The Changing Face Of Garden City
Story and Photos By John Ellis Kordes

This little house's days are numbered as the property is for sale.

Garden City is not a stranger to change despite common perception. Sometimes change can be dramatic and well publicized as when the old Garden City Hotel was torn down in 1973 and other times it can be more subtle, the latter being more common. Today, Garden City is seeing multiple changes all occurring at the same time. What follows is a brief look at these various situations which collectively are changing the face of Garden City.

Garden City's only gas station has closed. Since 1907, there has been a gas station on the corner of Seventh Street and Franklin Avenue. The original building was known as the Garden City Garage. It was a large building that was constructed like a huge stable for cars as the automobile was in the process of replacing the horse in 1907. Visitors to the hotel would have their cars left there and their drivers would stay at the boarding house across the street (where Leo's is today). During the mid-1960's the Garden City Garage was torn down and replaced with a Texaco Station which has now closed. The owner of the property may want to develop it for stores and possible apartments up above. Time will tell but 100 years of auto service at that location has come to an end.

The Cathedral of the Incarnation with the lower and upper scaffolding. The Cathedral was completed in 1885 and has not been seen without scaffolding since 1998.

The little house on Nassau Boulevard opposite the railroad station, known for decades as the office for Stutzmann Reality, is coming down and the property will be sold. When Garden City Estates began in 1906, it was that location on Nassau Boulevard where the sales office was located. Since then a series of different realtors have been located there ending with Stutzmann. 100 years of real estate offices on that spot have come to an end. The property, when sold, will probably have a house (or two) built on it.

Sak's Fifth Avenue, which came to Garden City in the early 1960's closed not long ago. The building along Franklin Avenue is currently being gutted and transformed into a new structure by Winthrop Hospital.

What was Sak's Fifth Avenue is currently being transformed by Winthrop Hospital.

It will be known as the Wellness Center at Garden City. It is due to open before the end of the year.

Adelphi University is in the midst of the most widespread construction it has undertaken in decades. A good size portion of the campus is being transformed, promising a bright future during the 21st Century. Adelphi was founded in Brooklyn in 1896 and moved to Garden City in 1929. Although a women's college then after WWII men were allowed in and the University has grown from its original three buildings to an nationally known university.

Since the 1920's a Paulino has bee cutting hair on New Hyde Park Road. In recent decades, it has been the Ben Paulino Salon but it was Ben's grandfather and uncles who were there cutting hair in barber shops long ago. In the 1970's Ben and his wife Mary had a small salon in a retail space there. In 1988, the large Paulino building opened where there had been an empty lot. It has retail on the first floor and the large Paulino Salon on the entire second floor. That 80 year legacy has now come to an end with the closing of the salon and the sale of the building. However, Ben and Mary and their staff will still be cutting hair but no longer on New Hyde Park Road. They will all be at Annastasia Beauty Salon on Franklin Avenue.

The formerly Texaco Station has recently closed. The future of the site remains unclear.

The Garden City Hotel will be converting almost half of its rooms to condos. This work is to commence soon and will eventually mean the closing of the hotel's night club. This is the fourth Garden City Hotel dating back to 1874. This one opened in 1983.

The first ten houses in Garden City were built in 1872. They were identical in appearance and demonstrated the taste and elegance demanded by Stewart for his new village. Later they acquired the nickname "Apostles" by the Cathedral school children. Today, six remain including the one on Eleventh Street owned by the historical society. The other five are all privately owned as some have changed with various additions. There is one currently for sale along Rockaway next to the Cherry Valley Club's tennis courts. There has been talk about taking down the house to make room for new houses. Hopefully that was just a passing thought. There is no law protecting these houses (or the national register of historical places does not protect them).

The large crane marks where massive construction has been underway on the Adelphi University campus. The building on the left (Woodruff Hall) is one of the original three buildings built in 1929.

What becomes of the Food Basket site on Seventh Street will largely determine the character of that area. For decades Garden City had three supermarkets on Seventh Street. It was the A&P, Grand Union and Gristede's became the Food Basket. Now that the Food Basket is gone the Village is waiting to see what becomes of that location.

In the fall of 1998 the lower scaffolding went up on the Cathedral of the Incarnation after a piece of the spire fell off in a storm. Several years after that the tall scaffolding went up. Finally, with the recent sale of the Middle School Field by the Cathedral, funds were available for the exterior restoration to commence. The Cathedral hopes to have all the scaffolding down within the year.

The future of the historic 1883 St. Paul's structure remains the oldest and most important unresolved issue in the village today. The school closed in 1991 and the Village acquired the property in 1993 and we are now in 2007. Without question St. Paul's will play a major role one way or another in the changing face of Garden City.