GAHS STORE: BOOKS
IMAGES OF AMERICA: LONG ISLAND CITY
Introduction, Page 7
Long Island City is the largest community in Queens County. It was the earliest part of Queens to
be recognized by the Dutch and was the scene of many British troop movements during the Revolution.
Astoria was the first hamlet in the county to organize itself as a village, in April 1839. In 1870,
the hamlets of Hunters Point, Ravenswood, Astoria, Bowery Bay and Middletown united to form Long Island
City. The place grew rapidly due to its extensive waterfront, the commercial traffic on Newtown Creek,
and its position as a railroad terminal.
The opening of the Queensboro Bridge in 1909 proved the making of Long Island City as many factories
located there, and innumerable industries took advantage of the ample space and low land cost.
Long Island City today is a study in contrasts. Hunters Point is primarily factories and industry,
but the Astoria, Steinway, and Ditmars areas are solidly residential with apartments and private
houses accomodating thousands.
--From Queens-- Pictorial History, by Vincent Seyfried, 1983.
This photographic history of Long Island City touches upon many themes, including architecture,
amusements, industry, people, and neighborhoods. Its few hundred pictures cannot do justice in
so ambitious a subject but serve only as a hint of the wonderful depth found in our community.
Long Island City retains the unique character and charms of a small town, yet it possesses the
overwhelming advantages of a great city, as Manhattan is just a few minutes away.
Here, artisans and artists crossed paths, fertilizing each other's imagination and inspiring new
dimensions of creativity. If F. Scott Fitzgerald drove down Northern Boulevard and through Queens Plaza
, and dreamed of writing The Great Gatsby, he undoubtedly would have listened to music played by
Sunnyside's Bix Beiderbecke or heard Gershwin's latest compositions played on a Steinway piano.
While Rudolph Valentino and the Marx brothers shaped their careers at the Paramount (today the
Kaufman-Astoria) movie studios on film sets built by local talent, they wore costumes sown by
local needles. When Chester Carlson borrowed a back room in his mother-in-law's beauty parlor
for a laboratory and there duplicated the word "Astoria" on the first photocopy, our community's
name appeared on the first page of the information age.
For 350 years, creative people flocked here in search of a better life. They laid out our streets;
built our schools, bridges and subway tunnels; and worked on our farms and in our factories. They
patronized our beer gardens and our movie theaters. They lived out their lives, raised their
children, and enjoyed the benefits of the American Dream.
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