I am HERE: A Collaged History of Woodside Heights

We all travel a circuitous route to end up at a place called “here.”

Some might call it home even.

How long does one have to stay static to claim space as their own?

Starting with a land acknowledgement and ending up in the 1900s, the research for this “drawing” took me to various places within the 100 square miles of land once owned by no one.

The place where our family lighted was once a swamp, then the Heights and now a mishmash of languages, aromas and perceptions.

-Micki Watanabe Spiller 5/29/2023

(click photos to zoom in)

Some interesting tidbits unearthed in the basement of the Central Queens Public Library:

  • This place was first called “the bad water place” by the Mespeatches, then Middleburg, then Hastings, then Charlotteville, then Newtown before it finally ended with Woodside.

  • The portion of Woodside on the hill west of 58th street between Roosevelt Ave & Queens Blvd was developed by Effingham Nichols in 1886 who called it Woodside Heights. (We did not make this up to make a better acronym!)

  • Near the intersection of Roosevelt Ave and 58th Street Woodside Ave/Betts Ave. was once a natural spring that provided water for locals called Rattlesnake Spring.

  • In the 1850’s Woodside had many luxurious estates where the wealthy from the city had summer retreats. We were the “summer place on the island” before the Hamptons.

  • The Woodside Canning Factory, owned by the Riker family (yes that one), which employed hundreds of people during the height of the fruit season. 1876

  • Woodside had a Union Cigar Factory which was not affected during the NYC strike, thus the smokers of Woodside were happy. 1884

  • The Law and Order Committee of Woodside was created to combat the “ruffians, ball players, picnic parties” from the city that descend upon the bucolic quiet every Sunday. 1882