Memory Lane: Webster’s Pond

“Webster’s Pond” was alternatively known as “Twin Ponds” was located at 49th Street and 10th Avenue, the site that is now Maimonides Hospital, and previously Israel Zion Hospital—after the cows that would cool off in and around the pond were shooed away, and the pond was filled in. 

“Old Timers” 

The Brooklyn Daily Eagle used to have a column called “Old Timers.” In it, older people would often recall their earliest memories of their childhood years in old Brooklyn. When we read articles published in the 1930’s and 40’s—by seventy or eighty-year-olds…we are getting their accounts of 1880’s history of Boro Park! 

Recalls Louis Brown in the May 3, 1942 edition of the Eagle: “Boys Used to Catch Gold Fish in the Ponds of Old Bay Ridge…. My recollection is that opening of 49th Street divided it in two…and then they called it Twin Ponds. It was called Webster’s Pond after Fred Webster who had a carpet cleaning establishment on the south side of 49th Street, near present 10th Avenue. In earlier years, I understand it was called Martense’s Pond after the old Martense family who owned many acres around that neighborhood (one vestige of this Dutch family’s presence is the fact that 36th Street is still named Martense Street because it bordered the family’s farm, as we will perhaps document in the future).” 

Geographically and topographically it is quite evident why this particular location became a pond—since 10th Avenue sits at the bottom of quite a steep elevation, causing the water to run down into that pit. 

A New York Daily Eagle article in October of 1945 features one Mr. Robert Ryder who recalls not only this, but a number of other ponds—that made for great ice skating in the winter, and for bathing and fishing for goldfish and carp in the summers; such as “Long Pond” at Bay Ridge and 13th Avenues; “Simmons’ Pond” which was near… 46th Street; and Baker’s Pond at 49th Street and 6th Avenue. He recalls the way “all in all, the paths in this old sylvan section were well beaten and known offhand by the [neighborhood children] who no doubt could relate a good story of the boys breaking a path through the woods to “Crazy” Laney’s cabin at the time of the blizzard. This was real rescue work and created much talk at the time.”  

A Hazzard in the Center of Town 

But then the fatal accidents began accumulating—as one could expect in an area that was rapidly becoming more residential. The Eagle on September 3, 1909, carries the headline, “Boy While Fishing, Pulls up A Corpse. Webster’s Pond, in Sunset Park Section, Scene of Another Drowning. A small boy fishing from the bans of a lake known as Webster’s Pond, at Forty-fifth Street and Eighth Avenue yesterday, attracted the attention of a number of passersby. The noticed the lad pulling in his line in a hurry as if he had a bite from a fish .When he got the line ashore, a large object was seen at the end of it, and the boy ran away as if frightened.

The danger posed by the pond continued to escalate, as more residents moved in, presumably. As one newspaper reported: “Want Ponds Filled up. Residents in vicinity of Sunset Park aroused by many fatal accidents... it was ordered that the secretary write to the Department of Highways and ask that the ponds in eh Sunset Park section be filled in immediately, thus preventing more accidents and deaths. 

Eventually, the site saw the construction of Israel Zion, later known as Maimonides Hospital, which continues to stand there to this day.