Stephen M. Ostrander

A 19th-century historian and writer, he is known for A History of the City of Brooklyn and Kings County. The published edition describes him as an M.A. and notes that he had been a member of the Holland Society, the Long Island Historical Society, and the Society of Old Brooklynites.

The book’s prefatory material explains that when he died in 1885, he had already completed a substantial amount of manuscript for a history of Brooklyn and Kings County, along with chronological notes and a large body of research. Some of his earlier work had appeared in the Brooklyn Eagle in 1879–80, and that newspaper series grew into the larger historical project.

His major history was eventually published in 1894, edited by Alexander Black, which suggests both the scale of his ambitions and the value later readers placed on his research. For listeners interested in Brooklyn’s origins and development, his writing offers the perspective of a deeply committed local historian.