B-cups and pigeon vests: Maidenform in Bayonne

Research often makes an interesting story even more fascinating. Case in point: pigeon bras.

Pigeon bras? You certainly knew that birds have breasts (so to speak) but so much so that they need support? Well... not really.

It all starts with a bit of reading I was doing for Women's History Month, where I stumbled on the story of Ida Cohen Rosenthal. A Russian immigrant who arrived in Hoboken in 1904, Ida soon married, bought a Singer sewing machine and went into business for herself as a dressmaker. Within 15 years, she and her husband William were operating a factory with 20 workers, but their time in Hoboken would be cut short due to snow. It wasn't that the white stuff was preventing their workers from getting to the shop, or curtailing their deliveries. What infuriated the Rosenthals was the fact they had to manage it. City statutes required property owners to clear snow from the public sidewalks in front of their buildings, and the couple apparently didn't want to be responsible for that task, sizable though their shop might be. Rather than hiring people to shovel their walk, they moved across the river, decamping to Washington Heights.

Their business prospering, the Rosenthals partnered with a friend, Enid Bisset, in a new Manhattan dressmaking venture, Enid Frocks. It was the 1920s, and the flapper look was in style, with its waifish, boylike appearance. To fit into the vogue fashion, women would bind their bosoms with plain strips of cloth to approximate a flat chest, despite their natural dimensions. Ida and Enid went one step beyond and created a bandeau that hooked in the back and cupped a woman's natural curves. Their dresses appealed to the more womanly customer, who didn't like the restrictive feeling of the fashion of the day. Including a brassiere with the purchase of an Enid Frocks dress, Ida and Enid apparently didn't initially recognize the bonanza they had created. Their customers would have to show them.

And, indeed, they did: after buying an Enid Frocks dress and accompanying bra, women would return to buy more undergarments, which the women accommodatingly sold them for a dollar apiece. Ida created the brand name "Maiden Form" to differentiate the womanly bras from the boyish look of the flapper fashion, and the undergarment business took off, despite warnings from her brothers, who told her to stick with dresses. In fact, it was the bra, not the dress, that kept the company afloat after the stock market crash of 1929, when competing dressmakers went out of business. Already, the success of the business had led the Rosenthals back to New Jersey when Maiden Form outgrew its New York factory. According to some sources, it eventually became one of the largest employers in Bayonne, doing well throughout the Great Depression.

Which leads us to... pigeon bras. Maiden Form, like virtually every manufacturer in the United States, had to fight tooth and nail to get raw materials during World War II. If it wasn't needed for the war effort, it wasn't going to get to the factory. Ida, in her own spunky style, convinced government officials that her business was absolutely essential. Wouldn't women serving in the WACs and WAVES face fatigue without the right support from a Maiden Form bra? (Ironically, Jane Russell would famously support this concept for another manufacturer in commercials for the 18 hour bra.) Parts of the business also converted to parachute making, while yet another group at the Bayonne factory turned out pigeon vests. Sewn from bra fabric and attached to a paratrooper's gear, the vests enclosed a carrier pigeon, which the paratrooper would release with a message once he'd landed in enemy territory. Soldiers being who they are, the vests quickly became known as bras.

The challenge of wartime shortages overcome, Ida brought her company into the late 40s and 50s with a series of innovative advertising campaigns that kept Maiden Form in the vanguard of women's undergarments. William had already made substantial contributions to design, including standardized cup sizes to ensure women could find a reliable fit, time after time. By 1960, the company's name had evolved to Maidenform, its founder still active in the business at an age when most folks would have retired. The business had expanded into Europe and Latin America, its manufacturing moving to southern states and Puerto Rico. Ida continued to work until suffering a stroke at the age of 80, leaving Maidenform in the capable hands of her daughter.

Today, Maidenform is part of Hanes Brands and retains offices in Iselin, its former Bayonne factory now converted into chic apartments. You have to wonder how many people know the unique way the small city supported the troops in World War II... or, for that matter, millions of American women. I do know that the next time I drive down Avenue E, I'll give a small salute and a knowing grin to the pigeons hanging out in front of the brick building at number 154.

Anchors, birds, farmhouses and oil: the evolution of Bayonne's Constable Hook

Last week's visit to Bayonne revealed more than an interesting avian visitor and a surprisingly highbrow golf course. A small sign at the start of the Hudson River Waterfront Walkway revealed that Henry Hudson himself might have been the first to discover the site's ornithological gifts. Equally as interesting, my research revealed a truly hidden morsel of Dutch-American heritage lurking within the city's industrial heart.

Henry Hudson:
possibly the first guy to bird at Bayonne

I guess I shouldn't have been surprised to read that Hudson anchored his ship, the Half Moon, not far from the site of the current-day walkway when he first visited the area. Histories of early New World visitation by European explorers credit the English-born, Dutch-employed sea captain with discovering New York Harbor, Manhattan and the river that was later named for him. They don't say much, if anything, about the place where he parked the craft after sailing through the Verrazzano Narrows upon his arrival in September 1609.

As it turns out, it was at a bulge along the peninsula between the river and the Kill van Kull, now known as Constable Hook in Bayonne. Hudson reportedly called the area Bird Point in recognition of the prevalence of gulls at the site.

In fairness, the Dutch West India Company wasn't paying Hudson to look for birds, but for the northwest trade route to Asia. According to the First History of Bayonne printed for the 250th anniversary of the city's settlement, the local natives were both friendly and generous. Members of the Raritan branch of the Lenape tribe "visited his vessel daily, bringing furs, oysters, corn, beans, pumpkins, grapes and apples to trade." The dense forests of the area were home to an abundance of animals including panthers, bears, snakes, beavers and rabbits, making the region even more attractive for settlement and establishing trade.

Some of the encounters between natives and newcomers turned violent during Hudson's 1609 visit to the area, but I couldn't find accounts of any disputes at Bird Point -- it's possible they might have occurred on nearby Staten Island or perhaps farther south near Sandy Hook. What is known is that Hudson stayed near Bayonne only for a short time, leaving to explore the river route clear up to present-day Albany.

The Bird Point peninsula remained solely in Lenape hands until 1646, when the Dutch West India Company granted the land to constable Jacob Jacobsen Roy, who apparently never did anything with the property. Instead, the tract lay unchanged until about 1700, when Pieter von Buskirk arrived from Manhattan to build a house and start a farm. About 35 years later, he buried his wife Tryntje nearby, starting a family cemetery that reportedly grew over the years to include neighbors as well.

For 200 years von Buskirk's descendants lived on the property as the world changed around them. The family sold a portion of the land to the Hazard Powder Company in 1798, probably one of the first signs of heavy industry in the area. Real estate speculation and the attendant population growth spurred the communities of Constable Hook, Bergen Point, Salterville and Centerville to unite as Bayonne in 1861. The Central Railroad of New Jersey laid tracks into the city, bringing even more industrialization. And finally, in 1872, John D. Rockefeller's Standard Oil Company became the first of several refiners to settle on Constable Hook, attracted by its key position on New York Bay.

By 1900, the land Pieter von Buskirk tended tilled had become a different kind of farm, lined with acres of oil tanks to serve what was, for a time the world's largest refinery. The family farmhouse was demolished by Standard Oil in 1906; many of the cemetery plots were emptied, their contents moved to other graveyards despite a court battle waged by family members who reportedly hadn't visited in decades. Another burial ground started by one of Pieter's descendants remains, still in some semblance of order among the massive tanks of a company that specializes in oil and chemical storage. (Look closely at the grassy area on this Google Earth view and you might locate it.)

You have to wonder if the spirits of Pieter and Tryntje von Buskirk wander the streets of Bayonne looking for their homestead, and perhaps the gulls of Bird Point. Maybe they gain some solace from the restored wetlands near the waterfront walkway, or perhaps they've found some peace in their ultimate resting place, though not on their own family property.

All hail the King (rail) of Bayonne!

Wow, was all I could say. I went to Bayonne to find a new species for my New Jersey birding list, and I was astounded by what else I found.

The New Jersey birding community has been abuzz with the sighting of a King rail near the Hudson River Waterfront Walkway, a natural oasis of sorts nestled among the city's shipping terminals and oil tanks. Finding rare avian visitors in industrialized areas is no real shock for local birders - as we've found often in Hudson County, pockets of nature thrive where some would assume it to be impossible, and water quality has improved enough to host wildlife. I wasn't quite sure what I'd find there, but I was prepared for just about anything. Maps of the area showed a good-sized green area labeled "Bayonne Golf Club" on a tract of land jutting into upper New York Bay. Rather than looking into it before my trip, I just headed out, road directions in hand.

As for the King rail, it's a rarer visitor to New Jersey's marshes than the species usually seen here, the Clapper rail. Well, it's usually more "hearing" than "seeing": secretive by nature, rails generally live among the reeds and grasses of wetlands, frustrating birders by their clapping calls. (Needless to say, rails are masters at the game of Marco Polo.)  If you're going to see them at all, it's likely to be at low tide as they come out to feed on crustaceans and insects. Clappers tend toward saltwater marshes, while Kings are freshwater birds, with the two species sometimes sharing space (and cross mating) in brackish marshes. Bayonne, located on the bay where Hudson River and Atlantic Ocean waters meet and mix, is apparently geographically desirable for Kings and Clappers.

After a wrong turn that landed me in Bayonne's Marine Ocean Terminal, I found parking for the Walkway in a strip mall lot. I was barely out of my car when I saw a binocular-wearing couple coming off the path. "Here for the rail?" one asked. Just down the path a bit, alongside the long bridge, he told me, adding that other birders were still there. The usual rule was in force: when in doubt where to find a chase bird, look for the crowd.

The walkway winds along the northern edge of what's traditionally known as Constable Hook, with an inlet on one side and a reclaimed landfill on the other. This, as I discovered, was no typical capped landfill, but more on that in a moment. The wild grasses and flowers on the undulating slope put me in the mind of Scotland or Ireland, and the goldfinches perching on the thistles had to agree that someone had done a good job of making a nice habitat. I noticed a few egrets in the inlet to my left, patiently waiting for an early lunch to swim by.

The farther I walked along, the more the pieces came together. The "Bayonne Golf Club" I'd seen on the map isn't a city owned course; it's an all-out exclusive country club, modeled after the traditional links courses in Scotland. At the crest of the hill was a large, expensive-looking clubhouse with a huge American flag flying beside it. According to designer Eric Bergstol, as quoted on Golf.com, the economics of converting the landfill and doing the necessary wetlands mitigation blew the concept of a low-cost public links course out of the water, so it appears he hit for the fences. Bulldozer-sculpted hills and dales are lined by grasses, shrubs and flowers recommended by a Rutgers agronomist, all within the backdrop of Manhattan, the Statue of Liberty and the container cranes of the port. As part of the deal, the developers were required to provide public access to the waterfront, hence the walkway.

The King rail had found a home in a most regal environment.

Fortunately, if a rule of finding chase birds is to find the crowd, the next rule is to look wherever you see someone aiming their optics. As I crossed the bridge on the walkway, I encountered a man with a viewing scope aimed between the railing and support struts. Maybe he had the rail? I walked up slowly, figuring not to scare it if it was there. It wasn't, but the consolation was a very cooperative Yellow-crowned night heron, plus more specific guidance on the rail's whereabouts. It wasn't much farther - maybe 100 feet.

Two birders were on the site as I arrived, waiting for the secretive rail to emerge from the grass to forage on the small patch of mud to the side of the bridge. A little farther down, where a wider mudflat held a stream, they'd seen a rail chick who was a bit less shy, and in the distance they'd noticed a Clapper rail.

Yup, that's the King rail, right in the middle.

Knowing I wouldn't be able to differentiate a King rail chick from a Clapper rail chick, I decided to wait the adult King out by the mud patch. A moment or two later, I noticed some movement in the grass, just behind the first layer of reedy grass. Looking closer, I was pretty sure it was the King (overall, they're a rustier shade than their cousins), but it was tough to tell because he was preening. I wasn't going to let that be the sum of my first-ever look at his species, so I sat down to wait, staring at that patch of grass as the occasional golf cart whirred past behind me.

It may sound crazy, but in situations like that, I like to send a mental message to the bird, letting him know it's safe and I just want to admire him. Sometimes it works; other times it rises to levels of frustration that nearly lead me to a Sheldon Cooper-type tantrum.

Are we in golf heaven? No, Bayonne.

This time it worked. Like an actor coming onstage, the rail emerged from the curtain of grass to walk to an open area where I could see him completely. Stopping, he posed with his wings raised above his back, as if to air them. Then, like a model, he walked a few more steps and turned, allowing me to see the rest of him as I committed him to memory.

Just as I was thanking the bird for being so cooperative, a golf cart stopped behind me and the King ducked back into the grass. Two course employees were wondering why so many binocular-toting people had been standing around the bridge for the past few days. Pulling out my Sibley guide to show them, I explained the significance of the rail and complimented them on the golf club's work to create a good environment for birds. It didn't occur to me until now that the rail was as much of a VIP (or VIB) as any of the club's members, and he didn't require use of the club's exclusive boat or helicopter to get to the links.

PTs and phragmites: Naval history and nature mix in Bayonne

When you're both a curious avocational historian and an early-stage birder, you tend to end up in places that might not seem useful to either interest. That's not such a bad thing. The basic premise is that you don't know what you don't know. If you're not sure a location is historic, or if the habitat might be a little off, you can't automatically discount it for being barren of a good story or a good bird. If you take a look around and keep an open mind, you might be rewarded with a real treat.

That was my rationale for a recent visit to Bayonne. From a geographic perspective, it looks great: located at the southern tip of the peninsula separating Newark Bay from the lower Hudson River, the city's borders are mostly shoreline. However, this advantage, combined with proximity to New York and Newark, made it the perfect place for industry. Starting with the construction of the city's first oil refinery in 1875, Bayonne became heavily industrialized, resulting in a gritty image and negative environmental implications. So much for the birds, right?

Not so fast. From the Meadowlands to Linden, we've seen some incredible wildlife in areas that are bouncing back from years of neglect or abuse. As for Bayonne, local birders have reported interesting species in and around the waterfront parks, so I decided to take a look. A quick check of the map showed a nice bit of marshy open space right on the bay, accessible directly from Route 440. Granted, you can't expect much from visiting a marsh in the midst of an extended period of sub-freezing weather -- it's highly unlikely you'll find anything but ice -- but I figured the bay might reveal some interesting ducks. And who knows? I might run into a few historical markers along the way.

After navigating the heavy truck traffic of US 1 and 9 and then 440, I made the quick turn into a small parking lot for Rutkowski Park. As promised, it's on the waterfront, easily accessible by car if you have good reflexes and no 18-wheelers are barreling down your neck. The only other vehicle in the parking lot was a utility van.

The park itself seems rather unassuming from the highway approach -- a somewhat hilly field with paved paths -- one headed toward the water's edge and another headed straight back to the marsh. Walking along the bay, I soon found the men responsible for the van, braving the chill with rod and reel despite signs warning the dangers of eating locally-caught crabs. A little farther along, I saw a few mallards and buffleheads drifting not far from shore.

The ELCO crane, with the NJ 

Turnpike extension in the background.

As I continued my stroll, a strange yellow contraption came into view, looking way too well-maintained to be something the park's designers left because they couldn't move it. A detailed historical plaque dismissed all doubt: this thing wasn't just there intentionally, it had been moved from another waterfront location in Bayonne specifically because of its significance.

This contraption was a crane which once stood within the boatyard of the Electric Launch Company, better known as Elco. Now replaced by the Boatworks condo development, Elco operated at its Avenue A and 8th Street location from 1892 to 1949.

The company's roots were in pleasure and utility craft, building electric-powered boats (equipped with Edison storage batteries, if my research proves correct) for clients including Charles Lindbergh and Henry Ford. However, its real claim to fame was as a defense contractor, constructing fast boats for the United States and its allies during both World Wars. Specifically, Elco built the 80-foot Patrol Torpedo (PT) boat, the primary motor torpedo boats used by the Navy during World War II. The men and women of Elco built 170 PTs at Bayonne, and the crane at Rutkowski Park once lowered the newly completed vessels into Newark Bay.

Known as mosquito boats for their ability to reach a target almost silently, the wooden-hulled, gas powered PT boats carried crews of 12 to 14 men and performed multiple duties, from laying mines to rescuing stranded aviators. Some even participated in the D-Day invasion at Normandy. The most famous of the Bayonne alumni was PT-109, which, under the command of Lt. (j.g.) and future present John Kennedy, was rammed and sunk by a Japanese destroyer in August 1943.

Unfortunately, Bayonne's Elco crane is likely one of the few large and authentic relics of the PT. Only one of the boats still exists, according to the U.S. Navy's Naval History and Heritage Command, the rest having been disposed of shortly after V-J Day. Elco itself merged with Electric Boat of Groton, Connecticut in 1949 to form General Dynamics; entrepreneurs revived the Elco name in 1983 to manufacture electric boat motors and pleasure craft in Athens, New York.

As for the rest of Rutkowski Park, I've vowed to return once the weather warms and the marsh thaws a bit. Having found some unexpected history, I can't wait to see what might be lurking in the tall grass along the boardwalk.

Many thanks to Jodi Jameson of Hackensack Riverkeeper for the heads up on Rutkowski Park!