Bette Weidman

This is one amazing book that promised to be somewhat interesting but kept delivering more and more as I turned the pages. I had not intended to read it in one night but it was hard to put it down. To begin with, the book has a very helpful map (1873) that clarified some mysteries regarding why some places still carried names that had nothing to do with modern geography as we know it from the viewpoint of our highways and railroad stops. Why is Hempstead Harbor so far away from Hempstead? This question and others are answered in this book.
The photos alone are wonderful time capsules of buildings, events, peaceful family times, inventions, notable residents and visitors, worklife, trips to the grocery store and even those rare views of what must have been commonplace in those days, the ever-present small trading ships. They are organized by area, not date or alphabetically so you can travel from place to place, lingering for a time in Roslyn before moving on to Glen Cove, Sea Cliff and Port Washington. Each photo has a number and paragraph with not simply a label and description, but explanations. A single concise but interesting paragraph informs the reader, as it does from one photo I selected at random, on major forms of transport, engineering, the construction and quality of local highways, evolution of current major routes, George Washington's presence at this place, his mode of transportation snd wealth, developing industry and where you can still see existing structures from this time.
There is a chronological index of photographs and a general index in the back along with a list of photographs in the front. It is a wealth of information on history and a curiosity to see the rural and pastoral settings that are entirely concrete and brick today. It also has photos of early beach vacation spots.
Anyone who lives or works in the area or who has had family from this area would certainly find this a great book but this view of history and our collective personal lives would be of interest to residents who may have never been to the northeast.… (mehr)