After much debate and ultimately this completely official proclamation, the awkwardly worded Prospects Lefferts Gardens (and its hyphenated step-sister) nabe name has been shortened to the more useful, accurate and simple to pronounce "Lefferts." Originally the land owned and developed by the prominent Lefferts family, the area was always, and continues to be, part of the Greater Flatbush area. Given the outpouring of neighborhood jingoism gripping parts of the great social experiment known as the Borough of Brooklyn in the world's cultural and financial capital New York City in the Empire State of New York, an essential, largely liberal and trend-setting Eastern power-central member of fifty of the estimable United States of America in the venerable Northern Americas of the Western Hemisphere on the third planet from the sun, the currently habitable rock known as Earth, Universe....
The Q hereby pronounces the name of the neighborhood spanning from Empire Blvd to the North, New York Avenue to the East, Prospect Park AND the Parade Grounds to the West, and Caton Avenue to the South, irrevocably and irreducibly "LEFFERTS," no more no less.
These environs will continue to associate deeply with the larger and highly historic neighborhood of Flatbush, once the Town of Flatbush in the dutch chartered city of Breukelen. Put otherly, a resident of Lefferts IS a resident of Flatbush.
Your eyes are getting heavy...count back from 100...now repeat after me..."I live in Lefferts, I live in Lefferts...I live..."
36 comments:
Someone once suggested Prospect Empire as a name for the hood. I think that would be good.
One MINOR quibble Tim; the southern part of our neighborhood was owned not by the Lefferts family, but by the infamous Axtells, whose Melrose Hall estate was centered around what is now Winthrop Street, but I guess we CAN forget about those Tory traitors and just use Lefferts (since they were on the winning side). :-)
There's a great article about the Axtells and Melrose Hall in "Flatbush and the American Revolution"
http://tinyurl.com/b53ruql
IMO well worth the 19 bucks that Amazon is charging for their one used copy. Back in the late '70s, I had a hell of a time tracking down that slim book, published by the elusive Flatbush Historical Society.
Oh but there should be an active and ever present Flatbush Historical Society! Let's get some history buffs to revive it.
Does the neighborhood really end at New York Ave? I suppose it could. Although the Crown Heights branch of the BPL is on the West Side of NY Ave. I think that part of Brooklyn is called WIngate, but it's really a part of Crown Heights and not really Lefferts which which more likely ends at Nostrand.
But I like PLG as a name. Just get the lack of hyphenation correct.
"I think that part of Brooklyn is called WIngate, but it's really a part of Crown Heights''
Actually East Flatbush, or at least that's what it was called when my wife grew up there. Crown Heights was historically in Brooklyn, pre 1894; East Flatbush in the Town of Flatbush.
I live in Lefferts, I live in Lefferts, I live in Lefferts. Make this happen people!
-Paul G.
Kind of you to include Caton Avenue as the south border. Lefferts really does sound a lot better than Axtells. Now, what can y'all do about getting the B train to stop at Parkside again?
LOVE your blog!!
How many signatures do you think we would need to gather before Google Maps would make this change? And how many before Brownstoner would take up our cause? Lefferts!
But 'Lefferts Gardens' sounds so much prettier than plain 'Lefferts'. And I don't think it is too much to say - it's just two words, as are many other Brooklyn neighborhoods such as Crown Heights, Park Slope, Boerum Hill, Brooklyn Heights, Coney Island, Red Hook, etc.
What precisely are these "gardens" of which you speak? I have a garden. Do you have a garden? How many gardens? I've always found the name Carroll Gardens VERY suspect and real-estatey. BUT it does say Lefferts Gardens on the buses...
I think Lefferts is more accurate and unencumbered.
"Lefferts really does sound a lot better than Axtells"
LOL--that might have been the name if the OTHERside had won the American Revolution. More likely "Melrose Park, which was the name of an abortive 1880s RE development centered around the Axtell's Melrose Hall mansion. It was indicated in broken lines on an old Plat map I consulted (at the Long Island--now Brooklyn--Historical Society) when I researched the history of my house. That's what lead me to that obscure book I mentioned earlier, which, in those pre-internet days, I found out about through word of mouth.
CF,
I've always been under the impression that the "gardens" portion of the PLG name was a reference to the Brooklyn Botanic Garden.
(And that the whole name was created as a shortened form of "Prospect Park/Lefferts Manor/Brooklyn Botanic Garden.")
If we going to be "rebranded" we'd better decide on something soon because if we don't we'll become known as "that area over by the new skating rink."
Or the RE brokers will come up with something annoying... anyone care to play? I'll go first. How about:
Clarkson Up To Empire Stretch Of Flatbush Avenue
or CUTE SOFA
Right Diak; PROSPECT Park. LEFFERTS Manor (or Homestead, or farm) and Botanic GARDEN[S}
Unlike Tim, I have no problem with the whole mouthful as an "official" name, especially since it has 45 years of use, , but I DO agree that "Lefferts" sounds much better as an unofficial shorthand version--kind of like "the Slope" for Park Slope, the Heights, for Brooklyn Heights, or, for that matter, "the Manor" for you know what.
BTW, ""that area over by the new skating rink." is better than "Across the Park from Park Slope"
I vote CUTE SOFA! Well done diak!
to Anon. 2/21 at 8:14: thanks for the endorsement but be aware that I'm against this kind of marketing via unhistorical renaming. I prefer the traditional, tried and true. I don't want to live in CUTE SOFA. Similarly, I don't want to be a resident of any of the other broker acronyms for our area that I've discovered ...
Like the unfortunately toxic: Neighborhood Around ProspectPark And Lefferts Manor
= NAPALM
Or the regionally vague: General Area South of the Parkway And Crown Heights' Orthodox
= GASPACHO
Or given the single-family zoning in the Manor and general lack of new construction: Shortage Of Housing Options
(It's already taken.)
This had possibilities: Total Opposite of Park Slope; Integrated Diverse Environment
= TOPSIDE
until someone pointed out that it would lead to residents becoming known as "Topsiders" which would inevitably lead to the derisive slang term "loafers."
Maybe the most misleading name came from: Section Of Brooklyn Undulating to a Reggae Beat (Insufficient Amenities)
= SOBURBIA
Is Mr Flatbed onto something with simply: Leafy Environs of Flatbush Featuring Efficient Rapid Transit Service?
Or perhaps it should be left open to see what happens over the next few years: Nice Area, Mixed Ethnicities, In Transition
= NAME IT
I should get back to work....
AESOPP!!! Area East and South of Prospect Park.
You heard it here first.
AESOPP!!! That's fabulous!
Lefferts it is. Simple, easy to say, easy to remember, easy to spell. And no hyphens. Effort to add a 2nd word to the name(or 3rd or 4th the way things have gone in the past) only results in debate. Too much debate as always about everything.
The "Gardens" in PLG refer to the Brooklyn Botanic Garden [singular). The name "Prospect Lefferts Gardens" was created when the historic district was established. In addition to "Gardens", the historic district moniker incorporates the Lefferts name, from Lefferts Manor, and Prospect, from the Park.
"Gardens" refers to the Brooklyn Botanic Garden (singular). PLG is the historic district, the name of which comes from the geographical tentpoles of the Garden, Lefferts Manor, and Prospect Park.
"The name "Prospect Lefferts Gardens" was created when the historic district was established".
Actually 1968--shortly before PLGNA was formed. The Historic District (caps)which was established in 1979, is considerably smaller than PLG [or Lefferts, if you prefer] as a whole, consisting of, more or less, all of lefferts Manor plus the North side of Lincoln II and most of Lefferts & Sterling II & III. PLG [or just Lefferts, is Empire to Clarkson and Ocean to New York Aves. and includes a second small Historic District on Ocean Ave.
Also, to the best of my knowledge, that hyphen in the official Historic District name was simply a clerical error on the part of the Landmarks Preservation Commission. Seth Kaplan, of the now-defunct "PLOG" blog lead a successful campaign a few years ago to get Wikipedia to drop the hyphen.
There are facts and then there is truth. For facts, refer to Mr Marvin's history. But the truth is LEFFERTS GARDENS stands for:
Littered End of Flatbush: Few Eateries, Restaurants, or Takeout Services. Griping Also Regarding Drinking Establishments Nowhere to be Seen
Diak for President. Dude Is All Knowing.
Sorry, Lefferts alone sounds incomplete and uninteresting to me. Now, Lefferts Gardens is good. Why fix something when it isn't broken?
Or how about Prospect Lefferts? I feel like Prospect should still be in there since practically the whole nabe's west side is attached to Prospect Park.
Why garden(s)? Lefferts is sturdy, accurate, bold. Either Prospect or Gardens sounds like Wiliam B. May came up with it. (no offense to Bill, of course.
and by the way, it IS broke. that's why i started this whole silly conversation...
I live in Prospect Lefferts Gardens, which sounds just fine to me - yes, it's a made up name, but it was made up by residents not real estate brokers.
So, what about leaving "Prospect Lefferts Gardens" as our "official" name, since it's gained a degree of recognition after 40+ years of use, but encouraging people to say "I live in Lefferts" as a short hand expression, similar to "I live in the Slope" or "I live in the Heights" or [sorry Tim] "i live in the Manor"? Somehow "the Lefferts" doesn't sound quite right.
Bob: You've got me confused with someone else who dissed "the Manor." I poke gentle fun, but I love the name. Especially since I've met very few pretentious people from it! The combination of a name like "the Manor" with insufferable people would be too much to bear. It's actually one of the most lovely micro-hoods in the whole City. And that's really saying something, cuz this town is full of splendor.
In time, though, Bob, Prospect-Lefferts Gardens will have a quaint grandmotherly quality to it, not unlike the aroma of freshly applied denture cream and talcum powder. My grandkids will wonder if such a place ever truly existed, and I will tell them "only on Wikipedia" to which they'll say Wiki-what? and I'll say "it was like the early digital Encyclopedia Britannica only not as accurate," to which they'll say "Britanni-what?" and I'll tell them about rotary phones, and pay phones, and carbon paper and mimeographs and high fructose corn syrup and icebergs, and then I'll tuck them into their micron-plastic sealed "oxygen beds" for a comfortable night away from the deadly sun rays that punctuate our underwater neighborhood and cause painful rips in our radiation proof wet suits that have replaced skin as the only membrane keeping the water out and our blood in. On the bright side, Family Pizza will have started delivering and the Internet Coffee House will have resumed selling coffee. The future; you win some, you lose some.
I love your last comment Tim--even the dystopian parts show your keen sense of humor!
SO, when I say "I live in Lefferts" which I'll try to do, it will be understood that it's a shorthand expression for Prospect Lefferts Gardens [but NEVER Prospect-Lefferts Gardens, unless I'm discussing the hyphenated OFFICIAL Historic District]. When YOU, or anyone else says "I live in Lefferts" it'll mean whatever it means, but I'll happily maintain the illusion that you've accepted my compromise :-)
A very amusing and persuasive argument, Mr Flatbed... for the other side! Its exactly that musty, dusty, old-timey thing that I like — and will be more valuable as the history slips into, well, history. (Hell, I might even be willing to try something like a "Greater Pigtown" designation but I'd expect too much pushback from the kosher and halal contingents.) I have to side with Bob M. and babs on this one.
So, as for me:
"Prospect Lefferts Gardens" (no hyphen) for formal uses. Maps, documents, elections, etc.
"Lefferts Gardens" in conversation with those beyond our borders.
And within "the family": any nickname you like. "Lefferts" or any of the nametags under the photo at the top of your blog. To which I'll add:
"Leffertsburg" — but please, please no more boring arguments about hipsters, pro or con...
"Ebbets Abbey" — the area's heyday combined with a little patrician pretention.
"Phat Albert Village" — thinking reverse psychology here; maybe the publicity will cause him to leave the area.
"PLuGtown" — 20th century roots with an echo of the 19th century!
A bit more about the Axtell family's Melrose Hall and the abortive Melrose Park development that grew up around it in the late 19th Century: Through links to many historic photographs on today's Brownstoner, I came across this 1908 photograph of a house in Melrose Park:
http://www.brooklynvisualheritage.org/melrose-park-residence-w-brown
This house was in the southern part of our neighborhood, off of Flatbush Ave. Interestingly, it's identified as the home of W.A.A. Brown, who built some of the earliest row houses in Lefferts Manor--the four story houses on Midwood I, in 1898 and the three story ones on Midwood II in 1899 and 1900 [dear to my heart, since my house is one of them. Obviously Mr. Brown wasn't going to live in one of his middle class spec. houses :-)
Diak, you are making me laugh. Ebbets Abbey? Phat Albert Village? LOL. Thanks for the light humor because the other current discussion on this blog (about RS and the woes of developers) is just way too heavy.
Prospect Lefferts Gardens now; Prospect Lefferts Gardens forever!
My vote is to leave the Gardens, but drop the Prospect. Lefferts Gardens, pretty but less cumbersome.
it's better than PRO - LE - GA.
TRIBECA. NOLITA. DUMBO. BOCOCA. PROLEGA.
yep. be warned.
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