A Brief History of Jones Beach

Before there was Jones Beach, there was High Hill Beach. This small community comprised of 100 cottages with a boardinghouse, hotel, and a post office. It was only accessible by boat. Robert Moses wanted to make beaches more accessible to the public.  He noted undeveloped tracts of land and once he discovered they had been purchased by the City of Brooklyn, he had them transferred to the Long Island State Park Commission. As head of the LISPC and the State Council of Parks, he had legislation drafted to create the Westchester Parks Commission and oversaw the building of routes to Long Island’s State Parks. It was not an easy task. When the LISPC attempted to secure Jones Island in 1924, the Towns of Oyster Bay and Babylon both turned him down. In 1926, the Town of Hempstead supported the bill to give the land to New York State. Construction of the causeway began soon after. Its projected cost at the time was $400,000. In 1927, the Town of Oyster Bay gave its part of Jones Beach to the stat and then the Town of Babylon.

To help create the beach, 40 million cubic yards of sand were dredged to raise the beach 14 feet. In the meantime, the Jones Beach Causeway and Southern State Parkway were being created. The beach opened August 4, 1929. The East Bathhouse was the only building present when the beach opened in 1929. It had over 10,000 lockers with dressing rooms, a snack bar, mini-hospital, and stations for umbrella rentals. The West Bathhouse opened in 1931 with two pools attached, with one reserved just for children.  This pool offered free swimming lessons. At that time, the mile-long Boardwalk was built, connecting the two bathhouses. Two pools were built for the East Bathhouse in the 1960s.

The houses at High Hill beach were all moved to what is now West Gilgo Beach where the houses were renovated and expanded. In 1964, a fire destroyed the Boardwalk Café, A restaurant called The Boardwalk Restaurant was built in its place. That was torn down in 2004.  The beach offered many activities such as archery, roller skating, and shuffleboard. Its famed 18 hold golf course was closed in 2013 due to the effects of Hurricane Sandy.

Moses wanted the now well-known water tower to resemble the Campanile, a tower in Venice. This tower is capable of holding 315,000 gallons of water to run the bathrooms of Jones Beach. Jones Beach expanded in 1960 with the development of West End I. The final pieces of the West End expansion opened in 1962. West End I was closed in 1991 due to budget cuts. In 2000, the Theodore Roosevelt Nature Center opened in its spot.

The first theater, the Jones Beach Marine Stadium was built in 1930. It was torn down in 1952 to build a bigger theater. For two decades, Guy Lombardo and his brothers offered a wide range of Broadway shows at the theater. The theater has been renovated twice and hosts a variety of concerts every summer.

 

Sources:

Hanc, John. Jones Beach: An Illustrated History. John Hanc, 2010

Theodosiou, Constantine. Jones Beach. Arcadia Publishing, 2018