A Brief History Of Kings Highway

In many ways, Kings Highway is the mother to Brooklyn’s major thoroughfares. The roadway is reputedly named after King George III — the British monarch who ruled during the American Revolution — and the roots of Kings Highway predate even the first Dutch colonists. Over the centuries, it has slowly evolved into the road we know (and love?) today.

According to a recent write-up in Brownstoner, Kings Highway began as a trail used by the Canarsee Indians before it was later adapted by the Dutch to connect smaller roads and cow paths in Brooklyn’s early settlements.

The road is considered one of the first to be officially called a highway in the new world. Peter Stuyvesant used the term in a document dated June 4, 1654, according to Forgotten New York. Meanwhile, the name “Kings Highway” has been in use for more that 200 years.

Kings Highway also once much longer and zigzagged through Brooklyn, connecting the Fulton Ferry to Flatlands and then turning southwest to head to what is now Bay Ridge, according to Forgotten New York. Much of Kings Highway was still dirt road all the way into the early 20th Century. However, a building boom in the 1920s, crowded the roadway with theaters and storefronts and parts of Kings Highway were widened to accommodate more traffic.

Eventually, the section of Kings Highway connecting Flatlands to the ferry terminal became Fulton Street, according to Forgotten New York, and was shortened to the path we know today connecting Brownsville to Bensonhurst.