By DEBBIE ROSEN
"It was back in the good old days when you could go out and not lock your door," said Helen Downs, a 49-year resident of Island Park who moved to her waterside home on Suffolk Road, some 25 years ago. "My husband got notice the day after Christmas in 1951 to join the navy, so we had to push up our wedding plans from June to January. They were so nice and donated the place to us," she said of what was then the Channel Inn. Ms. Downs recalled how the restaurant supplied the beer, while family and friends cooked the meats and prepared salads for her big day with a hundred guests. "Even before we were married , we hung out there all the time," she added. "It was sad to see it go, but it will increase the value of our neighborhood."
This unique piece of property holds a history dating back to the 1930s, when it was home to a small corner neighborhood grocery store owned by the Pearsal family. In the 1950s it became the Channel Inn, a bar, restaurant type of place to go. From 1975 to 1987 it would become the most successful of all the restaurants there. David Jones would call Suffolk Road and the waterfront home. After David Jones closed, the Chart House took over from 1987-1993.
The landmark restaurant David Jones was famous for hanging out, serving up good seafood, and providing great times to family and friends. Packed like sardines in a can, the place rocked and rolled each and every week, cars lining the streets and people waiting on line to get in. Roberta Scully lived just half a block down from the eatery and the site brought back a wave of memories. "I kept my very first boat docked there, my three grown children worked there," said Ms. Scully. "When it was the Channel Inn, my friends and I all hung out there and kids from the city used to come out too," she added.
For Ms. Scully and many others on Suffolk Road in Island Park, their lives were intertwined with whatever restaurant called the waterside property home. "To so many of us that building was a part of our lives and represented life here on the waterfront," said Ms. Scully, looking over photos which line her Scully Realty Office with visions of waterside fun. She laughed looking at one picture of her now grown son, Michael, with a huge crab sticking out of his mouth back when he was a youngster. "Living on the water is a great way of life, great for kids," she recalled. "You had a place for the kids to fish and swim, a place to put your boat, whatever restaurant was there we were all a part of it, and it was apart of us," she added. Perhaps the finest fact about the property is its prime location, lying on a canal. It's the only canal besides the Shinnecock Canal, this one is also open on both ends, pouring into both Reynolds Channel and Pearsals Hassock.
Five years after the Chart House closed, Beal Bank foreclosed on the property which lay barren until bought by a local developer in June of this year. Now, the property is home to four new colonial homes. The Island Park-based general contractor Nystrom Construction, a four generation family business, has two more homes to complete work on.
Many area residents see the development to the area as an improvement to the foreclosed property, which used to be home to village Christmas parties. More so, it is a chance for future homeowners to enjoy a life like Roberta Scully. A life along the waterfront.
