This great vintage film from 1928 shows the Staten Island Ferry arriving to, and departing from, Whitehall Terminal in lower Manhattan. The boat seen here is the Bronx, commissioned by the City in 1905 after it took over the private Staten Island ferry service. The 246' vessel made regular tribes between Staten Island and Manhattan until it was scrapped in 1941.
It's impossible to know why Movietone's crew took this film of the arrival and departure of a New York ferry boat. But it's wonderfully moody and atmospheric, with the coming and going of people, cars, trucks, horses and carriages, accompanied by the ringing of bells and the blowing of whistles.
