek, Mr. Bliss coaxed them along, step by step, until he got them over said bridge; and, now GreenPoint shares the full measure of benefit derived from a rapid, cheap, and easy communication with other parts of the city of Brooklyn.
"Within the last two or three years," says a writer in the Brooklyn Times, of December 1, 1868, "manufacturing interests of considerable magnitude have sprung up in this suburban locality, and several large and substantial buildings for manufacturing purposes are now in course of completion. Some of these employ several hundred hands, thus enabling many to avail themselves of their labor, their sole capital, in providing the comforts of a home and the means of happiness.
"The large accession of productive industry, and the superior facilities for carrying on business in this favored locality, have naturally and rapidly increased the population of the ward, and a still further demand for houses and homes is the result. But the enterprise of our citizens is equal to the emergency, and from seventy-five to one hundred houses, many of them first-class, and all good, are now being constructed, and will be ready for occupation when the early spring returns. And it is not to be wondered at that so many seek this section. Its natural advantages and attractions. account for it. It has churches and public schools, commodious and convenient,. with cheaper rents, better air, and plenty of Ridgewood water. It has two rail roads and two ferries, to facilitate travel; and a discount and a savings bank, for the accommodation and security of all in their money transactions.
"The Green-Point Savings Bank was chartered at the last session of the legislature. The want of an institution of this kind has been felt here for a long time. The population of the ward, which now numbers some 25,000, with the growing and thriving vicinities of Blissville and Hunter's Point east and north of us, embraces a population of nearly an equal number, and is a guaranty at once of the prosperity and success of a savings bank."

was incorporated, with a capital of $250,000, and erected a large and commodious factory. They had a successful career, until the repeal, by congress, of that section of the steam boat law, respecting life-boats, when the demand fell off, and so did the company.
Returning, however, from our digressive remarks concerning the first outcroppings of civilization, social, political, commercial, educational and religious, which followed Mr. Bliss's creation of a turnpike communication with the rest of the world, we may state that having thus placed Green-Point en rapport with Williamsburgh and Bushwick, he next turned his attention to ferry accommodations. Previously all water communication with the city had been by means of skiffs, at a charge of four cents per passenger, but Mr. Bliss finally succeeded, after three years endeavor, in securing from the corporation of New York a lease dated in 1850. The ferry was established in 1852, and was soon after transferred to the hands of Mr. Shepard Knapp, who still retains it at its original location from the foot of Green-Point avenue to the foot of Tenth street, New York. Having purchased a large tract of land in Queens county, then called Dutch Kills, but now named Blissville, in his honor, Mr. Bliss next set on foot, the Green-Point and Flushing Plank Road from the ferry, which road was intended to be united with the Astoria and Flushing railroad, about half a mile this side of the latter place. In consequence, however, of the opposition of some Dutch farmers along the proposed route, the road was never finished according to the original design, but turned off and united with the Williamsburgh and Newtown road at the end of Calvary Cemetery. Its cost was over $60,000 (including the bridge), and it was first traveled in the summer of 1854. In 1853 the Green-Point Gas Light Company was incorporated, with a capital of $40,000; and the patronage, at the outset, of twenty-six customers! Mr. Bliss cooperated actively with the company in getting their works erected; and, in 1856, was chosen alderman (under the consolidation) for the purpose of furthering this and other matters of local interest in Green-Point, and held this position during 1857 and '68.
Previously to 1855, those who did not choose to walk to their homes on the point, from the Williamsburgh bridge, entrusted themselves to the mercies of an old omnibus, and generally found themselves, when the ruts were bad (as they generally were) pretty well shaken up before they reached their own doors. So, when the City Railroad Company ran their cars through Williamsburgh, to the bridge over Bushwick creek, Mr. Bliss coaxed them along, step by step, until he got them over said bridge; and, now GreenPoint shares the full measure of benefit derived from a rapid, cheap, and easy communication with other parts of the city of Brooklyn.
"Within the last two or three years," says a writer in the Brooklyn Times, of December 1, 1868, "manufacturing interests of considerable magnitude have sprung up in this suburban locality, and several large and substantial buildings for manufacturing purposes are now in course of completion. Some of these employ several hundred hands, thus enabling many to avail themselves of their labor, their sole capital, in providing the comforts of a home and the means of happiness.
"The large accession of productive industry, and the superior facilities for carrying on business in this favored locality, have naturally and rapidly increased the population of the ward, and a still further demand for houses and homes is the result. But the enterprise of our citizens is equal to the emergency, and from seventy-five to one hundred houses, many of them first-class, and all good, are now being constructed, and will be ready for occupation when the early spring returns. And it is not to be wondered at that so many seek this section. Its natural advantages and attractions. account for it. It has churches and public schools, commodious and convenient,. with cheaper rents, better air, and plenty of Ridgewood water. It has two rail roads and two ferries, to facilitate travel; and a discount and a savings bank, for the accommodation and security of all in their money transactions.
"The Green-Point Savings Bank was chartered at the last session of the legislature. The want of an institution of this kind has been felt here for a long time. The population of the ward, which now numbers some 25,000, with the growing and thriving vicinities of Blissville and Hunter's Point east and north of us, embraces a population of nearly an equal number, and is a guaranty at once of the prosperity and success of a savings bank."

1. NEZIAH BLISS, son of Samuel (and grandson of Dr. Neziah Bliss, an eminent and wealthy citizen of Tolland county, Conn., which county he represented for many successive years in the state legislature), was born in May, 1790, at Hebron, Conn. Thrown, at an early age, upon the world, through the improvidence of his father, young Bliss first went, in 1807 to New Haven, where he became a clerk in a store. In 1810, lie removed to New York city, where he made the acquaintance of Robert Fulton, then at the height of his fame as the inventor of steam boats. At his house he was a frequent and welcome visitor, and even now speaks with pleasure of the instruction which Fulton was always ready to give, and the lively interest which he ever manifested in his young friend's progress. Full of the subject of steam navigation, he went, in the fall of 1811, to Philadelphia, where, in the following spring he became concerned with Daniel French in the organization of a company to build a little steam boat. This vessel was about sixty feet long, by twelve feet wide, and was constructed with an oscillating engine and a stern-wheel, which Bliss judged to be best adapted to avoid the drift wood which formed so serious an impediment to the navigation of the western waters. This little boat was, for sometime, employed as a ferryboat between Philadelphia and William Cooper's landing. About the same time, also, Mr. Bliss became intimately acquainted with Oliver Evans, since known as the originator of mill machinery, elevators, coolers and rail roads, and was concerned with him in many of his earlier experiments with rails, etc. During his residence in Philadelphia, Mr. Bliss was employed, as a clerk, in a book store and in other pursuits.
In 1816 he went to Cincinnati, and in 1817 made the acquaintance of the eldest son of Gen. Wm. H. Harrison, afterward president of the United States; and together with him became interested in the organization of a company for the construction of another steam boat. This boat, named the General Pike (in honor of Gen. Zebulon Montgomery Pike, who was killed at the battle of York, and who was the father-in-law of young Harrison), was one hundred feet long and twenty-five feet wide; was the first boat ever built at Cincinnati, and the sixth built upon the western waters, although the only one at that time running, and ran between Cincinnati and Louisville, Ky. The only ship builder whose services could at that time be procured in Cincinnati was one Brooks, from the state of Maine, who had previously been engaged in building sloops, while the other carpenters employed upon the work had to be selected from common house joiners. The engines were constructed by a Mr. William Greene, an engineer of that city, from plans and specifications furnished mostly by Mr. Bliss, who, also, assisted Greene in establishing a foundry in which to cast them. The boat was first run in 1819, performed tolerably well, and made money for its owners. In 1820, Bliss sold out his interest, went to New Orleans, and in 1821, entered the state of Missouri. Here, providing himself with horse, saddle and bridle and with no companion but a guide he followed the trail described by Schoolcraft in his View of the Mines and Resources of Missouri, and visited the now celebrated Iron Mountain of Missouri. Becoming deeply impressed with the immense resources which might there be developed, he, with the aid of his friend Ex-Governor Gen. Clarke, procured the passage of a legislative act, authorizing a loan of $50,000, for the term of twelve years, without interest, for the purpose of manufacturing iron from the Iron Mountain. He immediately entered into arrangements with parties from Ohio, to prosecute the work, but a serious illness which attacked him, and the protracted debility which followed it, forced him to abandon the further prosecution of his project, which is now being realized in the mines of the Iron Mountain. In 1823, Mr. Bliss purchased a steam saw-mill at St. Louis, Mo., where for a time, he sawed hard timber, but at length made a trip up to Prairie-du-Chien, in the first steam boat which ever ascended to that point, with the intention of procuring pine timber from the Indian lands not ceded to the United States government. On arriving there, however, he found that express orders from government had preceded him, against his being allowed to procure the timber, and he consequently returned homeward, visiting, on his route, Galena, Ill., then a hamlet consisting of a few miners' log cabins. Arriving at St. Louis, he disposed of his mill, and went, in the fall of 1824, to New Orleans. During the ensuing winter he went to Oupelousas, La., where he organized a company for steam boat navigation between that point and New Orleans, The boat was built at Cincinnati, and successfully run on its intended route, passing down stream, through the Bayou Placquemine, a distance of eleven miles, stern foremost! This boat, the Oupelousas, was the first on this part of the Mississippi. On returning, in 1827, to New York, Mr. Bliss so received and partially accepted a flattering proposition to go to Mexico as an agent of the Baring Brothers, of London, England. At this juncture he became acquainted with Dr. Eliphalet Nott, formerly president of Union College, New York, with whom he was engaged during part of 1827 and '28 in certain experiments in steam navigation. In 1831, Mr. Bliss established the now celebrated Novelty works, in Now York city, with the view of constructing sea steamers. In 1832, he purchased the property then known as Stuyvesant's cove, just above the present Novelty works, in New York island; and, in connection with Dr. Nott, became the owner of thirty acres of the John Meserole farm in Green-Point, L.I., within the present city of Brooklyn, where his present residence is; and, in the fall of the same year he married Mary A., daughter of John A. Meserole, Esq., by whom he has six children.
From this point his history becomes incorporated with that of Green-Point, which he has seen grow up from a few farms to a populous village, and subsequently to a beautiful and promising ward of the third city of the Union. Surrounded by innumerable evidences of his own large-hearted foresight, and the results of his own fostering care; crowned with the honors of a well spent lifetime; and enjoying the affection of a large family, and the respect of his fellow citizens, he well merits the Position which is unanimously accorded to him, as "the Patriarch of Green-Point."