Highlights of Area History

The history of Wheatley Heights/Dix Hills is inseparable from that of Deer Park, Wyandanch, and Half Hollow Hills. Before 1974, Wheatley Heights was not even on the Long Island map. In the 1800s, our area was a part of the district called West Deer Park.

Chief Wyandanch was a powerful Montauk chieftain who wielded great influence in the 1600s among many “Paumonok” tribes, and white settlers alike. In the early 1700s the Wheatley Heights/Dix Hills area was home to the Secatougue Indian tribe. Some Huntington farmers moved southward, establishing farms in “Half Hollow Hills”, where acres of huckleberries, blueberries, and wild strawberries grew.

Long Island Railroad Service was extended to the current Wyandanch and Deer Park stations in the early 1840s. In the 1860s there was a 1200 acre apple orchard in this immediate vicinity. Records show the biggest “town” of the area in 1882 was Deer Park, with a population of 100. Prized water springs of the (Wheatley Heights) area lead to the founding of the Colonial Mineral Springs Co. (off of today’s Colonial Springs Rd). From 1860 to 1900, a more successful business, the Terra Cotta Brick Co. thrived due to the abundant local reserves of sand and red clay. Most of these bricks were used for construction of buildings in New York City.

In the 1830s, after he was president, John Quincy Adams built a summer home just west of Deer Park Ave. The largest, most impressive local residents of the 18th and 19th centuries was the mansion built and owned by Jacob Conklin, who’d been a crew member of the famed pirate ship commandeered by Captain Kidd! Generations later, descendants sold this mansion to the son of President U.S. Grant. It burned to the ground in 1918.

Bagatelle Rd was named for the well-known Bagatelle Nursery, owned by Dr. Herman Baruch in the early 20th century. Baruch was the brother of FDR’s advisor, Bernard Baruch. Dr. Baruch bought the “Castle” from the grandson of shipping and railroad tycoon Cornelius Vanderbilt, and later sold it to an order of Catholic nuns. (Current site of Madonna Heights).

At the turn of the 20th century, our area was known as a hunter’s paradise (deer, rabbit, woodchuck, quail). Deer Park also became well known for its beautiful dahlias: a Mexican flower that was competitively cultivated by many local nurseries in the early to mid 20th century. The Dahlia festival was an annual Deer Park event.