QUEENS CHRONICLE, Thursday, November 11, 2021 Page 10
C M ANN page 10 Y K 43rd Anniversary Edition
Ozone Park: the antidote to NYC Suburban dreams and memories within the big city by Deirdre Bardolf Associate Editor
In the early 19th century, diseases like smallpox, yellow fever, measles, malaria and tuberculosis plagued New York City. There was also a torrent of heat waves throughout the late 1880s that killed thousands of people. Residents who were packed in overcrowded tenements in densely populated areas like Lower Manhattan were afflicted by disease, heat and poor sanitation, all during a time when medical experts were still trying to figure out how diseases spread. That made newspaper advertisements for a new neighborhood called Ozone Park rather appealing to families and workers looking to escape the hazardous conditions in New York City. “Own your home at Ozone Park and enjoy the pure life-giving air of the Atlantic Ocean,” read one ad from an 1883 issue of The New York Sun. Like disease, the concept of “ozone” was relatively new as well and not understood as the toxic gas that has both beneficial and harmful effects on the Earth’s atmosphere. “At the time, they thought air could be infectious and dangerous,” said Kara Schlichting, a historian of urban and environmental history and assistant professor of history at Queens College. “They started to identify ozone in the atmosphere and it was linked to beaches. Sea air was seen as ozone-rich and healthy,” she said. People were then drawn to the newly developing neighborhoods that were given these bucolic names that “evoked green, Arcadian ideas,” like Ozone Park and Woodhaven. Ozone Park became a destination for factory workers starting with the development of a factory built by French immigrants Charles Lalance and Florian Grosjean, near the site of the old Union Course racetrack in Woodhaven. The original factory burned down in 1876 and a new one was rebuilt just south of the location and as a result, employees needed housing nearby. The clocktower from the Lalance and Grosjean factory still stands today at 91-20 Atlantic Ave., which is now occupied by Medisys Health Network. Then, two land spectators, Benjamin Hitchcock and Charles Denton, bought up surrounding plots of land to sell to investors and construction companies looking to attract second-generation German and Irish workingclass folks. Broader appeal came with Long Island Rail Road expansion, said Schlichting, back when it was 5 cents for a train ride. By 1920, there was a boom for suburbia in Queens County, with a population of almost
Linden Boulevard and 113th Street in Ozone Park in 1976. This corner looks very different today but Ozone Park has always been beloved for its small-town feel and local businesses, in addition PHOTO BY JOHN MARGOLIES VIA LIBRARY OF CONGRESS to its accessibility to mass transit and the airport. half a million. Suburban growth was so widespread that it was suggested the lawn mower become the official symbol of Queens. “Germans, Irish, Italians and Eastern Europeans moved from the core to the outer edges. The borough wasn’t even ready, streets and sewers were barely down,” said Schlichting. “They put the cart before the horse in excitement of moving to these developments.” State Sen. Joe Addabbo Jr. says the love that his father, Congressman Joseph P. Addabbo Sr., had for Ozone Park was passed on to him also. He said his father moved five times in his whole life, all within a onemile radius of Ozone Park. “I was always fascinated with Ozone Park because of that small-town feel,” Addabbo said. “In a big city, that little slice of Ozone Park was a little slice of Main Street.” He recalled the local hardware store, the grocer and the movie theater on nearby Cross Bay Boulevard which provided access to anything else one could have needed. For him, Ozone Park is about the memories. It was at that movie theater that he saw his last film with his dad before he passed — “Rocky V.” Addabbo said that the area has gotten more diverse and is thankful for that. “My kids growing up in a neighborhood now that’s diverse only benefits them,” he said. “Even though Ozone Park has undergone some changes over the years, the warmth of people and the camaraderie in the neighborhood feeling is still there.” If someone were moving to Ozone Park now, he would tell them he hopes they like neighbors. “We’re very neighborly. For the
For the latest news visit qchron.com 43RD ANNIVERSARY EDITION • 2021
OZON E PA RK
most part, we live on top of each other. We’re attached at the hip, our homes are attached, we have common driveways.” That is always a cause for a “Hello” in passing. John Dibs talks to people considering a move to the area pretty often. He is a real estate agent who grew up in South Ozone Park and has owned his business in Ozone Park for over 20 years. His great-grandfather was in the cavalry in World War I and when he came back to the United States, he got a job at the original Aqueduct Race Track and then started his family in Ozone Park. Dibs says he thinks the area is “undervalued” because it is so accessible, with JFK Airport nearby, along with the subway, train lines and ample buses. These days, homes go for around $600,000 for a one-family and around $800,00 for two-family. He said home ownership is feasible in the area because people can buy a multifamily dwelling, rent out part of the space and therefore pay little in out-of-pocket costs. In few other places in the city can one find a one-bedroom apartment for $1,500 or a twobedroom for $1,800. Dibs mentioned Resorts World Casino and the brand-new Hyatt Regency JFK Airport as not only destinations but job providers. He also noted the active community members who run groups like the Cityline Ozone Park Civilian Patrol and the many food pantries. Before the casino and hotel began to draw people, Ozone Park was home to famous residents over the years including singer Cyndi Lauper, actor John Lord, actress and singer Bernadette Peters and actor Ray Abruzzo, who appeared in “The Sopranos.” There are, of course, the real mobsters like John Gotti of the Gambino crime family, who operated out of Ozone Park. Writer Jack Kerouac was jokingly called
the “Wizard of Ozone Park” by fellow writer friends Neal Cassady and Allen Ginsburg. In a journal entry, he wrote of his home in Ozone Park: “that very house that sometimes rattles and is set on the edge of the world instead of Crossbay Boulevard.” If anyone is a testament to loving Ozone Park and staying there, it is Theresa Labiento, who lived there almost 100 years before selling her home and moving in with her daughter in Howard Beach. It is close but she still misses it dearly, she said. Labiento celebrated her centennial on Oct. 11 with a family party and again with the Golden Age Club at the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary church, which she attended growing up. “I loved where I lived,” she said. She grew up on 102nd Avenue and remembers being active in the nearby churches. “There were a lot of things going on in church. They had bingo, they had dances.” Once she was a little older, she remembers going to the nearby Forest Park and visiting the historic carousel with her girlfriends. Eventually, they would go to dances and different halls and clubs, like the one where she met her husband. “We had our fun,” said Labiento. “Good, clean fun.” She remembers being shocked that one of her brothers would move out of the city and to Long Island. “We thought, ‘Well, my goodness, where did he go? Now we’ve got to go visit him and stay the night.’” Schlichting sums up what Addabbo, Dibs and Labiento all recognize and cherish about the area and what rooted their families here for generations: “It’s that suburban dream within the big city.” “That’s what Eastern Queens is,” she said. “It has a small-town feel within the largest Q metropolitan system in America.”
The famous clocktower on the former site of the Grosjean kitchenware factory on Atlantic PHOTO BY JIM HENDERSON VIA WIKIPEDIA Avenue.
