A Guide to Myrtle Avenue, the Spine of Ridgewood

September 15, 2015, 6:30 am

≫ Next: A Guide to Flushing Meadows-Corona Park, a Sports Destination

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Ridgewood Theatre, 55-27 Myrtle Avenue between St. Nicholas and Putnam avenues Myrtle Avenue, one of the lengthiest streets in both Brooklyn and Queens, runs for nearly 15 miles from Jay Street MetroTech complex in the heart of downtown Brooklyn, east to Jamaica Avenue at the former Triangle Hofbrau. It was first laid out in 1835 from Fulton Street to as far as Cripplebush Road, an ancient Kings County track now largely replaced by Bedford Avenue. It was extended in 1839 to Brooklyn’s Broadway, and again in 1854 as the tolled Jamaica Plank Road out to Jamaica. (Most of NYC’s toll roads of this type were made “free” around 1890-1900.) Horsecars appeared on Myrtle in 1854, which later became trolleys taking electric power from overhead wires. The infamous El shrouded Myrtle from 1888 to 1969 — at first as far as Grand Avenue, to Brooklyn’s Broadway early in 1889, and to Wyckoff Avenue later the same… Read More

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A Guide to Flushing Meadows-Corona Park, a Sports Destination

September 22, 2015, 6:30 am

≫ Next: A Guide to Bayside’s Bell Boulevard, an Architectural and Culinary Mecca

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View of Citifield from the Passerelle Boardwalk over Corona Yard With the recent completion of the United States Open tennis tournament at Arthur Ashe Stadium and the now-expected ascension of the New York Mets into the National League baseball playoffs for the first time since 2006, Flushing Meadows-Corona Park finds itself at the center of New York City’s professional sports life as summer 2015 draws to a close. Let’s take a look at some of these venues as well as the park itself. Rocket Thrower Home to the First World’s Fair Flushing Meadows-Corona Park was created in 1939, when New York City’s first World’s Fair was constructed in the large expanse south of Flushing Bay formerly home to ash heaps and garbage dumps that was memorialized in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s 1925 novel The Great Gatsby. A second World’s Fair was held 25 years later from 1964-65. The present-day park features several leftover elements from both World’s Fairs it has hosted.… Read More

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A Guide to Bayside’s Bell Boulevard, an Architectural and Culinary Mecca

September 29, 2015, 6:30 am

≫ Next: Film History and Eclectic Architecture Abound in Bayside, Queens

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Bayside, in northeast Queens, was first settled by the British around Alley Creek, the East River inlet now leading to Alley Pond Park, in the early 1700s. It was first named Bay Side in 1798 and by the time the one-word spelling appeared in the 1850s, it was a small but potent community, giving rise to governmental leaders and statesmen. The neighborhood has always retained a small-town atmosphere centered around Bell Boulevard. The street is named for Abraham Bell, an Irish Quaker who was a partner in a shipping firm and owned a vast farm in the area, and has nothing at all to do with Alexander Graham Bell, the inventor who obtained the first patent for the telephone. The city, however, has added to the confusion by naming P.S. 205, as well as its playground at 75th Avenue and 217th Street (a couple of blocks from the boulevard), Bell Park… Read More

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Film History and Eclectic Architecture Abound in Bayside, Queens

October 6, 2015, 6:30 am

≫ Next: How Ditmars Boulevard Went From Troubled Waters to a Busy Downtown

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Brownstoner recently took a look at historical and culinary highlights centered on or near Bell Boulevard, the “main street” of Bayside, Queens. But the neighborhood is large and goes far beyond that stretch, with a deep history in film, theater and sports, as well as eclectic architecture. Here are some of Bayside’s historical and architectural highlights. The Boundaries of Bayside Bayside is defined by the East River on the north, the Clearview Expressway on the west, the Long Island Expressway on the south, and the Cross Island Parkway and Alley Pond Park on the east. Unlike a great deal of suburban localities, its side streets feature somewhat individualistic and eclectic architecture, since it was settled in the early 1900s, before Levittown initiated the concept of “cookie-cutter” suburban tracts. A Pre-Hollywood Home for Film Actors In the 1910s Bayside became a film actors’ colony until the nascent industry decamped to Hollywood. The Famous Players-Lasky Corporation built studios… Read More

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How Ditmars Boulevard Went From Troubled Waters to a Busy Downtown

October 22, 2015, 6:30 am

≪ Previous: Film History and Eclectic Architecture Abound in Bayside, Queens

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The name Ditmars, or Ditmas, appears more than once in the NYC street directory. The Bronx has a Ditmars Street in City Island, while Brooklyn has a Ditmas Avenue through Kensington and namesake Ditmas Park, which turns into Avenue D and then continues as Ditmas through East Flatbush and Brownsville. And then in Astoria there’s Ditmars Boulevard, named for Abram Ditmars, the first mayor of Long Island City, New York, elected in 1870 (the city became a mere neighborhood when Queens became a part of Greater New York). His ancestors were German immigrants who settled in the Dutch Kills area in the 1600s. Ditmars Avenue was laid out in the late 1800s, and during the 1910s — during Queens’ big changeover to a consistent street-numbering system — many busy roads were renamed as boulevards, and Ditmars was one of them. On the present Queens map, Ditmars Boulevard stands in place of 22nd… Read More

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