Conrad Poppenhusen

[1] In 1852 Poppenhusen received a license from Charles Goodyear to produce hard rubber products[1] and subsequently moved the company to a small rural village in Queens.

College Point was founded in 1870 when Poppenhusen incorporated the neighborhoods of Flammersburg and Strattonport together.

For his workers in the area, Poppenhusen built housing, the First Reformed Church, and numerous streets.

(Today the tracks connect to Manhattan directly via tunnels, but no longer to College Point.)

In that same year he also founded the Poppenhusen Institute, containing a vocational high school and in 1870, added the first free kindergarten.