Wilkinson Brothers Paper Mill: Shelton's Lost Pulp Mills

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Ghost Factories along Canal Street E and the Housatonic River Canal Street in Shelton, Connecticut, feels like a graveyard for American industry. Years ago, I walked down this very road to explore the Star Pin Company . Today, Star Pin is nothing but a cracked foundation and scattered rubble. But right next door, separated by a rusty gate, sits another forgotten giant. I arrived too late to see any leftover machinery or the previous tenant's last setups. Cleanup crews had already taken over the site. Grey duct tape and thick plastic sheeting sealed off the window frames and doorways. Abatement workers were busy removing asbestos from the ancient boiler pipes. Nature had already started claiming the site, too. Back in 2018, the local news reported that a section of the back building simply fell into the Housatonic River. Since then, the property has been used mostly for storage. Still, slipping inside was surprisingly easy. I came here on a mission. I wanted to find a hidden pi...
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Crown Palace Hotel Razed For New Housing

 

About six years ago, I wrote a small piece on this mystery hotel building. At the time I could not find any history or a name associated with the three-story building that was built in 1931. The property was mostly fenced off and used mostly as storage for school buses and other private vehicles. The building entranceways were always bricked off but occasionally I would see someone had busted through the lower cinder-blocked doorway probably looking for scrap metal inside. However, recently I came upon an entry in "The Jewish Chronicle Guide" listing the Crown Palace Hotel under the address 570-600 Crown St, Brooklyn. I always knew the structure eerily resembled a hotel based on its architectural facade and the wide swath of open land that goes back decades in the 1940s and 1980s satellite imagery. It also matches the demographic makeup of the Crown Heights neighborhood to have a hotel for traveling Jews in the area.





Sadly, the building was demolished sometime earlier last year since the New York City Department of Buildings (DOB) application for it was submitted in May 2021 and signed off on December 22, 2021. The adjoining lot was also cleared of the wild-growing trees as seen above in Google Street View in July 2021. Making a way in its place will be a 75-foot-tall condo development with a combined square footage of 185,149. A community space is also allocated to the building as well as two loading berths. Currently, the lot is used as an off-street private parking lot.


Status: Demolished

Location: 600 Crown St & 630 Crown St, Brooklyn NY



Source:


1. "Two Buildings To Be Built On Empty Lot On Crown and Troy", October 24, 2021, CrownHeightsInfo

2. The Jewish Chronicle Travel Guide. (1997). United Kingdom: Jewish Chronicle Publications. [Page]

3. Londono, Vanessa, "Permits Filed For 600 Crown Street In Crown Heights, Brooklyn", NY Nimby, December 21, 2022


Location: 630 Crown St, Brooklyn, NY 11213, USA

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