New York's General Slocum Disaster

From Wikipedia.

Yesterday, I wrote about New York City's North Brother Island and mentioned the General Slocum disaster taking place by it.

The General Slocum was a passenger steamboat built in Brooklyn 1891 and used for excusrsions. During its career, it experienced numerous mishaps including groundings and collisions.

On June 15, 1905 it caught fire and sank in New York's East River by Norther Brother Island. At the time it was chartered by the St. Mark (or Matthew) Evangelical Lutheran Church (German-Americans). It is estimated that 1,021 of the 1,342 aboard died from the fire or drowning with all sorts of glaring problems with the ship.

It was the city's worst disaster until 9-11 and still ranks as worst maritime disaster.

An Unlucky Ship.  Kind Of Like Chicago's SS Eastland.  --Cooter

New York's Forgotten Island

AP and Wikipedia.

Now abandoned North Brother Island is located in the East River between the Bronx and Rikers Island in New York City. It was once home to the Riverside Hospital and Typhoid Mary, who lived there for the last two decades of her life until she died in 1938.

It is also the site of the wreck of the steamer General Slocum in which over 1000 people died in 1904, New York's worst disaster until 9-11; still its worst maritime disaster. There is a picture of bodies from the ship washed up on the island's shore.

There are few food sources for land animals on the island, but it is a haven for birds and is a bird sanctuary. 
The island was uninhabited until 1885, when the Riverside Hospital moved there. After the hospital moved, it became temporary housing for World War II veterans attending local colleges and then in the 50s became a drug rehabilitation center.

Today, it is just sitting there abandoned.

 --DaCoot