A Lakeview Gem - One More on EJ Jennings

As stated in my blog description above, one of the purposes of this website is to provide "then and now" visual perspectives of West Hempstead subjects. Old photos of West Hempstead are not easy to come by, but the ones that do exist and are accessible give us a glimpse of our rural beginnings and how different WH used to look like in the old days.

Thus far, all the subjects we have studied reveal "now" shots that show completely different landscapes from what once existed in the "then" shot. What was once a beautiful Victorian home is now a gas station. What used to be a hospital campus is now a housing development, etc. The unfortunate result is that either the subject in an old photo no longer exists today, or that the few old structures that are still around in WH don't have old photos readily available with which to compare the "now" shot. On rare occasions, the same subject exists in both the "then" and "now" photos, showing how the subject evolved over time.

In the piece below, we have found one such subject.

The following photo below comes from a 1904 Brooklyn Eagle article about the up and coming community of Lakeview. Entitled "A Typical Lakeview Home", this photo accompanying the article depicts a modest home built on an embankment, with a man and a woman posing on the front porch.


Delightfully, the house still stands today at 715 Woodfield Rd, albeit with some considerable modifications (see below). The exterior has been converted from clapboard to stucco, the porch has been enclosed, and the rear has been extended, leaving little resemblance to the original structure.

Who owned the house? None other than our own E J Jennings. Unfortunately the property record card is missing for this home at the Nassau County Dept of Assessment website. So how am I so sure that this was the Jennings home? A few reasons:

1) Much of the Brooklyn Eagle article dwelled on Jennings, so it's fair to assume that the reporter used his home for the photo.

2) Both photos show the home was built on a deep embankment. On the bottom right of the "then" shot is what appears to be a pond, consistent with the location of the home in the contemporary shot.

3) The shapes of the homes in both photos are identical (except for the modifications done over the years shown in the "now" shot) including a unique five window arrangement affronting the house on the second floor. Before the era of big housing developments on Long Island, it was rare to have two homes built exactly alike.

4) Most convincing of all are the two images below comparing the 1914 Belcher Hype map with the Google sattelite image. Jennings' property was eventually sold and developed as Lake View Park, sometimes also referred to as Birdhaven because of the names of the streets of that section. But as the 1914 map indicates, he still lived on a small piece of that property in a house on Woodfield Rd right on the pond, until he died in 1925. I have labeled the image on the right to show where that home is located today.

Thomas Donlon and Schodack Trout Pond

In the 1880s, a group of businessmen from Brooklyn who shared an enthusiasm for fishing formed an organization they called the Unit Fishing Club wherein they would arrange expeditions to take part in their favorite pastime. Their preferred destination was Mombasha Lake in Orange County, upstate NY - an ideal location with a reputation of being an angler's heaven. There was only one problem - it was a major schlep. At the time, there were no crossings over the lower Hudson River, which meant the trip required taking a ferry and the better part of a whole day just to get there.

Some members began looking eastward for a good freshwater fishing spot on Long Island. They found an opportunity in an area called Lakeview, which, although did not yet have train service until 1892, was a not too distant walk from the Hempstead or Pearsall's Corner train stations. Aside from the large lakes of the Brooklyn Water Works, a smaller lake bordered Woodfield Rd., just south of Eagle Ave. Sometime between 1887 and the early 1890s, a club member named Thomas Donlon purchased the fishing hole and 30 acres surrounding this lake from Hendrick B. Ryder, a deacon of the Rockville Centre Baptist Church and superintendent of its Sunday school, and one time Hempstead Town highway commissioner. The 1914 Belcher-Hyde map below displays the lake and land owned by Donlon. (The road labeled Brooklyn Ave. is Woodfield Rd.)

Donlon was a contractor who built many structures in Brooklyn. One of his works remains as among the oldest standing firehouses in Brooklyn (and probably the oldest still in operation), having been built in 1883, located on 11th Ave in Park Slope as the headquarters of Ladder Co. 122. (Photo below taken from the http://www.nyc-architecture.com website).

The pond that Donlon purchased was part of a stream called Schodack Brook that once extended much further north and ran its course through Lakeview into Smith's Pond, at one time a tributary of the Brooklyn water system. Though the small size of Donlon's pond did not seem like it was much to get excited about, a story reported in the Brooklyn Eagle in 1910 illustrates the prodigious quality of marine life that was sustained by the pond at that time. On July 4th that year, Donlon threw an Independence Day party for many friends, where he held a contest for who could catch the biggest fish. One of the guests was almost pulled into the water by the force of the creature pulling on the other side of the line. When a couple spectators helped the man reel in his prize, they were amazed to find it was a twenty pound turtle that gave the man such trouble.

Referring back to the map above, there was a man named Thomas Rhodes who lived across the street from Donlon (Rhodes' home is labeled and can be seen at bottom center). When Donlon bought land in Lakeview, he hired Rhodes to work on his farm earning a modest $50/month for the 8 months a year during planting and harvesting season, and $35/month for the remaining 4 months. Notwithstanding his meager salary, Donlon had always promised Rhodes that he would be "well taken care of", without ever specifying the meaning of that pledge. In 1917, Rhodes found out what his old boss meant when Donlon passed away and willed to Rhodes 1/2 an acre of his property for every year he worked (totalling 15 acres), a tribute to his old farmhand's loyalty. The remaining 15 acres was left to his wife, which Rhodes later purchased from her from the proceeds made from working the farm.

The aerial photo below (from the Fairchild Aerial Survey) gives an amazing perspective of the old Donlon farm. Taken in 1949 soon after the Southern State Parkway was widened and rerouted at exit 18, the photo looks westward toward New York City. I have included some labels to help the visualization. The original route of the Parkway wound around Hempstead Lake along Eagle Ave through Hempstead Lake State Park (a fact which helps understand the origin of the word "parkway"). At the left center of the photo, one can make out the cutoff of the old Parkway. In 1947, a new interchange at exit 18 was created and the Southern State was routed through Hempstead Lake, upon landfill, effectively cutting the lake into two parts. The road running horizontally at the top is Woodfield Rd, and the road running vertically at the right is Eagle Ave. The open farm fields on both sides of the Parkway at the top left corner is what was left of the Donlon Farm after the Parkway bisected it.

This high resolution image below comes from the same photo and is a close-up of Schodack pond as it looked in 1949.


Not long after this photo was taken, the farm was sold and carved up for a housing development. Like E J Jennings, Donlon also had a local street named after him, which can be found to the west of Woodfield Rd., just south of Eagle Ave.

Mayfair Avenue and St. Giles the Cripple

Previously we noted that WH attorney Francis B. Taylor had purchased a piece of property from John T. Hanna along Hempstead Turnpike in 1889. The following year, Hanna and Taylor petitioned the Town Highway Dept. to open up a road that bordered their property, that would run north-south between Hempstead Turnpike and First Avenue in Garden City. This road would become known as Mayfair Avenue. At that time, the only approach to Garden City from West Hempstead was Rockaway Ave (Cherry Valley Ave came in from the southwest). The Garden City Company vehemently opposed the opening of this road, ostensibly for two reasons: 1) It would detract from the exclusivity of the Village to have another road lead into town. 2) Hanna & Taylor's motives were to subdivide the northern sections of their property for new residences. The Garden City Co did not want to have a competing residential development so close to their village.

As it turned out, the Highway Dept. sided with Hanna & Taylor and Mayfair Avenue was built.

In 1891, shortly after the Mayfair petition was approved, an Episcopalian nun named Sister Sarah founded a hospital for children in Brooklyn called St. Giles the Cripple. The hospital was unique in that it not only provided medical services to children, but also social and educational services as well. The hospital filled a real need and quickly got off the ground and was now left with one problem. During the summer when people fled Brooklyn en masse for the country or for the beach, the St. Giles children had to endure stifling conditions of their stuffy quarters and tar-baked play yards. As a result, the children circulated and signed a petition that was presented to the trustees, asking for a summer home in the country where they could escape the city heat. The trustees quickly raised the requisite funds to purchase a home and began looking for a suitable location. The old Queens County Courthouse in Garden City Park was briefly considered, but having been built in 1786 and not used since 1872, the building was beyond repair. Ironically, the courthouse burned down soon after St. Giles rejected the site for their summer home.

In January 1903, a four acre site was chosen in West Hempstead at the north end of Mayfair Ave. and the Taylor estate, bordering Garden City. An airy country house already existed on the property and the Brooklyn Eagle declared that "a prettier spot for a summer home could not have been selected". Transfer of title took place on May 1 of that year and the building was dedicated on Saturday, May 30 with a tall, 18 ft. 'wayside cross' erected on the front lawn (the scene pictured below taken from the Brooklyn Eagle).

The hospital brought in cows and chickens and planted a garden, affording the young residents an enriched country experience during their stay at the Long Island facility. The campus eventually added a separate boys' dormitory, a schoolhouse and a surgical pavilion (seen below).

Eventually, St. Giles' 'summer annex' was utilized year round. During the 20s through the 50s, St. Giles played a major role in treating children suffering from polio. During that time, they claim to have ran the second largest outpatient clinic among all of the children’s orthopaedic hospitals in America.

By 1960, a polio vaccine had been discovered leading to a dramatic drop in the number of cases involving polio. By 1973, St. Giles sold off the West Hempstead property and soon after, in 1978, the Brooklyn Hospital closed for good. The organization still continues, however, as a charitable foundation with an endowment of over $26 million.

As for the West Hempstead property, the land was subdivided and developed as a quaint little cul-de-sac called Berryhill Court. Despite the hospital's relatively recent demise, there no longer seems to be any remnant of its existence. (The 'now' photo below taken from Google Maps approximate to the location of the St Giles , albeit further back from the street).

Francis B. Taylor and the Mayfair Section

In the previous post, we mentioned the name of West Hempsteader Francis B. Taylor, who was hired as an attorney by the People's Protective Association of Nassau County to try an stop the 1904 Vanderbilt Cup from taking place. Taylor actually had a personal interest in stopping the race - his home was located right on the course. He lived on Hempstead Turnpike at the corner of Mayfair Ave. Here is some more information about him, from what I've been able to gather.

Francis Bergh Taylor was born in 1864 in NJ and soon after moved to NY. He was a great-grandson a Revolutionary War soldier from South Carolina named Joseph Moringault and was an active member of the Sons of the Revolution. In 1889, he purchased a tract of land on the north side of Hempstead Turnpike from John T. Hanna, a stock broker who owned a large country estate where the Mayfair section is now located. In the 1906 Belcher-Hyde map below, you will notice J T Hanna's estate just west of Mayfair Ave and Francis Taylor's property just to the east of Mayfair.

In 1890, he received his law degree from NYU Law School (in the third graduating class of the school) and opened up a practice in Hempstead, becoming a prominent local attorney. Possibly owing to his southern roots, Taylor was a staunch democrat in politics, even as a young 20 year old when he worked for the Grover Cleveland 1884 election campaign and helped get the first democratic president in 28 years to the White House. In 1893 he was elected as Justice of the Peace for the Village of Hempstead and in 1897 served as the only democratic member of the Town board. When he left the board in 1898, the Republican who took his seat ensured that the TOH would be governed by one party rule for some time thereafter. Alas, Taylor's party affiliation ensured that his political career never got very far, since Nassau County and the Town of Hempstead had always been republican strongholds. He ran and lost for County Comptroller in 1919, and ran unsuccessfully for State Assembly in 1922 and 1923. In the 1922 defeat which he lost by only 35 votes, he filed a lawsuit claiming ballot irregularities and successfully petitioned a judge for a recount and re-examination of the voting machines. (He evidently lost anyway).

One of the more interesting cases which F B Taylor litigated was one brought in 1905 by a taxpayer of School District 17, involving (among other things) the issue of separation of church and state. Before SD17's John Street School was built in the 1930s, the district schoolhouse was located at the south corner of Nassau Blvd. and Dogwood Ave. The school board had voted to expend $200 in erecting a horse shed on school grounds, the alleged purpose of which was to accommodate people who would attend a religious school that leased the building on Sundays. Taylor successfully brought suit on behalf of his client to prevent the board from what was ruled inappropriate public expenditure.

Francis B Taylor died in 1940 in West Hempstead and his body was taken to South Carolina to be buried together with his ancestors.

The First International Auto Race in America – in West Hempstead

The following originally appeared in the Winter 2008 edition of the West Hempstead Civic Association News & Views newsletter -

Here’s a pop question. Name the first ever professional sports event to take place in West Hempstead. If you answered the home opener of the ABA New York Nets 1969-70 season at the old Island Garden, you would be wrong. You’d have to go back another 65 years before that when contestants in the Vanderbilt Cup, the first ever major international auto race in America, zoomed past the West Hempstead farms that lined the Hempstead & Jamaica Plank Road on what is now Hempstead Turnpike. The 300-mile race was the first of its kind in this country and it has an intriguing tie-in to West Hempstead history. Here is the story:

In 1904, heir extraordinaire and sports car aficionado William K. Vanderbilt II organized an auto race on Long Island for the purpose of what he claimed was to stimulate the advancement of the American automobile which lagged behind the innovation and performance of its European counterpart. The contest would be modeled after popular European auto races that were held for a few years since, and would be as much a measure of sturdiness and endurance of these early machines as it would be of performance and speed.

The plotted course would run clockwise along Jericho Turnpike, Route 106, and Hempstead Turnpike, forming a virtual triangle though parts of North Hempstead, Oyster Bay, Hempstead and Queens, and the driver who completed ten circuits around the course in the shortest time would be declared winner. To deal with the risk of running through the highly populated areas, two ‘control’ sections were designated where drivers were required to slow down to under 20mph - a three-minute control at Hicksville and a six-minute control through Hempstead Village. (The western end of the Hempstead control was located in West Hempstead, around where the IHOP is now situated on the Turnpike).

But not everyone was convinced of Vanderbilt’s altruistic motives. Many Long Island farmers viewed the race as a needless form of entertainment for the wealthy and thought of the race car as nothing more than a rich kid’s toy. The disruptions caused by using public roads for an event of this type were obvious, as the affected rail lines and roadways, the primary means through which farmers delivered their goods to market, would essentially have to be shut down for the day. The perils to locals and their livestock that might inadvertently wander onto the course presented a serious risk. The filth created by the 90,000 gallons of oil that was to be spread over the roads as an anti-dusting agent, the belching exhaust from the cars, and the profusion of fuel turned Hempstead into what the NY Evening World called a ‘gasoline village’ and left it ‘smelling like Hunter’s Point’.[1] During the trial runs, well-bred ladies who kept fine homes along Fulton Avenue in Hempstead were so incensed about their rugs being soiled by people dragging in oil from the street that they considered suing the promoters of the race for damages.[2]

One West Hempstead farmer, Edwin C. Duryea, was so vehemently against the race that he was determined to prevent it from taking place. (Duryea, along with his brother Frank, tended a farm that was bounded by Hempstead Ave and Woodfield Rd., between Woodlawn Ave to the north and Chestnut St. to the south.) Together with fellow West Hempstead locals William Stringham and George Langdon, he formed the People’s Protective Association of Nassau County and appealed to the County Board of Supervisors to block the event. They retained another West Hempsteader, Francis B. Taylor, as their legal counsel, and circulated a petition that garnered hundreds of signatures in opposition to the race.[3] When the Board of Supervisors rebuffed their appeal on the grounds that, dangers notwithstanding, the Cup was good for commerce in the County, they filed an 11th hour injunction in court the day before the race to declare the race illegal. The judge refused to intercede and so the stage was set for an event the next morning, October 8th, the magnitude of which was never before witnessed on Long Island.

Cartoon depicting Long Island farmers' protest of the 1904 Vanderbilt Cup. Photo Courtesy of The Suffolk County Vanderbilt Museum (via the Vanderbilt Cup races website)

Throngs of people came out to see the big show. The NY Times claimed that 50,000 fans were at hand[4] while the NY Sun estimated a much more conservative 20,000 at the course at any one time[5]. While the true number was probably somewhere in between, it’s certain that not a vacant hotel room nearby was to be found the night before the race. As one observer put it, “every hotel within three miles of the highways concerned [was] sold out at Waldorf-Astoria prices”[6]. The Sun reported that even the barbers’ chairs in Garden City had been rented for the night[7]. In West Hempstead, it’s doubtless that Henry Woest, keeper of the Munson House, had all his 5 rooms quickly booked for the event.[8] His little inn was located at the intersection of Nassau Blvd and Hempstead Turnpike, where it’s likely that guests could have opted to merely lean out of their beds to have a front row seat of the race from their windows.

Perhaps Woest's guests may have just as well stayed in bed, for despite all the hype generated prior to the event, newspaper accounts described the affair as a real snoozer. There was only so much excitement produced by watching a loud machine whiz by in a flash, only to have to wait another five to ten minutes for the next five second thrill. Bored spectators who had motored out from New York City that morning hopped back into their touring cars while the race was far from over and used – what else? – the Hempstead & Jamaica Plank Road to get back home, creating a veritable obstacle course for horrified contestants who still had laps to finish. (Think of that next time you see a speeding car zig-zagging in and out of traffic along the Turnpike).

To the chagrin of the home crowd, a French car won the race, though as a small measure of consolation, it was an American-born who was at the helm. Overall, the competition was enough of a success as to warrant its establishment as an annual event. A couple years later, a spectator fatality finally convinced the organizers of the recklessness of hosting auto races on public roads, so as a result, the famed Long Island Motor Parkway was built. The LIMP was one of the first concrete roadways in the nation built specifically for the automobile and the first auto road to utilize bridges and overpasses to eliminate crossings. The LIMP was the archetype for the second oldest controlled-access highway on Long Island, the Southern State Parkway which, when completed in 1927, contributed more than any other factor to the housing boom in West Hempstead during the roaring 20’s.

Recognizing the realities of the demands in the local housing market brought on by the construction of the Southern State, the Duryeas sold their 35 acre farm in December, 1926 to a developer who built the “Plymouth Colony”, the name chosen for the cluster of homes and businesses that now occupy that site[9]. Soon after the sale, Hempstead Avenue then quickly transformed from a dusty country road that fronted Ed Duryea’s former property into a budding business corridor. For the erstwhile farmer, after watching his crops grow year after year, the 1927 growing season yielded a different sort of crop – in the form of the brick and stucco homes that sprouted up over his old farm.

By then, West Hempstead had bigger problems like finding more space for its school district that was experiencing an explosion in its student population. Ed Duryea sat on the Board of Education that presided over the expansion of the Chestnut St. School and the construction of the George Washington School in 1930. (You can find his name on the dedication plaque in the foyer of the GW School).

This June 6th marks the 100th anniversary of the dedication of the Long Island Motor Parkway, a road that literally paved the way for the proliferation of the modern controlled-access highway, and by extension, for the development of West Hempstead.

To learn more about the Vanderbilt Cup, see the recently published Vanderbilt Cup Races of Long Island by Howard Kroplick or visit his wonderfully informative website http://www.vanderbiltcupraces.com/.
[1] NY Evening World, Oct. 8 1904, pg. 6
[2] NYT, Oct. 3, 1904, pg. 1
[3] NYT Sept. 29, 1904, pg. 7
[4] NYT Oct 9, 1904, pg. 1
[5] The Sun Oct. 9, 1904 pg. 2
[6] NYT Oct. 8, 1904 pg. 1
[7] ibid.
[8] Long Island, 1905, (A Lodging Guide Published by the Long Island Railroad Co.), pg. 134
[9] NYT Dec. 5, 1926 sec. 11 pg. 1