Our historical posts about Long Island history have kept people informed and entertained all year. We love Long Island as much as you do and we love delving into the history of our home to share those facts with you. Below are the most popular articles in our “Crazy Facts About Long Island” series. Enjoy.
Photo: Shutterstock.
Crazy Facts About Fire Island - Our most popular post was all about the go-to summertime spot on Long Island. Key fact: Storms in the 1690s created the Fire Island Inlet, which eventually became the name of the entire island. Read more here.
Photo: Entenmann's Website.
Crazy Facts About Entenmann's - Our second most popular post was about the dessert that apparently never deserted our hearts based on the number of people who read this one. Key fact: In the 1950s, Frank Sinatra would call the Entenmann’s Bay Shore bakery and place a weekly order for a crumb coffee cake. Read on for some more cool and crazy facts.
Photo: kyselak / CC BY-SA (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)
Crazy Facts About Plum Island - At a time when we were all worried about Covid-19, people found interest in the island next to our island where government experiments have been carried out. The stories have been shrouded in secrecy, controversy and myth for decades. Key fact: In the early 1950s the Army set up a biological warfare research program on the island in Building 257 but it was quickly disbanded. Click here to get more facts.
Shoreham Nuclear Power Plant in Shoreham. Date: 15 April 2007. meta nemegi - Paul Searing / CC BY (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)
Crazy Facts About the Shoreham Nuclear Power Plant - The idea for cheap energy that spawned a thousand protests, op-ed articles and finger pointings. This project seemed to be doomed from the start. Key fact: The final cost of the Shoreham Nuclear Power Plant is estimated at $5.5 billion and it never generated any power for Long Island. Click here to read more hot facts.
Photo: Shutterstock.
Crazy Facts About Long Island Potatoes - When people of a certain age were young and growing up on Long Island they heard the cliche that all this was once potato fields. Key Fact: By the late 1940s there were over 70,000 acres of potato farms and 1,000 farmers on Long Island. At the time, up to 80% of all farming on Long Island was dedicated to potatoes. Click here to peel back myth from fact about Long Island potatoes and the farmers.
Left photo: Unknown author / Public domain. Right photo: Tower standing: Unknown author(Life time: Unattributed) / Public domain.
Crazy Facts About Tesla’s Wardenclyffe Tower on Long Island - Tesla’s idea was speculative and revolutionary: a global, wireless system for communication and power transfer by using the Earth’s conductivity for transmission of electrical currents. Sound familiar? Click the switch to learn more.
Postcard of MacArthur Airport. Photo: Long Island MacArthur Airport Facebook page.
Crazy Facts About MacArthur Airport - When you don’t want to schlep into the city and fight the crowds at JFK or - gasp - LaGuardia, then your only other choice is Long Island’s hometown airport, MacArthur. Key fact: In 1942 after Pearl Harbor was bombed, the airport was built on Islip Town-owned land for military use during the war. Take off with more crazy facts.
Photo: U.S. Navy photo by Photographer’s Mate Airman Kristopher Wilson / Public domain.
Crazy Facts About the F-14 Tomcat - The coolest fighter jet in the world. Full stop.Key fact: The F-14 first flew on December 21, 1970 in Grumman’s facility in Calverton and flight tested over Long Island Sound. Hit the throttle by clicking here to get more facts.
Brookhaven National Lab Main Entrance Sign. Photo: Brookhaven National Lab.
Crazy Facts About Brookhaven National Lab - With around $650 million in annual funding, employing over 2,500 people, and home to seven Nobel Prizes, Brookhaven National Lab is a heavy-hitter in the scientific community right here on Long Island! Key fact: The particle accelerators at BNL take stationary charged particles, such as electrons, and drive them to velocities near the speed of light. When they collide they produce new particles and reactions, some that haven’t existed in a natural state since just after the Big Bang. Get your mind blown with more facts by clicking here.
English: Lord Stirling leading an attack against the British in order to buy time for other troops to retreat at the Battle of Long Island, 1776. Public Domain.
Crazy Facts About George Washington’s Long Island Spies - You might have watched the AMC television show TURN: Washington’s Spies but did you know how to sort fact from fiction in the show? We tried to expose many of the facts related to what became known as the Culper Spy Ring. Key fact: Morton Pennypacker was a historian who in 1939 wrote the book "George Washington's Spies,” which brought to light the efforts of the spy ring. Previously no one had ever really known about the work the spy ring had done since the Revolutionary War. Uncover more historical facts by clicking here.