Borough Park Club House, ca. 1912. The neighborhood now known as Borough Park, was once called, for a short period of time in the 19th century, Blythebourne. It was the creation of a developer named Electus B. Litchfield. He had established a small cottage community in 1887 from the sprawling farmland that dominated this part of Brooklyn. A different developer, William H. Reynolds, arrived on the scene in the 1880s and bought, schemed, and constructed a new, larger community around Blythebourne, calling it Borough Park. The community had a suburban feel, with small wood-frame homes as well as large Queen Anne and Colonial Revival detached houses. The Borough Park Club House was conceived by Reynolds and designed by Benjamin Dreisler 1898. The Queen Anne/Colonial Revival building with a large wraparound porch was the center of activity for the neighborhood. It hosted events organized by fraternal organizations, church and synagogue, scouts, teachers, sports clubs, social clubs, union organizations, and political clubs. The clubhouse survived in its original form until World War II, after which it was converted in to a Jewish Center and then school, serving the booming Orthodox Jewish community that had moved into the neighborhood mid century. During these years the large porch was removed, two-story wings were added to the building, and the surrounding grass was cemented over. In the 1980s the building was demolished and replaced.