The Phillip House - Rockville Centre

The original owner of the Victorian-era home, which is now, The Phillips House Museum, was Captain Samuel F. Phillips, a prominent sea captain who settled in the countryside town of Rockville Centre, along with his wife and two children in the 1880’s.

With the passage of time, different homeowners, as well as changes and expansions in the town through the greater part of the 20th Century, The Phillips House grew into disrepair and was also situated in the wrong location, when in 1977, plans were being implemented to demolish it to make way for a parking lot.

Thankfully, for the efforts of a handful of dedicated town residents, it was instead moved to its current location in 1977.  While the interior and built-in structures are original and remain intact, the furnishings and accessories are all donations of items from the Victorian-era in which the house was inhabited by Captain Phillips’ family. The house was renovated and rededicated in October of 1995 by the Historical Society of Rockville Centre to the people of the town.

The kitchen contains an old “ice box”, the predecessor of our modern day refrigerator, as well as a l stove that has the option for both coal burning and electric but a huge collection of kitchen gadgets for almost every use possible for cooking.

Many of these items had the patent number engraved on them. All of these items have been cataloged for the museum. This tedious job was the work of a local boy scout working on his Eagle Scout badge. 

The collection, which has been called the "finest collection of kitchen gadgets" originally belonged to Lillian Blumberg. In fact, so extensive is this collection, that Lillian was offered a great sum from Sotheby’s, but she decided instead to donate it to the museum. The third floor attic houses an old fashioned "twisted chimney." When building chimney's during this period, the superstition was that a twisted chimney would prevent the evil spirits from entering the home. Builders would make the chimney straight on the exterior and "twisted" on the interior. 

Source:

“Rockville Centre’s Phillips House Museum: A Small Museum with a Tremendous History.” Travelin’ Cousins, www.travelincousins.com/travelin-the-nyc-outer-boroughs-with-elisa/rockville-centres-phillips-house-museum-a-small-museum-with-a-tremendous-history. Accessed 16 Oct. 2025

Dodge House - Port Washington

The Dodge House in Port Washington, built by Thomas Dodge in 1721, is one of the oldest homes in the town of North Hempstead. The house's architecture maintains much of its original Colonial and 19th-century flavor and family relics, including farm tools and original furnishings.

The Dodge homestead was part of a working farm for more than 200 years, acquired by the first Thomas Dodge on 350 acres that originally extended to Hempstead Harbor. William Dodge, Thomas Dodge’s son and the coroner for Queens County, began selling most of the property as a legacy for his children. When William's son Henry Onderdonk Dodge, died in 1898, his children sold the farm to developers.

In 1721, the interior included an entrance hall, a living room with a fireplace for cooking and heat and an upstairs with two bedrooms. Thomas Dodge added a dining room with a larger fireplace, a kitchen, and a weaving room. The original low ceilings with exposed hand-hewn beams still exist and all of the first floor rooms have 18th-century tongue-and-groove flooring and walls. In the late 1900s, the house was expanded and modernized; porches were added and dormers were built on the second story.

The original kitchen, which included a Dutch oven was also replaced with more modern, Victorian decor. A cast-iron stove for cooking, a galvanized sink with a water pump, soapstone tubs closets and a pantry were added. Heat was supplied with potbelly and Franklin stoves until 1910, when central heating was installed.

The Dodge House was leased to the Cow Neck Peninsula Historical Society by the Water Pollution Control District in 1993 to be restored and operated as a public museum. The museum includes the 19th-century outbuildings -- a chicken coop, a privy with a child's footrest, a wood shed and a two-door horse barn.

The Dodge house and its outbuildings have been listed on the National and State Registers of Historic Places since 1986. The home is also a designated landmark of the Town of North Hempstead's Historic Landmark Preservation Commission.

 

Source:

Hochman, Nancy S. "270-Year-Old Dodge House Now a Museum." New York Times, 26 May, 1996, pp. 6-15. ProQuest, https://www.proquest.com/newspapers/270-year-old-dodge-house-now-museum/docview/430567054/se-

Pepperidge Hall - Oakdale

Pepperidge Hall was the estate of Christopher Robert in Oakdale. The house was built in 1889 for his bride at the cost of $1,500,000. The Robert home was one of the three most famous residences on the South Shore.  A large inner courtyard with a 30′ by 50′ pool and fountain dominated the plan, and a 109-foot glass conversancy stood on the west side of the rectangle. Stepped gables, turrets, bay windows, numerous chimneys, stables, a dairy and carriage house were showcased. The house itself consisted of four wings with 67 rooms and accommodations for 20 servants. A conservatory was built to the west of the house. The Roberts lived at the estate for seven years before selling it.

The Roberts were the first and last to live at the house, It passed through the hands of numerous caretakers through the years. The house was used for a time as a hunting lodge and for an experiment in the raising of silk worms indoors directed by Dr. Ludwig Harpootlian.. Several silent films utilized the mansion as a backdrop, including “Lady Slippers”, “To Hell with the Kaiser”, and “Dead Men Tell No Tales.”

In 1939, it was supposed to be acquired by the Royal Fraternity of Master Metaphysicians as a rest and study retreat for its members., but that fell through. The house and property were finally sold in 1941. The house was razed and the property was cut up into building lots.

Sources: 

"METAPHYSICIANS BAR DEAL: PURCHASE OF PEPPERIDGE HALL IS DROPPED IN CONTRACT DISPUTE." New York Times. December 10, 1939

“Proud Suffolk Chateau Doomed by Progress.” Brooklyn Eagle. January 19, 1941

"To Raze Old Long Island Home." New York Times. January 11, 1941 

“2D Estate Bought by Metaphysicians; Pepperidge Hall, Once Famous Long Island Residence, Is Purchased for $15,000 to be a New Haven. The 65-Acre Tract Is Near the Vanderbilt Property Acquired by Society Last Year.”  New York Times. August 4, 1939

“A Vanished Gilded Age Mansion - The Saga of Pepperidge Hall.” The Abandoned Places, 23 Mar. 2021,   theabandonedplaces.com/a-vanished-gilded-age-mansion-the-saga-of-pepperidge-hall/

The Cuban Giants Baseball Team

The Cuban Giants were the first African American professional baseball club. The Giants were formed in 1885 at the Argyle Hotel in Babylon. The team took its name because it played in Cuba during the winter of 1885-1886 and the winter of 1886-1887. The team featured many players who would go on to play in the Negro Baseball Leagues including Ben Boyd, Sol White, Abe Harrison, Clarence Williams, and George Williams among others. During the spring of 1886, the Cuban Giants were bought by Walter E. Simpson who played at the Chambersburg Grounds in Trenton, New Jersey.

During the summer 1886, the team was sold to Walter L. Cook. During that time, the Giants signed legendary pitcher George Washington Stovey but he played only one game with the Giants. Like many owner-managers of this era, Cook took over the job of booking games for the team. The average pay for pitchers and catchers on the team was $18.00 per week. Outfielders and infielders made around $12.00 per week. During the winter of 1886, Cook arranged for the Giants to play in Cuba.

In June 1887, J.M Bright bought the team from Walter Cook. During the same year, the team would become colored champions for 1887. A year later, they would win the colored championship again when they defeated rival teams including the Pittsburgh Keystones, New York Gorhams, and Norfolk Red Sox. In 1889, the Cuban Giants joined the Middle States League, an independent minor baseball league. In 1890, the team name changed to the Colored Monarchs of York, Pennsylvania because they moved there. A year later, a portion of the Cuban Giants went to a rival team called the Gorhams who was managed by S.K. Govern. In 1896, the team was bought by E.B. Lamar Jr. and became the Cuban X-Giants. 

The Cuban X Giants became a dominating force at the turn of the century. Led by a young pitcher named Rube Foster, they won the Colored World Championship in 1903, defeating the Philadelphia Giants, five games to two. Foster pitched in four of those victories, and he would later become more widely known for his executive contributions to the sport, eventually earning the moniker, “Father of Black Baseball.”

In the winter of 1903, the club became the first African-American professional baseball team to play in Cuba, and two years later it became the first black baseball team to defeat a Major League team. While they ended up splitting a two-game series against the Brooklyn Dodgers, the Cuban X Giants sent a message by outscoring their MLB counterparts, 8-3. The team became a founding member of the National Association of Colored Baseball Clubs of the United States and Cuba, established in 1906. The team continued to exist until it was disbanded in 1915.

Sources:

Cuban Giants (1885-1915) | Blackpast.Org, www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/the-cuban-giants-1885-1915/. Accessed 1 Aug. 2025

“The Cuban X Giants of the Negro Leagues.” MLB.Com, www.mlb.com/history/negro-leagues/teams/cuban-x-giants. Accessed 1 Aug. 2025

Box Hill Estate - St. James

 Box Hill was an estate owned and designed by Stanford White with the help of McKim & Mead between 1884-1906 in St. James. White had married Bessie Smith of Smithtown in 1884 and purchased a small house in neighboring St. James. White apparently later regretted not tearing the house down to begin with and starting fresh but would go on build numerous additions over twenty years.

The house was originally a farmhouse. Stanford enlarged it several times after his wife received a large inheritance, around 1884. In 1903, he covered the entire building in “pebble dash” (rocks pressed into mortar). When it came to the interiors, Stanford was a compulsive purchaser. He collected temple ornaments from Japan, carpets from Turkey, tiles from Holland and mashrabiya screens from Morocco. Then, he filled rooms with as many pieces as could fit. 

The dining room is covered in anaglypta, which is paper pressed to look like paneling. Repeated freezing and thawing - Box Hill had no heating system until 1938 - caused the paint on the anaglypta to develop a crackle finish. 

The estate features a one-story verandah defined by a range of fluted columns. Also on the property are a cottage, barn, carriage house, stable, and water tower. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1973.

Its current owner is Stanford’s great-grandson Daniel White, who bought it from his parents and has been restoring it for more than 20 years.

Sources:

Bernstein, Fred A. “Tour the Houses of Stanford White with the Revered Architect’s Great-Grandson.” 1stDibs Introspective, 13 Feb. 2021, www.1stdibs.com/introspective-magazine/samuel-white-stanford-white/

“Box Hill Estate.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 8 Jan. 2025, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Box_Hill_Estate

L., Zach. “Box Hill.” Old Long Island, www.oldlongisland.com/2010/05/box-hill.html. Accessed 10 July 2025

Jackson House - Wantagh

Robert Jackson came from Connecticut to Wantagh around 1644 and had acquired land in the area and for three centuries it remained in the family.  

The Jackson homestead, which sits on 1542 Wantagh Ave., was built by Samuel Jackson in the mid-18th century and was the main house on the farm. The home features a main central hearth with a room on each side and a sleeping loft.

Elbert Jackson acquired the property in the early nineteenth century and enlarged the house by attaching a much larger, 2-story wood frame house in Greek Revival style to the south end of the original farmhouse. The new part of the house allowed for more formal spaces with a central hall layout. A kitchen wing was added onto the north end of the house in the early twentieth century, and the main entrance was framed by a small classical looking porch with a pediment and two columns.

Elbert’s wife Elizabeth inherited the house and it was sold out of the family in 1899 after her death. After a series of short-term owners, Charles Bradley purchased the house in 1909 and added the large bay window and interior partitions with Corinthian columns. In 1936, Bradley sold the house to another family, the Hummels, who lived there until 1967. After that point, the parcel was sold to a developer who subdivided its associated land for new residential construction.

The Samuel and Elbert Jackson House stands on the last remnant of the Samuel Jackson farm; the rest is essentially now a residential subdivision of mainly twentieth-century homes. The Jackson House was listed for sale and was purchased in December 2020. The 5-bedroom, 3.5-bath house was described as a center hall federal period colonial with 4 fireplaces, a home office, wide plank pine flooring, and secret gardens on the circa half-acre lot.

 

Sources:

O’Connor-Arena, Melissa. “The Jackson Homestead.” Wantagh-Seaford, NY Patch, Patch, 19 Nov. 2010, patch.com/new-york/wantagh/the-jackson-homestead.

Paonessa, Laurie. "Samuel and Elbert Jackson House." Clio: Your Guide to History. May 7, 2021. Accessed June 21, 2025. https://theclio.com/entry/133236

“Wantagh Preservation Society.” Wantagh Preservation Society and the Wantagh Museum, www.wantagh.li/museum/. Accessed 21 June 2025.

D-Day Anniversary

 

In 2019, we had the honor of interviewing two World War II veterans. Sharing these interviews in honor of the anniversary of D-Day.

 

           

      

edward dionian   
August 10, 1921 - August 3, 2021
Interviewed July 18, 2019

https://nyheritage.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collection/p15281coll40/id/409/rec/4

 

SALVATORE CITRANO

SEPTEMBER 30,1925 – MAY 3, 2021

INTERVIEWED JULY 9, 2019

 

https://nyheritage.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collection/p15281coll40/id/362/rec/2