Original invite to the tunnel's opening. Courtesy brooklynrail.net.
In 1861, a shady NYC contractor known as Electus Litchfield was hired by the city to close up a 17-foot-high, 21-foot-wide, 1,611-foot long tunnel running under Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn. The tunnel had been the home to the first-ever underground railway constructed in the world. It had been built by the Long Island Railroad in 1844 as an attempt to alleviate the deaths that were occurring on the streets above, as the train that ran there took about 8 blocks to stop—not the best way to protect the life of a pedestrian who might have stumbled onto the tracks. The tunnel was built entirely with hand tools, took seven months to complete and cost $66,000—a grand sum in those days, but not really for the tunnel’s backer, Cornelius Vanderbilt.
But it is to our advantage that Litchfield was not the most ethical of men, because he only filled in each end of the tunnel, rather than the whole thing (saving himself a good deal of cash).
Fast forward to 1981, when a young engineering student’s search through old moldy papers led him to surmise that the long-forgotten railway tunnel did in fact exist (rumors had circulated for years—including those involving German spies, vampires and John Wilkes Booth’s lost journal, but that’s fodder for another post). He eventually convinced the city to allow him to open a manhole over on Atlantic Avenue and, after clawing through some dirt with his bare hands, then smashing through a shoddily constructed brick wall, the young man—Bob Diamond—found what he had been looking for.
For nearly 30 years, Diamond led tours through the tunnel, regaling visitors with tales of politics, murder and corruption. Now, he may have fallen prey to the same treatment from the city (sans the murder part) as the NYC Department of Transportation shut down the tunnel in 2010 (they claim safety issues, Diamond claims otherwise).
Diamond continues to fight the decision though and you can get updates on his website that’ll tell you everything you’ve ever wanted to know about this hidden part of New York’s past.