Dismantled: 2010
Wood: Antique Pine, Southern and Western (Pinus resinosa)
History: 1099 Leggett Ave. is located in Hunts Point, a peninsula in the South Bronx in New York City. The address at the corner of Leggett Ave. and Barry St. was recently home to the Modern Suppliers Inc., a large hardware company that recently moved across the street, and was replaced by a scaffolding supply company at the site. In the 1940′s, the location was occupied by a large lumber company. Further research is currently in process.
The area is home to 50,000 residents; Hispanic (one of the highest concentrations in NYC), Black, White, Asian, American Indian, Alaskan Native (close to 100) and over 300 people of two or more races. More than half live below the poverty line, which has created at least two one problem- two prisons with a third planned. Over 800 industrial businesses are on the peninsula. The New York City Terminal Market, one of the largest
food distribution facilities in the world, moves fresh fruit and vegetables from almost every American state and 55 foreign countries.
Going way back, Europeans settled Huntʼs Point in 1663, buying it from the Wekkguasegeeck tribe. The land was later given to Thomas Hunt Jr. George Fox (1624–1691), founder of the Quakers is said to have preached in the area in 1672, hardly imagining the parade of prostitutes, drug dealers, gangs, mobsters, arsonists and others on the same site 300 years later. In the 19th century, New Yorkers were attracted to Huntʼs Point as a luxury destination. Tiffany (of jewelery fame) had land here. This came to an end after World War I when a train line was built nearby, and apartment buildings replaced mansions, streets replaced meadows and Huntʼs Point.
There are a number of non profits operating in this section of the South Bronx providing the area with hope – Per Scholas, Inc., Sustainable South Bronx (SSBx), Rocking the Boat, and many others.
Adapted from Wikipedia “Hunt’s Point, South Bronx”
