The Hole: Cowboys and Bodies in Brooklyn/Queens
The Hole, a section of Lindenwood along the Brooklyn-Queens border, could be an extremely unflattering name, except that the area truly is a hole: the land is 30 feet below grade, meaning the area is marshy in places and homes are built only a few feet above the water table, so they must use cesspools…
The Hole, a section of Lindenwood along the Brooklyn-Queens border, could be an extremely unflattering name, except that the area truly is a hole: the land is 30 feet below grade, meaning the area is marshy in places and homes are built only a few feet above the water table, so they must use cesspools instead of the municipal sewer system. Nathan Kensinger compiled a photo essay of this neighborhood, which is famous for bodies and for horses: bodies because it was an old mob dumping ground, and horses because they used to roam the fields of The Hole. Some horses still reside there, as does The Federation of Black Cowboys. Kensinger’s essay captures a piece of New York that is both ancient and timeless, and it reminds us how diverse the land is within the boundaries of New York City. It’s a city with an island of pick-up trucks and lobster shacks, massive skyscrapers and financial juggernauts, beaches, forests—and The Hole, a neighborhood that harks back to the Wild West.
The Hole [Nathan Kensinger]
Meet ‘The Hole,’ [Curbed]
An Urban Frontier [NY Times]
Rob, that doesn’t sound so convincing!
snappy roaming wild pitbulls aren’t going to bite you, they probably wont even come up to you at all. maybe if you have food in your hand or something, i dont know..
*rob*
why would anyone want this place to stay this way other than for their own amusement. The people who live here are obviously unhappy and want to leave.
i dont mind wild vegetation bxgirl. urban praries are cool to look at and explore. it’s the people who try to make it look MORE like this everywhere.
*rob*
And rob- you are aware there is lots of – dare I say it- vegetation here?
Rob, telling us that there are wild pitbulls roaming the area is not a great way to get anyone to agree to go explore it with you…I’m just sayin’!
Whoops- spoke too soon before reading the article. Too late. Hope they just leave it alone- I love these small, nearly forgotten bits. They’re what make NYC so fascinating.
Very cool. Almost sorry they wrote about it- I give it about 3 more months before Mike Bloomberg decides he has to “gentrify” it and put in luxury wild west estates for the likes of Paris Hilton to buy and experience the real life and grit of NYC. Or maybe Joe Sitt will buy it and build a Wild West theme park.
Wow!
this doesn’t even look like NYC – it really does look like the rural south…