History of Fresh Meadows
History of Fresh Meadows
Colonial and Revolutionary Times
Fresh Meadows was originally of Dutch sailors who discovered the area in 1628. The name translates to “salt meadow” and is also the name of a town in Holland. After the influx of people to Flushing after a British colony, it was founded in 1640, a migration to Fresh Meadows, the “southern suburb of Flushing, followed. The area was then called “Black Stump” is used for the blackened stumps were separated by a large arable land.
Black Stump was a British base during the American Revolution, Benedict Arnold and his troops marched through Black Stump and even spent some nights in the area. While in Fresh Meadows, British troops remained at Ryerson’s Tavern, now 74th on the Avenue and Utopia Parkway could be found. The Klein family, a large landowner in Fresh Meadows, the building was demolished in 1933.
The Nineteenth Century
The Black Stump School was founded in the 1800’s, is located in the current situation of the Utopia Playground on Utopia Parkway and 73rd Avenue. (Some sources list his position on the current position of No. 26 at 73rd Ave and 195 St.) The school has been a one-room wooden frame country school house, accompanied by 10-15 students during the winter but as many as 50 children during the summer months. After school was abandoned, it served as headquarters of the Black Stump Hook, Head and Bucket Co. # 1, “a group of firefighters, who served neighborhood farms until 1913.
Twentieth Century
The 1900’s were a time of great change to Black Stump, who began to stand at its current name, fresh meadows. In 1923, Benjamin C. Ribman opened the 141-acre Fresh Meadows Country Club, which operated until 1946. During his 23-year anniversary of the Country Club hosted the 1932 U.S. Open (won by Gene Sarazen) and the 1930 PGA Championship. Other celebrities who played on the course are baseball greats Babe Ruth and Ty Cobb, boxer Joe Lewis and golfer Bobby Jones. The Country Club was sold in 1946, the New York Life Insurance Company.
After the acquisition of Fresh Meadows Country Club and most of the arable land holdings of the Klein family, built in New York Life Insurance Company Fresh Meadows Housing Development, is a “model community for the return of World War II soldiers and their families.
The development includes two-to three-storey houses, apartment buildings, shopping centers, a cinema, a public library and schools, including PS 26.Viewed as a pioneer in the “landscape planning,” the development contained a lot of open countryside, accessible from each apartment unit. The shopping center was one of the first to create a “car-oriented” layout. It opened in 1949 and still operates today. The other major development in Fresh Meadows is opened Utopia Estates, a 1,000-house development in 1940.
A New Millennium
End of 2003, what remained of the small farm, a two-hectare plot of land that was previously part of the 100-acre farm Klein, was sold to developers, ending the history of agriculture Fresh Meadows. Today, Fresh Meadows, a long way from his early days as a predominantly white neighborhood come Farm and is one of the most diverse areas of America.
Once a farming community known as Black Stump, Fresh Meadows is now one of the most affluent areas of New York. It is traditionally home to a thriving Jewish community have been, but have in recent years, Asian-American families also moved.
The neighborhood’s busiest road is the 73rd Avenue, a 200-year-old street with traditional single-family homes and a popular bike path lined with Tudor. A huge apartment complex in the northeast also shares a name with the neighborhood and the place is a large shopping center.
Fresh Meadows, Cunningham Park is one of the largest in Queens. The 358-acre park has ball, barbecues and beach volleyball, and often plays host to performances by artists such as the New York Philharmonic, the Metropolitan Opera and the Big Apple Circus.
No major subway lines are located in Fresh Meadows, but residents, the F in Kew Gardens, by accessing local buses. Express buses also reach Midtown Manhattan in an hour. For drivers, the neighborhood on Long Iceland Expressway, Union Turnpike and Utopia Parkway is easily accessible.
Colonial and Tudor homes dominate Fresh Meadows. A four-bedroom, three-bath house on the market for $ 849,000. Tenants find one bedroom apartments for around $ 1,100 and two-bedroom apartments for $ 1,500. Co-ops list for about $ 200,000.
