A Dive Into the History of the Gowanus Canal

For more than 150 years, Brooklyn’s Gowanus Canal has been called a cesspool, an industrial dumping ground, and a blemish on the face of the populous borough, but it was one of the most important waterways in the history of New York harbor. New York writer and guide Joseph Alexiou is the author of Gowanus: Brooklyn's Curious Canal. He explores how the Gowanus creek—a naturally-occurring tidal estuary that served as a conduit for transport and industry during the colonial era—came to play an outsized role in the story of America’s greatest city.