America’s largest public cemetery is also the loneliest place in New York City.
Everyone who ends up on Hart Island is because things have gone terribly wrong for them. They died without any money, or family member to claim their body and therefore a stranger in a strange land.
I live on City Island, which is next to it and I have had a rare opportunity to visit Hart Island with restricted access, but fortunately for me, the short visit was a curious one.
Hart Island had been used as a tuberculosis sanatorium, a Union Civil War Camp, an insane asylum, a reformatory and it was also used to launch missiles during the Cold War in the sixties. This desolate island at one time also housed a rehab facility. However, Hart Island continues to be used as NYC Potter’s Field.
Today, the NYC Council is working out a plan on how to improve and upkeep as well as transportation to Hart Island.
This smaller island is next to City Island - A Slice of NYC Paradise in The Bronx, which is headquarters for #CityImages. Hart Island has inmates digging the graves under the control of the NYC Department of Corrections, but if the council approves a measure, it will become a City Park https://www.amny.com/news/city-leaders-vote-to-remedy-hart-island-ameri…
The Island of The Dead - Hart Island sometimes referred to as Hart's Island is located at the western end of Long Island Sound, in The Bronx, NYC. Measuring approximately 1 mile long by 0.33 miles wide, Hart Island is part of the Pelham Islands archipelago, to the east of City Island. Who will control Hart Island? https://cbsloc.al/2XcxU7M
NYC Council considers turning mass gravesite on Hart Island into a city park
https://www.6sqft.com/nyc-council-considers-turning-gravesite-on-hart-i…