Barren Island, Brooklyn

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1427 Flatbush Ave, Brooklyn, NY 11210, USA

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N40° 35' 34" W73° 53' 35"   (40.592777777778, -73.893055555556) Start navigation »

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Barren Island was an island off the southeast shore of Brooklyn, in Jamaica Bay. Land filling was used to unite the island with mainland Brooklyn in 1926 for what became Floyd Bennett Field. The area is separated from the Rockaway Peninsula in Queens by the Rockaway Inlet. All of what was once Barren Island is now part of the Jamaica Bay Unit of Gateway National Recreation Area, managed by the National Park Service.
It once maintained a somewhat diverse community for its time, supported mainly by a fish rendering plant and other industries related to offal products. The island housed a plant that rendered horse bones (supplied from the streets of New York City and elsewhere) into glue. This activity inspired the name Dead Horse Bay for the still extant water body on the western shore.

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