On February 22, 1808,. Masepth’s DeWitt Clinton became mayor of New York. One of the most remarkable citizens of Queens, he served in every level of government, from local (Mayor of the City of New York), to state-wide office in Albany, (the state assembly, state senate, and later as governor), and in Washington (senator). He was regent of New York University, and organized both the Historical Society of New York and the Academy of Fine Arts. Clinton was a major proponent of the Erie Canal.
Notable quote: “Pleasure is a shadow, wealth is vanity, and power a pageant; but knowledge is ecstatic in enjoyment, perennial in frame, unlimited in space and indefinite in duration.”
January 24, 1812
An earthquake is felt for over a minute in Queens County. Although most of Long Island sits on glacial deposits, bedrock outcroppings similar to those found in Manhattan exist between 21st Street and the East River. Small faults running through these rock formations start in Queens and are the source of many slight tremors felt recently in this area.
March 20, 1812
The Hempstead Turnpike Company is incorporated. Three tollgates are set up along the route running from 168th Street in Jamaica to Main Street in Hempstead. The Turnpike is attractive to Jamaica authorities as it releases them from road maintenance, lowers taxes, and generates a steady revenue stream from long term leases.
Decades later, public complaints over poor maintenance force the company to abandon its charter.
January 04, 1821
Out of a Jamaica printer’s shop, the Long Island Farmer published its first issue. The Farmer was a weekly paper for throughout most of the nineteenth century. Later it became a daily, and in 1926 it changed its name to the Long Island Daily Press. The Jamaica based paper published under this name from 1926 to the 1960s changing to the Long Island Press by 1967.
The paper served Suffolk, Nassau, Queens, and part of Brooklyn and had a format and fold similar to the New York Times. (This writer delivered the Press in Nassau County from 1972-74.). The rival Long Island paper, Newsday, established in 1940, eventually usurped the Long Island Press, which folded in March 1977.
September 03, 1821
The Norfolk and Long Island hurricane caused a storm surge of 13 feet in one hour. Although Manhattan south of Canal Street was largely underwater, few deaths were reported.
The hurricane, estimated to have been a Category 3 event, made landfall at Jamiaca Bay. It was the only hurricane in recorded history to directly strike (meaning the eye of the storm passes over) what is now modern New York City.
December 04, 1823
On December 4, 1823, Cord Meyer is born in Germany. He immigrated to America and settles in Masepth. Meyer got his start by making charcoal for the sugar refineries that lined the East River. He later made a fortune after going “upstream” into sugar refining itself.
His son, also named Cord Meyer, founded a real estate business that built thousands of homes for as little as $600. He both transformed rural Newtown Village and was the driving force in changing the community’s name to Elmhurst. His company is still very much a part present day Queens having built, among other major projects, Boulevard Gardens in Woodside and the Bay Terrace Shopping Center.
December 23, 1823
A Visit by St. Nicolas is published in the Troy Sentinel. The anonymous author is later claimed by Clement Clark Moore. Its opening line, “T’was the night before Christmas” is now a holiday classic. Although written at Chelsea, the family estate near West 23rd Street in Manhattan, some believe he was relaying his holiday experiences from childhood when he visited ancestral homesteads in Elmhurst and Jackson Heights.
May 22, 1827
Union Course Racetrack, located between Jamaica and Atlantic Avenues in Woodhaven, was the scene of the contest for a $20,000 purse between “Eclipse” representing the North, and “Sir Henry” the South. Southern planters raised horses on their estates, and sent them north to the New York area to race. The keen competition between the sections of the country, even at this early date, brought intense publicity to the meet with some $200,000 wagered.
“Eclipse” won.
June 1829
The ninth post office in Queens opened in Newtown. Bernardus Bloom, a tavern keeper, was appointed postmaster. Before this date, letters for persons living in Newtown had been deposited in the Brooklyn post office and had to be picked up in person. Before the introduction of postage stamps, the letter’s recipient paid the postage.
April 25, 1832
The Brooklyn and Jamaica Rail Road Company incorporates and starts building a ten-mile long route from Brooklyn along Atlantic Avenue to Jamaica, Queens. Two years later, it becomes a part of the Long Island Rail Road with the stated intention of providing rail and ferry service between New York and Boston. After a competing direct rail line is built along the Connecticut shore by 1850, the LIRR spirals into the first of its many bankruptcies.
March 01, 1837
The Jamaica to Hicksville leg of the Long Island Rail Road opened for business. This branch, part of LIRR's main line, today serves the Queens stations of Hollis and Queens Village, and the Bellerose station (just across the Nassau County line).
The LIRR is unique in the annals of major rail transportation for most of its traffic was always passenger service. Perhaps no rail line in the nation can boast more innovative firsts. For example, the mainstay of modern freight, 'piggyback' service (in which trailers are loaded onto flatcars), originated when Long Island potato farmers loaded their wagons directly onto cars and shipped them fully loaded into New York.
April 15, 1837
On April 15, 1837, the Village of Flushing was incorporated. Although nearly 200 years old, the built up part of the community was rather small, embracing only the the area defined as Flushing Creek, Northern Boulevard, Bowne Street, and Sanford Avenue. Its two nurseries, Bloodgood and Linnaean, however, were known around the world and are widely credited with being the home of the American horiticultural industry.
September 1842
The Astoria Fire Company organizes only three years after the incorporation of Astoria Village.
February 13, 1844
New York State&rsqup;s Board of Regents chartered the Astoria Female Seminary. The 1828 building was older than the community of Astoria. In 1839, residents of Hallets Cove had renamed their village as a tribute to John Jacob Astor who donated money for the school. Rev. John Walker Brown, pastor of St. George’s church ran the institute for many years.
In its short term it was one of the finest such schools for young ladies; one of the women who taught there later went to China as a missionary and went on to write one of the first Chinese-English dictionaries. Although the seminary collapsed at Brown’s death, it reopened briefly in 1858. The building eventually served as the parsonage of St. George’s Church for over 150 years. The community’s namesake was demolished to build senior housing in 2005.
April 25, 1844
Patrick Jerome “Battle-Axe” Gleason is born in Ireland. He arrived in America with his brothers, fought in the Civil War, and made a small fortune in California. He got involved in local politics and was elected mayor of Long Island City twice, from 1887-92, and 1896-97.
Gleason’s personality was legendary. As mayor, he owned trolley lines under city contract, leased personal property to the school district, and sold water to the city from his wells. When the railroad put a fence to block traffic on the ferry, he personally chopped it down earning the nickname “Battle-Axe.” Gleason’s volatile temper got him arrested, and his relationship with the board of aldermen was tempestuous at best. The newspapers, which loathed him, refused to publish his photograph.
Yet Gleason is still remembered fondly by the people of Hunters Point, for he was a friend to the common man. PS 1, which was the largest high school on Long Island when built, was his legacy to the community’s children. When he died bankrupt and discredited but a few years out of office, hundreds lined the route to his internment.
“Patrick Jerome Gleason was never boring,” wrote the late George Henke of Sunnyside. “Although labeled a brawler, braggart, buffoon and scoundrel, he was not worse than some of his slick opponents. He was an astute politician.”
June 22, 1847
The Jamaica Farmer and Advertiser warned that nearly a dozen sailors jumped ship from the USS Ohio anchored in the East River. It traced their progress from Williamsburg, through Queens to Flushing. They were perhaps seeking employment along the busy ports on Long Island's North Shore.
A posse of Kings and Queens County officials finally arrested several of the men in Roslyn and Great Neck. Maritime life must have been brutal at that time, for, of the first 100 men granted shore leave, more than 30 deserted.
May 06, 1848
The Astoria Presbyterian Church was organized. The original building on 27th Avenue in Old Astoria was dedicated June 11, 1847. In 1922, the church moved to its present location on the west side of 33rd Street between 31st Avenue and Broadway. Today the existing building is threatened with demolition.
July 1848
Calvary Cemetery receives its first internment. Today it contains over three million internments making it one of the largest cemeteries in the country.
November 21, 1848
Cypress Hills Cemetery opened. It is part of the “Cemetery Belt” along the Queens-Brooklyn border (Cypress Hills is two-thirds in Queens and one-third in Brooklyn). Today, almost 5 million (almost three times the number of living residents) are buried in 29 Queens cemeteries.
October 27, 1858
Naval architect and marine engineer John Bogert used to putter around a laboratory in an old factory building on Myrtle Avenue. To this Flushing native, a graduate of both the Flushing Institute and Columbia University, we give credit to developing the first modern aircraft carrier.
In 1917 when the United States entered World War I, it faced the knotty problem of moving an army (with its supplies) to Europe and across thousands of miles of U–boat infested waters. Bogert’s solution was to design a special ship to protect those convoys–the escort carriers, or “baby flat tops.” That war was over before the government had a chance to act on his plans.
Although various navies experimented with primitive carriers, nothing was standardized. Bogert conceived the idea that aircraft take off from the carrier’s bow and land on the flight deck from the stern. He also designed the first practical system for stopping planes, those arresting cables that stretch across the deck. Escort carriers were later eclipsed by the famed fleet carriers of legend (which were two or three times their size), but 130 vessels of this class were eventually commissioned to do routine patrol work, scouting, and escorting convoys – tasks their larger counterparts couldn’t do. A few even saw service in Vietnam.
Bogert was born in Flushing on October 27, 1858 and continued working until the 1950s when he was well into his nineties.
