The Water's Edge

Point No Point... has become a metaphor for the eponymous point of land which was dredged out of existence and is slowly being recreated. The changes in the shoreline over time tell a great deal about Bridesburg’s relationship to its waterfront.

The 1849 map labels ‘Point No Point’ on the south side of the Frankford Creek where it enters the Delaware River. By 1861 Point No Point’ is labeled the north side of the creek and the former point to the south of the creek is gone. The river was dredged to a navigable depth up to the edge of Lennigs Chemical Works. A bulkhead has been built at the end of the creek channel, presumably to discourage silting the waterway and to maintain a navigable channel. through the creek. A mill race is shown off of the horseshoe curve on the creek to provide water power to a nearby mill.

Moderate changes to the 1875 riverfront shoreline include some filling and the additions of some piers at the north end of the peninsula and straightening the irregular shoreline south of the Bridge Street pier. A pond was excavated off Frankford Creek for industrial use on the Lennig property. The presence of waterways and shoreline modifications all bear witness to Bridesburg’s ability to capitalize on the surrounding water as a resource for transportation, processing material, disposal of human and industrial wastes and power.

By 1925 the Delaware shoreline was filled in to follow the straight run of the train tracks. The advent of rail transport made access to shipping less important just as the access to a millrace was no longer necessary as electricity became readily available. Improvements in public water and sewers soon leveled the playing field between waterfront and inland sites in terms of access to resources. Navigation in the creek ceased in 1928 due to silting from upstream erosion (A. Levine). The horseshoe bend was removed in 1934 (A. Levine)

Today, fill dumped between the railroad tracks and the river has added acres to the industrial properties that occupy all the land along Bridesburg’s waterfront. The shoreline now extends to the location of the former ‘Point No Point’ at the north tip of the peninsula and well beyond the historic shoreline at the south portion of the study area. The water that lapped at the Bridge Street pier has been displaced by tractor trailers parked on landfill which cut off the last access point between boats and Bridesburg.
The map above shows how the location of the water’s edge has changed in the study area since ‘Point No Point’ was labeled on Dripps map of 1849. The water's edges were traced from the author’s photos of historic maps indicated in the Maps and Images section of the Resource page. The condition and mounting of these maps precluded scanning and protective covers often required that photographs be taken at an angle to avoid glare. To rectify the angles along with the varying orientation and scales presented in different atlases, the photographs were skewed, scaled and rotated with reference to Bridge Street and Richmond Street. These streets are aligned in all maps from 1861 to the present and so that the rectified images offer an adequate basis for the purposes of this comparison. High-quality scans of the same maps will yield more accurate information on the location of historic structures when such documents become available.

This satellite image shows the mouth of the Frankford Creek cut off from its source after the creek was re-routed in the 1900's to create a straighter run to the river. The "Frankford Creek now parallels the on ramp to the Betsy Ross Bridge shown at the bottom of this photo. Image: Google Map http://maps.google.com/

"The Steamboat Columbia at the Bridge Street Wharf, 1923" As captioned and published in Historical Northeast Philadelphia. Note the two story Pier. By the 1950's the double-decker pier was replaced with this structure. From Images of America: Bridesburg (110) In 2005 front the dead end of the public portion of Bridge street there is neither a view of or access to the river. Photo: J. Spector

Since colonial settlement, the waterfront has been important to the economy and the recreation of the community. An interview with Viola Chalfont (b.1917, interview 1993) a longtime Bridesburg resident yielded stories about “Swimming in the river at the foot of Kirkbride Street as a young child. Also at the end of Bridge Street was a two story wharf. It was there that she played piano and dancing was held.” “Rohm and Haas has been an active part of the community in the past and continues to help out even today. Mr. Haas was visible part of the company and personally saw to it that no one would be laid off because of lack of work.” (Freitag & Silcox. 6 interview by John J. Shrimp) It is apparent that the people of Bridesburg are grateful to the enterprises and entrepreneurs that lined the waterfront and provided jobs to their neighbors.

By the later part of the twentieth century, the last recreational access to the waterfront, the pier at Bridge Street had been has been turned into a storage yard for Rohm and Haas. This loss is documented in the last three Sanborn atlases where the pier is colored yellow and labeled as “Bridge Street Municipal Pier” in 1947, as “Vac.”(Vacant) in 1967 and not labeled or colored at all by 1978. The photos above show the evolution of the public space at the waterfront from a recreational access to one that is completely blocked by the chain link gates of industries both viable and vacant.
Detail showing public pier designation at Bridge Street and Delaware Avenue right- of -way. Insurance Maps of Philadelphia. New York: Sanborn Map Company, 1947.
Detail showing vacant designation at Bridge Street. Delaware Avenue right-of-way is labeled 'Rohm & Haas Storage Yard. Insurance Maps of Philadelphia. New York: Sanborn Map Company, 1967.
Detail showing no pier designation at Bridge Street. Insurance Maps of Philadelphia. New York: Sanborn Map Company, 1978.