Pier 16, South Street Seaport
81 South Street | Financial District | built 1900
Open on the map7 entries
The city photographed every building for its tax records around 1940 and again in the 1980s. NYC Municipal Archives.
Written with AI from the source each entry cites, then fact-checked.
- 1924
The Fulton Ferry to Brooklyn stops running from Pier 16
A regular ferry service, the Fulton Ferry, linked Pier 16 on South Street with the Fulton Ferry landing in Brooklyn until 1924. In 1973, almost fifty years later, the Seaport museum floated the idea of a Brooklyn ferry from the Seaport again. Today New York Water Taxi serves the Seaport directly on summer Fridays, weekends and holidays.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1967
Seaport museum planners propose a permanent berth at Pier 16 for a rigger
By the 1960s the old Ward Line docks at Piers 15, 16 and part of 17 stood mostly empty. Peter Stanford and his wife Norma co-founded the Friends of South Street in 1966, and in 1967 he began pressing for a museum around South and Fulton Streets. The tentative plan for that museum included a rigger docked permanently at Pier 16, alongside restored buildings in a three-block area. The state legislature had already passed a law allowing a museum on Schermerhorn Row.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1968
The retired lightship Ambrose is given to the Seaport museum for Pier 16
Lightship No. 87 served as the Ambrose station vessel guarding the approach to New York Harbor until 1932, when a newer vessel replaced her. After the Coast Guard retired her in 1964 she was an exhibit at the World's Fair, then sat in Curtis Bay, Maryland. The South Street Seaport Museum was given the ship in 1968, and the federal landmark nomination form lists her location as Pier 16. It says she has undergone no alteration since she was decommissioned that year.
“Following the Fair she was laid up in Curtis Bay, Maryland, until 1968 when she was given to South Street Seaport Museum in New York City.”
Source: National Park Service
- 1970
By the early 1970s the Seaport Museum runs Piers 15 and 16, six ships and an exhibit hall
The old Ward Line docks, Piers 15 and 16 and part of 17, were mostly empty by the 1960s. Within a few years of that, in the early 1970s, the Seaport Museum operated Piers 15 and 16 along with six ships, an exhibit hall and a bookstore-gallery. The museum hosted sea shanty singing and small folk festivals, and drew half a million visitors a year.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1977
The Landmarks Commission includes Piers 15, 16 and 17 in the South Street Seaport Historic District
The 1977 designation report for the South Street Seaport Historic District covers the East Side piers along South Street. It recalls how clipper ships bound from Europe, the Orient and South America once tied up at Piers 15, 16 and 17. Thanks to the Seaport Museum, the report says, ships were again moored at those piers.
- 2016
The tall ship Wavertree returns to the Seaport after a $13 million restoration on Staten Island
The 1885 iron sailing ship Wavertree went to Caddell Dry Dock and Repair on Staten Island in May 2015 for a $13 million restoration funded by city agencies and officials. The job covered new steel plating under the waterline, a new ballast system, upgraded wiring and a cathodic protection system against corrosion. She returned to the South Street Seaport Museum on September 25, 2016.
Source: Wikipedia
- 2026
Wavertree and the lightship Ambrose are permanently moored at Pier 16 for museum visitors
The South Street Seaport Museum says its 1885 tall ship Wavertree and 1908 lightship Ambrose are permanently moored at Pier 16, and a general admission ticket brings visitors aboard both. The museum's fleet also includes the 1885 schooner Pioneer and the 1930 tugboat W.O. Decker.
Source: southstreetseaportmuseum.org
Further reading
- South Street SeaportWikipedia
Nearby
- South Street Seaport Pilot House1 entry
- Schermerhorn Row91 South Street | 4 entries
- Schermerhorn Row92 South Street | 3 entries
- 2 Fulton Street (Schermerhorn Row)93 South Street | 4 entries
- Pier 164 entries
- Schermerhorn Row, No. 4 Fulton Street4 Fulton Street | 3 entries