Marian M. Delaney (Eagle Avenue) School

The picture above comes from the front page of the Hempstead Sentinel from February 28, 1929 and is a front view of a newly built school on Eagle Avenue.  The building was District 27's second school to be built, following the Chestnut Street School in 1912.  During its first decade, the WH school district experienced a steady increase in its student population and by 1924, a four-room addition was built at Chestnut to accommodate the influx of students.  But very shortly, even that proved inadequate. A series of meetings was then organized with the purpose of selecting two additional sites for schools, one in the southern section of the district, and another in the northern section.   A 3-4 acre parcel was chosen on Oak(ford) St. with a purchase price of $15,000 and its acquisition would be decided by a voter referendum on March 1, 1926.  In one of the most closely contested votes in District 27 history, residents rejected the proposal 113 to 110.  Owing to the closeness of the vote, the school board decided to resubmit the proposal again the following month.  Again, voters rejected it, this time by a count of 92 to 73.

The following year, on March 31, a vote was passed to acquire a $25K parcel on Eagle Avenue near the corner of Woodfield Rd.  After a heated meeting, on April 26th, 1927, two bond proposals were floated, one for a $400K 16-room school house and the other for a $260K eight-room school to be built at that site.  Both were soundly rejected.  Finally on August 16, a $200,000 bond issue was approved and work commenced on the new school in the fall.  A local firm from Hempstead, Kirwin Estabrook Construction Corp. was awarded the contract for the work.  The firm specialized in school construction and had just recently completed the Fulton Ave School and Garden City School, among others.  Ground was broken on Nov. 14. In a rare example of public works efficiency, construction of the eight-room building came in under budget at $185,000 and on Monday, November 5, 1928, nearly a year after work had started, students moved into their new school.  The date for a formal dedication ceremony was chosen to coincide with Washington's Birthday and on February 21, 1929, the new building was dedicated amid much fanfare.

Among the faculty that first year was a sixth-grade teacher named Marian Delaney, who soon worked her way up to assistant principal and eventually principal of the school.  In 1963, she retired and the following year, in appreciation of her 35 years at the school, the district decided to rededicate the Eagle Avenue School by renaming it the Marian M. Delaney school.  Below is a photo of district officials conferring the naming of the school after Ms. Delaney (right), who is visibly moved by the gesture.

On November 6, 1949, an east wing addition to the building was dedicated, but by the 1970s, a declining enrollment forced the district to consolidate the student body of the southern section with the Cornwell Ave School. Parents petitioned the State Supreme Court unsuccessfully to keep the school open and by the 1981-82 school year, the district vacated Eagle Ave.  For a time thereafter, the building was rented out by Adelphi University to run adult education programs.  After that, Nassau County has since utilized the school for its BOCES program, but it was announced this past year that the County would not extend its lease beyond 2013, leaving the building's future in doubt.

Below is a "now" shot of the Eagle Ave "Marian M. Delaney" School.

1875 Woodfield Train Disaster

The following article first appeared in the Fall 2012 edition of the WH Community Support Association newsletter.

Wreckage of the South Side Railroad disaster at Woodfield, purportedly the oldest surviving image of a train wreck on LI.  The Wreck occurred on the David Bedell farm, currently the site of the former Stop & Shop on Woodfield Rd. From the WH Historical Society archives.

Here’s a pop question: name the worst ever human disaster in the history of West Hempstead?  One would have to go all the way back over 137 years for the answer -  the South Side Railroad train wreck at Woodfield on February 3, 1875. (Update: Ironically at the same time this article went to print, West Hempstead learned about an awful car crash on the Southern State Parkway that killed four teenagers, matching the human life toll suffered in the Woodfield train disaster).   The following is a brief recap of that calamitous incident and the events that lead up to it.  But in order to understand what happened, some background information is necessary involving two important geographical features of West Hempstead that have long since disappeared – the headwaters of Schodack Brook and the path of the Hempstead-Valley Stream branch of the Southern Railroad.

Schodack Brook and the David Bedell Farm

Schodack Brook is a small rivulet which runs southward through Lakeview and empties into Schodack Pond in Hempstead Lakes State Park.  The brook can still be viewed today running though the residential section of Lakeview, just east of Woodfield Rd., but years ago it extended further north through what is now the site of the former Stop & Shop property.  In the late 1800’s that property was part of a large farm owned by David Bedell, who moved there with his wife Ruth (Rhodes) Bedell shortly after their marriage in 1843.  (That marriage brought together two of the more prominent families of West Hempstead whose roots in the local community date back to the very founding of Hempstead Village. David was a son of Hiram K. Bedell who had lived on a farm on the north side of Hempstead Turnpike.  Ruth was the daughter of William Rhodes whose large homestead sprawled along the east side of Woodfield Road and occupied much of the land that would become known as Hempstead Gardens.  The sole remaining visible legacy of the Rhodes estate is what is purported to be the oldest standing house in West Hempstead in its original location, the modest home at 419 Woodfield Rd, circa 1839).

The above map, circa 1873, shows the route of the South Side RR's Hempstead line through Woodfield at the bottom, with David & Ruth (Rhodes) Bedell's home just north of the tracks.  Further north along Woodfield Rd. are the homes of three of Ruth Bedell's Brothers, William L., Jacob and Isaac Rhodes.

Southern Railroad

In the mid-nineteenth century, Hempstead Village was displeased with being bypassed by the Long Island Railroad’s main line which ran three miles to the north, despite being one of the largest villages in western Long Island. Though since 1839 Hempstead was provided a shuttle train that connected to the LIRR’s main line at a depot called Hempstead Branch (later Mineola), villagers were looking for a more direct and reliable connection to points west.  By 1868, they found their answer in the South Side Railroad, a competing line to the LIRR that targeted the growing but underserved communities of Long Island’s South shore.  The South Side RR laid a single-track route from Valley Stream to Hempstead which was completed in 1870 and service began in September of that year.  (The branch should not be confused with the path of the existing WH branch of the LIRR built some 23 years later).  The route spurred off at Valley Stream and ran northeast, paralleling Cornwell Ave. until it crossed at Franklin Ave. in present-day Malverne where a station called Bridgeport was located.  Thereafter, it headed on a virtual straight path to Norwood station, located just south of Hall’s Pond (site of the St. Thomas Chapel parking lot).  Proceeding northeastward, the track passed Woodfield Depot at the intersection of Woodfield Rd. and Oakford St., and then over an embankment and culvert at Schodak Brook (at the present site of the old Stop & Shop).  The line then turned slightly northward where it ran through the woods and finally terminated in Hempstead Village.  No trace of this old line exists any longer, with the possible exception of a small access road that runs behind the WH Water District’s Birch St. Plant.

On January 31^st, 1875, the area experienced unusually strong rains that swelled the ponds and brooks of Long Island. At Woodfield Depot, the water backed up behind the culvert, and flooded David Bedell farm.  Bedell’s house was located just 70 yards north of the railroad bridge over the brook, and when the water level came within inches of the top step of his porch, he directed his family to roll up the rugs on the main floor so they wouldn’t get ruined.  On the evening of February 3, the managers of the South Side RR instructed an eight man crew to run a single engine and passenger car to Hempstead to verify the safety of the road and make any necessary repairs.  The crew proceeded slowly over Schodack Brook without incident and reached the terminal in Hempstead.  At around 8 PM, on the return train, the weight of the engine undermined the bridge, sending it backwards into the flooded creek and causing an enormous explosion that could be clearly heard as far away as Garden City.  The engineer, James Scott of Hempstead, was killed instantly.  Benjamin Carman, the brakeman and Eli Thorpe, trackmaster, were also killed.  Bernard Callahan, the fireman, survived the blast but was pinned down by the debris and drowned to death in the water.  Three of the four others on the train were severely injured.  The dead bodies were brought to David Bedell’s barn where the Hempstead coroner examined their cause of death.  A photo of the incident remains as the oldest surviving image of a train wreck on Long Island.

In the following months, an investigation of the incident revealed that the South Side Railroad was responsible for the shoddy construction of the Hempstead Branch and they were ordered to make repairs and pay for damages.  A couple of other fatal incidents sealed the fate of the South Side.  On April 30, 1879, less than ten years from when the line was opened, the last train rode the Hempstead - Valley Stream branch.  The South Side went bankrupt and its assets were sold at auction.  Locals had always hoped that another concern would purchase the Hempstead line and reopen it.  Instead, the buyer tuned out to be Henry Hilton, manager of the Garden City Company, who had no intention of reopening the line.  In all likelihood, his purchase was an attempt to protect his Garden City line from nearby competition.  West Hempstead would have to wait 1893 before it regained rail service, when the LIRR built the existing branch.

David Bedell continued to live at Woodfield until 1896 when he sold his farm to Edwin C. Duryea.  The Bedells lived to celebrate their 63rd wedding anniversary in 1906.  That year, Ruth passed away at age 90 and David was called to Heaven a few weeks later on July 4th, at age 93.

David and Ruth (Rhodes) Bedell at their 60th wedding anniversary- owners of the farm where the 1875 Woodfield train wreck occurred.

Freddie Voelpel's

The photo above depicts Freddie Voelpel's restaurant as it stood at 372 Hempstead Avenue between the years 1950-1957.  Freddie Voelpel was a bowling legend who at one time captured the Long Island bowling championship in 1944. The following year, Voelpel was on track to win a second championship before he suffered a serious mishap.  At his day job in the NY Daily News print room, he lost the tips of a couple fingers on his bowling hand when it got caught in a print roller.  He managed to continue to bowl competitively after that, but he never returned to the top of his game.

Freddie Voelpel was part of a pretty substantial bowling culture that existed on Long Island back in the '40s and '50s, wherein names like George Young, Andy Varipapa, Joe Falcaro and Tony Sparando would compete in tournaments and bowling halls like Mid Isle Lanes (formerly Heinemen's) on Peninsula Ave in Hempstead (now the site of a public storage facility) and Falcaro's own hall in Lawrence (Falcaro's closed down only about ten years ago).

In 1944 Voelpel took his winnings and bought a stake in a bowling venue called Baldwin Modern Lanes, but then he made a business decision that would later come back to haunt him, one that he would later regret.  Thinking that there was no commercial future in bowling, in February 1950 he sold his stake in Baldwin Modern and bought the restaurant you see pictured above. (He named it after himself because, well, he couldn't find a better name for it). This was right around the time when the deployment of automatic pin-setting machines was about to revolutionize the sport by obviating the need to rely on "pin-boys" to reset the pins. (Voelpel never gave these newfangled machines a chance but was the first to admit his mistake years later in an interview). As a result, commercial bowling would enjoy a huge upswing in the coming decades.

On the other side of the coin, around the same time that he got bought his restaurant, those local, family-run eating establishments such as Voelpel's were getting crowded out and losing business to cheaper fast-food joints that were popping up all over Long Island.

Freddie Voelpel was simply a victim of bad timing.  Aside from that, the combination of his day job and managing the restaurant left him averaging around four hours of sleep a night with no time for any leisure activity. In 1957, he sold the tavern and moved to the South Shore where he bought a boat and lived his life in semi-retirement.

Empire State Diner

The photo above c. 1949 looks south across Hempstead Turnpike and shows the Empire State Diner, a West Hempstead landmark during the '40s '50s and '60s. The diner was owned and operated by a Cathedral Gardens resident named Charles Efthinion, along with his brother Phillip who lived in nearby Hempstead Gardens.  

The Efthinion Bros. ran the restaurant until 1963, whereafter they relocated down the road to the southwest corner of Hempstead Turnpike and Nassau Blvd (current location of a Sleepy's), and opened a restaurant called "The Country Gentleman".  That restaurant was built on a site that for years, dating back to the 19th century, was occupied by William Stringham's general store and was once the central location of the long-forgotten Hamlet of Munson. Below is a "now" shot of the old Empire State Diner location. 

In 1964, the diner was demolished and in November of that year, ground was broken to build the first of many IHOPs on Long Island.  That restaurant continues to operate at the same location, nearly 50 years later, one of the few original businesses from that era.  (Below is an ad that appeared in the May 13, 1965 edition of Newsday).

The vacant building in the "now" shot was built in 1966 and represented S Klein's first foray into the automotive and tire business.  The building boasted 12 bays and the operators originally envisioned a capacity of servicing up to 280 cars per day.  What they did not envision was that S Klein wouldn't last another 10 years after that.

 The S Klein Tire & Auto Center became Korvette's Tire & Auto Center which then became Tires Incorporated.  This building may well be the record-setter for the duration of a vacant commercial building in West Hempstead.  (No, the temporary occupancy as the campaign headquarters of former Town Supervisor Greg Peterson's failed election bid for County Executive in 2005 does not count for filling the vacancy).

Maison Pepi - Gum Ying

Readers don't have to jog back their memories too far to remember when the building pictured above, a colonial home-turned restaurant, stood at the northeast corner of Hempstead and Eagle Avenues. It was only around ten years ago when it was torn down.   The house stood at that corner since at least the beginning of the 20th Century and at one time during the 1920s, was home to a famous interior designer named Edith Hebron.  

The image above was captured on a sunny day, some time in the 1960s, when the restaurant was known as Maison Pepi. In 1946,  Valley Stream resident and veteran restaurateur Charles Pepi purchased the home and converted it into a world-class eating establishment where patrons would come far and wide to enjoy its continental-American cuisine.  Maison Pepi was a real family-run establishment.  Charles Sr. served as Maitre d' while his wife and daughter waited for the tables, and his son, Charles Jr. tended the bar.  Maison Pepi would become a popular spot for wedding receptions, local civic and social group meetings, and a favorite jaunt for Long Island politicians. Charles Sr. died in 1962 and his son continued the operation until 1976.

That year the restaurant was sold and reopened under a new concern as Gum Ying, which served Chinese food and developed into a favorite eatery among locals. 

A highlight in the history of Gum Ying came on March 9, 1982, when it was paid a visit by New York City Mayor Ed Koch, who arranged a lunch meeting there with Nassau County Executive Francis Purcell.  The meeting was little more that a photo-op for Koch but it created alot of local buzz at the time.  Koch had had his sights on the NY State Governorship, but just prior to this meeting, he turned off upstate and Long Island voters when he described the suburban lifestyle as "sterile" in an interview for Playboy Magazine.  (He ended up losing the democratic primary to Mario Cuomo).  The lunch intended to make up for that gaffe and attempted to show how well Koch, an outspoken Democrat politician, could get along with his Republican counterparts like Purcell.  For the record, Koch ordered Chinese noodles and barbecue shrimp and remarked about how good the food was at Gum Ying (Purcell had already been a regular customer at the restaurant).

Alas, in 2002, Gum Ying closed its doors for good and the corner landmark that overlooked Hall's Pond for 100+ years was knocked down, to make way for the site's current occupant, below.

History of the Hempstead Golf & Country Club Part II

In our previous post we focused on the early history of the Hempstead Golf & Country Club property, and the former owners of the estate, CC Parsons and his son Theophilus.  The following paragraphs will trace back the history of the golf club.

At the turn of the 20th Century, the sport of golf was quickly becoming a favorite pastime and leisure activity for the well-heeled set.  On Long Island in particular, an explosion of clubs began to dot the landscape over the next decades to the point where today, it is home to more than 160 public and private corses.   In 1899 a group of Hempstead locals were given permission by the Garden City Company to develop a nine-hole course as the Midland Golf Club, on a vacant plot of land just south of 4th Street between Cathedral and Hilton Avenues. That course was short-lived, however, because in 1907 Garden City decided to reclaim the property for real-estate development.  That same year, another public course was being laid out just to the west named the Salisbury links, and Midland members were invited to join.  However, rather than being absorbed by Salisbury, Midland retained their separate identity and remained listed in the US Golfers Association directory as the only chartered club in America without a course.

When Salisbury became a private club and changed its name to Cherry Valley in 1916, the old Midland members found themselves in a quandary: either they would soon need to find their own course or their club would disband and disappear. 

As mentioned in my last article, in late 1919 former Hempstead Village Mayor and WWI veteran Theophilus Parsons moved his family down to DC to pursue his career as a patent lawyer, and looked to sell his 122-acre estate in the southwest corner of the village.  By April 3, 1920, it was reported that a small part the estate was sold to Mineola developer Richard T. Childs and the Mineola Homes Co., upon which 3 homes were built, and it was assumed that the remainder of the estate would be developed for homes.  Fortunately, perhaps because of the efforts of some fast moving citizens, that plan never materialized.

The creation of the Hempstead Golf and Country Club can be traced back to a meeting held on Saturday, June 25, held at the Hempstead Bank Building (at the corner of Fulton & Main Sts.)  Earlier that week, a group of men from the old Midland club organized to explore the suitability of acquiring and redeveloping the estate into a golf course. They solicited the advice of golf champion and designer of the Salisbury course, Walter J. Travis, who affirmed that the soil and terrain would make for a championship-caliber course.  A committee was formed under the leadership of Jesse Richards, a manager at the NY & Queens Electric Light & Power Co. and WH Eaton, a junior partner at Doubleday, Page & Co., and shortly thereafter, a lease agreement was made with the property owners that included an option to buy the site outright. 

By August, work was started on the course, under the supervision of master architect Peter Lees.  When Lees got to work, he found a property two-thirds of which was highly cultivated farmland, which held down construction costs.  The remaining third was wooded. The sod was a sandy loam about eighteen inches deep, similar to those of the Garden City courses, which figured favorably for the drainage of the greens and fairways, after heavy rains.  Lees laid out a course 6,334 yards long in total, and designed the unique feature where the first, ninth, tenth and eighteenth holes would be in full view of the veranda of the clubhouse.  (The course has since been redesigned). 

Membership fees were modest in comparison to other area clubs - the cost was set at a $100 initiation fee and a $100 annual membership, and soon the predetermined 350 member quota was quickly filled.

The old Parsons Homestead (circa 1704 - see previous article) was renovated into a stately clubhouse in time for a grand opening on Memorial day, 1921, while work continued on the course. By late Summer, nine holes were made ready and on a rainy Saturday, on Sept. 17, 1921 the golf course formally opened as Jesse Richards drove first ball.  By afternoon the clouds let up and the late Summer sun bathed the course in sunshine. 

In May 1922, the club exercised their option to purchase the property outright for $134,000, and the following year all 18 holes were ready for play.  A couple years later, an additional 18 acres was added to the property and the course underwent a complete redesign by A W Tillinghast and readied for the 1927 season.

Over the years, the clubhouse and grounds have undergone major renovation and changes. In 1934, a major fire destroyed a portion of the house, but the club regrouped and rebuilt that section.

Over 90 years later and still going strong, the Hempstead Golf and Country Club continues to provide leisure to its members and beautiful scenery to its community.

History of the Hempstead Golf & Country Club Part I - the Parsons Estate

The post below originally appeared, with minor modifications, in the Winter 2012 edition of the West Hempstead Community Support Association News & Views newsletter.

The following is the first of a two-part post on the history of the Hempstead Golf and Country Club property, much of which lies adjacent to West Hempstead. The present article will focus on the Parsons family, the last owners of the house before it was expanded and remodeled into the clubhouse of the HGCC. Among the members of this family who lived in this home included two war heroes, two authors - one of whom was a founder of the Hempstead library, the other a Pulitzer Prize winner, an inventor and entrepreneur who became a world-famous household name, a secretary of the Hempstead Board of Education, and the youngest president of the Village of Hempstead ever to serve in that office.

We begin with Charles Chauncy Parsons, who purchased the 120+ acre property on the south side of Front Street some time in the 1870s. C C Parsons was born in Taunton, MA in 1840 to an illustrious Massachusetts family. His father, Theophilus Parsons, was dean of Harvard Law School. His grandfather, also named Theophilus Parsons, served as Chief Justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Court, was a good friend of John Adams, and was one of the drafters of the Mass. State Constitution in 1780. In 1860 Charles graduated from Harvard and two years later, received a law degree from Harvard Law School. During his college years, Charles displayed an aptitude for ingenuity and inventiveness, particularly in the area of chemistry. By the time he graduated in mid-1862, the Civil War was well underway. So on August 22, 1862, he enlisted in the Army and received a commission of Second Lieutenant in the 1st Mass. Cavalry and saw action in the famous battles at Antietam and Wilderness, among others. He was a classmate and friend of Colonel Robert Shaw, the famous leader of the all-black 54th Mass. Regiment, and subject of the1989 film Glory. By the time he was mustered out on May 30, 1865, he had been promoted to the rank of Major and honorably discharged.

After the war he settled down and plied his skills in chemistry, perfecting various formulas for insecticides and household cleaning solutions. In 1867, he moved to NY and started a business manufacturing chemicals. Sometime shortly after his marriage to Julia Worth Michael of Virginia in 1876, he moved out to Hempstead where he purchased an old stately house and farm in the southwest corner of town that would later become home to the Hempstead Golf & Country Club.

Around the same time he patented a formula that refined ammonia to be used as a domestic cleaning agent and thereafter “C C Parsons Household Ammonia” became a household name. His company, Columbia Chemical Works, headquartered in Brooklyn, distributed this and other products throughout the world for well into the 20th century.

Parsons was heavily involved in the civic affairs of Hempstead Village. For many years he served as secretary of the Hempstead Board of Education and belonged to various civic and social groups.

Julia Parsons founded the Hempstead Subscription Library in 1889, forerunner of the Hempstead Library, and served as its president for more than ten years until her untimely death in October 1900. She served as the local regent of the Daughters of the American Revolution and as president of a literary society called the Hempstead Woman’s Club. She was also an accomplished author who published titles under the pseudonym Julian Warth. At her probate hearing, it was revealed that she bequeathed $20,000 to build a new library on the grounds of her estate. However, for unknown reasons, possibly due to the fact that the location was not central enough, this plan never came to fruition.

A couple months later, in January 1901, C. C. Parsons also died unexpectedly and was mourned by a great many citizens of Hempstead.

The Parsons has two sons: Theophilus, born in 1877 and Geoffrey, born in 1879. Geoffrey inherited his mother’s literary skills, and after graduating from Columbia, he became an author and newspaper reporter for the NY Herald-Tribune, eventually becoming that paper’s chief editorial writer. In 1942, he received the Pulitzer Prize for his reporting on Roosevelt’s foreign policy in 1941.

After the death of his father, Theophilus received a law degree from Columbia and continued to live at the Hempstead Estate. In 1902, Theophilus organized a literary society called the Hempstead Outlook Club, and the inaugural meeting on April 12 was held at the Parsons home. One of the topics discussed at that meeting was a survey of the oldest houses in Hempstead, and it was revealed that a part of the Parsons

home dated to 1704! If that estimate is correct, that would rank the house among the oldest surviving structures in the entire County.

In June of that year, Theophilus married Florence Whitin of Massachusetts, who picked up where her late mother-in-law left off as secretary of the Hempstead Library and president of the Hempstead Woman’s Club. By the middle of the decade, Theophilus was elected the youngest-serving President of Hempstead Village. The job of the Village president back then was a bit different than today’s mayoral responsibilities. For one thing, the population of the village then hovered just over 3,500 persons, whereas today it stands at almost 54,000.

Instead of dealing with such issues as arranging the multi-billion dollar gentrification projects of today, the president had other important concerns to deal with, such as stray dogs roaming the village, giving out tickets to people who rode bicycles on the sidewalks and cars exceeding the 20 MPH speed limit. Theophilus got a lot of negative press in those days for being overly aggressive in enforcing the Village’s codes.

When WWI rolled around, Theophilus enlisted in the Army and fought in France attaining the rank of Captain in the 10th Machine Gun Company

After the war he moved his family to Washington, DC and set up a law practice as a patent lawyer. In 1920, the recently vacated Parsons Estate created a golden opportunity for both real estate developers and golf enthusiasts who all vied to acquire the property in that rapidly expanding section of Hempstead. In a future post, we shall explore the early history of the eventual occupant of that property, the Hempstead Golf & Country Club.

Early view of the Hempstead Golf & Country Club—formerly the Parsons Homestead. (Courtesy of the HPL digital collection).