Flushing, Queens

Flushing, founded in 1644, is a neighborhood in the north central part of the City of New York borough of Queens, 10 mi east of Manhattan.

Flushing was one of the first Dutch settlements on Long Island. Today, it is one of the largest and most diverse neighborhoods in New York City. Flushing's diversity is reflected by the numerous ethnic groups that reside there, including people of Asian, Hispanic, Middle Eastern, European and African American ancestry. It is part of the Fifth Congressional District, which encompasses the entire northeastern shore of Queens County, and extends into neighboring Nassau County. Flushing is served by five railroad stations on the Long Island Rail Road Port Washington Branch, and the New York City Subway Number 7 subway line has its terminus at Main Street. The intersection of Main Street and Roosevelt Avenue is the third busiest intersection in New York City behind only Times Square and Herald Square.

Flushing is part of Queens Community Board 7 and is bounded by Flushing Meadows-Corona Park to the West, Francis Lewis Boulevard to the East, Union Turnpike to the South and Willets Point Boulevard to the North.

Dutch colonial history
In 1645, Flushing was settled by Europeans on the eastern bank of Flushing Creek under charter of the Dutch West India Company and was part of the New Netherland colony. The settlement was named after the city of Vlissingen, in the southwestern Netherlands, the main port of the company. Flushing is the anglicization of the Dutch Vlissingen; the town of Vlissingen in the Netherlands even today is called Flushing by Anglophones.

In its early days, Flushing was inhabited by English colonists, among them a farmer named John Bowne. John Bowne defied a prohibition imposed by New Amsterdam Director-General Peter Stuyvesant on harboring Quakers by allowing Quaker meetings in his home. The Flushing Remonstrance, signed in Flushing on December 27, 1657, protested religious persecution and eventually led to the decision by the Dutch West India Company to allow Quakers and others to worship freely. As such, Flushing is claimed to be a birthplace of religious freedom in the new world.

Landmarks remaining from the Dutch period in Flushing include the John Bowne House on Bowne Street and the Old Quaker Meeting House on Northern Boulevard.

English colonial history
In 1664, the English took control of New Amsterdam, ending Dutch control of the colony, and renamed it New York. When Queens County was established in 1683, the "Town of Flushing" was one of the original five towns into which the county was subdivided. Many historical references to Flushing are to this town. The town was dissolved in 1898 when Queens became a borough of New York City.

Flushing was the site of the first commercial tree nurseries in North America, the most prominent being the Prince, Bloodgood, and Parsons nurseries. Much of the northern section of Kissena Park, former site of the Parsons nursery, still contains a wide variety of exotic trees. The naming of streets intersecting Kissena Boulevard on its way toward Kissena Park celebrates this fact (Ash Avenue, Beech, Cherry ...Poplar, Quince, Rose). Flushing also supplied trees to the Greensward project, now known as Central Park in Manhattan.

During the American Revolution, Flushing, along with most settlements in present-day Queens County, favored the British and quartered British troops. Following the Battle of Long Island, Nathan Hale, an officer in the Continental Army, was apprehended near Flushing Bay while on what was probably an intelligence gathering mission and was later hanged.

The 1785 Kingsland Homestead, originally the residence of a wealthy Quaker merchant, now serves as the home of the Queens Historical Society. The 1790 United States census recorded that 5,393 people lived in what is present-day Queens County.

Nineteenth century
During the 19th century, as New York City continued to grow in population and economic strength, so did Flushing. Its proximity to Manhattan was critical in its transformation to a fashionable residential area. In 1813, the Village of Flushing was incorporated within the Town of Flushing. By the mid-1860s, Queens County had 30,429 residents. Flushing's growth continued with two new villages incorporating: College Point in 1867, and Whitestone in 1868. In 1898, although opposed to the proposal, the Town of Flushing (along with two other towns of Queens County) was consolidated into the City of New York to form the new Borough of Queens. All towns, villages, and cities within the new borough were dissolved. Local farmland continued to be subdivided and developed transforming Flushing into a densely populated neighborhood of New York City.

Twentieth and Twenty-first century
The continued construction of bridges over the Flushing River and the development of other roads increased the volume of vehicular traffic into Flushing. In 1909, the construction of the Queensboro Bridge over the East River connected Queens County to midtown Manhattan.

The introduction of rail road service to Manhattan in 1910 by the Long Island Rail Road Port Washington Branch and in 1928 by the New York City Transit Authority Number 7 subway line hastened the continued transformation of Flushing to a commuter suburb and commercial center. Due to increased traffic, a main roadway through Flushing named Broadway was widened and renamed Northern Boulevard.

Flushing was a forerunner of Hollywood, when the young American film industry was still based on the East Coast and Chicago. Decades later, the RKO Keith's movie palace would host vaudeville acts and appearances by the likes of Mickey Rooney, The Marx Brothers and Bob Hope. The theater now lies vacant and in disrepair due to an unauthorized real estate development project that took place in the early 1990s.

The New York Times says that Flushing's Chinatown now rivals Manhattan's Chinatown for being the center of Chinese-speaking New Yorkers' politics and trade.

Location of the World's Fair
The 1939-1940 World's Fair was held in Flushing Meadows-Corona Park. Massive preparations for the Fair began in 1936 and included the elimination of the Corona dumps. Among the innovations presented to the world in 1939 was the television, which broadcast a speech by Franklin D. Roosevelt.

After the World's Fair, the New York City pavilion was converted into the temporary headquarters of the United Nations where, in 1947, the UN voted in favor of the establishment of the State of Israel. After the United Nations moved to their permanent headquarters in Manhattan, the New York City pavilion was converted into a roller rink & ice skating center.

A second World's Fair, the 1964-1965 World's Fair was also held at the site of the Flushing Meadows-Corona Park. Pope Paul VI attended the Fair on October 4, 1965. On this papal trip, Pope Paul VI became the first pope to visit the United States. An exedra now commemorates the site of the Vatican pavilion. Michelangelo's masterpiece, the Pietà, was exhibited during his trip.

Following the Fair, the Unisphere, the New York State Pavilion and the New York City Pavilion remained in the park. The NYC Pavilion's roller rink which had been converted back into exhibit space for the 1964-1965 World's Fair became the Queens Museum of Art.

Landmarks, museums and cultural institutions
Flushing has many landmark buildings. Flushing Town Hall on Northern Boulevard is the headquarters of the Flushing Council on Culture and the Arts, an affiliate of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. The building houses a concert hall and cultural center and is one of the sites designated along the Queens Historical Society's Freedom Mile.

Other registered New York City Landmarks include the Bowne House, Kingsland Homestead, Old Quaker Meeting House (1694), Flushing High School, St. George's Church (1854), the Lewis H. Latimer House, the former RKO Keith's movie theater, the United States Post Office on Main Street and the Unisphere, a 12-story high, stainless steel globe that served as the centerpiece for the 1964 New York World's Fair. The Flushing Armory, on Northern Boulevard, was formerly used by the National Guard. Presently, the Queens North Task Force of the New York City Police Department uses this building. In 2005, the Fitzgerald-Ginsberg Mansion on Bayside Avenue and in 2007, the Voelker Orth Museum, Bird Sanctuary and Victorian Garden were designated as landmarks.

Several attractions were originally developed for the World's Fairs in Flushing Meadows-Corona Park. There is a stone marker for the two 5,000-year Westinghouse Time Capsules made of special alloys buried in the park, chronicling 20th century life in the United States, dedicated both in 1938 and 1965. Also in the park are the Queens Museum of Art which features a scale model of the City of New York, the largest architectural model ever built; Queens Theatre in the Park ; the New York Hall of Science and the Queens Zoo.

The Queens Botanical Garden on Main Street has been in operation continuously since its opening as an exhibit at the 1939 World's Fair. The Botanical Garden carries on Flushing's nearly three centuries long horticultural tradition, dating back to its once famed tree nurseries and seed farms.

Demographics
Flushing is among the most religiously diverse communities in America. There are "over 200 places of worship in a small urban neighborhood about 2.5 square miles (6.5 square kilometers)." "Flushing has become a model for religious pluralism in America, says R. Scott Hanson, a visiting assistant professor of history at the State University of New York at Binghamton and an affiliate of the Pluralism Project at Harvard University."

In 1657, while Flushing was still a Dutch settlement, a document known as the Flushing Remonstrance was created by Edward Hart, the town clerk, where some thirty ordinary citizens protested a ban imposed by Peter Stuyvesant, the director general of New Amsterdam, forbidding the harboring of Quakers. The Flushing Remonstrance cited the Flushing Town charter of 1645 which promised liberty of conscience.

Today, Flushing abounds in houses of worship, ranging from the Dutch colonial epoch Quaker Meeting House, St. George's Episcopal Church, the Free Synagogue of Flushing, the Congregation of Georgian Jews, St. Mel Roman Catholic Church, St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church - the largest Greek Orthodox Church in the United States, and the Muslim Center of New York.

The intersection of Main Street and Roosevelt Avenue, the business center for Flushing located at the terminus of the Number 7 subway line on the westernmost edge of the neighborhood has a concentration of Chinese and Korean small businesses, including Asian restaurants. Chinese-owned businesses in particular dominate the area along Main Street and the blocks west of it. Ethnic Chinese constitute an increasingly dominant proportion of the Asian population and as well as of the overall population in Flushing. Consequently, Flushing's Chinatown has grown rapidly enough to become the second-largest Chinatown outside of Asia. In fact, the Flushing Chinatown may surpass the original Manhattan Chinatown itself within a few years.

The northeastern section of Flushing near Bayside continues to maintain large Italian and Greek presences that are reflected in its many Italian and Greek bakeries, grocery stores and restaurants. The northwest is a mix of Jews, Greeks, and Italians. Most of central Flushing is an ethnic mix of Whites, Hispanic Americans, and Asian Americans.

An area south of Franklin Avenue is a concentration of Indian, Pakistani, Afghan and Bangladeshi markets.

Neighborhoods
Broadway-Flushing, also known as North Flushing, is a residential area with many large homes. Part of this area has been designated a State and Federal historic district due to the elegant, park-like character of the neighborhood. Recently much of the area was rezoned by the City of New York to preserve the low density, residential quality of the area. The neighborhood awaits designation as an Historic District by the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission. Broadway-Flushing is bounded by 29th Avenue to the north, Northern Boulevard and Crocheron Avenue to the south, 155th to the west and 172nd Streets to the east.

The Waldheim neighborhood, an estate subdivision in Flushing constructed primarily between 1875 and 1925, is a small district of high quality "in-town" suburban architecture that preservationists have tried to save for at least twenty-five years. Waldheim (German for "home in the woods"), known for its large homes of varying architectural styles, laid out in an unusual street pattern, was the home of some of Flushing's wealthiest residents until the 1960s. Notable residents include the Helmann family of condiment fame, the Steinway family of Steinway pianos, as well as A. Douglas Nash, who managed a nearby Tiffany glass plant. The neighborhood was rezoned by the City of New York in 2008, in order to halt the destruction of its original housing stock, which began in the late 1980s, and to help preserve the low density, residential character of the neighborhood. As with the Broadway neighborhood, preservationists have been unable to secure designation as an Historic District by the NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission to date. Today, Waldheim stretches between Sanford and Franklin Avenues on the north, 45th Avenue on the south, Bowne Street on the west and Parsons Boulevard on the east. The area is immediately southeast of the downtown Flushing commercial core, and adjacent to the Kissena Park, East Flushing and below Kissena park is South Flushing neighborhoods.

Parks
All the public parks and playgrounds in Flushing are supervised by the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation. For Queens County, the Department of Parks and Recreation is headquartered at The Overlook in Forest Park located in Kew Gardens.


 * Flushing Meadows-Corona Park, a 1255 acre park, is considered a flagship park in Queens. The site hosted two World's Fairs, the first in 1939-1940 and the second in 1964-1965. As the result, the park infrastructure reflects the construction undertaken for the Fairs. Also located here is Citi Field and the National Tennis Center which is the home of the US Tennis Open. In 2008, a new Aquatic Center was opened in the park.


 * Kissena Park is a 234 acre park with a lake as a centerpiece.
 * Bowne Park is an 11 acre park developed on the former estate of New York City Mayor Walter Bowne.
 * Flushing Fields is a 10 acre greenbelt that includes the home athletic field of Flushing High School.

Economy
When New York Air existed, its headquarters were located on the grounds of LaGuardia Airport in Flushing.

Education
Public schools in Flushing are supervised by the New York City Department of Education through Administrative District 25. There are numerous public Elementary and Junior High Schools in Flushing and students generally attend a school based on the location of their residence.

High schools
The five public high schools in Flushing include John Bowne High School, Robert F. Kennedy Community High School (Forest Hills High School), Townsend Harris High School, The Flushing International High School and Flushing High School, the oldest public high school in the City of New York. Flushing High School is housed in a distinctive Gothic Revival building built between 1912 and 1915 and declared a NYC Landmark in 1991. Private high schools include Archbishop Molloy High School, Holy Cross High School and St. Francis Preparatory School. Townsend Harris High School is a selective high school located on the Queens College campus and was once ranked by U.S. News and World Report as one of the best public high schools in the United States.

Higher education
Queens College, founded in 1937, a senior college of the City University of New York (CUNY) is located on Kissena Boulevard near the Long Island Expressway. The City University of New York School of Law was founded in 1983 adjacent to the Queens College campus. The Law School operates Main Street Legal Services Corp., a legal services clinic.

Libraries
In 1858, the first library in Queens County was founded in Flushing. Today, there are eight branches of the Queens Borough Public Library with Flushing addresses. The largest of the Flushing branches is located at the intersection of Kissena Boulevard and Main Street in Flushing's Chinatown and is the busiest branch of the highest circulation system in the country. This library has and houses an auditorium for public events. The current building, designed by Polshek Partnership Architects, is the third to be built on the site—the first was a gift of Andrew Carnegie.

Transportation
The New York City Transit Authority operates the Flushing Number 7 subway line, which provides a direct rail link to Grand Central Station and Times Square in Manhattan. The Flushing-Main Street subway station located at the intersection of Main Street and Roosevelt Avenue is the eastern terminus of the line. Until the Flushing Number 7 made its way to the intersection of Main Street and Roosevelt Avenue in 1928, the center of Flushing was considered to be at the intersection of Northern Boulevard and Main Street.

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority operates the Long Island Rail Road Port Washington Branch that has five rail road stations in Flushing. The Flushing-Main Street Station of the Long Island Rail Road is located one block away from the subway station that bears the same name. The Long Island Rail Road also has stations at Mets–Willets Point, Murray Hill, Broadway and Auburndale. The Long Island Rail Road provides a direct rail link to Pennsylvania Station in Manhattan.

Major highways that serve the area include the Van Wyck Expressway, Whitestone Expressway, Grand Central Parkway and Long Island Expressway. Northern Boulevard extends from the Queensboro Bridge in Long Island City through Flushing into Nassau County.

Sports
The New York Mets, of Major League Baseball's National League, have played their home games in Flushing for nearly their entire existence. After playing their first two seasons at the Polo Grounds in Manhattan, the Mets relocated to Flushing Meadows – Corona Park and have remained there since — first in Shea Stadium from 1964 through 2008, then in Citi Field from 2009 to the present day.

Located across from Citi Field is the United States Tennis Association's Billie Jean King National Tennis Center, which hosts the annual US Open Grand Slam tennis tournament. The event was relocated to Flushing in 1978 from its previous home, the West Side Tennis Club in the nearby neighborhood of Forest Hills, Queens.

Popular culture

 * The first series of Charmin toilet paper commercials featuring Mr. Whipple (Dick Wilson) were filmed in Flushing at the Trade Rite supermarket on Bowne Street.
 * The rock band KISS first played at the Coventry Club on Queens Boulevard in 1973, and is said to have derived its name from "Kissena," one of Flushing's major boulevards.
 * Joel Fleischman, the fictional character from the 1990s comedic drama Northern Exposure, was said to have relocated from Flushing. Often, references were made to actual locations around Main Street, Flushing.
 * The eponymous celebration in Taiwanese director Ang Lee's 1993 comedy hit, The Wedding Banquet, takes place in Downtown Flushing's Sheraton LaGuardia East Hotel.
 * Fran Drescher's character "Fran Fine" on the TV show The Nanny, was said to have been raised in Flushing, where her family still lived. Drescher herself was born in Flushing.
 * Flushing was the location of the Stark Industries (later Stark International) munitions plant in Marvel Comics' original Iron Man series. In the movie Iron Man 2, the Stark Expo is located in Flushing.
 * On the Norman Lear-produced TV show All in the Family, in the episode when Edith Bunker was arrested for shop lifting, she mentions the Q 14 bus, and the names of a few long-gone stores that were in downtown Flushing.
 * The main characters of The Black Stallion series resided in Flushing and many of Flushing's streets and landmarks in te 1940s were mentioned in the first book.

Notable residents

 * Judd Apatow, stand-up comedian, director, producer, screenwriter
 * Annet Artani, singer/songwriter and international pop star
 * Yak Ballz, rapper, born Yashar Zadeh
 * Daniel Carter Beard, founder of the Boy Scouts of America
 * Jerry Beck, animation historian
 * Black Sheep (hip hop group), rap group
 * James A. Bland singer and composer
 * Raymond Calabrese, founder and owner of Calabrese Creations in Iron, Inc., prominent ornamental iron and aluminum manufacturer.
 * Godfrey Cambridge African American comedian and actor
 * Fidel "Fidelito" Castro Díaz-Balart, Cuban leader Fidel Castro's son
 * Joseph Cornell, artist
 * Fran Drescher, actress, author, politician/humanitarian, cancer survivor, activist (known for The Nanny as Fran Fine)
 * Tom Duane, first outwardly gay member of the New York State Senate
 * Jimmy Durante, comedian
 * Jon Favreau, actor/producer/director
 * F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896–1940), novelist
 * Franky G, actor
 * Mic Geronimo, rapper
 * Charles Dana Gibson, illustrator
 * Mary Gordon, writer
 * Al Greenwood, former keyboardist of Foreigner


 * Marvin Hamlisch, composer
 * Richard Hemann, Entrepreneur and founder of Hellmann's Mayonnaise, resided in the Waldheim neighborhood
 * Mark Hurd, former CEO of Hewlett-Packard
 * Sarah Jones, Tony Award-winning stage actress and poet
 * Steve Karsay, Baseball player
 * Keith and The Girl, podcasters
 * Kevin "Flushing Flash" Kelley, boxer
 * Large Professor, hip-hop producer
 * Gene Larkin, Major League Baseball player
 * Lewis Latimer, inventor - Lewis H. Latimer House is a designated New York City Landmark
 * Gene Mayer, tennis player
 * Sandy Mayer, tennis player
 * Charles Momsen, vice admiral who organized rescue of USS Squalus
 * Robert Moog, inventor of the Moog synthesizer
 * Rick Moonen, executive chef of RM Seafood and R Bar Café at Mandalay Bay
 * Lewis Mumford, architecture critic and historian
 * A. Douglas Nash, Manager and Designer for world-famous Tiffany Glassworks, resided in the Waldheim neighborhood
 * Prong, crossover thrash band
 * Richard Outcault, creator of Buster Brown and Hogan's Alley
 * Samuel Parsons, landscape architect
 * Nancy Reagan, actress and First Lady
 * Rufus Reznik, USFL Linebacker
 * Richard Riorden, Los Angeles mayor
 * Royal Flush, rapper
 * John Seery, artist
 * Kasey Smith, Danger Danger keyboardist
 * Paul Stanley, member of the band KISS
 * Beau Starr, actor
 * Mike Starr, actor
 * Jeannie Suk, Professor of Law / Harvard Law School


 * Bill Viola, video artist
 * Suzanne Weyn, children's author
 * Harvey and Bob Weinstein, founders of Miramax and the Weinstein Company
 * John Williams, academy award winning film composer
 * John Vinocur, journalist
 * Najibullah Zazi, convicted al-Qaeda member
 * Henry E. Steinway

Buried in Flushing

 * John Bowne, Quaker advocate
 * Louis "Lepke" Buchalter, mob boss
 * Alan King, comedian
 * Louis Armstrong, jazz musician
 * Bernard Baruch, financier
 * Eugene Bullard, the first Black military pilot
 * Ellis Parker Butler, author noted for the story Pigs is Pigs
 * Dr. Adam Clayton Powell, Sr.
 * Jack Gilford, comedian and actor.
 * Waxey Gordon, notable American gangster
 * Dizzy Gillespie, one of the greatest jazz trumpeters
 * Hermann Grab, Bohemian writer
 * Thomas Birdsall Jackson, United States Congressman
 * Bert Lahr, actor
 * Molly Picon, Yiddish stage and film star
 * Lemuel E. Quigg, United States Representative from New York
 * May Robson, actress
 * Boris and Bessie Thomashefsky, celebrated husband and wife, Yiddish theatre stars
 * Aris San, acclaimed Greek-Israeli singer
 * Henny Youngman, comedian