Bay Park: The early years

This historical information was taken from two yearbooks of The Bay Park Property Owners’ Association, Inc. that were published in 1933 and 1944 and contributed by Charles D’Agostino, editor of the Bay Parker.

Bay Park consists of about seventy acres. It contains about 500 homes bounded on the north by East Rockaway and on the east by Hewlett Bay. In the days before the bulkheads were built in Bay Park, the land was known as marshland, covered in part by tidewater, marsh grass and shrubbery known as white birch. We are told that there was fine fishing in Hewlett Bay at that time. Eels, flounders, bass and fish, and that wild ducks and wild pigeons congregated in large numbers the shores of Bay Park.
Years ago, a land improvement company located in East Rockaway bought the land now known as Bay Park for development purposes. This company contracted with another company to construct bulkheads in Bay Park and the Grand Canal. It is said that the contract price for building the bulkheads and constructing the Grand Canal was $250,000.
The south bulkhead was built beginning at the southeasterly corner of the land now known as the town beach and extending to the easterly side of the Grand Canal. Later on, a portion of the bulkhead was removed, about 200 feet, to provide a bathing beach that is now leased by the Bay Park Property Owners’ Association, Inc.
The west bulkhead was built beginning at the westerly side of the Grand Canal and extending to Higbie Creek. The Grand Canal, about 75 feet wide, was constructed for a distance of about 2600 feet to North Boulevard. Bulkheads were then built on the three sides of the canal, making it one of the most attractive places for bathing and boating along the South Shore of Long Island.