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Flushing, Queens

Prominently sited on Main Street in the heart of downtown Flushing, St. George's (Episcopal) Church is a notable example of Gothic Revival design. Erected in 1853-54, this impressive stone building is the congregation's third church building on the site since 1746. The large size of St. George's is indicative of the importance of Flushing as a major regional center during the nineteenth century. A rare surviving work in New York City by the leading ecclesiastical architects Wills & Dudley, St. George's is a major example of ecclesiological church architecture.

A philosophical reform movement that had widespread influence on American Protestant Episcopal church design in the nineteenth century, ecclesiology sought spiritual renewal by returning to the rituals and architectural forms of the medieval church. Its architectural precepts are reflected at St. George's in the clear expression of the interior spaces in the exterior massing, in the straightforward use of the materials, and in the inclusion of certain details derived from medieval architecture, such as the high pitched roofs and lofty tapered spire, which the ecclesiologists imbued with symbolic meaning.

The design is also noteworthy for handsome walls of randomly-laid granite rubble trimmed with dressed red sandstone and stained glass windows in wood tracery derived from English Perpendicular and Decorated Gothic sources. In 1894, the church was enlarged by the addition of a new chancel wing that matched the older parts of the church in materials and detailing and incorporated exceptionally fine stained glass windows.

The 1907 Neo-gothic Old Parish House, designed by the prominent architect Charles C. Haight, complements the church building and features a skillfully composed asymmetrical design. The church and parish house are located in a landscaped churchyard that contains approximately fifty gravestones and memorials dating from the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.

DESCRIPTION AND ANALYSIS

The Early Development of Flushing

St. George's (Episcopal) Church is located in Flushing, one of the oldest European settlements on Long Island. Originally known as Vlissingen, it was founded by a group of English colonists who were granted a patent on October 19,1645 by William Kieft, the director general of the Dutch colony of Nieuw Amsterdam.

These settlers, many of whom were Quakers, came from Massachusetts seeking religious freedom. Under the rule of Governor Peter Stuyvesant, the Quakers were denied the right of meeting for worship and in 1657 issued the famous Flushing Remonstrance, one of the earliest colonial pleas for religious freedom.

Two major buildings, the Friends Meeting House (1694-1719) and the Bowne House (1661-1696), survive as monuments of this important period in Flushing's history.

By the early nineteenth century Flushing had become a major regional village. In 1800, a stage line opened connecting Flushing and Brooklyn. In 1826, Rev. William A. Muhlenberg, rector of St. George's, established the Flushing Institute, a private secondary school that attracted students from as far away as South America and Europe.

The village was officially incorporated in 1837 and by 1843 had its own newspaper. Direct rail service to New York City opened in 1854. Many wealthy New Yorkers built elegant houses on the side streets off Main Street, especially in the years following the Civil War.

In 1862, the Romanesque Revival style Town Hall was constructed on Northern Boulevard and between 1853 and 1854 the congregation of St. George's erected its present building on its historic Main Street site.

Early History of St. George's Parish

The Episcopal Church was the second religious denomination to organize in Flushing. In 1702 the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts sent the first Church of England clergyman, Rev. George Keith, to Flushing as a missionary. Keith, a former Quaker, attempted to speak at the Quaker meeting but was shouted down, and he soon left the settlement.

In 1704, Rev. William Urquhart, whose parish comprised the towns of Jamaica, Flushing, and Newtown, began conducting regular Church of England services at the Guard House in Flushing. Around 1746, Capt. Hugh Went worth, a merchant in the West India trade, donated a half-acre tract from his farm in Flushing for the construction of an Anglican church building and establishment of a grave yard.

Erected near the highway leading to Jamaica (present-day Main Street), the small frame church building was named St. George's soon after its completion.

In 1761,underthe leadership of Samuel Seabury, who later became the first bishop of the Episcopal Church in America, the church was officially incorporated under a Royal Charter from George in as "the Rector and Inhabitants of the township of Flushing in Queens County in Communion of the Church of England." In 1797, Trinity Church in Manhattan (the mother church

Fort Totten Historic District, Fort Totten, Bayside, Queens

Building 638 is a one-and-one-half-story rectangular structure, faced with red brick, laid in American bond, and accented by clinker brick. It is set on a concrete foundation topped by a limestone bandcourse. Brick quoins mark the corners of the building. The asphalt-covered gabled roof terminates in a hip at the north end. A square tower interrupts the roof at the south end. The tower contains the arched entrance with paired paneled wood doors below a wood-paneled transom. The arch has a stone keystone and impost blocks. A blind stone panel is placed on the wall above the entrance arch. Arched openings filled with louvers mark the second level of the tower. A slate-covered spire, surmounted by a weathervane, rises from the tower. The main tower entrance is flanked by two single entrances with stone lintels and containing paneled wood doors. A concrete platform with wrought-iron railings extends across the front. The long sides of the building, at the east and west, are punctuated by tall arched window openings with stone impost blocks. These contain multi-pane sash set with colored glass, below fixed transoms. Secondary entrances with stone lintels and wood-paneled doors are also placed on these sides. Wood-frame shed-roof additions have been constructed at basement level on these sides. The cornerstone, placed at the southwest corner, reads: "Erected by the Quartermaster Corps United States Army 1938."
Building 638 was constructed in 1938-39 as the Fort Totten Chapel. Erected for the Office of the Quartermaster General according to a standardized plan, 6167-110-127, the building displays the forms and details of a Colonial Revival-style religious structure. Chapels of similar design were constructed at army posts throughout the United States. This was the second chapel structure at the fort; the first, a Gothic Revival-style frame structure, had been built between 1871 and 1879 and located somewhat further to the east along Murray Avenue. Funding for the construction of the new chapel was provided by the Work Relief Appropriations Act of 1936 under the direction of the War Department's Construction Program. It has remained in use for purposes of religious worship.

Historic District description

Fort Totten occupies a 136-acre site in northeast Queens, north of Bayside, on a peninsula jutting into the Long Island Sound. The Fort Totten Historic District, incorporating much of the peninsula, includes over 100 buildings and smaller secondary structures built between the 1830s and the 1960s.1 The fort, originally called the Fort at Willets Point, was established in 1857 as a major component in the defense system of New York Harbor. Its surviving, although uncompleted, fortification displays the features of the last phase of the Third System of coastal fortification, an important period of American military construction. The fort's surviving structures from various phases of construction vividly depict the changing role of military technology and defense strategy between the Civil War and World War II. The major period of improvement and expansion for the fort occurred in 1885-1914, resulting in much of the historic character that exists today.

In addition to upgrading the fortifications and batteries, installing torpedo buildings, and reconfiguring the parade grounds, the Army built about 80 structures, many of them to house the soldiers and officers who were stationed there. In 1898, the Fort at Willets Point was renamed in honor of Maj. Gen. Joseph G. Totten (1788-1864), who had been a major force in developing the Third System, and it was characterized as one of the most essential posts on the East Coast. The buildings and grounds, represent Fort Totten as a major military post and as one of the most intact, self-contained army posts in New York City.

Fort Totten is a tangible reminder of New York City's once-powerful harbor defense system which ranged from the inner harbor adjacent to Manhattan Island to the Narrows and Long Island Sound. Since the sixteenth century, New York Harbor has been recognized for its strategic importance, and as the city grew to prominence, its defense became increasingly important to New York and the nation. Fort Totten (the Fort at Willets Point) was planned as the counterpoint to Fort Schuyler on Throgs Neck (The Bronx), begun 1833, to guard the Long Island Sound entrance to New York Harbor. Although the Third System fort, begun in 1862 during the Civil War, was never completed because of advances in weaponry during that conflict, the army post retained its importance as the site of advanced training for Army Engineers and of research in military technology and military medicine.

It also housed several major military commands, including the Eastern Artillery District, New York, and the Coast Defense of Eastern New York and the North Atlantic District, through much of the twentieth century.

In 1968,