Remi Wesnofske Farm
1935-1954
South Oyster Bay Rd.
Hicksville, NY
Telephone: HI-3-1085
1948 FARM VIEW, HICKSVILLE
Aerial photograph looking eastward across the flat lands
of the fertile Hempstead plains in Hicksville and
encompassing most of the Wesnofske farm.
The road construction running diagonnal upper left to lower right
is the Northern State Parkway.
It's construction sliced off a portion of the Wesnofske farm.
The Parkway overpasses at the bottom are over the Oyster Bay line
of the Long Island RR and Miller Road.
The road running from left to right in the upper portion with
the Parkway exit is South Oyster Bay Rd..
The first house to the right of the exit was the Catapano home.
The second set of buildings toward the center of the photo is the Remi Wesnofske home and barns. The rectangle parcel further right of the Wesnofske farm was rented for a period
before it was sold off and houses built in 1951.
(1951 Picture view below)
1951 Hicksville
Three years later this image shows rapid residential development pressing in on farming areas. In the foreground is the LIRR (1) Oyster Bay branch out of Hicksville. Woodbury Road (2) runs eastward to upper right. To the left of the superimposed 'V' is the South Oyster Bay clover leaf with the Northern State Parkway. At the bottom point of the 'V' is theRemi Wesnofske farm.
In 1954, the farm was sold and Remi Wesnofske farming operations were moved to Bridgehampton, NY in Suffolk County.
Within 10 years, this Hicksville area was completely developed and suburbanized.
The Remi Wesnofske
Hicksville Farmstead
1935-1954
A blowup of the above 1948 image. The white buildings are the multiple barn structures (outshining the indistinguishable and undistinguished outhouse for those working on the farm). In front of the barns is the Remi Wesnofske homestead. Across the street resided the Jarrett family in the old Bergold farmhouse and in the house on the far right lived the Schiffmacher family.
In the late 1940's, cabbage, corn, cauliflower, potatoes and carrots were grown on the farm. Intensive hand labor for cultivation, weeding, harvesting and laborious irrigation in dry seassons was involved. As specialized mechanical equipment for various crops developed in the early 1950's, potato cultivation was concentrated on the near side of the road and corn concentrated across the street.
The farmland, about 80 acres, between Miller Road at the left and South Oyster Bay Road (center) was made up of land bought from the Blyman family and land rented from the Schiffmachers. Major portions of land across South Oyster Bay Road were rented from the Bergold family for additional culitvation.
The yellow X marks the location of the house and barns of the farm. The site today is occupied by the Bethapage Jewish Community Center. Directly across the street is the entrance to the subdivision community called Clearview Village.
The Images
This high resolution imagery was a commercial product of Fairchild Aerial Surveys of NYC. This image was found in 2009 in the NYS Archives in Albany and is described as "Oct 19, 1948 - View of the Northern State Parkway on Long Island during construction, exact location unknown.". Other images of Long Island, Northern and Southern State parkways are definitely located.This imaging was done by a commercial division of Fairchild Camera and Instruments. Fairchild was located in Syosset for many years and had during WWII developed cameras for military surveys of bombing damage during the war. After the war it continued its camera development and imaging work and these images here were likely commissioned by Robert Moses' Long Island Parkway Commission as parkway building after WWII was undertaken.. That probably is why they are in the NYS archives.
Fairchild continued its scientific and enginnering research in imaging and eventually developed an interest in semiconductors,. Its powerful imaging work became part military satellite imaging and of the NASA mapping and imaging work for the moon and space ventures we often see today.
Farichild's semiconductor research laboratory was relocated in the 1950's to California and was one of the seminal enterprises in what is now known as Silicon Valley in California.
