YOU never know what you’re going to find down by the water, which is why I am happy to have been born and raised in a city by the water. Oddly, I have never had much to do with water, other than self-cleanliness. I ride ferries avidly, and have done my time in rowboats, but have never swum a stroke even though I keep saying I will take lessons at the Y (I tried in 1968 as a kid but was too chicken to continue). My father was a strong swimmer and served in the British merchant marine in WWII, as Newfoundland was still under British control at the time; he visited places as far flung as Greenland and Trinidad.
Here’s a shot I squeezed off while meandering around Brooklyn Heights in December 2021. Liberty Enlightening the World you recognize. In the foreground is the M/V North River, a vessel commissioned in 1974 and tasked with transporting sludge, a semi-solid slurry (semisolids suspended in water) that can be produced from a range of industrial processes, from water treatment, wastewater treatment or on-site sanitation systems, between wastewater plants. It’s a dirty job that must be done.
“North River” is an old name for the Hudson River, as it leads to upstate locations and was NYC’s first superhighway for boat traffic. The East River’s name is still obviously in use. But there was also once a South River. Can you guess what it was?
It was the Delaware River, the undefended barrier between New Jersey and Pennsylvania.
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2/16/24