Нью-Йорктегі шағын аралдар: Солтүстік және Оңтүстік Бауырлар

Pair of small islands in New York City's East River

North and South Brother Islands are a pair of small islands located in New York City's East River between the mainland Bronx and Rikers Island. North Brother Island was once the site of the Riverside Hospital for quarantinable diseases but is now uninhabited. According to the New York City Parks Department, which oversees the islands, North Brother Island has about of land, and South Brother Island about
Public access is prohibited but permission is occasionally given to researchers and journalists; a NYC Parks staff member escorts all such visitors.

Both North Brother Island and South Brother Island were claimed by the Dutch West India Company in 1614 and were originally named De Gesellen, translated as "the companions" or "the brethren" in English. By the late 1600s the islands were owned by the British who occupied the area. In 1695 the government granted both to James Graham who did not develop the islands because the currents in the area were treacherous. The islands were both originally part of Queens County. On June 8, 1881, North Brother Island was transferred to what was then part of New York County (later to become the Bronx). On April 16, 1964, South Brother Island was also transferred to the Bronx. The islands had been incorporated into Long Island City in 1870, before the consolidation of New York City in 1898.

The northern of the islands was uninhabited until 1885, though a lighthouse was built in 1869. In the mid 1880s

The island was the site of the wreck of the General Slocum, a steamship that burned on June 15, 1904: 1,021 people died either from the fire on board the ship, or from drowning before the ship beached on the island's shores. According to Joseph Mitchell, a reporter for newspapers and for The New Yorker, the island was the site of many outings of "The Honorable John McSorley Pickle, Beefsteak, Baseball Nine, and Chowder Club" organized by John McSorley of McSorley's Old Ale House; photos of the outings are featured on the walls of the bar. Mary Mallon, also known as Typhoid Mary, was confined to the island for over two decades until she died there in November 1938. Because of her contagious illness, she had been declared a public menace in 1915; she suffered a stroke in 1932 and was thereafter confined to the hospital. According to the Smithsonian magazine, the need for a quarantine hospital in a remote location had declined by the 1930s, as "public health advances lessened the need to quarantine large numbers of individuals". Following World War II, the island housed war veterans who were students at local colleges and their families. After the nationwide housing shortage abated, the island was again abandoned until the 1950s, when a center opened to treat adolescent drug addicts. The facility claimed it was the first to offer treatment, rehabilitation, and education facilities to young drug offenders. Heroin addicts were confined to this facility and locked in a room until they were clean. Many of them believed they were being held against their will. Staff corruption and cost forced the facility to close in 1963. Since the mid 1960s, New York City mayors have considered a variety of uses for the island. John Lindsay, for instance, proposed to sell it, and Ed Koch thought it could be converted into housing for the homeless. The city also considered using it as an extension of the jail at Rikers Island. Some buildings are in danger of collapse; a dense forest conceals the ruined hospital buildings. In October 2014, New York City Council member Mark Levine, chair of the City Council's Parks Committee, led a delegation to visit the island, and declared his desire afterward to open the island for limited "light touch, environmentally sensitive" public access. In October 2016, New York magazine reported that the council had commissioned a study from the University of Pennsylvania's School of Design, followed by a public hearing, on how the island could be converted into a park with controlled access by the public. In 2017, reporter Josh Robin of the NY1 channel was allowed to visit the North island and posted a video report that included some of the abandoned buildings. Also in 2017, the Science Channel filmed an episode on North Brother Island for the series What on Earth?. Journalist Dave Mosher accompanied the crew and posted a report and still photographs of the buildings and environment. The report stated that the island is "both eerie and beautiful" but added that most buildings were unsafe, that few buildings still included a "functional roof" and poison ivy was problematic everywhere. Jacob Ruppert, a brewery magnate and early owner of the New York Yankees, had a summer house on the island that burned down in 1909. Hampton Scows paid property taxes every year but did not develop the island. In November 2007, the island was purchased in a complicated transaction in which $2 million of federal grant money from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Coastal and Estuarine Land Conservation Program was allocated to the Wildlife Conservation Society and the POINT Community Development Corporation. The Trust for Public Land then acquired the island on behalf of those organizations, and then donated it to the city's Parks Department as a wildlife sanctuary. South Brother Island was the 13th island to come under the Parks Department's jurisdiction. From the 1980s through the early 2000s, North Brother Island supported one of the area's largest nesting colonies of black crowned night heron. However, by 2008 this species had abandoned the island for unknown reasons. Barn swallows use the abandoned structures for nesting, and can be seen flying over the island. On South Brother Island, dense brush supports nesting colonies of several species of birds, notably black crowned night heron, great egret, snowy egret, and double crested cormorant. New York City Audubon has monitored nesting colonies on the island for over twenty years. In their May/July 2019 Nesting Survey however, New York City Audubon was unable to confirm the great blue heron or the green heron as breeding on any of the coastal islands. Some other wading bird species, including black crowned night herons, were found to have breeding colonies on South Brother Island; snowy egret and double crested cormorant were also found nesting there. In fact, "the three largest wader nesting colonies" in the survey included South Brother Island. There was no mention in the report of any significant findings on North Brother Island.

In June 2009, North Brother Island was featured in episode 8 ("Armed and Defenseless") of Life After People on the History Channel. It was used as an example of what would happen to structures after 45 years without humans. It was featured in the Broad City episode "Working Girls" and was mentioned in the episode "Twaining Day". It was also featured in the Unforgettable episode "The Island", and it is a location inhabited by women and children in Victor LaValle's 2017 novel The Changeling. North Brother Island was also mentioned as the Enclave base in Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur season 1 finale "O. M. G. Issue 2".