Port Morris, Bronx

Port Morris is a neighborhood geographically located in the southwest corner of the Bronx, New York City. The neighborhood is part of Bronx Community Board 1. Its boundaries are the Major Deegan Expressway and Bruckner Expressway to the north, East 149th Street to the east, the East River to the southeast, the Bronx Kill to the south, and the Harlem River (Park Avenue stub) to the west. Its ZIP Codes are 10451 and 10454. The neighborhood is served by the NYPD's 40th Precinct.

Throughout its history, Port Morris primarily served as an industrial and manufacturing district well known for its piano factories. The now-filled Mott Haven Canal and Port Morris Branch provided freight access to the neighborhood. Since the late 1990s, aided by city rezoning, the neighborhood has experienced widespread residential and commercial redevelopment.

Oak Point, the southern tip of the West Bronx, is in Port Morris; it contains the Oak Point Yard. The area is also traversed by the Bruckner Expressway, a major freeway. Most of the neighborhood is within walking distance from several stations of IRT Pelham Line (6 train).

The history of Port Morris, as with other neighborhoods, is sometimes confused by the lack of fixed official boundaries. Late in the 20th century the name was sometimes applied to parts that included Mott Haven. Mott Haven by older definition lies to the north and west of Port Morris with the Major Deegan Expressway and Bruckner Expressway serving as modern boundaries.

There is some evidence that a British paymaster ship went down off Port Morris's coast during the American Revolutionary War with millions of dollars in gold aboard. The cargo has never been recovered.

The name comes from a deep water port established along the neighborhood's East River (Long Island Sound) waterfront by Gouverneur Morris Jr., son of Gouverneur Morris, in 1842. He built a two-mile (3 km) railroad from Melrose to his family's holdings on the waterfront, later called the Spuyten Duyvil and Port Morris Railroad, abandoned a hundred years later.

The area is dominated by factory and warehouse buildings constructed in the mid-to-late 19th century, convenient to the railroad yards, of which the Oak Point Yard is the main survivor. Notable early businesses were the R. Hoe Co.; Cutler & Hammer Tool Works; Mothers Friend Shirt Waist factory (1888) at Willow Avenue between East 135th and 136th Streets; and the Estey Piano Company Factory (now designated a city landmark by the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission). While many of the early industrial buildings remain, they are little used for manufacturing anymore.

In the 1870s the Mott Haven Canal emptied out into the Western Port Morris riverfront serving industry in the Mott Haven area. After being declared a "nuance" by the Board of Health in 1896 the canal was slowly re-filled, its last segment being in use until 1960s. Today only a small indentation in the Harlem River remains