Brooklyn Today November 21: Do You Know the Way to Basquiat’s Grave?

November 21, 2018 Brooklyn Daily Eagle

Share this:

***The Brooklyn Daily Eagle office will be closed on Thursday and Friday for Thanksgiving. The next Brooklyn Today newsletter will be sent on Monday, Nov. 26.***

Weather, Brooklyn (NWS): Day 41°, Night 22°, Mostly Sunny

Send tips to [email protected]. Click here to signup.

Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
THE LEDE: Happy Wednesday! We show you the way to Jean-Michel Basquiat’s grave, Brooklyn’s most popular dog names are revealed, and New York urges Trump to abandon his “discriminatory gender policy.” Plus, a water tower bar is all the rage in Williamsburg, a Downtown Brooklyn apartment hits the market for $100 million, and the borough’s bus routes are redesigned. Finally, a Florida father’s discovery sends a Brooklyn rapist to jail, we recommend the best breakfast sandwiches in the city, and a woman is raped near Prospect Park. Have a great Thanksgiving!

IMPRINT: John Legend kisses his wife Chrissy Teigen on the latest coverof You Magazine.

____________________________
The Rundown
~DO YOU KNOW THE WAY TO BASQUIAT’S GRAVE?: It’s a good time to visit Jean-Michel Basquiat’s grave in Green-Wood Cemetery. The legendary artist, who died of an accidental drug overdose in 1988, is on New Yorkers’ minds these days. Work he painted in collaboration with Andy Warhol is on display in a blockbuster retrospective of the latter’s art at the Whitney Museum. Basquiat, who grew up in Boerum Hill, was the coolest of the cool kids in 1980s NYC. He was a Neo-Expressionist powerhouse. Brilliant. Beloved. Tragically addicted to heroin. Dead at age 27. Now he rests in peace beneath a plain granite headstone that says “Artist” and a blanket of autumn leaves in Brooklyn’s famous cemetery. (via Brooklyn Eagle)

~THE MOST POPULAR DOG NAMES ACROSS BROOKLYN: Say “farewell” to Fido and “see ya” to Spot. This year, the most common dog names in Brooklyn and Queens are Bella and Max — but that’s not to say all New Yorkers are on the same page when it comes to naming their pups. A new report from Localize.city shows that even though you’ll find a Bella or a Max at many a dog park across the two boroughs, the names will vary from ZIP code to ZIP code. Gizmo takes the number one slot in parts of Jamaica and Crown Heights, while residents of North Queens and South Brooklyn, perhaps fans ofSylvester Stallone, are most likely to name their dogs Rocky. (via Brooklyn Eagle)

~AG URGES TRUMP TO ABANDON ‘DISCRIMINATORY’ GENDER POLICY:New York’s AG is joining with 19 other offices to stop the feds from enforcing a definition of genders that would exclude the existence of transgender and gender nonconforming individuals. Last month, key officials in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services were considering adopting a definition of sex as an immutable, binary biological trait determined by or before birth. “The Trump administration is attempting to write transgender Americans out of existence,” said AG Barbara Underwood. “This policy is deeply cruel and simply unacceptable — and my office will do everything in our power to protect the rights of transgender and gender nonconforming New Yorkers.” (via Brooklyn Eagle)

~WOMAN RAPED NEAR PROSPECT PARK, SUSPECT ON THE LOOSE: A woman was raped near Prospect Park on Sunday. Around 4 a.m., the 59-year-old the victim was approached from behind by a man, who put her into a chokehold. The man, described as black and between 25 and 35 years old, allegedly told the woman that he had a knife and gun on him and threatened to hurt her if she did not comply with his demands. The woman was pushed against a parked van as the alleged rapist tried to sexually assault. He then dragged the woman behind a bench near Parkside Avenue and Parade Place along the southern side of Prospect Park and raped her. (via Brooklyn Eagle)

~GRIT MEETS GLAM: THE WATER TOWER BAR IS PEAK BROOKLYN:While Brooklyn has up-scaled radically over the years, its rugged water towers have stuck around, still capably performing their original function and now serving as a reminder of the borough’s industrial past. Now the water-tower motif has been cast in another role: as a nightlife peak experience. Opening last night, The Water Tower bar atop the Williamsburg Hotel is a glam, boozy, high-end moneymaker. The hotel’s third onsite watering hole is exactly what it sounds like: a speakeasy-style boîte housed high above the hotel, in a circular structure with a pointy top, shaped like an urban water tank. (The Bridge via Brooklyn Eagle)

~A DOWNTOWN BROOKLYN APARTMENT TOWER IS ON THE MARKET FOR $100M: The developer of one of Downtown Brooklyn’s newest rental apartment buildings is looking to sell it for $100 million. CBZ Management is putting the 21-story BRiQ apartment house, which has 110 units, on the market with an asking price of slightly more than $900,000 per unit. The name reportedly refers to the building’s red-brick facade. CBZ finished work on BRiQ, at 237 Duffield St., earlier this year and started renting in July. BRiQ contains a variety of studio, one-bedroom and two-bedroom apartments whose rents range from $1,117 to $4,550 per month. (The Real Deal via Brooklyn Eagle)

~CITYLAB UNVEILS REDESIGN OF BROOKLYN BUS SYSTEM: CityLab recently detailed the ills of Brooklyn’s bus system and designed an ideal bus system of its own. Bus ridership in the city as a whole has declined by 20 percent during the past decade. Reasons for that include growing congestion, demographic changes and system-wide MTA service cuts that began in 2010. CityLab’s imaginary bus route mainly consists of straight north-south and east-west routes rather than “zig-zagging trajectories.” The organization would like all routes to run buses every 6 minutes from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. (CityLab via Brooklyn Eagle)

~BROOKLYN CHILD SEX ABUSER TO BE SENTENCED IN FLORIDA: A Brooklyn man who has already done time for statutory rape was convictedThursday in Miami’s federal court of producing child pornography and committing a felony involving a minor. Dondell Davidson, 51, targeted an 11-year-old girl who lives in Port St. Lucie, Florida, in 2016. Eventually, he talked her into sending a photo of her genitals via email and masturbating during a video chat. After her father found out and reported the incidents to the police, investigators uncovered more than 1,600 messages between Davidson and the 11-year-old. (Miami Herald via Brooklyn Eagle)

____________________________

Staff Picks:
LONG READ: “Tests Showed Children Were Exposed to Lead. The Official Response: Challenge the Tests” (via NYT)

ANOTHER LONG READ: A massive earthquake will hit the Northwest. The only question is: When? (via The New Yorker)

EAT: Here are the 14 best breakfast sandwiches in New York City, including two in Brooklyn. (via Eater)

TECH: Google wants to create virtual reality sneakers. (via Ars Technica)

____________________________
NATIONAL BULLETIN: The first recreational marijuana stores in the East open in Massachusetts…Netflix was started after its founder got upset over a $40 late fee…And a $48.8 million mansion is torn down to make room for a new one in Florida. (via Boston Globe, Forbes and USA Today)

FOREIGN FLASH: An Australian wedding magazine closes after it refuses to feature same-sex marriages…Archaeologists discover an erotic Roman fresco in Pompeii…And an Australian girl auctions her virginity to pay off her parents’ mortgage. (via White Mag, BBC and News.com.au)

____________________________
ROYAL WATCH: Talk about strange traditions. The royal family gets weighed before and after Christmas dinner. (via Cosmopolitan)

____________________________

BROOKLYN TONIGHT
7:00PM — Heaven on Earth: T.J. Clark and Wendy Lesser at McNally Jackson. Details.

7:00PM – 9:00PM — Brooklyn Winery 101 at Brooklyn Winery. Details.

8:00PM — Consumption at Beverly Social Club. Details.

9:00PM — Internet Explorers at Caveat. Details.

9:30PM — 90s Hip Hop R&B Sing-Along at Union Hall. Details.

____________________________
EAGLE SPORTS: LIU-Brooklyn head men’s soccer coach TJ Kostecky was convinced his team would “make some noise” in the NCAA Tournament. The Blackbirds certainly did just that, running out to an early two-goal lead in Thursday’s first-round match at No. 18 West Virginia before having their magical season come to an all-too-abrupt end in an eventual 4-2 loss to the Mountaineers. (via Brooklyn Eagle)

____________________________
MILESTONES

Happy birthday to Troy Aikman, Bjork, Marcy Carsey, Richard J. Durbin, Ken Griffey Jr., Goldie Hawn, Carly Rae Jepsen, Laurence Luckinbill, Lorna Luft,Juliet Mills, Sam Palladio, Cynthia Rhodes, Nicollette Sheridan and Marlo Thomas!

Brooklyn Today’s editor is Scott Enman. Contact him at[email protected].