South Brother Island

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For other uses, see South Brother Island (disambiguation).

South Brother Island is one of a pair of small islands in the East River situated between the Bronx and Riker's Island, New York City and containing seven acres of land.[1] The other island, larger and better known, is North Brother Island. It is uninhabited. As late as the 1960s, South Brother Island was considered part of Queens County, but is now part of Bronx County. It has long been privately owned. Together, the two Brother Islands, North and South, have a land area of 81,423 square meters, or 20.12 acres.

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[edit] History

Both North Brother Island and South Brother Island were claimed by the Dutch West India Company in 1614 and both were originally named "De Gesellen". (The term was translated as "the companions.")[1]

Jacob Ruppert, a brewery magnate and early owner of the New York Yankees (responsible for bringing Babe Ruth to the New York Yankees from the Boston Red Sox), had a summer house on the island that burned down in 1909.[1] No one has lived on the island since then. There are no structures extant.

Ruppert owned the Island until the late 1930s. In 1944 it was purchased by John Gerosa, president of the Metropolitan Roofing Supply Company, who intended to build a summer retreat for his workers on the island. This did not come to pass.

In 1975 the City sold South Brother Island to Hampton Scows Inc., a Long Island investment company, for $10.[2][1]

Hampton Scows dutifully paid property taxes every year but did not develop the island. On November 20, 2007, it was reported that the City of New York would be purchasing the island and preserving it as a wildlife sanctuary. [1] The price is reported to have been in the neighborhood of $2,000,000.[2]

[edit] Wildlife

The island's dense brush supports a major nesting colony of several species of birds, notably Black-crowned Night Heron, Great Egret, Snowy Egret, and Double-crested Cormorant. [3]

[edit] References

  1. ^ a b c d e "City Claims Final Private Island in East River", New York Times, November 20, 2007. Retrieved on 2008-05-26. "South Brother Island, seven acres of dense forest, bittersweet vines, flocks of wild birds and little else, is a speck in the East River — and a glimpse of what the rest of the city might have looked like thousands of years ago." 
  2. ^ a b "New York's South Brother Island to be a sanctuary", New York Newsday, 2007. Retrieved on 2008-05-26. "The island, an overgrown, uninhabited 7-acre piece of land battered by wind in the East River, was sold to the investment group Hampton Scows Inc. by the city in 1975 for $10. Now the federal government is purchasing it from the group for $2 million, a markup of 20 million percent, and turning it over to the city's Parks Department." 
  3. ^ "So, You Were Expecting a Pigeon?; In City Bustle, Herons, Egrets and Ibises Find a Sanctuary", New York Times, December 4, 2003. Retrieved on 2007-08-21. "By contrast, South Brother and its bigger sibling, North Brother Island, have resisted such an invasion. North Brother's vegetation -- a jungle of thick brush, low trees and tangled bittersweet vines set among the ruins of a dozen quarantine and hospital buildings -- has produced a secure haven for the black-crowned night heron, the city's most populous heron species. More than 230 crude nests of sticks and twigs were counted there last June." 

[edit] Further reading

[edit] External links

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Islands of New York City