Lynbrook historians as detectives

Editors note: Art Mattson is the official Lynbrook village historian and the director of the Historical Society of East Rockaway and Lynbrook. Additionally, he is the author of “The History of Lynbrook,” which is available on Amazon.com and at local libraries.

How do historians determine the age or location of long-gone buildings? One of the best ways is to closely examine old photos and picture postcards (see photos above).

The first photo is from a postcard labeled “School – Lynbrook, L.I.” Records show that the building was constructed sometime between 1905 and 1910, and that the building served grades one to 12 for decades. But the postcard was not dated and had no cancelled postage stamp. The school’s location was not known either. The question was, “What is the date of the postcard and where was the school?”

The second photo is of the Lynbrook Lyceum. It was taken by Lynbrook’s Leo Bock early in the 20th century. The date of this photo was not known, but the building was known to be on Union Avenue on the east side of the street, opposite today’s Lynbrook High School.

What more can the postcard and picture tell us? Looking again at the Lyceum picture, we see that there is part of another building visible in the background with a leafy tree partly obscuring it. (See arrow.) On closer inspection, we can see what appears to be a cupola atop a roof. The gabled roofline, roof trim, cupola and tree match those in the school photo. From those two images, we can conclude that the Lynbrook school building stood just south of the Lyceum, on the east side of Union Avenue. There is a parking field there today.

Is there more we can learn? The Lyceum photo has American flags flying. On close inspection with a magnifying glass, the flags can be seen to have 45 stars. Since Utah was admitted as the 45th state in 1896, and Oklahoma was admitted as the 46th state in 1907, the flags suggests that the Lyceum photo was taken between 1896 and 1907 . . . unless old flags were kept flying beyond 1907. Newspapers reported the destruction of the Lyceum by fire in 1913, hence the widest possible date range of the Lyceum photo must be 1896-1913.

Another piece of information narrows the dates further. Shortly after the Village of Lynbrook was incorporated in March 1911, police uniforms were changed from light gray to dark blue. Since the police officer in the Lyceum picture is wearing a dark uniform, the final date range for the Lynbrook Lyceum picture is 1911-1913. Voila!