Black Tom Island
The term "Black Tom" originally referred to an island in New York Harbor next to Liberty Island. The island received its name from a local legend of an African American resident named Tom. By 1880, a causeway and railroad had been built connecting it to the mainland for use as a shipping depot. Between 1905 and 1916, the Lehigh Valley Railroad Company, which owned the island and causeway, expanded the island with landfill, resulting in the addition of the entire area to the limits of Jersey City. The area contained a mile-long pier that housed the depot as well as warehouses for the National Dock and Storage Company.
Black Tom was a major munitions depot for the northeast. Prior to a 1915 blockade of the Central Powers by the Royal Navy, American industries were free to sell their materials to any buyer, but henceforth the Allies were the only possible customers. It was reported that on the night of the attack, two million pounds (1 kiloton) of ammunition were being stored at the depot in freight cars, including one hundred thousand pounds of TNT on the Johnson Barge No. 17, all awaiting eventual shipment to Britain and France. Jersey City's Commissioner of Public Safety, Frank Hague, reported he had been told the barge had been "tied up at Black Tom to avoid a twenty-five dollar towing charge" (US$534 in 2012).
Read more about this topic: Black Tom Explosion
Famous quotes containing the words black, tom and/or island:
“Belinda lived in a little white house,
With a little black kitten and a little gray mouse,
And a little yellow dog and a little red wagon,
And a realio, trulio, little pet dragon.”
—Ogden Nash (1902–1971)
“And the Angel told Tom if he’d be a good boy,
He’d have God for his father & never want joy.
And so Tom awoke and we rose in the dark
And got with our bags & our brushes to work.
Tho’ the morning was cold, Tom was happy & warm,
So if all do their duty, they need not fear harm.”
—William Blake (1757–1827)
“I ... would rather be in dependance on Great Britain, properly limited, than on any nation upon earth, or than on no nation. But I am one of those too who rather than submit to the right of legislating for us assumed by the British parliament, and which late experience has shewn they will so cruelly exercise, would lend my hand to sink the whole island in the ocean.”
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)