A Bayside Avenue Gem That Dates Back to the Post Civil War Era

Bayside Avenue runs from Union Street and 31st Drive at Mitchell Gardens east to 29th Avenue at 154th Street in Murray Hill. If you know the area, you know that’s nowhere near Bayside, but some New York streets follow an old naming convention in which streets and roads are named not for the neighborhoods in which they’re located, but for the neighborhoods or towns to which they lead, directly or indirectly. Neither Flushing Avenue in Brooklyn and Queens nor White Plains Road in the Bronx actually go to those towns, but they go to roads which will take you to those towns.

A walk along Bayside Avenue  provides a look at many different architectural styles, old and new. Big mansions have sprung up along the avenue recently, including one that looks like a vast Oriental pagoda.

At 146th Street, though, you will see a little jewel box, shaded by a conifer, that hearkens back to Queens’ semirural past. It features a French Second Empire mansard roof with dormers, and bay windows suitable for looking out on the passing scene while drinking coffee seated in a rocking chair.

The house dates back to the immediate post-Civil War era and, according to former Historic Districts Council president and current City Council candidate Paul Graziano, it was built by surveyor G. W. Haviland and was purchased by its current owners in the 1980s when developers were circling the area like sharks for small homes like this to purchase and demolish for large, impersonal housing developments.

The house isn’t landmarked, and so could fall prey to similar development in the future.

Kevin Walsh’s website is forgotten-ny.com