Red House, Tackapausha, Massapequa

In late January, 2013, I came across this new sign on the Massapequa side of Tackapausha Pond.  At the Central Avenue library, a small book of postcard views of Massapequa has a photo of the red house, which I have linked here, from the Long Island Memories digital collection.
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George Kirchmann of the Massapequa Historical Society graciously explained:

The Massapequa Historical Society erected the Red House marker last November. It was the first of the large estates (traveling eastward) that lined Merrick Road from Seaford to Amityville in the 1800 - 1960s period. James Meinell bought 600 acres in the Seaford - Massapequa area in the 1850s and completed the house in 1856. He was born in Ireland in 1789, came to the US in 1810 and made his fortune buying and selling New York City real estate. He opened the New Theater on Lower Broadway around 1855 and it became well known for the quality of its plays. The main troupe that performed there was Laura Keene's, whose troupe performed Our American Cousin at Ford's Theater the night Lincoln was shot. Meinell died in 1865 and his mansion became a hotel, then a boarding house, and a private house again until it was torn down in 1964.

Snow and Ice, Jan. 23-26

Sometime in the 1970's, I joined many people skating on Tackapausha Pond.  I cannot recall skaters here in recent years, but on January 26, 2013, the ice was strong enough to hold an inch of snow.  Somebody had shoveled a far corner of the ice clear, and a few people were walking about.

Since the late 1600's, Seaford Creek has separated the Town of Hempstead (left and straight ahead) from the Town of Oyster Bay (on the right).  Tackapausha Pond flows into Seaford Creek, which here has gathered some ice in the past night or two.  The left fork is a short canal.  The photo was taken from Jetmore Place, Massapequa, looking north.

The Parkside Cafe on Adler Court, facing Seaford Creek, will reopen.  
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More photos from late January, 2013, are linked here. Captions will appear when you click on the photos. (Google+ albums are a bit tricky to view.)
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Seaford Public School Enrollment

The first column below is the enrollment in January, 2007.
The second column is the enrollment of 12/21/2012.

Grade
K.	Unknown	179
Gr. 1	180	165
Gr. 2	190	170
Gr. 3	197	195
Gr. 4	205	182
Gr. 5	204	199
Gr. 6	226	163
Gr. 7	207	188
Gr. 8	227	204
Gr. 9	173	179
Gr. 10	220	202
Gr. 11	223	208
Gr. 12	173	199

The Seaford School District extends about three miles from Seaford Harbor north to Jerusalem Avenue.  North of Jerusalem Avenue there is more than a mile of the Seaford postal zone that is not in the school district.

East-west along Merrick Road, the school district runs about 1.2 miles from near Cedar Creek to Seaford Creek at Tackapausha. East-west at the railroad, the extent is about 0.6 miles.
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The other day (11.18.2016) I met a graduate of the Seaford High School class of 1965.  He said his graduating class numbered 320.  In vast parts of Nassau County that had farms or vacant land in the early 1940's, there was a housing boom through the 1950's that caused a peak in high school enrollment in the 1960's.  By the 1970's, districts were dismissing staff and closing schools.

Maximum water height during Sandy

Newsday of 1.8.2013 published a summary article titled "A Tally of Storm's Wrath," reporting numbers that the newspaper had received from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.  The only number that specifically mentioned Seaford was the Maximum Water Height in Seaford of 8.36 feet.  According to the text of the article, the figure was derived from tide gauges in the bays and observations along the coast.  A friend told me that FEMA representatives were measuring high water marks on buildings a day or two after the storm.
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Newsday offered FEMA's inundation map at http://newsday.com/sandy but I could not access it. Hopefully, the map will become available on FEMA's website, which at the moment offers the 2009 flood prediction map.

School Board Meeting of 1.3.2013

The Seaford School District Board of Education held its first meeting of 2013 at the Seaford Manor Elementary School on January 3, 2013.  For most of the public meeting, the topic was school safety in light of the tragic events at Newtown, Connecticut.  The school board president described at length what was done for the final week of school in December and what additional precautions have been taken.  "Tweak" described the on-going change of procedures based on experience and advice.  
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Seaford trustees, staff, and residents deserve praise for their work and helpfulness in the days and weeks following the hurricane, some coping with their own damaged properties, many caught up with the need to communicate by visits rather than electronically.
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Seaford trustees, staff, and residents deserve praise for their concerned and level-headed planning of and reactions to safety issues raised by the deaths at Newtown.
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The second large topic was the need to get FEMA funding for construction of the emergency access/"egress" road at the Harbor School. Patch has an excellent narrative of the attempts to build this alternate route.
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For an earlier use of the word Egress instead of Exit, the reader may wish to read this story of P. T. Barnum.