About This Site

Historic and Architectural Significance Victorian Flatbush is an area of turn of the century residential neighborhoods that stretches from the southern edge of the Parade Grounds south to Avenue H, and from Coney Island Avenue east roughly to Flatbush and Bedford Avenues. It is the direct historical descendent of the Town of Flatbush, one of the six towns that became the Borough of Brooklyn. Flatbush, or ‘t Vlacke Bos, in the original Dutch spelling, traces its official recognition as a town back to 1652 when it was granted a charter by Governor Peter Stuyvesant. It began life as a Dutch town, part of the colony of New Netherlands, and was populated by farmers until 1664, when the colony was captured by the British “ without firing a shot”, according to Nedda Allbray in Flatbush, the Heart of Brooklyn. Flatbush was largely rural until around the beginning of the twentieth century, when the development of the Brooklyn, Flatbush, and Coney Island Railroad (now the Brighton BMT line) spurred development as a residential suburb of Greater New York. It contains today the largest concentration of freestanding Victorian-era homes in the United States.

About Beverley Square West: In 1898, architect Thomas Benton Ackerson had a dream to found a community of large spacious houses, no two alike, with lawns, stained glass windows and fireplaces. He purchased Catherine Lott’s farm and named it Beverley Square West. Under the name T.B. Ackerson Construction Company, he developed the area incorporating his trademark Palladian windows, and large exterior columns with the ornamental trim and paneling, beamed ceilings, and carved mantels used in other Flatbush houses of the period. Ackerson was also responsible for the development of the Fiske Terrace neighborhood.