Many Puerto Ricans migrated to Brooklyn on the SS CAROLINA, from 1906 - the year the New York and Porto Rico Steamship Company purchased the vessel - to June 2, 1918, the date the ship was sunk by a German U-boat.

Fifteen of the 335 people on board were lost when the CAROLINA was torpedoed. Survivors held annual commemorative reunions, giving the ship a heightened cultural significance. Years later, the band leader Rafael Cortijo with singer Ismael Rivera recorded "Carolina," which celebrates the ship.