WITH its distinctive Tudor-style ticket offices with shaped and cut glass and unique luminaires, Forest Hills station’s position overlooking Burns Street seems perfect to give a speech, and that’s exactly what former President Teddy Roosevelt did here in 1917. The station’s design goes back to 1911 and, as it was built in tandem with Forest Hills Gardens, it was always meant to be the perfect complement to the neighborhood. It continues to be directly connected to the development via ornamental walkways.
Here’s Teddy Roosevelt at Forest Hills in 1917, though there was no sound recording at that time. That year, US troops were mustering to travel to Europe to aid the WWI effort.
The Forest Hills station’s lighting and signage are marvelously detailed, from the station lamps to the stylized “FH” on the wrought iron signposts. Signs are printed using the classic Goudy typefont. For rail architecture buffs, the Forest Hills station is a destination in itself. The design is English tudor accented with red brick, red tile windows, casement-style windows and benches and platform lighting unique to the station. Some of these highlights were installed after a late-1990s renovation. The station is not a major one and many trains deadhead past it. If the LIRR put this much effort into stations such as East New York, well, that’d be a way to run a railroad.
When looking out at Forest Hills Gardens from the railroad platform, I’m reminded of the cult 1960s TV show The Prisoner, in which Patrick McGoohan (who was born in Astoria) plays a secret agent who is spirited off to a mysterious location, known as “The Village,” where village masters attempt to extract information from him by whatever means necessary. The show was filmed in the northern Welsh village of Portmeirion, built as one of the world’s first theme parks by Sir Clough Williams-Ellis in the 1920s. Images from Retroweb’s Prisoner page.
Check out the ForgottenBook (HarperCollins, 2006), as well as Forgotten Queens (Arcadia, 2013). I also have a chapter in the anthology “New York Calling: From Blackout to Bloomberg” (Reaktion, 2007). As always, “comment…as you see fit.” I earn a small payment when you click on any ad on the site.
10/14/26