Nineteen fourteen is one of those milestone years, not the leas of which is because it marks the beginning of World War One and, thus, arguably, the true start of the 20th Century.
In 1914, the last passenger pigeon - a species whose flocks created vast clouds of birds between the eastern seaboard and the Ohio River Valley - died in the Cincinnati Zoo. In 1914 Charlie Chaplin appeared made his film debut, Star Wars' Obi Wan Kanobi, Sir Alec Guinness was born (as was Soviet leader Yuri Andropov) and in Brooklyn, N.Y. 7-year-old William Levitt was amongst the 99 million people who called the United States their home.
What was the future Levittown like back then? The Atlas of Nassau County, Long Island by Belcher E. Hyde for that year, especially when compared to maps of our area from the last three decades of the 19th Century such as the Beers, Cline, and Comstock Map for 1873, gives us some indication.
By 1914, the number of farming properties in the neighborhood and immediately surrounding area had doubled from forty years earlier reflecting the manner in which the advent of the motor car (showcased at the 1908-11 Vanderbilt Cup Race) and expansion of the LIRR (beginning rail service to Island Trees via the Stewart Line in 1873) rendered the region more accessible.
Notably, vast tracts of undeveloped and uncultivated land belonging to the Merillon Estate Company spread out forming a rough "U" shape with the Hempstead Turnpike/Jerusalem Avenue intersection, site of that ancient grove called "the Island of Trees", as its epicenter and smaller farms clustering themselves thereabouts east of Division Avenue. This "U" is significant because it'll reappear on a 1948 Levittown street map indicating the 6000 Cape Cod houses and side streets created between 1947 and '48.
There are also changes in roads reflecting this 1873-1914 growth: Division Avenue no longer meets up with its namesake in Hicksville nor continues thence southwards past Hempstead Turnpike to 'round abut present day Knoll Lane; Bloomingdale Road no longer extends to the Turnpike; and a diagonal, unnamed road that, if superimposed upon a contemporary map, would form a line running from the East Village Green to St. John's of Jerusalem Church on Wantagh Avenue, vanishes into the sands of time.
By 1914, the number of farms and residences between Jerusalem Avenue and Hicksville Road had increased to be served by a growing Island Trees School District whilst the Jerusalem School District that evolved in the Levittown's District 5, straddled the area now considered southern Levittown and northern Wantagh.
Few of the landmarks in our neighborhood in 1914 remain today save the Garner House (1896), Little Red School House (1876), St. John's of Jerusalem Church (1856), and of those pre-Levitt & Sons landmarks created after the Great War, only five remain, albeit modernized.
Want to learn more about the history of Levittown and the surrounding communities? Visit www.levittownhistoricalsociety.org
