Early development What is now Rockaway Beach was formerly two different hamlets, Holland and
Hammels. In 1857, Michael P. Holland had purchased land and named the area after himself. Soon afterward, Louis Hammel, an immigrant from
Germany, bought a tract of land just east of Holland. In 1878, he decided to give portions of his land to the
New York, Woodhaven and Rockaway Railroad in order to build a railroad station for the peninsula. The area around it became collectively known as "Hammels". On June 11, 1897, Hammels merged with Holland and they incorporated as the Village of Rockaway Beach. One year later, it was incorporated into the
City of Greater New York and became part of the newly formed borough of
Queens. However, the neighborhood, along with the eastern communities of
Arverne and
Far Rockaway, tried to secede from the city several times. In 1915 and 1917, a bill approving the secession passed in the legislature but was vetoed by the mayor at the time,
John Purroy Mitchel. In the early 1900s, the newly built railroad station opened up the community and the rest of the peninsula to a broad range of the population. The wealthy no longer had a monopoly on the peninsula, as various amusement parks, stores, and resort hotels attracted people from all over the city to spend a day or a whole summer there. Much of the area was developed by
James S. Remsen and
William Wainwright. In this era, it became known as "New York's Playground". Rockaway's famous amusement park,
Rockaways' Playland, was built in 1901 and quickly became a major attraction for people around the region. With its growing popularity, concern over swimming etiquette became a problem and early in 1904, the Captain of the
NYPD, Louis Kreuscher, issued rules for those using the beach, censoring the bathing suits to be worn, where photographs could be taken, and specifying that women in bathing suits were not allowed to leave the beachfront. The park was grand for its time. One of its most popular attractions, the Atom Smasher roller coaster, would be featured in the beginning of
This is Cinerama, a pre-
IMAX type movie, in 1952. An
Olympic-size swimming pool and a million-dollar midway also were built within the amusement park; they would serve the community for over eighty years. The
Temple of Israel Synagogue was built in 1921, and listed on the
National Register of Historic Places in 2014.
1930s–1960s In the 1930s,
Robert Moses came to power as
New York City's Parks Commissioner and his extensive road and transportation projects were both a benefit and disaster for the neighborhood. As commissioner, Moses ordered the construction of the
Marine Parkway Bridge and the
Cross Bay Veterans Memorial Bridge. The bridges were completed in 1937 and 1939 respectively. The Marine Parkway Bridge was built further west on the peninsula between
Jacob Riis Park and
Breezy Point linking the isolated communities to Brooklyn. The Cross Bay Bridge landed in the middle of the neighborhood of Rockaway Beach. The new bridge made the community the peninsula's gateway to Queens as it provided the only direct car access to the borough. The construction of the two bridges started to transform the neighborhood and the rest of the peninsula into a more year-round residential area or
commuter town, as people had a more convenient way to travel to and from work. The conversion of the
Rockaway Beach LIRR branch to the
Rockaway subway line also brought an increase to Rockaway's permanent residents. Although the bridges were intended to improve the Rockaways, Moses' other projects both directly and indirectly hurt the community. One such failed project was the planned construction of the
Shore Front Parkway in the 1950s and 1960s. Wanting to connect
Staten Island to
the Hamptons, Moses focused on making a highway through the Rockaway Peninsula. His idea was to connect the Marine Parkway Bridge with the
Atlantic Beach Bridge, which connected the Rockaway Peninsula to
Nassau County. The plan would also provide an extension midway through to include the Cross Bay Bridge. Many feared that such an extensive project would do more harm to the peninsula than good and pointed to the community displacement that had happened in the
South Bronx because of Moses' roadway construction Although Moses never got to make his highway, he did leave his mark. A piece of the planned parkway that ran west to east in the
Rockaway Park and Rockaway Beach neighborhoods was constructed and opened in 1939. Houses were literally cut in half in order to build the four-lane street. Some of these houses are still standing today. The existing, still unfinished street is locally known as the "road from nowhere to nowhere" because it does not have any relevant connections to any other area or highway. Robert Moses' construction of other recreational areas and facilities, such as the
New York Aquarium and
Jones Beach State Park, indirectly impacted the neighborhood as well. These more modern recreational facilities lured tourists and beachgoers away from the peninsula. With fewer customers, businesses and hotels closed, and by the 1950s, the area had fallen into economic decline. The transition from a summer vacationing area to a full-time residential neighborhood had taken its toll. In an effort to revitalize the neighborhood, the city constructed the Hammel Houses. This social housing project would be one of the many so-called
urban renewal efforts that dominated the community and much of its eastern neighbors in the last half of the 20th century. The
New York City Housing Authority purchased the land in 1952 on the north side of the elevated track. In 1964, the Authority decided to demolish and rebuild the entire area to what it is today. The
Rockaway Courthouse was built in 1931; it served as a local Municipal and Magistrate's Court and was last used as a civic building in 1962. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2014. Out-of-towners start to call the beach "
Williamsburg on the Rockaways" because some surfers from the Brooklyn neighborhood spend whole summers out in the Rockaways. The community was devastated by
Hurricane Sandy in late 2012. Rockaway Beach reconstruction began with Phase One, a $10 million contract provided by the
Army Corps of Engineers to restore of sand along Rockaway Beach in August 2013. The second phase put nearly of sand in 2014 at a cost of about $37 million. Phase Two was paid by the federal government through the
Hurricane Sandy relief bill. ==Demographics==