"By an invention of Mr. John G. Murphy, father of ex-Senator Henry C. Murphy, the managers of these boats were enabled to reverse their machinery without changing the position of the horses. The steamboat was very popular with the public. Owing to its success there was soon a very marked desire in both cities for the addition of the second steamboat, in accordance with the terms of the contract made by the lessees with the city of New York. Objection was made by the lessees on the ground of additional expense, and boats run by horse power were substituted. In 1815 Robert Fulton died. Mr. Cutting, who had lived in New York, removed to Brooklyn, and died at his residence on the Heights in 1821. The winter of 1821-22 was one of the most severe in the history of the country. The ferries were obstructed by enormous quantities of floating ice. Great cakes became jammed between the double hulls, and travel was practically suspended. Brooklyn had grown rapidly, and an uproar arose in which the ferry management was roundly assailed. Who can tell but it was here that the original idea of the East River Bridge was first born? In 1827 a steamboat similar to the Nassau, and called the William Cutting, was put on the ferry, but even this did not satisfy the public, who were eagerly seeking more extended accommodations. In 1833 Messrs. David Leavitt and Silas Butler secured a controlling interest in the stock of the company, and sought to meet the anticipations of the people by adding two new steamboats, the Relief and the Olive Branch. Unlike their predecessors, these boats had single hulls and side wheels. Subsequently agitation in the southern part of Brooklyn led to the establishment of the South Ferry." In 1817, the Loisian Academy, which had been started four years before, received a salaried teacher, and was removed to the small frame house on Concord and Adams streets, where Public School No. 1 was afterward built. Brooklyn began soon after the Revolution to think seriously of the matter of incorporation as a village. On January 8, 1816, a public meeting was held at the public house of Lawrence Brown, "to take into consideration the proposed application for an incorporation of Brooklyn. A committee, consisting of Thomas Everit, Alden Spooner, Joshua Sands, the Reverend John Ireland, and John Doughty, met the following day at the house of H. B. Pierrepont. On April 12th the act incorporating the village passed the Legislature." [Illustration: FULTON FERRY-BOAT, WM. CUTTING _Built in 1827_]