Debra Davidson, one of the authors of “Fresh Meadows,” moved to the Queens neighborhood in 1962 when she was in the second grade. One year later, her co-author Fred Cantor left Fresh Meadows for the suburbs.
“Her knowledge kind of complemented mine, so it made sense to bring her on for the book,” Cantor said.
“Fresh Meadows” was published last October as part of Arcadia Publishing’s “Images of America” series, which chronicles the histories of neighborhoods around the country through compelling photographs.
For the book, Cantor and Davidson collected images from residents who gather on a popular Facebook group, “Fresh Meadows Rules.” They also combed the Fresh Meadows Development archives, the New York Life Insurance archives and their own personal collections.
Cantor, who lived in Fresh Meadows before moving to Connecticut in 1963, says he got the idea for the book after finding the Facebook group, which has more than 1,000 members, back in September 2010.
“I got a chance to connect with some people I hadn’t seen in almost 50 years, and some of the photos that people were posting on to the group page just captured that idea of postwar America,” Cantor said.
He also connected with Davidson through the Facebook group. Davidson lived in Fresh Meadows from age 8 through her years at Queens College. After reminiscing about their respective childhoods in the neighborhood, Cantor proposed writing the book.
“We saw through the Facebook group that there was an audience of people who would be interested in a book about Fresh Meadows’ history,” Cantor said.
Established in 1946 after New York Life Insurance bought the Fresh Meadows Country Club, the neighborhood was one of many communities designed for and marketed to returning World War II veterans. Cantor, whose father was one of those veterans — the family moved into the original development, bisected by 188th Street — said that everything down to the layout of the roads there was tailored to family life.
“The streets ... aren’t designed in the standard grid pattern. They’re deliberately curved,” Cantor said. This was “to keep people from driving fast,” he explained. “The streets were designed with the idea that children were probably going to be running around and playing in the neighborhood.”
“They still study Fresh Meadows in land use planning courses in colleges,” he added.
Davidson said that unlike Parkchester in the Bronx and Stuyvesant Town in Manhattan — communities that were likewise established by insurance companies — Fresh Meadows was designed with more suburban intentions.
“The original development had lots of open space and only three high-rises. It was this hybrid of city life and suburban life, and that’s still what it is,” Davidson said.
“Fresh Meadows” is available through most large retailers, including Amazon and Barnes and Noble, and the Queens Public Library. All the authors’ royalties will go to the library’s Fresh Meadows branch.
“For us, it was sort of a labor of love,” Davidson said. “It was great to look back at this great time in the lives of so many people.”
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