Neighbors felt cut down Caption: "Neighbors felt cut down--Argyle Road residents were stunned when workmen \[in foreground] yesterday cut down four huge shade trees alongside site of addition to Public School 139 \[located at 330 Rugby Road] at corner of Cortelyou Road. They insist city promised a year ago the trees would remain. One, a consulting engineer, figured cost of removal at $800. 'A ridiculous waste of taxpayers money and a handsome, tree-lined street is ruined in the bargain,' he said;" several wood-frame private houses in background.

Jacob Duryea house, Flatbush Avenue, 1892. This wood-frame farmhouse once stood about 100 feet south of the entrance to the Kings Theatre. In the late 18th century, it was the homestead of Dr. James J. van Beuren, a descendent of a family of Dutch doctors active in Flatbush and New York. According the Brooklyn Medical Journal, van Beuren died in 1802. The house later passed to the family of Jacob Duryea, for whom nearby Duryea Place is named. By the late 19th century, the property was surrounded by tracks and structures associated with the Brooklyn City Railroad's Vernon Avenue car barn. The homestead was razed between 1898-1906.

The Beverley Road Station House is the sole entrance to the open-cut BMT Line station below. The house was built in 1907 and completely renovated in the 1990s. Quirky Subway Fact: The distance between this station and the next station, Cortelyou Road is the shortest distance between two stations in the entire NYC subway system. At only 600 feet, if a full length train had only the first car platform at the start of one station, the end of the train would still be at the end of the other station's platform.

William and Lulu Norwood House, September 1, 1958. This nearly 5,000 square foot home was constructed in 1906 for real estate broker William Norwood and his wife. A number of architectural features present a Northern Italian Villa style, including the porch, tower, and the deep eaves (or part of the roof that overhangs the edge of the building). The rest of the home is a solid Colonial Revival. Despite the large home, the oddly- shaped lot has almost no backyard space as the subway (today's Q train) runs directly behind it and the rail infrastructure was present prior to the home's construction.

The last quarter of the nineteenth century brought rapid changes to many parts of Brooklyn, not least to the town of Flatbush and its environs. Flatbush (from the Dutch vlacke bos, flat forest or wooded plain) was one of the original 6 towns making up the city of Brooklyn, and became part of that city in 1894. Four years later Brooklyn would become part of the consolidation of Greater New York City. This story is by Deborah Tint, Special Collections Cataloger, Brooklyn Public Library

Adjacent to the Q train tracks, you might spy a clearing in the woods. The Knickerbocker Field Club was established in 1889 in the Flatbush neighborhood of Brooklyn. Its original structure was a two story Colonial Revival Style building clad in clapboard and shingles, with a deep porch supported by Doric order columns. A fire in 1988 destroyed a portion of the building. The Field Club was the last standing portion of the area's Tennis Court development, yet was not considered worthy of landmark status. The remains of the original structure were demolished in 1992, replaced by a new clubhouse, still operating under the name "Knickerbocker Field Club."

Third Church of Christ Scientist, November 23, 1930. The Third Church of Christ, Scientist of Brooklyn was established around the turn of the century. Their 1927 church building was designed by Cherry & Matz in a Greek Revival style. The building was sold in 1982 to the Flatbush Seventh-day Adventist Church, which still occupies the structure today.

403 East 19th Street, August 7, 1962. This two-story Colonial Revival home was constructed in in 1909-1910 by Benjamin Driesler for William H. Silk. The large curved porch is an iconic feature of the 1981- landmark designated Ditmas Park Historic District. Today the porch and the home is obscured by large trees.

Suydam-Ditmas House was built about 1700 and torn down in 1911. Hendrick Suydam, born in 1731, purchased the farm in 1759 from the heirs of Jacobus Lott. The house was owned by the Ditmas family until 1909.

The Vanderveer Windmill, east of Flatbush Avenue, ca. 1875. Fittingly, Kings County's foremost windmill was located on the farm of a prominent Dutch family in the Dutch-settled town of Flatbush. Likely built in the first decade of the 19th century (sources vary on the exact yet; some suggest decades earlier), farmer John C. Vanderveer's windmill was originally equipped with 26-foot "sails." Around the early 1830s, the sails were removed and the mill was converted for simple grain storage. Vanderveer's windmill played an unlikely role in the Draft Riots of 1863. Concerned that violence directed at African-Americans would spread from riots in Manhattan to Brooklyn and beyond, black residents of Flatbush took shelter in the windmill as a precautionary measure. Sixteen years later, on March 4, 1879, the windmill caught fire in the early morning hours in a blaze visible from Brooklyn City Hall (now known as Borough Hall).

BMT Brighton Line tracks, viewed from the Albemarle Road pedestrian bridge, July 2, 1962.

William Fox Albemarle Theatre, ca.1920. Designed in a modest French Renaissance Revival style, the building was created by Arthur Carlson and Harrison Wiseman, experienced theatre architects. Wiseman designed at least 22 theatres in New York City including a number of Yiddish venues on Second Avenue. A vaudeville and motion picture house, it was managed, initially, by producer William Fox. The movie house remained a single screen venue until a fire in 1984 heavily damaged the building. The theatre closed, was purchased by Jehovah’s Witnesses, and soon reopened as an Assembly Hall, which it remains today.