Harding Park is a working class residential neighborhood geographically located in the south central Bronx in New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

. The neighborhood is part of Bronx Community Board 9

Bronx Community Board 9

Bronx Community Board 9 is a local government unit of the city of New York, encompassing the neighborhoods of Castle Hill, Parkchester, Soundview, Bruckner, Harding Park, Bronx River, Clason Point and Unionport...

. Its boundaries, starting from the north and moving clockwise are: Lacombe Avenue to the north, Pugsley's Creek to the east, the East River

East River

The East River is a tidal strait in New York City. It connects Upper New York Bay on its south end to Long Island Sound on its north end. It separates Long Island from the island of Manhattan and the Bronx on the North American mainland...

 to the south, and the Bronx River

Bronx River

The Bronx River, approximately long, flows through southeast New York in the United States. It is named after colonial settler Jonas Bronck. The Bronx River is the only fresh water river in New York City....

 to the west. White Plains Road

White Plains Road

White Plains Road is a major thoroughfare which runs the length of the Bronx, New York, from Castle Hill and Clason Point in the south to Wakefield in the north, where it crosses the city line and becomes West 1st Street of Mount Vernon, New York. The Bronx River Parkway lies to its west and...

 is the primary thoroughfare through Harding Park. ZIP code is 10473. The area is patrolled by the 43rd Precinct located at 900 Fteley Avenue in the Soundview

Soundview, Bronx

Soundview is primarily a residential neighborhood geographically located in the South Central section of the Borough of The Bronx in New York City. The neighborhood is part of Bronx Community Board 9...

 section of the Bronx

The Bronx

The Bronx is the northernmost of the five boroughs of New York City. It is also known as Bronx County, the last of the 62 counties of New York State to be incorporated...

. As in Silver Beach

Silver Beach, Bronx

Silver Beach is a neighborhood in the Throgs Neck section of the new York City borough of the Bronx.Silver Beach is a predominantly Irish, German, and Italian neighborhood in the southeastern Bronx, lying on a bluff on the southern shore of Throggs Neck. The land was used as a lockout during the...

 and Edgewater Park in Throggs Neck, a peninsular location and irregular street grid incongruent with the main Bronx grid lend an air of isolation.

History

The small peninsula of the Bronx defined by the Bronx River, Pugsley's Creek, and the East River is known as Clason Point, named for 18th Century merchant Isaac Clason who purchased what was previously known as Cornell's Neck in 1793; the land stayed in the family until they sold it in 1855.

The region's first residents were the Siwanoy

Siwanoy

The Native American Siwanoy or Sinanoy were a band of Algonquian-speaking people, the Wappinger, in what is now the New York City area. By the mid-17th century, when their territory became hotly contested between Dutch and English colonial interests, the Siwanoy were settled along the East River...

 Indians, who spoke Algonquian

Algonquian languages

The Algonquian languages also Algonkian) are a subfamily of Native American languages which includes most of the languages in the Algic language family. The name of the Algonquian language family is distinguished from the orthographically similar Algonquin dialect of the Ojibwe language, which is a...

. Europeans began settling the region in the early 17th century, and the Cornell family built the first permanent European settlement in the spit of land first known as Snakipins by the Indians, then Cornells Neck and later Clason Point. In the 1640s a series of skirmishes between the Cornells and the Siwanoy, known as the Pig Wars, were led by Chief Wampage

Chief Wampage

Wampage I, aka Anhõõke was the Chief of the Siwanoy Indians of Westchester County, New York.It is believed that the Siwanoys, under the leadership of Wampage, lead the massacre of the family of Anne Hutchinson...

, the Siwanoy scahem believed to be the Indian leader who killed Anne Hutchinson

Anne Hutchinson

Anne Hutchinson was one of the most prominent women in colonial America, noted for her strong religious convictions, and for her stand against the staunch religious orthodoxy of 17th century Massachusetts...

 and her children in 1643 at Split Rock

Split Rock

Split Rock may be:U.S. populated places:* Split Rock, New York, also industrial disaster site, in central part of the state* Split Rock Township, Minnesota* Split Rock Township, South DakotaRock formations:...

, now in the northern Bronx. A passing ship rescued the Cornells, and they returned to their home the year after Wampage's last raid. Britisher Thomas Pell

Thomas Pell

Dates may not be entirely accurate in this article due to disagreements between sources.Thomas Pell was a physician who was famous for buying the area known as Pelham, Westchester, New York, as well as land that now includes the eastern Bronx and southern Westchester County. He founded the town...

 arrived at a treaty in 1654 with several Siwanoy sachems, including Wampage, that the Dutch authorities didn't recognize. This disagreement was rendered moot in 1664 when the British fleet appeared in the harbor and the Dutch capitulated.

By the middle 19th century Clason Point had many farmhouses, despite its poor drainage. Even today the main shopping area is fairly distant, along Story Avenue, the Bruckner Expressway

Bruckner Expressway

The Bruckner Expressway is a freeway in The Bronx. It carries Interstate 278 and Interstate 95 from the Robert F. Kennedy Bridge to the south end of the New England Thruway at the Pelham Parkway interchange....

 and White Plains Road

White Plains Road

White Plains Road is a major thoroughfare which runs the length of the Bronx, New York, from Castle Hill and Clason Point in the south to Wakefield in the north, where it crosses the city line and becomes West 1st Street of Mount Vernon, New York. The Bronx River Parkway lies to its west and...

. Its seaside location and views attracted seaside resorts, dancehalls and amusement parks in the early 20th Century, served by a ferry from College Point, Queens

College Point, Queens

College Point is a working-middle class neighborhood in the New York City borough of Queens. It is located north of Flushing on Flushing Bay and the East River and is part of the Queens Community Board 7. Willets Point Boulevard and the Whitestone Expressway are often the neighborhood's...

.

In the early 1920s Thomas Higgs, who owned about 100 acre (0.404686 km²) of beachfront property, began leasing tents to visitors and the area became a summer bungalow colony named for President Harding. After World War II these became permanent year-round residences due to a housing shortage, eventually sheltering over 250 families.

Harding Park survived the attempt of Robert Moses

Robert Moses

Robert Moses was the "master builder" of mid-20th century New York City, Long Island, Rockland County, and Westchester County, New York. As the shaper of a modern city, he is sometimes compared to Baron Haussmann of Second Empire Paris, and is one of the most polarizing figures in the history of...

 to tear down what he called the "Soundview Slums" but became City property in 1979. Three years later, in 1982, Harding Park Homeowners Association, the first cooperatively owned low and moderate-income community in the city was formed.

Land use and terrain

Harding Park is dominated by detached bungalows very closely set, many of them built off the grid. The total land area is roughly 1 square miles (2.6 km²). The area is low lying and flat.

Demographics

As of the census

Census

A census is the procedure of systematically acquiring and recording information about the members of a given population. It is a regularly occurring and official count of a particular population. The term is used mostly in connection with national population and housing censuses; other common...

of 2000, the two census tract

Census tract

A census tract, census area, or census district is a geographic region defined for the purpose of taking a census. Usually these coincide with the limits of cities, towns or other administrative areas and several tracts commonly exist within a county...

s that make up the neighborhood have a population of 5,859. The racial makeup of the neighborhood is 6.53% White, 19.59% African American, and 2.76% from other races. 80.54% of the population are Hispanic or Latino of any race.

Over 20% of the population in Harding Park lives under the poverty line. Puerto Ricans account for the largest ethnic group.

Urban renewal

After a wave of arson ravaged the low income communities of New York City throughout the 1970s, some of the residential structures in Harding Park were left seriously damaged or destroyed. At the same time much of the undeveloped land in the community was left to rot. Many homes have been rehabilitated also many subsidized multi unit townhouses have been or are being built on vacant lots across the neighborhood. Many in the community however feel the new development has led to new problems.

The infrastructure of the community has not been updated in many years. Many streets flood after periods of heavy rain. The nearest retail strip is almost a mile away. Public transportation is lacking and there is only one school in the neighborhood.

External links

• Forgotten New York Harding Park

40.8094444°N 73.8563889°W

Concerned Harding Park Homeowners