Historical society carves out a futureBy Marie York Posted 3/21/13
Courtesy of Kingsbridge Historical Society The Kingsbridge Heights Police Station, originally the 40th Precinct and later designated the 50th, was designated a New York City landmark in 1986 and is located at Kingsbridge Terrace and Summit Place, west of the Jerome Park Reservoir. 
Courtesy of Kingsbridge Historical Society Miss Bangs and Miss Whiton School for Girls, established in 1905 in the Goodridge Mansion and leased to the Horace Mann School in 1918. In 1959, the Conservative Synagogue of Riverdale purchased the property. 
Courtesy of Kingsbridge Historical Society 1906 Charles Buck postcard of PS 7, which opened in 1895 at West 232nd Street and Church Street, now Kingsbridge Avenue. The building was razed in 1965. 
Courtesy of Kingsbridge Historical Society The Farmer’s Bridge, also known as the Free Bridge, opened in 1758 at West 225th Street, east of Broadway, and served as a free alternative to the King’s Bridge, which charged a toll. 
Courtesy of The Kingsbridge Historical Society The Roman Catholic Orphan Asylum, built in 1902, comprised two identical five-story buildings, one for girls and one for boys. It was acquired by Archbishop Michael Corrigan for $290,000 in 1899 and run by the Sisters of Charity. Today only the chapel is still in use. Photo
The Kingsbridge Historical Society, an organization dedicated to exploring the neighborhood’s storied past, is now looking to the future. For much of this century, with declining membership and nowhere permanent to hold its meetings, the Bronx’s oldest historical society — founded in 1949 — seemed destined to slip into obscurity. In the last four years, the once-thriving and active society held just a handful of events, mostly sparsely attended walking tours of local historic sites. “Slowly, people just stopped participating,” said Peter Ostrander, a Riverdale resident and president of the society for the past three decades. He was seeing the same lack of interest at other public meetings as well, he said, “It was just the trend.” Then something fortuitous seemed to happen: a group of like-minded history buffs attending last year’s Riverdale Riverfest found each other and decided to reinvigorate the floundering organization. “We realized it’s time to revitalize so we can bring everyone together, maybe those who are new to the community or have been here, to help them explore their history,” said Riverdale resident Thomas X. Casey, the society’s secretary. Among the group’s top priorities were, most obviously, finding a permanent place to hold meetings and, more importantly, bringing the organization into the 21st century. Enter Nick Dembowski. The local schoolteacher with a penchant for web design created an eye-catching, user-friendly website that features historic photos, links to historic documents and other historic organizations and, the pièce de résistance, a feature that allows visitors to overlay maps from the time of the Revolutionary War, as well as from 1885, from 1921 and a satellite image from 2006, to see how the Riverdale-Kingsbridge area has changed in the last four centuries. In addition to serving as a learning tool for visitors, the website, www.kingsbridgehistoricalsociety.org, also allows the society to announce events, eliminating the arduous — not to mention costly — task of sending out mailings, Mr. Ostrander said. Keywordshistorical society, kingsbridge historical society, thomas x. casey, history, revolutionary war, kingsbridge |
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