The history of Brooklyn spans more than 350
years. The settlement began in the 17th century as the small Dutch-founded town
of "Breuckelen" on the East River shore of Long Island, grew to be a
sizable city in the 19th century, and was consolidated in 1898 with New York
City (then confined to Manhattan and part of the Bronx), the remaining rural
areas of Kings County, and the largely rural areas of Queens and Staten Island,
to form the modern City of New York.
