Built in 1912 for the Long Island Rail Road (LIRR), The “Jamaica” was a magnificent parlor car complete with solarium, cooking facilities and an ice-cooled air conditioning system. It was donated by the LIRR to the Wantagh Preservation Society in 1972. The moving process, from the storage site at Grumman in Bethpage to the museum grounds, lasted two days and required several trucks, two dollies and a crane. Time and equipment were donated by local companies to complete this move, and to set the Car on its bed of hand-hewn ties and 80-pound rails.

For more info:
Wantagh Preservation Society
1700 Wantagh Ave
Wantagh, Long Island, NY 11793
 http://www.wantagh.li/museum

There’s a small field adjacent to a local park, and in that field was once located what some believe to be an Indian fort.  Others think it might have been used by the Dutch as a trading post, and there are even a few accounts that claim it was British.  So far, the most likely (and contemporary) theory is that the location was a wampum manufactory that was re-enforced as a Dutch fort.  Amidst all the speculation, one fact remains.  The location is an archaeoogical site that once housed a wooden structure in the early 1600′s.

	Fort Massapeag Archeological Site *** (added 1993 – Site – #93000610) Also known as Fort Neck Site;Massapequa Indian Fort Address Restricted, Oyster Bay
	Historic Significance: Information Potential Area of Significance: Historic – Aboriginal Cultural Affiliation: Munsee Period of Significance: 1600-1649, 1650-1699 Owner: Local Gov’t Historic Function: Defense, Domestic Historic Sub-function: Camp, Fortification, Village Site Current Function: Landscape, Recreation And Culture Current Sub-function: Outdoor Recreation, Park

Studying history in an unoffical capacity can be a funny thing for me.  Usually, there’s a specific person, place or thing that I want to research, and it gets into my blood and stays there.  Over time, I accumulate more and more information about it through internet, library, and person to person research.  Most of the time, I’m able to find out enough information about what I’m investigating to give me a good comprehensive picture of that piece of the past.  However, when it comes to Fort Massapeag, the more I research… the more questions I’m left with.  Allow me to begin with what I think I know of this mysterious location, and perhaps, over time… perhaps others can add more to the story.

In the early 1600′s, there stood a 100′ x 100′ wooden stockade in the marshes along the shore of the Great South Bay in what we now call Massapequa.  Massapequa (land of great water) got it’s name from the Massapequan Indians that occupied the land.  When European settlers arrived, so did the conflict.  There weren’t may battles on Long Island between settlers and Indians, but one of the largest massacres is believed by some historians to have taken place in Massapequa, roughly around Merrick Road.  In 1653, a British settler, who was working for the Dutch (Capt. Underhill… who is buried in Locust Valley), led an attack against a group of Indians not far from this fort.  It is not known if there is any connection.  It is said that they were a peaceful people, and that perhaps the attack was the result of a trade dispute, thus leading some to believe that the fort was more of a trading post/frontier refuge.  The diagrams of the layout suggest that the design is consistent with Dutch frontier forts of the time period.

There have been vague mentionings and passing references of what some assume to be Fort Massapeag throughout history, but overall, the location remained relatively untouched untill the 20th century.  That’s when things get really interesting.

In the 1930′s the Harmon National Real Estate Company purchased this area of Massapequa to build a new housing development.  Long Island was quickly becoming more of a year-round suburbia than the vacation bungalow land that it was just 15 years before.  Areas were being developed into communities, including this little corner of Massapequa.  Harmon began clearing out the woodlands just north of the old fort when they unearthed a mass of skeletons.  There were over 20 skeletons found, and thus stories of the Indian massacre began to surface once again.  By this time in history, Indian artifacts were quite popular, and artifact hunters decended upon the newly cleared development in droves.  The only problem was that most of these ‘hunters’ were interested in the items themselves, and nothing more.  Most of the items found were removed and either kept or sold.  Little to nothing was learned about what was found.  At some point Charles E. Herold, a local historian, managed to convince the development company to save the fort.  The company and Mr. Herold came up with a plan to leave the fort undisturbed and use it as centerpiece for their development, so they fenced the property off in 1934.

Thankfully, back in the thirties, the fenced in fort still wasn’t easy to find if you didn’t know where to look, as it was covered in overgrowth and brush.  The nearest access by automobile was a quarter of a mile away, so the only access to it was by foot.

The location remained fenced off and all but forgotten until the 1950′s, when planners from the Town of Oyster Bay designed a street plan where roads crossed over the site property.  Hearing of the proposed plans, another local historian took up the fight to save the location from being lost to ‘progress’.  John O’Halloran had to find the site by air thanks to the overgrowth, but he was able to spot the embankments where the fort once stood.  His efforts convinced the Town of Oyster Bay to purchase the land, adding it to the attached town park.

In the 1990′s, thanks to the efforts of Dorothy McGee, Fort Massapeag became a National Historic Landmark.  It’s one of a small handful on Long Island and the only archaeological one.  To qualify for historical landmark status, a location must be of historical significance, and at least 50 years of age or older.  At well over 350 years of age, I’d say that the fort qualifies.

Oh, and no… I won’t tell anyone where it is unless I know you.  I don’t want to be responsible for that one oddball going and digging for artifacts.  It’s listed on the National Register of Historical Places… but they’re instructed not to give out the address as well.  It’s not hard to find if you’re willing to look around.

Thanks for reading,

-Craig.

Note: Some of the items found from the site (or the surrounding area to the north) are on display at the Nassau County Museum at Garvies Point in Glen Cove.

50 Barry Drive, Glen Cove, NY 11542
516-571-8010
http://www.garviespointmuseum.com/indian-archaeology-long-island.php

Like many other people coming to New York at the time, Mary Mallon was an Irish immigrant who had come to seek a better life in America at the turn of the century.  She’d gotten a job working as a cook for Mr. Warren and his family who were summering out on Long Island.  There were a total of 11 people staying in that home for the summer, and by September 3rd, more than half of them had come down with Typhoid fever.  Now, please understand that Typhoid fever was not common on Long Island at that time, at least according to three of the local doctors called in to investigate the source of the sudden outbreak.  Herein lies the twist, really.  The source of the outbreak.  At this point in time, they had determined that there were no contaminated food or water sources at the location, so they began to check for contaminated people.

It was assumed that somebody had to have contracted the disease prior to performing any services for the Warrens, but hadn’t shown the signs of the disease during their time there.  A health investigator, George Soper, determined that a single woman in her 40′s had been taken on as the new cook but appeared to be in perfect health.  Soper (who later published his findings in the New England Journal of Medicine), figured out that a relatively healthy human being was capable of carrying the virus, and could be outwardly unaffected, themselves.  He determined that Mary must have gotten a mild case of typhoid earlier, and was able to infect others, while still being healthy herself.  George Soper was the first to identify and document a case of a healthy typhoid carrier in the United States.  It happened here on Long Island, in Oyster Bay.

Now here’s where things go wrong, thus creating the infamous legend of “Typhoid Mary”, spreader of death and disease.

Soper tracked “Typhoid” Mary Mallon down at her new job as a cook for a new family in Manhattan and explained to her how she was transferring disease through bacteria through her cooking (described to her as ‘tiny invisible bugs’, when she was unable to understand how she had a disease but could somehow be in perfect health at the same time.)  He then demanded urine, blood and fecal samples from the woman.  She refused rather abruptly… by grabbing a carving fork and chasing him to the front gate of the home.

At this point, Soper understood that he would be unable to deal with her on his own, so he began to investigate her background, in order to determine how far she may have been spreading the potentially deadly virus.  It turns out that over the past decade or so, Mary had worked for roughly 8 other families, some of which were located on Long Island.  There were 7 outbreaks at those 8 places.  One notable location was Sands Point, where 4 servants became infected.  Overall, there were 22 documented infections and one death in the wake of “Typhoid Mary” over that ten year period.

With enough information to back up his claims, Soper got the New York City’s Health Inspector involved, and Mallon was immediately taken to a hospital where Soper’s claims were confirmed.  Just as quickly, Mary was then isolated to an island hospital where she was confined to a cottage on the grounds of Riverside Hospital where she would remain for the next three years.  It was during this time that she gained her nickname, “Typhoid Mary”.  Eventually, she was allowed to go free, under the conditions that she would keep in contact with the Health Dept. of New York, and that she would not work with food.  She, of course, agreed with these conditions in order to regain her freedom.

Here, is where the public’s opinon of Mary changed from pity to anger.

Mary rejoined society as a launderer.  Washing clothing, she could not transmit the disease (that she never believed she had, nor could spread), but found that she was unable to make enough money in this field of service.  So, Mary disappeared for a time, and did not maintain her obligation to the Health Dept.  Eventually, she even returned to cooking again, but under an assumed identity.  She now refered to herself as Mrs. Brown, and had gotten herself a job as a cook in the Sloane Maternity Hospital in Manhattan.  At least 25 people became infected within three months during her time here.  Two died.  She was quickly found out, and arrested.

“Typhoid Mary” Mallon was, once again, confined to a cottage on the same little island located between the Bronx and Riker’s Island.  As part of Riverside Hospital, it was here that she spent the almost 25 remaining years of her life, passing away due to complications from a previous stroke.

Mary was not responsible for the deaths of thousands, and legend would have one believe.   Was she simply someone who would not believe that which she did not see.  Did she knowingly put people at risk?  We’ll never know for sure.   Had she felt the effects of the fever herself, then perhaps things would have turned out differently.  There were other cases like hers at the time, but she was the one in the public eye.  Unfortunately, there are lives that were lost to her ignorance, and negligence and it all began with a typhoid outbreak at one house on Long Island.

Thanks for reading,

-Craig

This unassuming home may not look like much more than a regular home from the outside (even if it was green and white at the time, and only a one story ranch at that), but it’s been the inspiration for what is arguably one of the greatest ghost stories ever told.  What makes this alleged haunted house so different from others, is that there are so many witnesses to the supernatural events inside.  Much like another Long Island ghost story turned into a movie, the Amityville Horror, there was a priest involved.  There was also a police patrolman named James Hughes, the homeowners, and even a Newsday reporter (David Kahn) that claimed to have witnessed the events inside.  It was claimed that items would fly about the home, and smash themselves into walls and onto the floors.  Some were seen to have launched themselves from as far as twelve feet across the room.  Caps twisted themselves off of soda bottles.  Toy soldiers went flying, and dented furniture.

There has been much speculation as to what natural phenomenon may have caused such incidents.  Lilco (now called LIPA) brought in equipment to check for ground vibrations.  RCA checked the radio frequency spectrum.  Mitchel Field’s air officials were consulted.  Magnetic fields were checked, undeground streams were investigated, and they even looked into an old well on the property.  They had the local town of Hempstead building department in to check for defects in the Herrmann home. Mr. Hermann even went as far as to put a cap on his chimney in order to eliminate the chance of a downdraft being one possibility.  No plausible explanations could be found.  Heck, they even had holy water sprinkled  in the home by Father William Mc Cloud from St. William The Abbot.  Nothing seemed to help.

Many felt that the young boy in the home, Jimmy, was to blame for the mysterious actions taking place in the home.  However, neither the patrolman, Newsday reporter, or Duke University parapsychologist (J. G. Pratt) found this likely.  The objects were thrown at too great a force for the young boy to be suspect.  The did, however, catalog 67 separate events in the home, over the course of five weeks.  Everyone seemed to agree that there was no way that the young boy would have been capable of pulling off a hoax of that scale.

Some say that the events were supernatural in nature.  They speculate that the home was built upon an old native American burial ground.  There are those who claim that the events were the very spirit of Sachem Tackapausha himself.   Most of these stories are speculation and rumor and have yet to be substantiated in any way.

Does this story sound vaguely familiar to you?  It should, if you’ve ever watched the movie “Poltergeist” (1982).  The movie was based upon the events that supposedly took place in this Seaford home.  The year was 1958.

Perhaps the most interesting part of the story is that the events ended just as abruptly as they had begun. To this day, there is no definitive reasoning for any of the events that took place, or for why they suddenly stopped.  The only thing we know for sure is that it all took place on Long Island!

http://www.skepdic.com/poltergeist.html

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,863178-1,00.html

Thanks for reading,

-Craig.

• 1.5 cl (one part) Vodka
• 1.5 cl (one part) Tequila
• 1.5 cl (one part) White Rum
• 1.5 cl (one part) Triple Sec
• 1.5 cl (one part) Gin
• 2.5 cl (1½ part) Lemon juice
• 3.0 cl (two parts) Gomme Syrup
• Dash of Cola

Highball glass (pictured above)

Served “on the rocks” (over ice)

This is the story of a popular drink that is said to have it’s origins on our very own Long Island.  The drink definitely sounds as though it was named after our “little” island.  There are some who claim that the drink was created various other places during prohibition during the 30′s with a specific intention to look like a non-alcoholic beverage.  However, there is little evidence to support this claim.  Rumor and speculation (even if it does seem logical) appears to be all the support to the claim that the drink was invented elsewhere. (it’s rumored to have been created in a community called Long Island, Tennessee, which could be true, but I want to see it on a menu older than 1970, first)

As you’ve read above, there is no actual tea in a Long Island Iced Tea.  There is, however, a very high content of alcohol in the drink.  It’s said to have very little ‘kick’ at first, but that changes quickly.  After just one or two, the ‘wow factor’ settles in and the effects of the alcohol hit you.  Many folks have managed their way to being schnockered (drunk) after one or two without even realizing that it was an alcoholic drink.  The drink gets it’s ‘iced tea’ coloring from the cola added.

Sometime during the 1970′s (1976 by many accounts), the drink was created by Robert (Rosebud) Butt, a bartender at the famed Oak Beach Inn (Babylon, NY, some other accounts list Christopher Bendickson as the bartender).  The drink, being fairly young as far as drinks go, appears to have reached the height of it’s popularity in the 1990′s, and is a nationally (some might say world-wide) known drink to this day.  It’s on menus all over the nation, and is particularly prevalent at establishments all over Long Island.  There is, after all, something about having a drink named after where you live.

Thanks for reading.

-Craig

Here’s the animation mentioned in our first post reply. http://forgottenli.com/?p=6

Propaganda.  In short, it muddies the truth.  Was the Lusitania strictly a passenger ship at the time it was torpedoed by a German sub or was it an armed merchant cruiser?  Did it have a hull full of British munitions?  It gets tough to get to the bottom of the matter, because there are so many facts that could lend themselves to either side of the truth.  I don’t know if we’ll ever know the whole truth behind the details of how this ship was sunk.  Enjoy watching the video above to get one version of the ‘truth’.

Oh, and you’re probably wondering how the sinking of a ship in the North Atlantic that facilitated the U.S. involvement in “The Great War” (WWI, even if it was another two years before we’d enter the war) is connected to Long Island at all.  The short version is that two messages left Telefunken Wireless (German owned) in Sayville, NY.  One message was the coordinates of the Lusitania, and the other was part of an attempt to get Mexico to attack the U.S. in order to keep us out of the war.

Should there be a post about Telefunken? Let me know.

Thanks for reading,

-Craig.

This took place in 1909 and while the concept of man flying was no longer considered new, it had now become something  attainable for those unable to build their own aircraft themselves.  Over the next few years, and leading into World War I, there were small airfields and flight schools springing up all over Long Island.  At this point in time, Long Island was quickly becoming the aviation center of the world.  There were air shows, training flights, international competitions, and world speed record flights taking place one after another.  People were buying aircraft or building their own and flying at every chance they got.  Flying clubs were formed.  Meets and events were all the rage.  Even seaplanes had begun to have their place in the history of flight… and that place was Long Island.

-Craig

Long Island may or may not officially be the origin of a vortex of historical events that have helped to shape both local and national history… but I think I could make a strong argument for it.

I’ve lived on this Island for 39 years now, and have spent more time travelling back and forth across it than I care to recall.  With my career being what it is, I’ve been in thousands of clients homes and businesses over the years and I think I’ve been in just about every town on the Island with a few rare exceptions.  (keep reading this blog in the future to find out which ones, how they came to be named, or even what happened in them).

My love for history didn’t develop in school.  Much like my father before me, the interest set in a little bit later in life.  Sure I remember hearing the information and, like most students, could regurgitate it in order to pass the latest test.  I’d always enjoyed hearing my father’s stories about what happened here or there or who did what and when.  However, it wasn’t until a year after high school that the bug really bit me.  My father was teaching me to drive his car that had a manual transmission.  Sure, I’d been driving for over a year by now with my Camaro, but that was both automatic, and not germane to this story.  What does matter is that we ended up out in Ronkonkoma on the Long Island Motor Parkway.  It was here that my father began to explain to me that this was the endeavor of Willie K. Vanderbilt, and shared with me what he’d heard from speaking to the local librarian.  Now while it is true that my father got some of the details wrong (or the librarian did), the basics of the story were all there.  Over time, I have come to find out more of the details of this historic roadway.  It was the first road designed exclusively for use with automobiles.  Road races were held on sections of the roadway that drew racers in from around the world.  I was driving on this same historic roadway.  This was when it hit me.  The era may be gone, but the physical history is still there.  Bits and pieces of the past could be put back together, much like a detective re-creates a crime.  Research and investigation would then become a part of my life from that point onward.  This accelerated at a ridiculous rate with the advent of this little thing we like to call the internet.

From then on, it was a whirlwind of finding out about people, places, and events that all took place on, around or over Long Island that helped to shape the history of this nation or the island itself.  Earth works in Massapequa remain where a Dutch fort once stood.  This was the site of the largest slaughter of Native Americans on Long Island.  The incident strained relations with settlers for decades after.  George Washington toured the island.  He had a spy ring here, and it is said that this ring of spies has been credited with not only helping to uncover the traitor Benedict Arnold and creating invisible ink, but also with helping Washington with information about British troop movements.  Nikola Tesla, the father of alternating current systems (a/c electricity) had one of his laboratories in Shoreham.  The man was a technology revolutionary.  There was the part that Telefunken Wireless in Sayville played in the sinking of the Lusitania in WWI.  That single event hurled the US into “the war to end all wars”.  The first non-stop, trans-Atlantic flight  left from Long Island.  President Roosevelt’s home: Sagamore Hill.  Camp Hero.  The Amityville Horror House.  Long Island’s Gold Coast.  Levittown.  Bicycle Railroad.  Fire Island.  Camp Upton.  Robert Moses.  The Nazi beach landing in Amagansett.    Negro baseball.  The Underground Railroad.  Captain Kidd.  Bootlegging.  Dutch Schultz.  Vitagraph Movie Studio.  Frank “Bring ‘Em Back Alive” Buck.  Buffalo Bill Cody.  All these things, events, and people have their connections to this island.  As you can well imagine, I could go on listing for pages on end.

This is my opening blog post for forgottenLI.com, and it’s sole intent and purpose is to tell you about who I am and why I do what I do.  I do not pretend to be an expert on any one area of history, but rather a guy who has listened to, read, and experienced a fair amount of the history that this wonderful island has to offer.  Not everything I type here will be accurate.  I can only assure you that I will do my very best to make it accurate.  When I’m wrong, I’ll do my best to admit it, and when I’m not sure of something, I’ll say so.  Being perfect is not in my genetic makeup, but attempting to be… is.  My only goal here is to get you interested in the history that lies between the strip malls and schoolyards.  It’s all around you and I just want you to open your eyes to it.  With that, I also hope you enjoy it as much as I do.
Thank you for reading.
-Craig.