St. Albans, Queens
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St. Albans is a residential community in the New York City borough of Queens around the intersection of Linden Boulevard and Farmers Boulevard, southeast of Jamaica and northeast of Springfield Gardens and Laurelton. Many famous jazz musicians used to live in some of the large houses there (particularly in the western section known as Addisleigh Park).
Part of a land grant to Dutch settlers from New Netherlands Gov. Peter Stuyvesant in 1655, the area, like much of Queens, remained farmland and forest for most of the next couple of centuries.
By the 1800s, the plantations of four families - the Remsens, Everitts, Ludlums and Hendricksons - formed the nucleus of this sprawling farm community in the eastern portion of Jamaica Township.
The area was earlier known as Francis Farm -- possibly the farmland of the family of Francis Lewis of nearby Whitestone, a signer of the Declaration of Independence. Francis Lewis Boulevard is now the eastern boundary of St. Albans.
In the 1890s, St. Albans began to emerge from a sleepy farm community. The first street lights illuminated Lazy Lane, which became Central Road and then Linden Boulevard, and Freeman's Path, which became Farmers Boulevard. New shops clustered around August Everitt's lone store.
In April 1892, a N.Y. syndicate laid out the Francis Farm. On July 1, 1898, St. Albans railroad station opened (later razed in 1935, and replaced with grade elimination October 15, 1935). Today, the St. Albans station provides Long Island Rail Road service to Penn Station in Midtown Manhattan or Flatbush Avenue in Brooklyn, with transfers available at Jamaica station.
In 1899, a year after Queens became part of New York City, 100 residents officially named their community after St Albans in Hertfordshire, England, which itself was named after a Saint Alban, thought to be the first Christian martyred in England.
The St. Albans Golf Course, built in 1915, brought rich and famous golfers, including baseball star Babe Ruth. The Depression forced the golf course owners to sell to the government, and it became the St. Albans Naval Hospital, serving thousands of World War II veterans. The hospital was turned over to the Veterans Administration in 1974 and more recently evolved into the Veterans Administration St. Albans Primary and Extended Care Facility.
The housing here consists mostly of detached, one and two-family homes. Linden Boulevard is the major shopping street.
[edit] Notable residents
- August Angerame (Decorated Veteran)
- Count Basie
- Brook Benton
- James Brown (musician)
- W. E. B. DuBois
- Roy Campanella
- John Coltrane
- Eddie "Lockjaw" Davis saxophonist
- Mercer Ellington
- Anna Lee Tingle Fisher, M. D. - astronaut
- Ella Fitzgerald
- Milt Hinton
- Lena Horne
- LL Cool J
- James McBride
- Illinois Jacquet
- Francis Lewis ?
- Joe Louis, boxer
- Floyd Patterson's mother, Annabelle
- Will Poole - football player
- Jackie Robinson, Major League Baseball pioneer who broke the color barrier with the Brooklyn Dodgers
- Al Roker, meteorologist
- Babe Ruth, baseball player
- Eileen Southern, musicologist
- William Grant Still, African-American classical composer
- Fats Waller, African-American jazz pianist
- Clarence Williams, jazz pianist and composer
- Lester Young, jazz tenor saxophonist and clarinetist.
- Terrence Robertson, Network Engineer .
[edit] External links
- Jazz Tour of Queens
- 1990 Population Demographics
- 1898 map of area shows Baisley Blvd, Farmers Blvd, Linden Blvd, and LIRR line which runs through St. Albans
