A ‘gem’ on Atlantic Avenue

Lyn gift shop owner Bill Gaylor, center, with his son, William Gaylor III, and his wife, Lillian, accepted an award from the Village of Lynbrook.

Brian Croce/Herald

Atlantic Avenue in Lynbrook, in 1916. Lyn Gift Shop is now at the location of the former Arcade Theatre, seen at right. Historian Art Mattson believes the photo was probably taken during the village’s July fourth celebration.

Courtesy Art Mattson

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Over the past 80 years, while just about everything in Lynbrook has changed — buildings, homes, schools, parks, even the fundamental ways in which people go about their lives — the Lyn Gift Shop has remained a constant.

Bill Gaylor has owned the shop, at 11 Atlantic Ave., since 1987. He and his wife of 51 years, Lillian, run the store, which specializes in fine gifts and Hallmark cards. For years, the earliest record Gaylor could find of the store’s existence dated back to 1945, but a recent discovery changed all that.

Mike McEnerney, a Lynbrook resident since 1972, was cleaning out his attic two years ago when he came across a book left behind by the shop’s previous owner, with “Lyn Gift Shop” written on one of the first few pages. The inscription included an address for the shop, 13 Hempstead Ave., and stated that it was a circulating library. A few pages later was a date: March 1932. Although his find didn’t mean much to McEnerney, he thought Gaylor would like to know about it.

“What makes it interesting is I don’t know how much older than 80 years it is,” Gaylor said. He was also curious as to why there would be a circulating library in Lynbrook when there was already a public library in place, and exactly where 13 Hempstead Ave. was, because that address no longer exists.

According to the village’s historian, Art Mattson, the gift shop’s 1932 location is now a small park near the corner of Hempstead Avenue and Merrick Road, an area now known as the Five Corners. Years ago, several commercial buildings in the area were demolished so Hempstead Avenue could be widened to accommodate ever-increasing traffic.

Gaylor, whose family moved to Lynbrook in 1949 and who graduated from Lynbrook High School in 1960, said he was happy to hear about McEnerney’s find. He already knew about two of the shop’s previous locations, one at 29 Atlantic Ave., now occupied by Unicorn Jewelers, dating back to 1945, and the other at 38 Atlantic, where F&L Deli & Catering now does business.

In 1987, Gaylor partnered with the shop’s previous owner, Larry Moskowitz, and moved the shop to its current location on Atlantic, the former site of the Arcade Theatre. Moskowitz retired a few years later — but Gaylor was only getting started.