The Little Station in
the Woods Page 3
This view
of the Avenue H station in January 1906 predates the one on page 1 by a
couple of months. The original right-of-way of the Brighton Line is at thr
right of the picture and we are facing south. The small trestle takes the
Bay Ridge branch of the LIRR Manhattan Beach Line over the
Brighton tracks, the opposite of today's arrangement. As of yet, there is
no sign on the future station house, nestled in the woods at left, and a
little distance from the train tracks. The large sign advertises Fiske
Terrace. Paul Matus
Collection
Enter Mr. Ackerson
In the first decade of the 20th century,
Flatbush was no longer a town and Brooklyn no longer a city. Even as the
first subway was being built under the streets of Manhattan, the Brooklyn
Grade Crossing Elimination Commission was beginning the work of converting
the southern reaches on the Brighton Beach Line from a surface running
extension of the Fulton Street Elevated into a four-track, fully
grade-separated modern rapid transit line.
It is no
surprise that development would follow the path of construction to house
those who wanted to move from the congested confines of the city to the
suburbs of southern Brooklyn.
Some of the
development was to consist of small tract houses, but not all. One of
those who saw the potential for the placement of big beautiful houses
amidst the woods of the newly opened areas was Thomas Benton Ackerson.
Ackerson envisioned and built the planned community of Fiske Terrace, the
beautiful grouping of roads and houses that still stretches north from
Avenue H.
It was at this
time that the distinctive Avenue H station house was constructed, probably
also by Mr. Ackerson. But was it always a station house? We know, from
photos such as those shown here, that it was the T.B. Ackerson Real Estate
Office. It could also have served as a station house at the same time, but
evidence indicates that the Brooklyn Rapid Transit Company, then
proprietor of the Brighton Line, had its own smaller station house on the
north side of Avenue H in 1906, at the time that the current station was
the Ackerson office.
So it was this
little house, intimately connected with the development of the community,
which has come down to us today as the Avenue H station house, a historic
gem of the subway system. One hopes that it will not disappear in some
future fit of modernization.
Continued on page
4
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