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According to legend, Whitestone takes its name from a large offshore rock where tides from the East River and Long Island Sound met; in other accounts the name is in honor of the White Stone Chapel, erected by townsman Samuel Leggett in 1837. For a time, Whitestone was known as Clintonville, after NYC mayor and NY State Governor DeWitt Clinton, who lived in the area. Both Leggett and Clintonville are recalled in area street names.

DeWitt Clinton (1769-1828) was one of early New York’s pre-eminent politicians, serving in the NY State Assembly and as a state Senator (1798-1811), US Senator from New York (1802-1803); NYC mayor (1803-1815) NY State Governor (1817-1822) and ran unsuccessfully for US President as a Federalist against incumbent President James Madison in 1812. DeWitt Clinton lived in Queens County, primarily during his time as mayor, in a mansion near Newtown Creek in Maspeth that burned down in 1933, though he had a summer house in Whitestone. While he was NYS Governor, Whitestone became known as Clintonville in his honor. Though the neighborhood became “Whitestone” again during the 19th Century the name is remembered by the lengthy Clintonville Street and Clintonville Playground.

Clintonville Street, looking south from 10th Avenue, looks like a main street in any smaller town just before entering the central business district. The blue St. Nicholas dome, though, gives it away as a metropolitan artery.

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This could be the second-best “onion dome” in the city, second only to the Louis Allmendinger Cathedral of the Transfiguration on Driggs Avenue in Greenpoint. But this one’s in brilliant Technicolor blue. It looks like they stuck the dome on top of a couple of quonset huts, but it works and has become, since its construction in 1969 by architect Sergei Padukow, a neighborhood landmark. At any rate I can’t help snapping it whenever I go by. My hand moves as if by instinct to the shutter button.

There’s been an onion dome on Clintonville Street since 1919, when the first St. Nicholas Russian Orthodox Church was built at this site, now just north of the Cross Island Parkway.

The church’s website provides views of the interior.

 

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The original Grace Episcopal Church was built at today’s Clintonville Street and 14th Road in 1858 on land that had been donated by Francis Lewis, a NY delegate to the Continental Congress and signer of the Declaration of Independence. The “new” Grace Church dates to 1904.

 

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One of Queens’ few remaining 18th century structures is the Colden-Wesson mansion at 2-11 147th Street opposite Francis Lewis Park. It stands within the old estate of the Declaration of Independence signer, and was built in 1762 and further enlarged in 1926. It has been owned by the family of Queens Supreme Court Justice Charles Colden (1885-1960) and later, by the Wesson family. Colden founded Queens College, whose Colden Center (since renamed for philanthropists Selma and Max Kupferberg) was named for him.

 

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I am showing the Waldbaum’s parking lot at 10th Avenue and 154th Street, because imagine if you can chuffing steam engines and an old Victorian-era train terminal here. This was the LIRR Whitestone Branch‘s terminal from 1886-1932; train service had begun from Flushing to downtown Whitestone in 1869.

In the 1920s, The LIRR offered the branch to the City of New York as a possible addition to what was then the BMT-IRT Flushing Line (today’s 7 train). The city turned down the offer, and the line was subsequently abandoned. Years later, in the early 1950s, the Transit Authority purchased the old Far Rockaway branch from the LIRR and created the A train extension across Jamaica Bay. If the subway were extended to Whitestone back then, the neighborhood’s development would have been considerably different.

Art Huneke has a comprehensive look at the Whitestone Branch’s remains in Queens, and a look at its former grand stations [Arrts Arrchives]

 

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I have always admired The (Beechhurst) Towers at 160-15 Powell’s Cove Boulevard; there’s an express bus stop right there, so the lack of a subway in Whitestone would be no problem. I have a weakness for solid, impregnable-looking brick buildings.

Charles Chaplin was a former resident. Like other developments in Beechhurst and Clintonville, this building housed several showbiz folks who were working at the Kaufman Astoria Studios.

 

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This is the estate residence of Broadway producer/songwriter Arthur Hammerstein. After a devastating fire in 1994 it was completely rebuilt and restored in 2000. It is now part of the Wildflower estate (named for one of Hammerstein’s musicals) at the eastern end of Powells Cove Boulevard east of 166th Street. This is as close as I could come for a picture before being forced away by a security guard, as it is still privately owned.


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  1. I went back to Whitestone & Flushing for my Flushing H.S. 50th Reunion a few years ago. We had a tour of the great old F.H.S. building (still looks just like it did), complete with gargoyles & hallway murals. It was wonderful to see that historic “castle” still standing, & operating. The auditorium is amazing; beautiful stained glass windows, wooden seats, wood everywhere, arching ceiling, & the magnificent old pipe organ…
    The stairways are still narrow & some lead up 5 flights to the singular tower room where we used to have our Music classes, Chorus practices. I’m told students in 2001 could see the Twin Towers savaged & brought down to the ground from those same windows. The grounds are still lovely, hilly & grassy. The building is now a National Historic Landmark, so I think it has a reasonable chance of being preserved. Just wonderful memories.