By Jack Garland

Whenever I visit the old hometown, I often make it a point to drive past its two crown jewels. Memorial Park and Wilson Park, with their unique personalities and functions, provide refuge from their concrete surroundings. In an ever-developing Long Island where it seems necessary to clear wooded areas to make room for half-occupied strip malls, I hope we never take these two beautifully maintained facilities and others like them for granted. Although I would not consider myself to be a tree-hugger, my passion for the outdoors is quite strong, and I think I can trace its foundation to an area just two blocks from my childhood home.

It was known simply as "the nursery," and was a tract of land that lay between the main line railroad tracks and Old Country Road. Its western boundary was defined by the even numbered homes on Wisteria Avenue, and along the eastern edge ran what we called "The Old Motor Parkway."

Centuries ago, this land was part of the massive Hempstead Plains that dominated a good portion of what is now central Nassau County. My parents and my older sister who moved to Mineola in the mid 1930s would recount that the land was indeed an active nursery. The owner had built a huge family residence on the property, and a small retail building was situated right at the edge of Old Country Road, where freshly cut flowers and, perhaps, even produce were sold to passing motorists.

By the time I arrived on the scene one decade later, much had changed. As soon as I was old enough to walk any distance without tumbling, my dad would take me on summer evening hiking adventures through the property. There was no longer any evidence, however, of a flourishing nursery. As we walked eastbound along Old Country Road, a long row of hedges to our left had grown to many times my height, obscuring any view of what lay inside. At the end of the hedges stood the little structure which, by that time, served more as a handy dumpster than a flower market. Behind this building stretched about 15 acres of land that had obviously been long abandoned.

About 100 feet from the road stood the house. My guess is that it was probably built in the 19th century and must have been quite an elegant showplace in its happier years. When I first laid eyes on it, however, it was already in ruins - overgrown, peeling, ominous, empty, silent. If a Hollywood film director ever needed a location for a haunted mansion scene, the search would end there.

As the years went by, I noticed that some of my older playmates in the neighborhood kept making reference to a place called "Pettit's." It soon became obvious that they were talking about the very scene of our father-son hiking trips; the nursery had a name. The Pettit family had owned the property and I never learned for sure what ever became of them. We just assumed that perhaps they all passed away leaving no one to care for the house and land. The unanswered questions merely added more intrigue to an already fascinating place.

As my age approached double digits, the parental warnings of "don't ever go in there without one of us" were amended to "don't ever go in there alone" and finally evolved into "well, just be careful." In the years that followed, not too many days went by without a visit to this special place where one could gaze in every direction and see nothing that was man-made.

The southern part, although rampant with knee-high grass, was mostly flat and open. In one area, there were still signs of its former life - straight rows of spindly, unknown plants. In another section, there was a healthy crop of what appeared to be bamboo. Off to one side stood the "mountain range," most likely a stockpile of unused topsoil. Estimated altitude...perhaps 10 feet.

By using an alternate entrance, we 20th century Huck Finns gained access to the northern half of the property and a completely different landscape. From the eastern end of Albertson Place, two pathways snaked through a heavily wooded area. It was difficult to get lost in this section because the dense foliage made it practically impossible to stray from these narrow trails. The pathways eventually merged and led to a spot where a steep climb would lead to the top of a trestle passing over the railroad.

The trestle was for the "Old Motor Parkway," which was, of course, the historic Long Island Motor Parkway, our nation's first toll road. Its battered, tar surface had suffered the same neglect and abandonment as the land it bordered and, in those years, the uncontrolled growth of trees and brush had reduced its width from two lanes to one. It ran from the railroad, south under Old Country Road into Garden City. In its original design, it continued east to Lake Ronkonkoma. Northbound from the railroad, the old parkway served as a convenient walking shortcut to Korvettes, a discount department store located at the corner of Westbury Avenue and Glen Cove Road.

The former nursery had become the ultimate playground. One evening I got the bright idea of moving our traditional game of "Hide and Seek" from the immediate neighborhood to Pettit's, where we could have a real game. If you can picture six or seven youngsters spread out over 15 acres, you can understand why our game never got beyond the first round. Forty painfully silent minutes had elapsed and no one found anyone. One by one, each participant got bored and meandered home. We reconvened the next morning and agreed that it wasn't such a great idea after all.

Were there safety issues? This was the '50s, and this was, after all, Mineola. Nevertheless, as we ended our nursery adventures each day and headed home along its pathways at dusk, I'm sure we all glanced over our shoulders and picked up the pace a little bit. Because of its size and isolation, Pettit's would occasionally become the haven for drifters, assorted ne'er-do-wells, and amateur arsonists. On one day in particular, I reported to my family that I had spotted a thriving rose bush on the property. My mom reasoned that the lonely rose bush would have a much happier environment in our back yard than in the midst of all that dusty wilderness. The next morning, she and I ventured off equipped with every imaginable piece of gardening equipment to rescue the homeless plant. We had barely broken ground when mom calmly announced that we would pick up our shovels and leave the area. She had seen "someone." In the distance was an individual rummaging about; for the time being at least, he was oblivious to, or unconcerned with, our presence. To be on the safe side, we hastily walked home and the rescue mission was abandoned permanently.

The downhill portion of the Old Motor Parkway from the railroad bridge southbound was an inviting stretch to set new speed records on bicycles. One day, we learned of a young cyclist who had struck some uneven pavement at the Old Country Road underpass and was fatally injured. A few weeks later, the underpass was filled in.

Because of age and vandalism, sections of floors in the old mansion were actually missing, resulting in a potential one or two-story drop for any careless visitor. Eventually, in the interest of public safety, the house was leveled. The small market building stoically remained at the entrance to the nursery for several more years until it too suffered the same fate. Finally, as the needs of our growing community dictated, our precious playground saw the inevitable arrival of the bulldozers.

I realize that I have become tremendously sentimental over what was, admittedly, many years of trespassing. During those years, however, I experienced the joy of being in a large expanse of the natural outdoors. The nursery is long gone, but the appeal still remains. Directly across the street from my present home out east lies what I call, "Pettit's on Steroids," 3,400 acres of pine barrens. Within this parkland, one can hike along Wheelers Road, an old, narrow, tar roadway that was severed and thus rendered obsolete by the construction of Veterans' Highway. Ironically, less than two miles to the north, the eastern portion of the Long Island Motor Parkway still lives on as a busy thoroughfare.

These days, as I drive past that special southeast corner of Mineola, I marvel at how much smaller the area appears to be today. I notice that the route of the Old Motor Parkway now serves as the LIPA right-of-way. As my attention quickly returns to the task of driving along Old Country Road, I reflect on my days at the nursery and I can't help but smile.

To all our readers who currently live in the Fairhaven Apartments, may the memories you accumulate at that site be as happy as those gathered by my friends and me so many years ago. Should you ever spot a strange rose bush mysteriously sprouting up in your garden, please give it a large drink of water and my best regards.