April is "History Month" at Chelsea Piers. For four weeks (April 9-May 10), Chelsea Piers is offering free waterfront history classes to public, private and parochial school students from around the city. Nearly 1,000 students are booked to attend these free 75-minute classes about the history of waterfront activities at the site of Chelsea Piers. The class, entitled "These 30 Acres," is interactive and follows a time line from 1600 until the present. Classes are offered to students in grades 3-5. This is the sixth year for this very successful program, which has already been presented to over 5,500 students and teachers over the last five years.

First opened in 1910, today's Chelsea Piers are the last survivors of a once-grand row of nine ocean liner piers, which were a frequent port of call for all the great ships that sailed during the heyday of transatlantic voyages. Among the frequent visitors were the Lusitania, Mauretania, Barengaria and Olympic. The Chelsea Piers were to be the final stop on the maiden voyage of Titanic, a crossing that, as everyone now knows, ended in disaster on April 14, 1912. Thousands of immigrants traveling in "steerage" made the Chelsea Piers their first stop before being ferried to Ellis Island for processing.

The history being taught goes back even farther, and the discussion includes colonization by both the Dutch and the English, the birth of the Chelsea neighborhood in 1750 at a farm owned by Captain Thomas Clarke, the Chelsea-Gansevoort Plan of 1880, which called for the construction of the Chelsea Piers nearly thirty years before they were actually built, and the profound achievements and municipal improvements during the administration of Mayor George McClellan.

Classes are scheduled at the convenience of the schools. On Friday, April 19 and Saturday, April 20, 2002 at Noon, the general public is invited to attend open sessions of these history classes. If demand warrants, additional times will be scheduled. This is a perfect opportunity for senior groups, women's clubs, etc. to enjoy a thoughtful learning experience right where the history happened along the beautiful Hudson River. Reservations are necessary for this free class.

For more information about History Month or to reserve a space for you or your group, please call Ivy Balnarine at 212.336.6879.