Legends of LIC 32 lic courier • april 2013 • www.queenscourier.com HUNTERS POINT FERRY Old Long Island City was the most important community on Long Island for one reason: the Hunters Point Ferry. It was once the most important travel link between Queens and Manhattan. For 67 years it operated across the East River between the foot of Borden Avenue, Long Island City, and 34th Street, Manhattan. Service started on May 1, 1858, with the East River Ferry Company’s first boat, the Suffolk. Captain Ames Sander of Long Island City piloted the first boat as a twenty year old. Although he retired at 70 as a captain, he continued working on the LEGENDS OF LIC BY GREATER ASTORIA HISTORICAL SOCIETY LEGENDS OF LIC ferry until he died at 80. ‘The Old Skipper’ remained on active service as a river pilot and gatekeeper. When the Long Island Rail Road started service, demand skyrocketed. Two other boats, the Kings and the Queens were later pressed into service. The 34th Street Ferry was soon by far larger than its uptown rival, the 92nd Street Ferry at Astoria Village, which first saw regular service during the American Revolution. In 1887 the Metropolitan Ferry Company ran the ferry, and in 1902, it was taken over by the Long Island Rail Road. By then it was called the 34th Street Ferry. Within three years the railroad announced its closing. The passing of this institution will be without ceremony. To the new generation, the occasion will mean little or nothing for the ferry at its closing had long been an anachronism. But to those old timers, in whose life the boats had been intimately woven, and who held reverence to the memories of bygone days when it was very much alive, the ferry’s closing was an occasion of remembrance and loss. What killed the ferry? The LIRR’s 34th Street Ferry is done to death by the march of progress. The IRT tube to Atlantic Avenue in 1904, the Queensboro Bridge in 1909, the four Pennsylvania tubes to Long Island City in 1910, the Queensboro Subway in 1915, the Astoria and Corona ‘el’ sections in 1917, and the BMT in 1920. Service reached a peak in 1906 with 28 million people filling eight boats running every four minutes. By contrast, during its last few months in 1925, an entire day’s passenger service could be comfortably held by one boat on one crossing. In its prime, in 1907, it earned $250,000 for the Long Island Rail Road. By 1923 it lost the railroad $30,000. In 1924, its last complete year of operation, the deficit was reduced to $5,000 by suspending maintenance on the boats. The ferry service only missed two days in its history during the Blizzard of 1888. No one could reach it. Over two million troops during WWI were ferried on its boats. In one twelve hour period, 28,000 doughboys were loaded directly to troopships bound for France. At the end, the Long Island Rail Road alienated the last of its passengers by missing connections to trains. The ferries were no longer a dependable means of transportation. Next: Admiral of the City Fleet.
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