anish and Norwegian New Yorkers came together in 1704 to build a small Lutheran church in lower Manhattan at Broadway and Rector, but it was between 1930 and 1960 that the New York Norwegian community reached its peak of up to 62,000 members. This community, at one time the third largest Norwegian-speaking city in the world after Oslo and Bergen, Norway, had grown into a city unto itself with a full range of institutions and services, centered in Sunset Park and Bay Ridge. The decline of shipping and the Great Depression caused hundreds of Norwegian sailors to seek shelter in makeshift shacks in the rubble of a dump in Red Hook, known by some as "Ørkenen Sur" (Bitter Desert) and knocked down in 1934 to make way for the current athletic fields. A Norwegian presence remains in Bay Ridge through a few remaining institutions, as well as an annual Norwegian Day Parade that brings back those who grew up here. Other Norwegian and Scandinavian hubs existed around the city, including in Eltingville on Staten Island.