The Gun of Kingsborough Community College: A historical tribute
Daily, hundreds of students walk past the gun on Kingsborough’s campus without questioning its relevancy or history. Those who know may refer to it, erroneously, as a cannon. It stands in front of the historic flagpole, a souvenir from The New York World’s Fair of 1939. The reason for the gun would be better understood if the World War II Merchant Marine plaque were adjacent to it rather than mounted on a building wall far away.
The gun, mounted on a turret, survives as a relic of the Merchant Marine base that occupied the tip of Manhattan Beach during World War II, from 1942-45. The gun was willed to the college along with wooden barracks, naval street signs and The Rainbow Bandshell. The plaque names 228 sailors who trained on the base but were killed in action.