I had forgotten about the presence of the North Hills Branch of Queens Library on Marathon Parkway just south of the Long Island Expressway, constructed in 1987, but I marvel at it anew every time I pass by. A circular structure with a domed roof and a cupola, decked out in bright red, blue and yellow primary colors, and a yellow snow shovel over the door? Who could ask for anything more…
Compare to the nearby buildings, which were built by architects when sober. Southern Little Neck is completely dominated by garden apartment buildings, block after block after block. This is where the city that never sleeps sleeps. Zzzzzzzzzz. I’m glad I live in the small strecth of Little Neck along Northern Boulevard that comes with a bit of history.
Why the library is called the “North Hills” branch is unknown, since the community of North Hills is a couple of miles east, just past Lake Success in Nassau County.
Check out the ForgottenBook, take a look at the gift shop, and as always, “comment…as you see fit.
4/4/18
4 comments
The school right next to the library, PS 221, is called “The North Hills School.”
I’d guess that long ago, maybe even prior to the creation of Nassau County, North Hills referred to a broader, more vague, largely uninhabited area than it does now, that may have spanned the current Nassau line? I know that there are similar situations in the Bronx and Westchester, where e.g. the Town of Eastchester in Westchester isn’t contiguous with the Eastchester neighborhood in the Bronx, but they were once opposing ends of the original town before the Bronx and Westchester were split.
This one’s easy. The City-owned Douglaston Park golf course (three blocks south of the library) was the privately-owned North Hills Golf Course. North Hills moved to its current location in the 60s. The name stuck. Next door to the library is the North Hills School, a NYC public school.
The reason the library bears the North Hills moniker is that the it was named after the North Hills Country Club’s original location which is the current Douglaston Park Golf Course on Marathon Parkway. The village, like the library, was also named for the country club, which was established in 1927 and moved to its current location in the village of North Hills in 1961.
Someone call Steven Spielberg, one of his UFO’s is missing.