Is there any city in the U.S. as quintessentially American as Brooklyn? From Walt Whitman to the Dodgers, from George Gershwin to Coney Island, from Woody Allen to Flatbush, Brooklyn has been the source of so rich and varied a history that one might easily believe that this small corner at the northeastern edge of the continent had been conveniently set aside as a showplace for all that is most distinctive - and possibly eccentric - in American culture. This book is the first major celebration in text and pictures of this remarkable city. It beings with a brief history, tracing the gradual settlement of the western end of Long Island, from treaties with the local Indians to the less than enthusiastic 1898 union of the Independent City of Brooklyn with the City of New York. These chapters offer a cultural history of four of Brooklyn"s most estimable features: its waterfront, site of a once thriving shipping industry; its parks and open spaces, including Frederick Law Olmsted"s masterpiece of urban design, Prospect Park; its recreations ranging from the beloved underdog Dodgers to the fabulous array of amusement parks that have sprung up on Coney Island, and finally, its neighborhoods, diverse, fiercely partisan, and beautiful, from Flatbush to Brooklyn Heights, whose magnificent brownstones have been homes to so many great writers and artists. McCullough has written a graceful and witty text that, complement by a selection of rare historical pictures and Jim Kalett"s luminous, evocative photos, reveals the glories, idiosyncracies, and byways of Brooklyn.