Wyandanch, New York
Encyclopedia
Wyandanch (ˈ) is a hamlet and census-designated place
in the town of Babylon
in Suffolk County
, New York
. The population was 10,546 at the 2000 census.
, a leader of the Montaukett
Native American tribe during the 17th-century. Formerly known as Half Way Hollow Hills, West Deer Park (1875), and Wyandance (1893), the area of scrub oak and pine barrens south of the southern slope of Half Hollow terminal moraine was named Wyandanch in 1903 by the Long Island Rail Road
(LIRR) to honor Chief Wyandanch and end confusion between travelers getting off at the West Deer Park and Deer Park railroad stations. The history of the hamlet has been shaped by waves of immigrants.
The Massapequa Indians deeded the northwest section (of what now is the Town of Babylon
) to Huntington in the Baiting Place Purchase of 1698. The northeast section of the Town of Babylon "pine brush and plain" was deeded to Huntington by the Secatogue Indians in the Squaw Pit Purchase of 1699. What is now Wyandanch is located in the Squaw Pit Purchase area. Lorena Frevert reported in 1949 that in the Baiting Place Purchase the Massapequa Indians "reserved the right of fishing and 'gathering plume and hucel bearyes."
. Jacob Conklin's 1710 "Pirate House" was the first house built in what became the Town of Babylon.
. Casey had purchased the 1000 acres (4 km²) Nathanial Conklin estate in 1874 and he wanted a rail depot and post office located closer than the LIRR Deer Park depot that had opened in 1853. The 1875 West Deer Park/Wyandanch railroad station was demolished in 1958.
The first lots were sold near the station, around the time of a Long Island land boom in 1872. These were offered by a realtor named Charles Schleier, who tempted potential purchasers, describing the area as being "The finest, healthiest location, good for till soil, splendid water, good market for produce, rapid and cheap transit", and as "level land and hills, romantic scenery, fine clay land, mineral springs; the most beautiful place for private residence and garden". His efforts resulted in the first arrivals of German and German-American residents.
Grant's second son, Ulysses S. "Buck" Grant, purchased the Casey estate in 1882. After the demise of Grant and Ward bank in 1884, which caused the financial ruin of the Grant family, the estate was sold to Abraham H. Jonas for $60,000.
In April 1903, the 1343 acres (5.4 km²) ex-Conklin estate and historic Conklin family cemetery was sold to Bishop Charles Edward McDonnell of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn, who resumed the bottling of spring water from the Colonial Spring. Eventually the Mc Donnell property became the Catholic Youth Organization's (CYO) summer camp in Wyandanch. In 2011 14-year old, Michael Berdon (Nesconset,)the seventh great-grandson of Jacob Conklin, restored the 257-year old cemetery and laid a brick path approach to the gravesite with the assistance of the Nicolock Corp. (Lindenhust), Splendor Landscaping and Masonry (Commack) and Charles Dolon, the chairman of Cablevision Corp. Since the cemetery is located on private property, visits must be coordinated with tours conducted by the Town of Babylon.; Denise M. Bonilla, "Fixing up the Family Plot: Aspiring Eagle Scout with notable lineage restores historic cemetery," Newsday November 17, 2011: A23
On March 8, 1907, the Wyandanch post office was moved from the LIRR depot to Anthony Kirchner's General Store and Hotel on Merritt Avenue diagonally across from the railroad station.
Prosperous German and Austrian-Americans also lived in the hilly, secluded and sylvan Carintha Heights section, west of Conklin Street, which was developed by Brosl Hasslacher after the construction of William K. Vanderbilt's Motor Parkway. Hasslacher helped Vanderbilt assemble plots of land in Wheatley Heights for the right-of-way for his state-of-the-art parkway. Hasslacher built the Chateau Lodge (later the very popular Chateau Restaurant) off Hasslacher Blvd. (later Chateau Drive).
Irish and Irish-American families built homes on land they had purchased in the 1920s land bubble from realtor Harry Levey in Wyandance Spring Park or Home Acres. Home Acres was located between Brooklyn Avenue and Patton Avenue. The newcomers wanted to escape from the crowded and economically depressed conditions in Manhattan and The Bronx and enjoy the fresh pine air, privacy and lower costs of rural Wyandanch yet be within an hours ride of the "City" on the LIRR.
More affluent and prominent Irish-American families in Wyandanch (pillars of the community and the Catholic Church) lived nearer the "village" in more prosperous homes with larger plots of land. Catherine "Kitty" McMahon, a Democrat, was postmistress in Wyandanch, having been appointed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, from September 1933 until November 1948.
In the Upper Little Farms section bounded by Straight Path, Little East Neck Road and Grunwedel Avenue (now Patton Avenue) pioneering upwardly mobile African-American families also began building their own homes. Mortimer Cumberbach and Ignatius Davidson opened their C and D Cement Block Corp. on Booker Avenue at Straight Path on December 6, 1928; as late as the mid-1950s, C & D Cement Block was the only large business owned and operated by African-Americans in Suffolk County.
Upwardly mobile African-American families established homes south of the LIRR in the 1950s and 1960s. Many of these families--both middle class and working class--purchased homes in Wyandanch because they were denied opportunities to move into other fast developing white housing tracts on Long Island (such as Levittown
) due to exclusionist real estate practices: steering, restrictive covenants, red-lining or price points.
The rapid development of Wyandanch in the 1950s as one of the largest African-American communities in Suffolk County transformed Wyandanch politically into a hamlet, which by 1960 voted overwhelmingly Democratic. In the 1950s and 1960s the political interest of African-Americans in Wyandanch was mainly focus on winning seats on the Wyandanch Board of Education.
Suffolk County officials intervened quickly and inventoried problems included joblessness, lack of bus access to area businesses and factories, a lack of recreational facilities for youth, and a lack of African-American representation in the police force. The assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.
, added to the unease, though no violence was reported.
As a result of the August 1967 disturbances in Wyandanch, governments, private businesses, the Wyandanch School District, community church groups and individuals, residents and non-residents, acted to address the numerous problems facing the community. The U.S. Office of Economic Opportunity and its Wyandanch Community Action Center worked to improve bus routes, develop job training programs and assist the indigent with accessing government services. The Great Atlantic and Pacific Tea Company (A & P) built a modern supermarket in downtown Wyandanch at the corner of Straight Path and Long Island Avenue. Today, this building houses Suffolk County's Martin Luther King, Jr Community Health Center.
of 2000, there were 10,546 people, 2,525 households, and 2,113 families residing in the CDP. The population density
was 2,410.8 per square mile (931.8/km²). There were 2,776 housing units at an average density of 634.6/sq mi (245.3/km²). The racial makeup of the CDP was 3.9% White, 77.7% African American, 0.01% Native American, 0.01% Asian, 0.01% Pacific Islander, 6.26% from other races
, and 4% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 16.35% of the population.
's Long Island Motor Parkway
(LIMP) toll road (1908). LIMP had two concrete overpass bridges crossing hollows at Little East Neck Road and Colonial Springs Road (across from the Wheatley Heights Post Office). The parkway (abandoned in 1938) was dug up and the bridges demolished in the early 1960s to make room for the Westwood Village housing estate in Wheatley Heights.
Working class Wyandanch was sandwiched in between the wealthy estates of the: Belmonts, the Corbins and the Guggenhiems in North Babylon, and the Vanderbilts and the Baruchs in Wheatley Heights. What is now known as Wheatley Heights was mapped out as real estate sub-divisions of Wyandanch (including Wheatley Heights Estates, and Harlem Park) by Bellerose developer, William Geiger, (as in Geiger Lake park and pool) in 1913 following the development of the Long Island Motor Parkway. The filed lot sub-divisions south of the LIRR and east of Straight Path was known as the Colonial Springs Development Corp property. These lots ran from Straight Path to the Carll's River.
In 1941, Robert Moses' Southern State Parkway
was opened to Belmont Lake State Park
in North Babylon. Wyandanch residents were able to enter and exit the parkway at Exit 36 at Straight Path in West Babylon.
. It was demolished in June 1958 and replaced with a building which in turn was replaced in 1986.
The Martin Luther King Jr. Medical Center, a community health center, was opened in 1968, and moved into a new building in 19778.
In 1967, seven Wyandanch parents petitioned Dr. Gordon Wheaton, the Third Supervisory District principal, to dissolve the Wyandanch School District No. 9. The parents, supported by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People
, also asked Dr. Wheaton to order the 2,295 students in the Wyandanch schools (86 per cent of whom were African-American) to be divided equally into the more affluent and predominantly white surrounding Half Hollow Hills, Deer Park, North Babylon, West Babylon and Farmingdale school districts. The Wyandach school board (consisting of five African-Americans and one white man) opposed, and noted that the recently hired Superintendent of Schools had proposed a "$1,000,000 program designed to make Wyandanch a model school district." The superintendent noted that "the uprooting of culturally disadvantaged students to schools where the educational program is planned for the middle class would have damaging effects on our community's children." Rather than wait for a decision by Dr. Wheaton, the NAACP appealed directly to Dr. Allen, the chief of the State Education Department. On July 24, 1968, Allen rejected the petition to dissolve the Wyandanch School District; he told The New York Times that "serious obstacles imposed by existing law" prevented "dissolution of the district," which the Times reported "is now 91.5 per cent non white."
In 1979, teachers in the Wyandanch School District went on strike for two months. The Wyandanch Teacher's Association demanded a 32 percent wage increase over three years, limitation of class size to 32 students, and teacher input in educational policy decisions. A 13.3% was turned down; a final compromise granted the teachers a 19.5% salary increase.
In 2010-11, the New York State Department of Education removed the Wyandanch Memorial High School from its "Needs Improvement"
list and restored it to "In Good Standing" status for the 2010–11 school year.
, the school was renamed in honor of Martin Luther King, Jr.
.
On October 2, 1966 the $1.3 million, 29-room, Milton L. Olive Elementary School was opened at Garden City Avenue and South 37th Street with 870 pupils. The school was named for Milton Lee Olive III, an African-American private from Chicago who served in Vietnam where he saved the lives of four of his comrades by falling on an enemy grenade, an act for which he was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor. 70% of the students in the Wyandanch School District were African-American in 1966.
in 1967. The original center was replaced in 1999 by the LaFrancis Hardiman Early Childhood Wing of the Martin Luther King Elementary School, having been demolished in 1996.
, the CDP has a total area of 4.4 square miles (11.3 km²), all land. Wyandanch is a suburb of New York City. It is served by Exit 36 on the Southern State Parkway and Exit 50 on the Long Island Expressway.
Formerly known as Half Way Hollow Hills, West Deer Park (1875), and Wyandance (1888). Topographically, Wyandanch's nutrient-poor loam and sandy soils are part of the outwash plain which was formed as the last glacier melted about 10,000 BCE. The outwash plain slopes gently towards Belmont Lake State Park from the Half Way Hollow Hills terminal moraine and from Little East Neck Road.
In the mid and late 20th century, the Wheatley Heights area (Half Hollow Hills School District) developed as a separate community (due to class and racial dynamics) but is still served by the Wyandanch Fire Department and the US Postal Service.
Sources: Dyson, 118-9; "Paper Firm Buys Long Island Site," New York Times, October 5, 1947:R3; "Start This month on New Fairchild Plant," Newsday, March 2, 1951: 51; Grumman archives, Bethpage, NY; "Lunn Laminates Moving to Town," Babylon Town Leader, November 23, 1961. Roy Douglas' recollections
The town spent $156,000 refurbishing the Geiger Lake Pool in Wyandanch in the summer of 1989. The Town of Babylon demolished the Wyandanch pool in 2011.
. The first Mass to be celebrated in Wyandanch took place in June 1932 in a real estate building, with fund-raising eventually allowing construction of the Little Mission Chapel of the Our Lady of Miraculous Medal Roman Catholic parish, completed in June 28, 1936. An adjacent parish hall opened in 1941, followed in 1950 by an additional wing and a rectory.
The Franciscan Brothers moved their novitiate from Smithtown
to the Wyandanch parish in 1949.
The third oldest church in Wyandanch. The Community Nazarene Church was "founded in 1950 by the late Rev. Walter Eugene Hazard." The sanctuary of the Community Nazarene Church was opened in the early 1970s.
The First African Methodist Episcopal Church of Wyandanch was established in 1995 Under the pastorate of Rev. Linda Smith. The initial church services were helf in a church member's home, later in the Haskill's Funeral Home on Straight Path in Wyandanch and even later in a store front in Wyandanch
The House of Prayer Church of God in Christ was created by Elder Charles Bond in May 1988. The initial service was conducted in Pastor Bond's house at 20 Russell Court in Copiague. Elder Bond moved the church to a rented storefront in Wyandanch at 1551-A Straight Path. In 1990, "the church had saved enough money to purchase its present building located at 113 Mount Avenue in Wyandanch."
Census-designated place
A census-designated place is a concentration of population identified by the United States Census Bureau for statistical purposes. CDPs are delineated for each decennial census as the statistical counterparts of incorporated places such as cities, towns and villages...
in the town of Babylon
Babylon (town), New York
The Town of Babylon is one of ten towns in Suffolk County, New York . Located on Long Island, the town population was 211,792 as of the 2000 census. There is also a Village of Babylon located within the town. It borders Nassau County to the West, and the Atlantic Ocean to the South...
in Suffolk County
Suffolk County, New York
Suffolk County is a county located in the U.S. state of New York on the eastern portion of Long Island. As of the 2010 census, the population was 1,493,350. It was named for the county of Suffolk in England, from which its earliest settlers came...
, New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
. The population was 10,546 at the 2000 census.
History
This hamlet is named after Chief WyandanchChief Wyandanch
Wyandanch was a sachem of the Montaukett Indians in the mid 17th century on eastern Long Island...
, a leader of the Montaukett
Montaukett
The Montaukett is an Algonquian-speaking Native American group native to the eastern end of Long Island, New York and one of the thirteen historical indigenous centers...
Native American tribe during the 17th-century. Formerly known as Half Way Hollow Hills, West Deer Park (1875), and Wyandance (1893), the area of scrub oak and pine barrens south of the southern slope of Half Hollow terminal moraine was named Wyandanch in 1903 by the Long Island Rail Road
Long Island Rail Road
The Long Island Rail Road or LIRR is a commuter rail system serving the length of Long Island, New York. It is the busiest commuter railroad in North America, serving about 81.5 million passengers each year. Established in 1834 and having operated continuously since then, it is the oldest US...
(LIRR) to honor Chief Wyandanch and end confusion between travelers getting off at the West Deer Park and Deer Park railroad stations. The history of the hamlet has been shaped by waves of immigrants.
Native Americans
No archaeological evidence of permanent Native American settlements in Wyandanch has been discovered. Native Americans hunted and gathered fruits and berries in what is now Wyandanch/Wheatley Heights.The Massapequa Indians deeded the northwest section (of what now is the Town of Babylon
Babylon (town), New York
The Town of Babylon is one of ten towns in Suffolk County, New York . Located on Long Island, the town population was 211,792 as of the 2000 census. There is also a Village of Babylon located within the town. It borders Nassau County to the West, and the Atlantic Ocean to the South...
) to Huntington in the Baiting Place Purchase of 1698. The northeast section of the Town of Babylon "pine brush and plain" was deeded to Huntington by the Secatogue Indians in the Squaw Pit Purchase of 1699. What is now Wyandanch is located in the Squaw Pit Purchase area. Lorena Frevert reported in 1949 that in the Baiting Place Purchase the Massapequa Indians "reserved the right of fishing and 'gathering plume and hucel bearyes."
Earliest English settlers: 1706-1874
Wyandanch (West Deer Park before 1903) evolved out of what was originally known as the Lower Half Way Hollow Hills. The area was first settled by Captain Jacob Conklin after he was given a tract of land in what is now Wheatley Heights by his father, Timothy Conklin, about 1706. Gradually, pioneers from Huntington began settling along the southern slope of the Half Way Hollow Hills as they purchased farm and forestlands from the Conklins. What is known today as Wyandanch, originated with the establishment of the West Deer Park LIRR station in 1875. The present-day Wyandanch railroad station sits on the site of the 1875 station on the Long Island Rail RoadLong Island Rail Road
The Long Island Rail Road or LIRR is a commuter rail system serving the length of Long Island, New York. It is the busiest commuter railroad in North America, serving about 81.5 million passengers each year. Established in 1834 and having operated continuously since then, it is the oldest US...
. Jacob Conklin's 1710 "Pirate House" was the first house built in what became the Town of Babylon.
West Deer Park/Wyandance/Wyandanch: 1872-1903
The LIRR built the original West Deer Park railroad station, which incorporated a post office, in May 1875 at the request of General James J. Casey, a brother-in-law of President Ulysses S. GrantUlysses S. Grant
Ulysses S. Grant was the 18th President of the United States as well as military commander during the Civil War and post-war Reconstruction periods. Under Grant's command, the Union Army defeated the Confederate military and ended the Confederate States of America...
. Casey had purchased the 1000 acres (4 km²) Nathanial Conklin estate in 1874 and he wanted a rail depot and post office located closer than the LIRR Deer Park depot that had opened in 1853. The 1875 West Deer Park/Wyandanch railroad station was demolished in 1958.
The first lots were sold near the station, around the time of a Long Island land boom in 1872. These were offered by a realtor named Charles Schleier, who tempted potential purchasers, describing the area as being "The finest, healthiest location, good for till soil, splendid water, good market for produce, rapid and cheap transit", and as "level land and hills, romantic scenery, fine clay land, mineral springs; the most beautiful place for private residence and garden". His efforts resulted in the first arrivals of German and German-American residents.
Grant's second son, Ulysses S. "Buck" Grant, purchased the Casey estate in 1882. After the demise of Grant and Ward bank in 1884, which caused the financial ruin of the Grant family, the estate was sold to Abraham H. Jonas for $60,000.
In April 1903, the 1343 acres (5.4 km²) ex-Conklin estate and historic Conklin family cemetery was sold to Bishop Charles Edward McDonnell of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn, who resumed the bottling of spring water from the Colonial Spring. Eventually the Mc Donnell property became the Catholic Youth Organization's (CYO) summer camp in Wyandanch. In 2011 14-year old, Michael Berdon (Nesconset,)the seventh great-grandson of Jacob Conklin, restored the 257-year old cemetery and laid a brick path approach to the gravesite with the assistance of the Nicolock Corp. (Lindenhust), Splendor Landscaping and Masonry (Commack) and Charles Dolon, the chairman of Cablevision Corp. Since the cemetery is located on private property, visits must be coordinated with tours conducted by the Town of Babylon.; Denise M. Bonilla, "Fixing up the Family Plot: Aspiring Eagle Scout with notable lineage restores historic cemetery," Newsday November 17, 2011: A23
On March 8, 1907, the Wyandanch post office was moved from the LIRR depot to Anthony Kirchner's General Store and Hotel on Merritt Avenue diagonally across from the railroad station.
German-Americans: 1900-1955
Between 1900 and 1955, the dominant ethnic groups in Wyandanch were the German-Americans and Austrian-Americans. The earliest homes built in Wyandanch south of the LIRR were built by German and Austrian-American families. About a hundred "honest and frugal" German and Austrian-American families lived in Sheet Nine of the City of Breslau as early as the 1880s. Many members of these Sheet Nine families were skilled workers, gardeners, carpenters, plumbers, stable workers and servants on the nearby August Belmont estate and horse breeding establishment in North Babylon (1865) and on the Corbin, Guggenheim and Phelps estates in North Babylon. Sheet Nine Germans and Austrians also worked in the Wyandance Brick and Terra Cotta works and cut brush and pulled stumps for the construction of Long Island Avenue (Conklin Street) in 1895.Prosperous German and Austrian-Americans also lived in the hilly, secluded and sylvan Carintha Heights section, west of Conklin Street, which was developed by Brosl Hasslacher after the construction of William K. Vanderbilt's Motor Parkway. Hasslacher helped Vanderbilt assemble plots of land in Wheatley Heights for the right-of-way for his state-of-the-art parkway. Hasslacher built the Chateau Lodge (later the very popular Chateau Restaurant) off Hasslacher Blvd. (later Chateau Drive).
Irish-Americans: 1920s and 1930s
Beginning in the 1920s and extending into the 1930s, intrepid working-class settlers (recently arrived from County Donegal in Ireland) began building small wood-frame bungalow-type homes in the dangerous fire-prone pine barrens in Wyandance Springs Park-there were no springs, no park and no roads- and in Home Acres in the area bounded by Straight Path, Long Island Avenue, Little East Neck Road and Grunwedel Avenue (now Patton Avenue).Irish and Irish-American families built homes on land they had purchased in the 1920s land bubble from realtor Harry Levey in Wyandance Spring Park or Home Acres. Home Acres was located between Brooklyn Avenue and Patton Avenue. The newcomers wanted to escape from the crowded and economically depressed conditions in Manhattan and The Bronx and enjoy the fresh pine air, privacy and lower costs of rural Wyandanch yet be within an hours ride of the "City" on the LIRR.
More affluent and prominent Irish-American families in Wyandanch (pillars of the community and the Catholic Church) lived nearer the "village" in more prosperous homes with larger plots of land. Catherine "Kitty" McMahon, a Democrat, was postmistress in Wyandanch, having been appointed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, from September 1933 until November 1948.
African-Americans: 1920s and 1930s
African-Americans have lived in Wyandanch for almost a century. In the 1920s African-American families bought plots of land and built their own homes in the "Little Farms" section of the West Babylon school district between Straight Path, Little East Neck Road and Gordon Avenue. See, Douglas, "Pine Barren Pioneers," Long Island Forum, December 1982In the Upper Little Farms section bounded by Straight Path, Little East Neck Road and Grunwedel Avenue (now Patton Avenue) pioneering upwardly mobile African-American families also began building their own homes. Mortimer Cumberbach and Ignatius Davidson opened their C and D Cement Block Corp. on Booker Avenue at Straight Path on December 6, 1928; as late as the mid-1950s, C & D Cement Block was the only large business owned and operated by African-Americans in Suffolk County.
Pioneering Italian-Americans: 1920s-1940s
In the 1910s s, 1930s and 1940s, Italian-American families moved into Wyandanch and were very active in business, politics and the Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal Roman Catholic Church. In the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s, most businesses in Wyandanch (grocery stores, bakeries, restaurants, gasoline stations and auto repair shops, liquor stores, butcher shops, barber shops, bars and lumber yards) were owned and operated by either Italian-American of German-American entrepreneurs.Hispanic pioneers: 1940s-1960s
Hispanic families began to settle in Wyandanch in the late 1940s since the community offered affordable housing and land, within easy commuting distance of nearby defense plants and Pilgrim, Edgewood, Central Islip and Kings Park State Mental hospitals-where jobs were plentiful.Origins of Carver Park and racial transformation: 1951-53
In March 1951, Taca Homes offered expandable four-room Cape Cod style homes for sale in Wyandanch on a "non-racial" basis at the Carver Park development at Straight Path and Booker Avenue. The homes with basement, hot-water heat and tile baths sold for $7,200 and were eligible for Federal Housing Administration loan insurance. Carver Park was advertised as "interracial housing." Homes in the second section of Carver Park were purchased almost exclusively by African-Americans. The building of Carver Park and then the construction of Lincoln Park on Parkway Boulevard between Straight Path and Mount Avenue in 1956, with over 400 homes, triggered the transformation of Wyandanch from a mostly white community in 1950 to a majority African-American community in 1960. Many of the whites who lived south of the LIRR relocated and lower middle class African-Americans bought modest, individually-built homes in Wyandanch Springs Park and in the "Tree streets" area east of Straight Path.Upwardly mobile African-American families established homes south of the LIRR in the 1950s and 1960s. Many of these families--both middle class and working class--purchased homes in Wyandanch because they were denied opportunities to move into other fast developing white housing tracts on Long Island (such as Levittown
Levittown, New York
Levittown is a hamlet in the Town of Hempstead located on Long Island in Nassau County, New York. Levittown is midway between the villages of Hempstead and Farmingdale. As of the 2010 census, the CDP had a total population of 51,881....
) due to exclusionist real estate practices: steering, restrictive covenants, red-lining or price points.
The rapid development of Wyandanch in the 1950s as one of the largest African-American communities in Suffolk County transformed Wyandanch politically into a hamlet, which by 1960 voted overwhelmingly Democratic. In the 1950s and 1960s the political interest of African-Americans in Wyandanch was mainly focus on winning seats on the Wyandanch Board of Education.
Racial disturbances-August 1967
Racial tensions in Wyandanch in 1967 were similar to those across the United States. On the first three nights of August 1967, racial disturbances broke out in Wyandanch as small groups of young African-American adults reportedly smashed windows in three stores, overturned two cars, set fire to the auditorium of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Elementary School on Mount Avenue, set fires at the Wyandanch VFW Hall and ambulance garage at S. 20th Street and Straight Path, threw stones at the Wyandanch Fire House and pelted police officers with rocks and bottles.Suffolk County officials intervened quickly and inventoried problems included joblessness, lack of bus access to area businesses and factories, a lack of recreational facilities for youth, and a lack of African-American representation in the police force. The assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Martin Luther King, Jr. was an American clergyman, activist, and prominent leader in the African-American Civil Rights Movement. He is best known for being an iconic figure in the advancement of civil rights in the United States and around the world, using nonviolent methods following the...
, added to the unease, though no violence was reported.
As a result of the August 1967 disturbances in Wyandanch, governments, private businesses, the Wyandanch School District, community church groups and individuals, residents and non-residents, acted to address the numerous problems facing the community. The U.S. Office of Economic Opportunity and its Wyandanch Community Action Center worked to improve bus routes, develop job training programs and assist the indigent with accessing government services. The Great Atlantic and Pacific Tea Company (A & P) built a modern supermarket in downtown Wyandanch at the corner of Straight Path and Long Island Avenue. Today, this building houses Suffolk County's Martin Luther King, Jr Community Health Center.
Demographics
As of the censusCensus
A census is the procedure of systematically acquiring and recording information about the members of a given population. It is a regularly occurring and official count of a particular population. The term is used mostly in connection with national population and housing censuses; other common...
of 2000, there were 10,546 people, 2,525 households, and 2,113 families residing in the CDP. The population density
Population density
Population density is a measurement of population per unit area or unit volume. It is frequently applied to living organisms, and particularly to humans...
was 2,410.8 per square mile (931.8/km²). There were 2,776 housing units at an average density of 634.6/sq mi (245.3/km²). The racial makeup of the CDP was 3.9% White, 77.7% African American, 0.01% Native American, 0.01% Asian, 0.01% Pacific Islander, 6.26% from other races
Race (United States Census)
Race and ethnicity in the United States Census, as defined by the Federal Office of Management and Budget and the United States Census Bureau, are self-identification data items in which residents choose the race or races with which they most closely identify, and indicate whether or not they are...
, and 4% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 16.35% of the population.
Roads
The original roads in West Deer Park Wyandanch were Colonial Springs Road and Main Avenue, Little East Neck Road, Upper Belmont Road (now Mount Avenue)and Straight Path. All were established before 1900 by the Conklins or the Belmonts. What is now called Long Island Avenue (established in 1895) was originally known as Conklin Street, designed to provide easier access between the village of Farmingdale and the new real estate sites in the future Wyandanch. A section of William K. Vanderbilt Jr.William Kissam Vanderbilt II
William Kissam Vanderbilt II was a motor racing enthusiast and yachtsman and a member of the prominent United States Vanderbilt family.-Biography:...
's Long Island Motor Parkway
Long Island Motor Parkway
The Long Island Motor Parkway , also known as the Vanderbilt Parkway and Motor Parkway, was the first roadway designed for automobile use only. It was privately built by William Kissam Vanderbilt with overpasses and bridges to remove intersections...
(LIMP) toll road (1908). LIMP had two concrete overpass bridges crossing hollows at Little East Neck Road and Colonial Springs Road (across from the Wheatley Heights Post Office). The parkway (abandoned in 1938) was dug up and the bridges demolished in the early 1960s to make room for the Westwood Village housing estate in Wheatley Heights.
Working class Wyandanch was sandwiched in between the wealthy estates of the: Belmonts, the Corbins and the Guggenhiems in North Babylon, and the Vanderbilts and the Baruchs in Wheatley Heights. What is now known as Wheatley Heights was mapped out as real estate sub-divisions of Wyandanch (including Wheatley Heights Estates, and Harlem Park) by Bellerose developer, William Geiger, (as in Geiger Lake park and pool) in 1913 following the development of the Long Island Motor Parkway. The filed lot sub-divisions south of the LIRR and east of Straight Path was known as the Colonial Springs Development Corp property. These lots ran from Straight Path to the Carll's River.
In 1941, Robert Moses' Southern State Parkway
Southern State Parkway
The Southern State Parkway is a long limited-access highway on Long Island, in the U.S. state of New York...
was opened to Belmont Lake State Park
Belmont Lake State Park
Belmont Lake State Park is located in Babylon , New York on Long Island in Suffolk County, New York. The park has boating and picnicking facilities and playing fields for popular sports...
in North Babylon. Wyandanch residents were able to enter and exit the parkway at Exit 36 at Straight Path in West Babylon.
Railroad
In 1875, a station was built in Wyandanch on the Long Island Rail RoadLong Island Rail Road
The Long Island Rail Road or LIRR is a commuter rail system serving the length of Long Island, New York. It is the busiest commuter railroad in North America, serving about 81.5 million passengers each year. Established in 1834 and having operated continuously since then, it is the oldest US...
. It was demolished in June 1958 and replaced with a building which in turn was replaced in 1986.
Fire service
To combat the danger of frequent forest fires, the Wyandanch Volunteer Fire Department, Inc. was established in 1925 and incorporated in 1928. A new fire station was built in 1959, and a second one was added in 1964. Water wells were drilled in the 1950s.Medical services
Ambulance service began in 1951 with the community-formed Wyandanch Ambulance Club. Other volunteer squads operated as well, and in 1980 the non-profit Wyandanch-Wheatley Heights Ambulance Corps was formed.The Martin Luther King Jr. Medical Center, a community health center, was opened in 1968, and moved into a new building in 19778.
Public water
As late as 1980, hundreds of homeowners in Wyandanch were not served by the public water mains of the Suffolk County Water Authority but relied on private water wells. After community action, public water was extended to thousands of home in Wyandanch, West Babylon and North Babylon by the late 1980s.Sewers
In October 2011, a sewer pipe was being laid down on Straight Path from the Southern State Parkway into Wyandanch as part of the "Wyandanch Rising" program to upgrade downtown WyandanchEducation
Wyandanch was part of the Deer Park school district until 1923. Deer Park built the first permanent school building in Wyandanch on Straight Path at 20th Street in 1913. A modern Wyandanch grade school opened in September 1937, built for $120,000, $54,000 of which provided by the New Deal Public Works Authority. An addition to the Straight Path school was built in 1949 to accommodate the growing population.In 1967, seven Wyandanch parents petitioned Dr. Gordon Wheaton, the Third Supervisory District principal, to dissolve the Wyandanch School District No. 9. The parents, supported by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People
National Association for the Advancement of Colored People
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, usually abbreviated as NAACP, is an African-American civil rights organization in the United States, formed in 1909. Its mission is "to ensure the political, educational, social, and economic equality of rights of all persons and to...
, also asked Dr. Wheaton to order the 2,295 students in the Wyandanch schools (86 per cent of whom were African-American) to be divided equally into the more affluent and predominantly white surrounding Half Hollow Hills, Deer Park, North Babylon, West Babylon and Farmingdale school districts. The Wyandach school board (consisting of five African-Americans and one white man) opposed, and noted that the recently hired Superintendent of Schools had proposed a "$1,000,000 program designed to make Wyandanch a model school district." The superintendent noted that "the uprooting of culturally disadvantaged students to schools where the educational program is planned for the middle class would have damaging effects on our community's children." Rather than wait for a decision by Dr. Wheaton, the NAACP appealed directly to Dr. Allen, the chief of the State Education Department. On July 24, 1968, Allen rejected the petition to dissolve the Wyandanch School District; he told The New York Times that "serious obstacles imposed by existing law" prevented "dissolution of the district," which the Times reported "is now 91.5 per cent non white."
In 1979, teachers in the Wyandanch School District went on strike for two months. The Wyandanch Teacher's Association demanded a 32 percent wage increase over three years, limitation of class size to 32 students, and teacher input in educational policy decisions. A 13.3% was turned down; a final compromise granted the teachers a 19.5% salary increase.
In 2010-11, the New York State Department of Education removed the Wyandanch Memorial High School from its "Needs Improvement"
list and restored it to "In Good Standing" status for the 2010–11 school year.
Elementary schools
In 1956, the Mount Avenue Elementary School was opened, at a cost of $1,155,000. The next year, influenced by the Montgomery Bus BoycottMontgomery Bus Boycott
The Montgomery Bus Boycott was a political and social protest campaign that started in 1955 in Montgomery, Alabama, USA, intended to oppose the city's policy of racial segregation on its public transit system. Many important figures in the civil rights movement were involved in the boycott,...
, the school was renamed in honor of Martin Luther King, Jr.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Martin Luther King, Jr. was an American clergyman, activist, and prominent leader in the African-American Civil Rights Movement. He is best known for being an iconic figure in the advancement of civil rights in the United States and around the world, using nonviolent methods following the...
.
On October 2, 1966 the $1.3 million, 29-room, Milton L. Olive Elementary School was opened at Garden City Avenue and South 37th Street with 870 pupils. The school was named for Milton Lee Olive III, an African-American private from Chicago who served in Vietnam where he saved the lives of four of his comrades by falling on an enemy grenade, an act for which he was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor. 70% of the students in the Wyandanch School District were African-American in 1966.
Junior-senior high school
In August 1958, the Wyandanch Board of Education began planning the development of a junior-senior high school for Wyandanch. Wyandanch started a 9th Grade class in 1957-8 and added a class a year until the high school opened. The School District obtained 10 acres (40,468.6 m²) between South 32nd Street and Little East Neck Road and between Garden City Avenue and Brooklyn Avenue by condemnation for the high school and its athletic fields. The groundbreaking for the school took place on December 6, 1959, and the school opened in September 1961.LaFrancis Hardiman Early Childhood Center
The LaFrancis Hardiman Early Childhood Center opened for pre-K education in 1969 and was named for a resident who had been killed in the Vietnam WarVietnam War
The Vietnam War was a Cold War-era military conflict that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. This war followed the First Indochina War and was fought between North Vietnam, supported by its communist allies, and the government of...
in 1967. The original center was replaced in 1999 by the LaFrancis Hardiman Early Childhood Wing of the Martin Luther King Elementary School, having been demolished in 1996.
Wyandanch College Center
A liberal arts college was started in Wyandanch, with evening classes for over 200 students, in early October 1969, but soon closed.Day Care Center: 1973
Following the August 1967 disturbances, the Wyandanch Day Care Center was opened on Commonwealth Boulevard. The Wyandanch school district first provided space for 35 children in a classroom in the Straight Path Elementary School and later provided room in an empty building adjacent to the Milton. L. Olive Elementary School. Ground was broken for the new center on September 13, 1970, and the Wyandanch Day Care Center opened on February 25, 1973. The two-story, red brick, eight-classroom Day Care Center was constructed with a $1 million loan from the New York State Social Services Department.Public library
In April 1974, the construction of a public library was approved. Initially operating from two rented portable classrooms, the permanent building eventually opened in 1989.Geography
According to the United States Census BureauUnited States Census Bureau
The United States Census Bureau is the government agency that is responsible for the United States Census. It also gathers other national demographic and economic data...
, the CDP has a total area of 4.4 square miles (11.3 km²), all land. Wyandanch is a suburb of New York City. It is served by Exit 36 on the Southern State Parkway and Exit 50 on the Long Island Expressway.
Formerly known as Half Way Hollow Hills, West Deer Park (1875), and Wyandance (1888). Topographically, Wyandanch's nutrient-poor loam and sandy soils are part of the outwash plain which was formed as the last glacier melted about 10,000 BCE. The outwash plain slopes gently towards Belmont Lake State Park from the Half Way Hollow Hills terminal moraine and from Little East Neck Road.
In the mid and late 20th century, the Wheatley Heights area (Half Hollow Hills School District) developed as a separate community (due to class and racial dynamics) but is still served by the Wyandanch Fire Department and the US Postal Service.
Agriculture and Industry
The early history of Wyandanch was mainly agricultural. West Deer Park was quite productive agriculturally in the nineteenth century. Before 1854 "peaches were produced in large quantities and at profitable returns on the backbone hills of the island, which lie north of the main line of the Long Island railroad, near West Deer Park or Wyandance station." In 1854, seventeen-year locusts so devastated the peach trees "that cultivation on any extensive scale has not been attempted since."Water bottling
Water from the Colonial Spring in West Deer Park (now Wheatley Heights) was bottled in small blue embossed "West Deer Park" water bottles by the Colonial Springs Mineral Company between 1845 and 1854. The bottlers claimed it had "special medicinal properties." When Dr. George Hopkins (Brooklyn) ran the Colonial Springs bottling works: "A bottling house was built and the springs were welled in with enameled brick and covered with glass tops."Brick manufacture
Millions of building bricks were molded and baked at the Walker & Conklin and W.H. and F.A. Barlett brickyards using the Cretaceous clay and fine sand found in the area. The bricks were shipped out by railroad using a LIRR spur which ran along what is now N. 23rd Street. In October 1888 the Wyandance Brick and Terra Cotta Corp. was organized on the site of the abandoned Walker and Conklin brickyard to produce solid and hollow building bricks. In 1875, the best "hard" West Deer Park bricks were selling for $7 per 1,000 delivered, but the plant was destroyed by a forest fire in the spring of 1893.Pickle farms
In the 1880s, cucumbers for the pickle trade were successfully grown in West Deer Park. As the Brooklyn Eagle reported in 1882: "To-day, in West Deer Park alone, there are one hundred acres of the finest farmland in the country devoted to this crop and on the average the farmers owing them will realize $150 per acre." The pickle farms were located north of the Colonial Springs Road and Main Avenue, in what is now Wheatley Heights.Industry
The Conservative Gas Corp. established a propane bottling business in Wyandanch in 1929. Today it operates as Amerigas Propane LP.In 1947, Joseph F. Walsh established a paper box factory in Wyandanch and Ignatius Davidson and Mortimer Cumberbach, expanded their C & D Cement Block factory-making it the largest African-American owned business in Suffolk County, NY. Fairchild Guided Missiles established a large factory in Wyandanch in 1951-2 and built the Lark anti-aircraft missile and the Petral anti-sub and ship missile for the U.S. Navy. Fairchild Stratos left Wyandanch in 1963 and was replaced by Grumman Aircraft, which fabricated custom-built fibreglass and plexiglass sections and nacelles for U.S. Navy aircraft. Grumman left the community in 1977. Max Staller built the first supermarket and shopping center in Wyandanch in 1955. All these businesses were located near the Long Island Rail Road track in Wyandanch. Beginning in the 1950s and 1960s, light industrial factories were established in Wyandanch in the northern section of the Pinelawn Industrial Park in southwest Wyandanch and on the east side of Straight Path between two African-American housing estates.Sources: Dyson, 118-9; "Paper Firm Buys Long Island Site," New York Times, October 5, 1947:R3; "Start This month on New Fairchild Plant," Newsday, March 2, 1951: 51; Grumman archives, Bethpage, NY; "Lunn Laminates Moving to Town," Babylon Town Leader, November 23, 1961. Roy Douglas' recollections
Geiger Lake
In July 1945, the Town of Babylon accepted a deed from the owners of 40 acres (161,874.4 m²) Geiger Lake property (Wheatley Heights Estate, Inc.) located between Long Island Avenue and Grand Boulevard on the border between Wyandanch and Deer Park. The Babylon Town Board voted $3,500 to improve the "small lake." In 1946, Babylon cut the brush around the lake, dredged and cleared it, and rehabilitated "a sturdy log cabin" into concession and comfort stations. The Geiger Lake Town Beach and picnic grove was opened to the public on July 21, 1946. Geiger Memorial Lake was so popular that by 1948 "many houses" had been built on Elk Street on land with lake views.The town spent $156,000 refurbishing the Geiger Lake Pool in Wyandanch in the summer of 1989. The Town of Babylon demolished the Wyandanch pool in 2011.
Youth recreation
One of the major complaints voiced by young adults in Wyandanch after the August 1967 unrest was the lack of positive recreational activities. A youth center opened in January 1974, and in 1984 the Wyandanch Youth Services, Inc. (WYS) was formed. Since 1998 WYS has operated a full service from a new purpose-built youth center.Catholicism
Until the early 1930s, Catholics from the area worshiped at St. Kilian's in FarmingdaleFarmingdale, New York
The Village of Farmingdale is an incorporated village on Long Island within the Town of Oyster Bay in Nassau County, New York in the United States...
. The first Mass to be celebrated in Wyandanch took place in June 1932 in a real estate building, with fund-raising eventually allowing construction of the Little Mission Chapel of the Our Lady of Miraculous Medal Roman Catholic parish, completed in June 28, 1936. An adjacent parish hall opened in 1941, followed in 1950 by an additional wing and a rectory.
The Franciscan Brothers moved their novitiate from Smithtown
Smithtown, New York
As of the census of 2000, there were 115,715 people, 38,487 households, and 31,482 families residing in the town. The population density was 2,159.9 people per square mile . There were 39,357 housing units at an average density of 734.6 per square mile...
to the Wyandanch parish in 1949.
Lutheranism
Lutherans in Wyandanch held their first services from August 1934 in the Republican Hall. In June 1938 the Trinity Evangelical Lutheran Church was opened on S. 20th Street.Other religious institutions in Wyandanch
- Community Nazarene Church, 58 Cumberbach Street: 1950
The third oldest church in Wyandanch. The Community Nazarene Church was "founded in 1950 by the late Rev. Walter Eugene Hazard." The sanctuary of the Community Nazarene Church was opened in the early 1970s.
- First African Methodist Episcopal Church of Wyandanch: 1995
The First African Methodist Episcopal Church of Wyandanch was established in 1995 Under the pastorate of Rev. Linda Smith. The initial church services were helf in a church member's home, later in the Haskill's Funeral Home on Straight Path in Wyandanch and even later in a store front in Wyandanch
- House of Prayer Church of God in Christ, 113 Mount Avenue: 1988
The House of Prayer Church of God in Christ was created by Elder Charles Bond in May 1988. The initial service was conducted in Pastor Bond's house at 20 Russell Court in Copiague. Elder Bond moved the church to a rented storefront in Wyandanch at 1551-A Straight Path. In 1990, "the church had saved enough money to purchase its present building located at 113 Mount Avenue in Wyandanch."
Further reading
- Verne Dyson, Deer Park- Wyandanch History, 1957 (Deer Park Public Library)
- Roy Douglas, "Pine Barren Pioneers," Long Island Forum, October, November, December, 1982 (West Islip Public Library)
- Richard Koubeck, Wyandanch: A Political Profile of a Black Suburb, Institute for Community Studies, Queens College, 1971 (Wyandanch Public Library).
- Dyson, Deer Park-Wyandanch History available online at: http://cdm15281.contentdm.oclc.org/