AUGUST 1915

MOSQUITOES PLAGUE QUEENS

Get into a conversation with a long time Queens resident and you're likely to discover a subscriber of the Long Island Star- Journal, a daily paper that informed the community about local and world news until it folded in 1968. A banner across the Star Journal masthead reminded readers that the newspaper's name came from the merger of the Long Island Daily Star (1876) and the North Shore Daily Journal - The Flushing Journal (1841).

Welcome to August 1915.

Mosquitoes plague Queens. Participants at a mass meeting in Forest Hills demand an extermination campaign. Organizers of meeting claim property values in New Jersey increased after similar effort. There were large swamps in Jamaica and Flushing that could be targeted. Of major concern were scattered small ponds of stagnant water that drained areas with no sewers. One such pool was Backus Pond between Junction Avenue and 43rd Avenue. Called a disease ‘breeding stench hole’ and an ‘open cesspool of the worst kind’ the Star campaigned for sewer lines to serve the long suffering families of the area.

The Board of Estimate took action to clear the way for Queens Boulevard when the city moved to take title of the property between Grand Avenue and Hillside Avenue. The cost of the property, about $2 million, was added to the construction costs of about $1 million. The most complicated part would be moving back the $200,000 Presbyterian Church in Elmhurst.

Churches were very powerful in the community. Sunday Laws forbid many activities. Patrolman Charles Bleas of the Hunters Point Precinct saw a transaction from outside the store and served the summons to one Benjamin Fassler, 19, a clerk in Kramers Dry Goods store at 119 Vernon. Because the young man sold a pair of pink garters to a pretty young women one Sunday morning he was fined $5 in Magistrate’s Court. In a separate incident, Officers Gaffney and O’Connell went to Dengon Field at Hunterspoint Ave. and Creek Street and purchased tickets for a baseball game, again on a Sunday. They arrested the promoters who were released on $500 bail each.

A story titled ‘Mary’s Compass Wrong -- Lands Her In Blackwells’ picks up on the flavor of the time. Mary Lee, 32, walked into St. Johns Hospital 6 AM with a cut on her nose. After stitching her up, she subjected the staff to a shower of profanity. Patrolman Roger Larkin was summoned who arrested her and brought her before a magistrate. What followed was an exchange of dialogue rivaling vaudeville. Magistrate Leach asked her, ‘Where do you live?’ ‘In Manhattan,’ she answered. ‘But how did you get to Long Island City so early this morning?’ he pressed on. She replied naively, ‘I had been visiting friends in New Jersey and was on the way home.’ Getting nowhere, Magistrate Leach asked her ‘Why were you bleeding?’ Mary replied innocently, ‘I was just walking along and felt this cut.’ Exasperated, he fined her $5. When she was unable to pay, he sent her to Blackwell’s Island workhouse on charges of drunkenness.

Imagine spending a perfect summer day in a Queens beer garden before Prohibition! Social events of the time included a Clambake of the Master Horseshoes Assoc Local 87, at Bernsen’s Jackson Avenue Park at Jackson and Junction Avenues in Corona. A Grand Trolley Ride under auspices of the United Democratic Association of the 1, 2, 3 Election Districts of the Second Assembly District to Zehden’s Casino in College Point. And there was the Seventh Grand Family Outing of the Republican Club of Queens Country at J Link’s Schuetzen Park at Broadway and Steinway Avenue.

Queens was at the start of an unprecedented housing boom. This ad, by the G. X. Mathews Company was typical for the period. To let: we are just completing another block of 'Mathews Model Flats' which will be ready for occupancy August 1st. Five large airy rooms and bath with all modern improvements (6 family houses). Rents $16 & $17. Corner house all rooms facing streets. Corner store and two small stores suitable for any business. Surrounded by 66 Mathews Model Flats. Best location for business in this section. Inquire at our office at the corner of Eleventh and Grand Avenues (30th Avenue and 42nd Street).

Bold headlines advertised the growing transportation network in Queens. The centerpiece of this system was Queensborough Plaza. The 'L' station was described as being not only massive in appearance, but have architectural dignity and would be harmonious with neighboring buildings. The Plaza structure, with eight tracks running along its 480 length, was to be as ornamental as possible. It would be well worth the cost of $884,000 for passengers would be whisked to Grand Central in only six minutes The lower tracks were for trains to Manhattan, the upper for Astoria, Corona, and Brooklyn. The north platform was planned for the IRT, the south bound platform for both the Queensboro Subway and the Interborough’s Second Ave Line.

An advertising campaign from New York Telephone asks ‘Why run the risk of losing the good-will of customers and business associates by making them wait for letters [when] you could talk at once by telephone? A clear cut courteous telephone talk does more to build up good-will, to smooth out misunderstandings, and to make friends, than a letter can ever do Why not telephone first and avoid writing those expensive time-wasting letters? Local calls, at two to five cents each, are cheaper than a letter.’

World War I rumbled in the background. Photos showed Prince Leopold of Bavaria leading the Kaiser’s troops into Warsaw, a metropolis of one million. It was the largest modern city captured in warfare up to that time. On August 17, a German subs sinks a British transport in the Aegean with 1,000 lives lost. On August 18, a Canadian steamship with 1,000 soldiers sinks in the Dardanelles. On August 19, the White Star Liner Arabic was sunk by a torpedo. After reading reports on one million casualties in the first year, can we imagine the public’s horror to the Great War’s carnage? They had no idea that warfare and epidemic would claim millions more over the next four years.

That’s the way it was in August, 1915!