Library's trolley tour takes patrons all over town on historical trip

If you were out and about in Merrick on the evening of Aug. 2, you may have seen a trolley driving around town.

You weren’t imagining it — or mistaking the Long Island suburb for San Francisco. The North Merrick Public Library was hosting its very first Trolley Tour of the Merricks, as part of its summer reading program, with the theme “All Together Now.”

Kelly Rechsteiner, a community relations librarian in North Merrick, said the library drew its inspiration from the children’s television series “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood,” which famously featured Fred Rogers.

“The Trolley Tour was inspired by the beloved Mr. Rogers and his message of community, kindness and understanding,” Rechsteiner said. “Our summer reading program, ‘All Together Now,’ focused on these wonderful themes, which led to the visual of the Neighborhood Trolley, synonymous with Mr. Rogers.”

Rogers employed a toy trolley on his show, to take viewers into and around his neighborhood.

Library patrons packed into a trolley for three hour-long tours of Merrick, and caught glimpses of the hamlet’s hidden history. There were two adult-oriented tours as well as one family tour with the children’s library staff.

The library’s history

Taylor Smith, another community relations librarian, gave most of the presentation as the trolley made its way around town. She began with the history of the North Merrick library itself.

“The first library in Merrick’s history began in 1891,” Smith said. “About 50 books were circulated from the Cammann family farm. For many years the Merrick Library offered its services for free to their neighbors in North Merrick, but as populations grew, nonresidents were charged a fee.”

The North Merrick Library was established by a community vote on Nov. 21, 1964, and opened two years later, in October 1966. The current library is a former elementary school, part of the North Merrick School District.

Merrick campgrounds

Today there’s a small neighborhood in North Merrick referred to colloquially as Tiny Town, due to the comparatively miniature size of the area’s homes. Tiny Town features a series of circular streets that resemble a campground.

“The Merrick campgrounds were established by the Long Island Camp Meeting Association as a place for religious worship and meetings for New York Methodists,” Smith explained. “In 1860, the association bought 60 acres of land in North Merrick for its permanent summer site.”

The former site of the campgrounds is north of Camp Avenue and east of Merrick Avenue. Families rented one- and two-story homes in the summer so they could attend meetings. The population of the camp sometimes swelled to 10,000 due its proximity to the Long Island Rail Road.

Today, some of the campground’s smallest bungalows remain, hence the nickname Tiny Town. Many of them have historical markers indicating the year they were built.

“America’s entry into World War I, in 1917, and the Great Depression that followed, in 1929,” Taylor said, “brought a complete halt to camp gatherings.”

The Gables

The Merrick Gables, a neighborhood just north of Sunrise Highway, was the first large real-estate development in the hamlet after World War I. Homes in the area were influenced by California-style architecture — Spanish-style designs consisting of stucco, light concrete walls and turrets.

To wealthy buyers in the 1920s, the area was seen as high-class, and even attracted Hollywood stars, Smith said. “Stars like Errol Flynn and Ed Begley, father of Ed Begley Jr., live in Merrick’s mini-Hollywood during their performances on Broadway in New York City’s many theaters,” Smith said. “Stores and movie houses were built to accommodate the new residents.”

Similar to its effect on the campgrounds, the stock market crash of 1929 caused the Gables community to fail, and homes were sold at auction in the early 1930s.

Trolley takeaways

Aside from the tour’s main attractions, library patrons aboard the trolley had the chance to share some of their own history in Merrick, and the reasons why they wanted to take the tour. The general takeaway was that the participants were curious, and wanted to learn more about their hometown.

The tour was free to North Merrick patrons, but they did have to register in advance. The event was immensely popular, Rechsteiner said, and the waiting list exceeded 50 people.

“The community’s enthusiasm for the tour exceeded our expectations,” she said. “I’m sure we’ll be doing it again.”

Jackie Perez, the library’s director, said the library was thrilled to offer such a unique experience. “We were really excited to show our patrons how much history is on our community,” Perez said, “and how much our own town has to offer them.”