Owl's Head Park

Owl's Head Park is a 24-acre city park on a hill above Shore Road in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, between Shore Road, 68th Street and Colonial Road. Its paths climb a ridge left by the last glacier, and from the top you look out over the Narrows, the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge and New York Harbor.

For Troop 23 the park is two things at once. When the troop was formed in December 1910, it met in a barn on the estate that later became this park. It is also the park closest to our home at Our Lady of Angels, under a mile away, where the troop ends its year, takes meetings outdoors, and has put in a good share of work.

The map above marks the troop's usual spot, just inside the park along 68th Street, between Colonial Road and Narrows Avenue.

Where Troop 23 Began

Before it was a park, the hill was a private estate. Henry C. Murphy, a mayor of Brooklyn, a congressman and later the state senator who drafted the bill that authorized the Brooklyn Bridge, built his house here. The estate then passed to Eliphalet W. Bliss, a manufacturer who made his fortune bringing mass production to the pressed-metal industry. Bliss refurbished the house and added a horse stable and an observatory tower, with a view across the bay to Staten Island and the Watchung Mountains of New Jersey.

From 1910 Troop 23 met in the estate's barn. John Falk, who was in the troop in 1925, remembered it as "a monstrous scary place loaded with large Bliss Foundry patterns, even in the generous horse stalls," with two rooms at the back that served as the troop's offices. Meetings went to advancement training, marching drills on the parade grounds next door, contests between patrols, and some fun and games.

Bliss's will offered the estate to the city for less than it was worth, on condition that it be used only as a park, and in 1928 it became one. In the late 1920s or early 1930s the troop moved to the YMCA at 4th Avenue and 67th Street, later to the gym of Bay Ridge High School, and in the 1940s to Our Lady of Angels, its home ever since. The mansion, the stable and the tower were gone by 1940. In 2004 the estate's original wrought-iron gates, with Bliss's initials EWB, were put back at the park's southeastern entrance. The rest of the story is on the troop's history page.

Troop 23 in the Park Today

Owl's Head is where the troop goes when a meeting needs grass instead of a floor. The last meeting before summer is usually held here, with pizza. In June 2024 it was shared with Cub Scout Pack 23: the Cub Scouts raced their boats in a Raingutter Regatta, and everyone ate on blankets on the grass (Pizza Party in Owl's Head Park). When the pandemic stopped indoor meetings, the troop met here outdoors, and in May 2026 a Monday meeting moved to the park so Scouts could pitch a tarp shelter with the taut-line hitch and two half hitches.

The park has also had a good deal of the troop's service. In April 2024 Scouts and leaders joined a work day of the Owl's Head Park Volunteers, the park's own volunteer group, filling holes on the hillside with mulch. Within six months, three of our Scouts carried out their Eagle Scout service projects here. Shi painted park benches in December 2023. James painted benches, mulched trees and put in dog-waste bag dispensers in April 2024; troop leader Sherman Wong built the dispensers. In May 2024 Ivan cleared soil, trash and invasive plants from the fence line along the park's shared walking and biking path and mulched the slope behind it. All three went on to become Eagle Scouts.

Getting There

Owl's Head Park is in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, bounded by Shore Road, 68th Street and Colonial Road, ZIP 11220. From Our Lady of Angels it is under a mile on foot. The park has public restrooms, a playground, basketball courts, a dog run and the Millennium Skate Park.

Just below the park, by the water at 69th Street, is the American Veterans Memorial Pier, where the troop comes each September for the 9/11 vigil.

Owl's Head Park is run by NYC Parks: nycgovparks.org, with its history of the park. Troop 23 is a Scouts BSA troop in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, and every family starts the same way: come to a Monday meeting.