The Bold Plan to Save an 8-million Pound Hotel From the Ocean

In ‘This Week in History,’ six train engines, 112 railcars, 24 railroad tracks, and a team of determined Americans work to save a grand hotel.

Brighton Beach Hotel, between 1900 and 1910. Library of Congress. Public Domain

The owners of Brighton Beach Hotel had two options: move the hotel or lose it. The threat did not come from extortionists, competitors, or even the government. The threat came from the ocean.

Certainly, the owners preferred to maintain their hotel, but in order to do that they had to choose the option to move the 8-million pound structure. The lingering question was “How exactly does one move a hotel?” To add to the problem, the owners couldn’t allow the question to linger for much longer. If the hotel was to be moved, it would take a Herculean effort, and the effort would need to be coordinated soon.

Creating Brighton Beach

The very existence of the Brighton Beach Hotel, built in 1878, had taken a Herculean effort. William A. Engeman had a vision for this particular section of Coney Island known as Middle Division, but first he needed to purchase the land, and in order to do that, he needed to find out who owned it. That’s where the initial Herculean effort came into play.

Engeman had made his fortune selling mules and horses to the Union Army during the Civil War. And, indeed, purchasing all of the deeds to the beachside property required a fortune. The area that interested Engeman was owned by several hundred landowners, each owning a small piece, typically around two acres. It took several years for Engeman to identify the individual lots, acquire the sales records for each, contact the owners, make an offer, and settle each and every one of them.

Grand review of the great veteran armies of Grant and Sherman at Washington, in May 1865. Around three million horses and mules were used in various capacities during the Civil War. Library of Congress. Public Domain

Finally, the land belonged to him. His first point of business was to build a hotel. The first hotel, built in 1870, was a two-story building called Ocean Hotel. He then followed this by building Coney Island’s first pier and later added a pavilion to it.

But Engeman had bigger goals. He wanted to build a racetrack and a bathhouse. When he was presented with an offer from several railroad executives to build a rail line through his land, it provided him the opportunity to cash in on a portion of his land holdings and build several entertainment facilities.

Building Brighton Beach Hotel

Hotel Brighton, Brighton Beach, circa 1879. New York Public Library Digital Collections. Public Domain

More importantly, the investment by the railroad company, which was incorporated as Brooklyn, Flatbush and Coney Island Railroad, enabled him to build another hotel. The new Brighton Beach Hotel, often called Hotel Brighton, was placed rather close to the existing Ocean Hotel.

The Brighton Beach Hotel was larger and more elegant, capable of accommodating well over 1,000 people. The Gothic-style hotel had 174 rooms at a scale of three and five stories, depending on the section of the hotel; a wraparound porch and veranda on the first and second floors, respectively; a 175-foot bar in the lobby; elevators; lounges; a ballroom; a 16-table billiard room; three bowling alleys; a flower shop; beauty parlor; card room; telegraph office; a confectionary; an ice cream shop. The facility held two concerts daily.

The hotel opened in the summer of 1878 to much fanfare. One report suggested it cost $300,000 to build and furnish (about $10 million today). The fanfare and foot traffic increased dramatically when the rail line, which was quickly dubbed the Brighton Line, opened on July 1, 1878, just in time for the major holiday. A year later, Engeman built his horse racetrack. Brighton Beach was a place where families of varying classes, though primarily middle to upper class, could easily reach by train and choose to stay either for the day or overnight.

Brighton Beach Race Course lithograph from circa 1887. Library of Congress. Public Domain

The location of the hotel was ideal with the addition of the nearby train and the previously built amenities. Additionally, it was about 150 yards from the extent of the ocean at high tide. A low tide would provide about 500 feet of beach. That distance, however, closed rather quickly.

Facing the Inevitable

On Jan. 11, 1884, William A. Engeman, on the cusp of his 45th birthday died of Bright’s disease. His estate was split between his two brothers, George and John, and his only son, William. The latter received half of the estate, George received 40 percent and managed the estate, including the hotel, with John receiving 10 percent. By the time of his death, it was clear that the Brighton Beach Hotel was under threat from the encroaching tides. A week after his death, it became even clearer.

On Jan. 18, a major storm hit New York. The storm destroyed Engeman’s pier and washed away the grassy lawn in front of the hotel. It was the second time in three years the lawn had been washed away. Beachfront properties always run the risk of taking the brunt of powerful storms, which includes ocean surges. Bulkheads had been placed in front of several hotels along the Coney Island beaches, but the worry was becoming less about future storms and more about erosion and the reach of the sea. With each passing month, the ocean neared closer to Hotel Brighton.

By the winter of 1884 to 1885, George Engeman directed the removal of the Brighton Bathing Pavilion further inland about 150 feet due to the rising tides. It was another sign of what needed to happen to the hotel.

Forming a Plan

By 1887, a costly plan was put into place. Brighton Beach Hotel needed to be moved further inland and soon. By this time, the tides had already reached the hotel, leaving much of its front overhanging the ocean.

“The sea has steadily encroached upon the land at Brighton Beach for years,” the Evening World reported, “and despite the clause in the law of the land that no man shall be deprived of his property without just compensation, Old Neptune has gobbled up a nice bit of real estate with a 500-foot sea frontage and a depth of 500 feet, to which the hotel people hold a title deed. And this squatter who will not be evicted now threatens to crowd the original grantees still more. To avoid further conflict the company decided to remove [Brighton Beach Hotel] at an expense of $20,000 or more.”

The directors of the new Brooklyn and Brighton Beach Railroad Company, which had purchased the old bankrupt Brighton Line, coordinated with the Engeman estate on a plan. The plan was to lift the approximately 8-million pound hotel, place railroad tracks underneath, and pull it inland by train. The expense of $20,000 was certainly immense (about $688,000 today), but it was better than forfeiting the entire structure, not to mention all future business revenue.

The Big Test

B.C. Miller and Sons, a house-moving company, which had been used to move the Brighton Bath Pavilion, was contracted for the risky endeavor. In late 1887, the company dug underneath the hotel, removed foundation, and replaced the foundation with hydraulic jacks. Once all of the jacks were in place, the company removed the rest of the hotel’s foundation. The workers then placed 24 railroad tracks underneath. Once the tracks were laid, 112 flat railcars, each with a carrying capacity of 60,000 pounds, were placed on the tracks and underneath the lifted hotel. To further complicate the plan, the hotel had to be lowered by the jacks simultaneously. Despite the difficulty, the hotel was successfully lowered on the railcars. The effort, even by this point, was certainly, for the time period, Herculean.

It was time to test out whether the plan would even work or whether the movement of the hotel would destroy the structure and make the entire effort a waste. A large steel cable and tons of rope connected the railcars with six locomotives. These steam engines were separated by two railroad tracks, with three steam engines on both. These connected engines were scheduled to pull the cable connecting the railcars, and thus the entire hotel. Of the many things that could go wrong, the train engineers needed to ensure that their trains moved at the same exact time and at the same exact speed.

On Dec. 29, with the railcars and steam engines in place, a large crowd gathered to witness the first preliminary pull. A signal was given and the engineers shifted the trains into gear. The railcars inched forward, the crowd cheered, and the incremental movement made on this winter day proved the plan to be sound.

A Record-Setting Move

The Brighton Beach Hotel, Brooklyn, N.Y., being moved away from beachfront. The hotel was moved using flatcars on 20 railroad tracks, pulled by locomotives. Library of Congress. Public Domain

Now that it was clear the hotel could be moved successfully, it was several weeks before another attempt was made. A new foundation further inland was being laid, along with gas and water pipes, for the soon-to-arrive hotel. While this work was being done, the ocean made one last grasp for the hotel. On Feb. 25, 1888, a powerful storm hit New York. Fortunately, the hotel and the railcars it rested on remained intact.

It was during this week in history, on April 3, that the six locomotives on two tracks began pulling the 112 railcars holding the 8-million-pound hotel along 24 train tracks. The entire effort was scheduled to take about 10 days to complete. As the hotel was slowly pulled, the rails that had been passed by the cars would be pulled up and placed further ahead. It was a constant pulling up and laying down of rails.

“The hotel, when permitted to rest again, will be 550 feet inland from its former site,” the Evening World reported. “It will be the biggest case of house-moving on record.”

The Herculean effort to move the Brighton Beach Hotel was a success. It was reported that not even a pane of glass was cracked. The hotel not only survived the trip, it remained a staple of the Coney Island area for the next three decades.

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