Фреш-Мидоуз: История и названия местности

The name "Fresh Meadows" dates back to before the American Revolution. Fresh Meadows was part of the Town of Flushing, which had large areas of salt meadows, such as the original "Flushing Meadows". The wetlands in the hilly ground south and east of the village of Flushing, however, were fed by freshwater springs, and thus were "fresh meadows". Fresh Meadows Road (which today follows the same route under a number of names, including Fresh Meadows Lane and part of Utopia Parkway) traversed the area, and served as the route from the landing place at Whitestone to the village of Jamaica. In The Evening Post in 1805, farm owner James Smith advertised the sale of his 60 acre farm "on the road to Fresh Meadows and Flushing". During the American Revolution, British troops marched through the area. General Arnold drilled his troops in the area, on the current location of M. S. 216. In order to help move military supplies from British ships using the Whitestone Landing, and the troops encamped further east, a new road was built to connect the Fresh Meadows Road with Hempstead. This road began at what is now the intersection of Utopia Parkway and 73rd Avenue, near a local landmark along the Fresh Meadows Road: the remnants of a large tree that had burned after being struck by lightning, and that was known as the "Black Stump". The road took its name from this feature, and was called "Black Stump Road". During the 19th century, a farming community known as Black Stump developed in the area. The Black Stump School was built before 1871. The school was expanded in 1900, and a second story was added in 1905. The remains of the Black Stump School were demolished in 1941 in order to build present day Utopia Playground, located at 73rd Avenue and Utopia Parkway. For several years, the woods of Black Stump were rumored to be haunted because people heard strange sounds coming from the woods. In 1908, the mysterious sounds were discovered to be coming from a recluse who lived in a small hut and sang Irish folk songs at night. During the late 1880s, Parsons Nurseries was importing 10,000 Japanese maples into the United States each year with help from Swiss immigrant John R. Trumpy. Samuel Parsons' children, Samuel Bowne Parsons and Robert Bowne Parsons, later took over running the nursery. In 1886, Samuel Bowne Parsons helped renew the plantations of Central Park while serving as Superintendent of Parks. Samuel Bowne Parsons gave the lake on his property the name "kissena", which he thought was the Chippewa word for "it is cold". Kissena Lake was initially used as a mill pond. Parsons later used the lake for ice cutting, where surface ice from lakes and rivers is collected and stored in ice houses and use or sale as a cooling method before mechanical refrigeration was available. Just east of the lake was a water pumping station. By 1898, Samuel Bowne Parsons' son, George H. Parsons, had taken over as superintendent of Parsons Nurseries. Later that year, George was found in the lavatory by his father; he had died of heart failure. and Samuel Bowne Parsons died in 1906. Two real estate developers, John W. Paris and Edward McDougal, bought most of the Parsons land, then built large houses as part of the "Kissena Park" residential development. A tract of Parsons' exotic specimens was preserved in the modern day park and is now the Historic Grove.

In 1921, Park Slope resident Benjamin C. Ribman and others from the Unity Club of Brooklyn were looking to build a golf course. The group chose the intersection of Fresh Meadow Lane and Nassau Boulevard as the site, because the land was suitable for golf and roads provided accessibility to other parts of the city. A. W. Tillinghast designed the golf course. After the Brooklyn Daily Eagle pointed out that there was already a golf course name Woodland in Boston, the founders decided to name the course Fresh Meadow Country Club. At the golf course's dedication, the first round of golf was played by former NCAA golf champion Jesse Sweetser and club professional Willie Anderson. Nine days later, the clubhouse burned to the ground from an explosion of a boiler. The PGA Championship was held at Fresh Meadow Country Club in 1930, and the U. S. Open in 1932. In 1937, the golf course hosted a charity game between John Montague, Babe Ruth, Babe Didrikson, and Sylvania Annenberg, a game that was watched by 10,000 fans, some of whom rushed the golf course and left Babe Ruth's shirt in tatters.

In February 1946, the golf course's land was sold to New York Life Insurance Company for $1,075,000, , in order to build a housing complex on the land. The Gross Morton Company had also made an offer to buy the land, but it was not accepted. Construction cost the New York Life Insurance Company $35million (equivalent to $35.0 in 1946 is equivalent to about <calculated amount> in recent yearsmillion in )). New York Life Insurance Company donated land on 69th Avenue at 195th Street to the city so it could build a school. In 1947, the New York City Board of Education awarded contracts of over $1.8million (equivalent to $1.8 in 1947 is equivalent to about <calculated amount> in recent yearsmillion in ) to construct P. S. 26, an elementary school with a capacity of 1,494 students. The school, P. S. 26, also known as the Rufus King School, opened in February 1949. P. S. 173 opened soon afterwards, in September 1949, at 69th Avenue and Fresh Meadows Lane. The first twenty families moved into the Fresh Meadows Housing Development on September 2, 1947. As a result of housing segregation, New York Life Insurance Company did not allow black individuals to live in the Fresh Meadows Housing Development. It was also built to house local World War II veterans. The complex and its eponymous shopping center were among the first in the United States designed primarily to accommodate automobile traffic rather than pedestrian traffic. Apartment rents were between $74 and $108 per month, which included gas and electricity. The construction of the final residential building, a 20 story apartment building at 67th Avenue and 192nd Street, was completed and ready for occupancy in May 1962. At the time the building's construction ended, 11,000 people were living in the Fresh Meadows Housing Development. The shopping center was planned to include a Bloomingdale's, a movie theater, Canterbury Shops clothing store, Mary Lewis, Ormond Hosiery Shop, Woolworth's, Miles Shows, Buster Brown children's shoes, Selby women's shoes, Food Fair, a Horn & Hardart automat, Whelan's Drugs, Fanny Farmer, Union News, Womrath's Book Shop, Barrett Nephews dry cleaners, and Harris Brothers delicatessen, a Bank of Manhattan, a Jamaica Savings Bank, and a post office. Century Meadows Theatre opened November 1949. In 1973, Bloomingdale's added a three level extension to the store, on what had been a pedestrian plaza. This service was eventually kept, and it was expanded in 1970 with branches running further east into Queens. The combined QM1/QM1A service eventually became among the busiest privately operated express routes in the city by the 2000s. In 1972, Harry B. Helmsley and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation partnered to buy the Fresh Meadows housing and retail complex for $53million from the New York Life Insurance Company. The MacArthur Foundation acquired the property outright in 1995. Two months after the Bloomingdale's store was sold in August 1991, Kmart signed a 31 year lease for the space. Kmart closed the store in 2003, as part of an effort to close underperforming stores. Kmart sold the lease to the Fresh Meadows location and four other locations to Kohl's for $16million in 2003. The Kohl's in Fresh Meadows was the first Kohl's location in New York City.

Fresh Meadows was home to Klein Farm, the last surviving commercial farm in New York City, located on 73rd Avenue between 194th and 195th Streets. Adam Klein, from Brooklyn, bought the Voorhis farm in the 1890s. Klein bought the 200 acre plot of land for $18 per acre. The family sold portions of the land over time, but kept the two acres surrounding the farm house. His son, Charles Klein, was born on the farm and operated it after his father's death in 1954 at age 89. The farm's last day open was November 21, 2001. Many in the community were opposed to the proposed sale, including the Fresh Meadows Tenants Association, the West Cunningham Park Civic Association, the Flushing Heights Civic Association, the Hillcrest Estates Civic Association, the Utopia Estates Civic Association, and the Utopia Park Civic Association. Huang had also admitted to failing to report a spill of 10,000 gallons of heating oil from an underground tank into the soil beneath the RKO Keith's Theater in 1999. and they instead agreed to sell the land to a Westchester based developer, Steven Judelson. At the time, Judelson said he had not decided what to do with the land. The proposal was not approved, and a day care center was opened instead. The sale did not go through. In 2012, Huang was convicted of embezzling over $3 million of federal funds that were intended to pay for children's lunches at Huang's Red Apple Child Development Centers. The land was bounded by 73rd Avenue, 185th Street, Union Turnpike, and 188th Street. The 204 homes were designed by architect Arthur E. Allen. It was built by Mortimer M. Reznick, and George Miller was the architect. Reznick also built residential developments called Williams Homes in Flushing and Bonnie Meadows in New Rochelle, and a commercial development in Yonkers. Meadowlark Gardens Tenant Association was organized on June 3, 1977, in order to advocate for the tenants' rights.

Hillcrest is a neighborhood in the center of Queens; the name comes from its location on the hills between Flushing and Jamaica. Hillcrest stretches from the Grand Central Parkway to 73rd Avenue, between Utopia Parkway and Parsons Boulevard. Its main commercial street is Union Turnpike. Hillcrest is part of Queens Community Board 8. The ZIP Codes for the neighborhood are 11366 (Fresh Meadows and Flushing zip code) for anything above Union Turnpike, and 11432 or 11439 (Jamaica zip codes) for the southern part of the neighborhood (below Union Turnpike, north of Grand Central Parkway). It neighbors Kew Gardens Hills and Pomonok to the west, Fresh Meadows to the north, Utopia to the east, and Jamaica Hills to the south. It is mostly made up of single family homes, is in a relatively well off public school district, and has a low crime rate. As with many neighborhoods in the city, different residents have varying perceptions of its boundaries. Most people in the northeastern part of Hillcrest self identify as being in Fresh Meadows, as does everyone living in nearby Utopia. Others tend to identify with neighborhoods that surround them. There is a small group in the center of the Hillcrest area that identify exclusively with it. Hillcrest is home to an Orthodox Jewish community. Some public high schools in Hillcrest are Queens Gateway to Health Sciences Secondary School, and Queens School of inquiry. St. John's University is also located in the neighborhood on Utopia Parkway.

75th Avenue was originally known as Hell Fire Lane, then Quarrelsome Lane, and then Eiseman Avenue. In 1938 and 1939, Moss Brothers built approximately 550 homes along Utopia Parkway between Horace Harding Expressway and Grand Central Parkway. Moss Brothers hired architect Arthur E. Allen to design the homes. The development was called Hillcrest Gardens. Utopia is part of Queens Community Board 8 The following year, the Utopia Land Company bought of land between the communities of Jamaica and Flushing. The Utopia Land Company intended to build a cooperative community for Jewish families interested in moving away from the Lower East Side of Manhattan. They intended to name the streets after those on the Lower East Side, where there was already a large Jewish population. In 1909, of the land was sold to Felix Isman of Philadelphia for $350,000,
The area remained farmland until 1935, when the land was bought by the Gross Morton Park Corporation, run by George M. Gross, Alfred Gross, and Lawrence Morton. Gross Morton had experience in building residential developments in Queens, such as when it had developed the land of the Belleclaire golf course in Bayside, around today's 48th Avenue and 211th Street. In 1939, it bought of land that had been formerly part of the Klein Farm and the Wigmore estate. The land included about one mile of land directly on Union Turnpike, on which it built about forty stores. In 1938, Paul Roth bought the portion of the Klein Farm on the north side of Union Turnpike, between 185th Street and 188th Street, to build 70 houses. The Batterman family owned and operated a farm on land bounded by Union Turnpike, Utopia Parkway, 75th Avenue, and 170th Street. In 1938, the Foch Building Corporation bought the Batterman Estate in order to develop it into a residential neighborhood, named University Manor. The racial makeup of the neighborhood was 32.9% (5,864) White, 7.6% (1,355) African American, 0.1% (17) Native American, 47.1% (8,381) Asian, 0% (2) Pacific Islander, 0.4% (74) from other races, and 2% (356) from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 9.9% (1,763) of the population. The entirety of Community Board 8, which comprises Fresh Meadows as well as Kew Gardens Hills and Jamaica Hills, had 156,217 inhabitants as of NYC Health's 2018 Community Health Profile, with an average life expectancy of 83.9 years. This is higher than the median life expectancy of 81.2 for all New York City neighborhoods. Most inhabitants are middle aged adults and youth: 20% are between the ages of 0–17, 28% between 25–44, and 27% between 45–64. The ratio of college aged and elderly residents was lower, at 10% and 15% respectively. In 2018, an estimated 22% of Fresh Meadows residents lived in poverty, compared to 19% in all of Queens and 20% in all of New York City. One in eleven residents (9%) were unemployed, compared to 8% in Queens and 9% in New York City. Rent burden, or the percentage of residents who have difficulty paying their rent, is 54% in Fresh Meadows, slightly higher than the boroughwide and citywide rates of 53% and 51% respectively. Based on this calculation, as of 2018, Fresh Meadows is considered to be high income relative to the rest of the city and not gentrifying. According to 2009 census data, however, the neighborhood had 16,100 residents, 44 percent of whom residents are white, 24 percent Asian, 14 percent black, 29 percent Hispanic, and 3 percent identify as multiracial. The neighborhood has historically and traditionally been home to one of New York City's most notable Jewish communities. Today, there is an increasing presence of younger Asian American and Colombian American families, Israeli Americans, Bukharian Jews, and West Indian Americans living in the neighborhood.

Fresh Meadows is patrolled by the 107th Precinct of the NYPD, located at 71 01 Parsons Boulevard. The 107th Precinct ranked 11th safest out of 69 patrol areas for per capita crime in 2010. The low crime rate was attributed primarily to the area's isolation and to local neighborhood patrols. as of 2018, with a non fatal assault rate of 22 per 100,000 people, Fresh Meadows's rate of violent crimes per capita is lower than that of the city as a whole. The incarceration rate of 191 per 100,000 people is lower than that of the city as a whole.

Fresh Meadows is served by two New York City Fire Department (FDNY) fire stations. Engine Co. 299/Ladder Co. 152 is located at 61 20 Utopia Parkway and serves Utopia and the Fresh Meadows development, while Engine Co. 315/Ladder Co. 125 is located at 159 06 Union Turnpike and serves Hillcrest and southern Fresh Meadows.

as of 2018, preterm births and births to teenage mothers are less common in Fresh Meadows than in other places citywide. In Fresh Meadows, there were 74 preterm births per 1,000 live births (compared to 87 per 1,000 citywide), and 6.7 births to teenage mothers per 1,000 live births (compared to 19.3 per 1,000 citywide).

Fresh Meadows is covered by ZIP Codes 11365 north of 73rd Avenue; 11366 between 73rd Avenue and Union Turnpike. The United States Post Office operates two locations in Fresh Meadows: the Fresh Meadows Finance Station at 193 04 Horace Harding Expressway, and the Utopia Station, at 182 04 Union Turnpike in Utopia.

St. Francis Preparatory School, the largest Catholic high school in the United States, is located in Fresh Meadows. The Summit School, a state approved tuition free private school serving students with special education needs, holds classes at Hillcrest Jewish Center in Utopia. St. John's University, a private Catholic university, has its main campus in Hillcrest. The Japanese Weekend School of New York, a Japanese weekend school, holds classes at the building of P. S. 26. The school also holds classes in Westchester County and Long Island. The Japanese School of New York formerly held classes in Fresh Meadows between 1980 and 1991.

The Queens Public Library operates two branches in Fresh Meadows. The Fresh Meadows branch is located at 193 20 Horace Harding Expressway, and the Hillcrest branch is located at 187 05 Union Turnpike in Utopia.

In June 1873, the Central Railroad of Long Island opened a station, called Frankiston, on Black Stump Road, now called 73rd Avenue. It was east of the present day Clearview Expressway, where Cunningham Park is now. The railroad line continued northwest, along the parkland between today's Peck Avenue and Underhill Avenue, ultimately ending in downtown Flushing. The origin of the name Frankiston is unknown. Loomis L. White, the railroad's second largest stockholder, had bought all the land surrounding the station in April 1871. The station's building was built by E. W. Karker & Co. of College Point, April–May 1873. The train fare from Frankston to downtown Flushing was $0.30 (0.3 in 1873 is equivalent to about <calculated amount> in recent years).

In the 1970s, an extension of the subway system along Horace Harding Expressway was proposed as part of the Program for Action, but it was ultimately not built.

The Long Island Expressway (I 495) connects Fresh Meadows with both midtown Manhattan and Long Island, while the Clearview Expressway (I 295) provides access to the Bronx and the New England Thruway. The Long Island Motor Parkway, formerly a highway, is now used as a biking and walking trail, as part of the Brooklyn–Queens Greenway.

In October 2011, a book written by Fred Cantor and Debra Davidson that chronicled the history of Fresh Meadows was released. The book is part of the Images of America series.