The completion of the Erie Canal in 1825 all but sealed New York Harbor’s destiny as the most important port in North America. Ships from around the world called on the port 365-days a year and the business of piloting these vessels into the harbor was profitable and competitive. The pilot schooner fleet’s boats were handsome, heavily-sparred vessels that raced each other to incoming ships for the right to pilot them in. The most well known of these, the America, was the fastest vessel of her day and the namesake of the America’s Cup

The Joseph Pulitzer was built for Mr. Pulitzer as an ocean racer and was one of 22 such schooners operating out of New York Harbor in 1894. Ever since its completion in 1883, the Brooklyn Bridge with its epic proportions and grand design, was the background against which life on Fulton Street and the East River played. - DD