On September 29, students from SFC's Center for Entrepreneurship visited the Brooklyn Navy Yard with Cindy VandenBosch, founder and owner of Turnstile Tours, a company with a social mission that works in partnership with the Brooklyn Navy Yard Center at BLDG 92 to lead tours of the Yard.

Once a federal shipyard, the Brooklyn Navy Yard today is owned by the City of New York and is home to more than 330 businesses in industries ranging from ship repair to whiskey distilling, space suit design to modular home fabrication. While traversing the 300-acre industrial site with Cindy, students learned about the industrial sector in New York City and the stories behind a wide range of businesses at the Yard, from one-person start-ups to decades-old companies that employ hundreds of people.

While more than 20 companies were highlighted, a few of them included Cumberland Packing, a Yard tenant that packages Sweet N' Low and Sugar in the Raw; GMD Shipyard, a ship repair company that uses the dry docks at the Yard; Crye Precision, a business that designs and manufactures uniforms, equipment, and body armor; Final Frontier Design, a small company that specializes in the design of space suits; and Underground Signs, designer and producer of custom-made subway signs for personal use.

As an entrepreneur herself, tour leader VandenBosch reflected on her own experience of starting up and operating one of New York State's first benefit corporations and building a tour business that roots its work in community partnerships and specializes in the advancement of public knowledge about the meaning of place.

Turnstile Tours offers seven theme-based public tours of the Brooklyn Navy Yard in conjunction with the Brooklyn Navy Yard Visitor & Exhibition Center at BLDG 92. To learn more, please visit bldg92.org or turnstiletours.com.

Photo: SFC students, Professor Mary Gelormino, and tour company entrepreneur Cindy VandenBosch in front of the Perry and Paymaster Buildings, home to Duggal Visual Solutions and Kings County Distillery.