FOR years I had hunted Margaret Court. No, not the famed Australian tennis champion in the 1960s and 1970s. I was seeking a short alley in Homecrest, a subdivision of the larger Sheepshead Bay. The alley was shown on some maps to be on East 13th Street between Avenues Y and Z. Sheepshead Bay, like Canarsie, is full on tiny side streets chockablock with one-story bungalows, and though named, they’re strictly walkways with no room for motor vehicles (unless it’s an e-bike used by some deliveristas).
For about 20 years, 1973-1993, I bicycled the borough of Brooklyn with occasional forays in Queens and Nassau, even more rarely into Manhattan and Staten Island. On some of these expeditions, I hunted obscure alleys I found on maps. Try as I might, I could never espy Margaret Court. It turns out I was looking for a roadway when I should have been seeking a walkway.
Margaret Court isn’t a roadway at all but a walkway lined on both sides with charming small houses too big to be true bungalows. They are numbered #1 to 21, with odd house numbers on the north side and evens on the south.
The kicker is that Margaret Court was here before anything on the west side of East 13th Street was in place. In this excerpt from a Belcher Hyde atlas from 1929, unpaved or planned streets were left in white, with established paved roadways shown in purple. Framed houses are in yellow.
Margaret Court has not been given a green and white street sign by the Department of Transportation, so I’m providing one here. The alley is identified by a handwritten sign on its gate, which precedes a shallow staircase that drops to Margaret Court itself. It was probably named for a relative of its long-ago developer.
Update: Joseph Ditta sends this Street View, in which a DOT sign is visible.
Looking at Margaret Court from West 13th, it’s no surprise I could not find it on my trips to Homecrest all those years ago. I wasn’t looking for anything that looked like this.
The modern Google map shows Margaret Court lke this. You have to look hard to locate it.
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5/17/24
12 comments
Homecrest Avenue does not run between Avenues Y and Z, so none of the Margaret Court houses were demolished to open the street. Also, where you say “West 13th Street” you mean “East 13th Street.
All right, I wrote it just before bed. Homecest Avenue was apparently planned to go through there, but wasn’t built. I caught another whopper that you didn’t see.
I always enjoy learning about the obscure places that you find.
Google Street View somehow made it down Margaret Court. I’m not sure how this was done as obviously one of their camera cars wouldn’t fit.
You state that the DOT hasn’t given Margaret Court a green and white street sign, then immediately below that statement include a photo with a green and white street sigh for Margaret Court.
Never mind. I either missed the update on first reading or the page was edited about the same time I submitted my comment.
Great read! It’s charming as is in a way but imagine with more upkeep what a nice enclave that would be. Either way I’d have loved that growing up, as a little traffic-less greened adventure world.
If I lived there I would have a lawn jockey out front
My sister lived there.
The folks who live all the way at the inside end must have a tough time getting furniture or appliances delivered!
The dead-end at Margaret Court is because of a long-forgotten waterway, Squan Creek.
Lots of green thumbs on that block!