Image by Thomas Johnson from Brooklyn Museum in Wikimedia Commons

Walt Whitman is one of America’s literary giants. The poet lived and worked part of his life in what was then the independent city of Brooklyn and the now borough permeates much of his work. Although more than a century of transformations have significantly changed the Brooklyn that Whitman knew, if one looks close enough it is still possible to see remnants of Whitman’s time.

1. Fulton Ferry Landing

No person has ever described the commute of a typical Brooklynite as beautifully as Walt Whitman in his poem “Crossing Brooklyn Ferry.” In this poem, the poet describes the experience of crossing the East River from Brooklyn to Manhattan just before sunset. And although the original ferry landing is now part of Brooklyn Bridge Park, the park itself commemorates it’s native son with an inscription of the poem along its railings. Fulton Ferry Landing is now home to food vendors and Bargemusic a classical music hall housed on a floating barge at the foot of the Brooklyn Bridge.