Rockville Centre Historical Society, The Phillips House Museum

Name: Rockville Centre Historical Society, The Phillips House Museum
Address: 28 Hempstead Avenue, Rockville Centre, NY, 11570, US
Telephone: +15166330196

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Located in a historic RVC home, the Museum of the Village of Rockville Centre is also the home of the RVC Historical Society.

05/27/2026

A big thank you to Rob and Nicole from Long Island Library Resources Council for their incredible work helping improve the Rockville Centre Historical Society archives.

After applying for assistance through LILRC, we were fortunate to be selected for this amazing opportunity. Over the past six weeks, Bob and Nicole worked in the Phillips House organizing, cataloging, and improving the way we store and manage our collections and records. Their efforts will greatly support our ongoing research into Rockville Centre history and help us better share that history with the community.

Along the way, he even uncovered several items we didn’t know we had — and we look forward to sharing those discoveries with you soon!

05/25/2026

25 Earle Ave., built in 1930, is one of Rockville Centre’s most distinctive Tudor homes — and part of one of the earliest Levitt & Sons developments on Long Island.

Before Levittown made the family famous for mass-produced postwar suburbs, the Levitts were building elegant, architecturally detailed homes for upper-middle-class buyers. Their first “Strathmore” development began right here in Rockville Centre in 1929, years before similar Strathmore communities appeared in Manhasset, Roslyn, Great Neck and Westchester County.

Originally laid out under the name Colonial Manor with different street names, Levitt renamed the streets and built a collection of picturesque Tudor homes along Princeton Road and nearby streets. Unlike the later cookie-cutter image associated with Levittown, these early homes were designed to feel unique and custom-built.

At that time, the Levitt family enterprise itself was still in its infancy. Abraham Levitt had recently partnered with his sons William and Alfred, forming the company that would later reshape suburban America. Alfred Levitt — still a teenager at the time — helped design many of the early Tudor homes, while William handled sales and financing.

Local tradition holds that Abraham Levitt intended 25 Earle Ave. to become his own family residence, though he ultimately settled in a similarly styled Tudor home in Lawrence instead. With its dramatic turreted exterior, the house is said to have been inspired by one of the Duke of Wellington’s castles due to Levitt’s many trips to England as a child.

Today, 25 Earle Ave. remains a remarkable reminder of the Levitts’ little-known pre-Levittown era — when Rockville Centre became the birthplace of the original Strathmore community.

04/29/2026

141 South Park Avenue—known simply as Park Avenue at the time—was built around 1905 as part of the Riverside Park development, a neighborhood laid out in the 1890s by developers William Richtensteen and Edwin Wright’s Artistic Homes Company. They promoted the area as a modern, well-appointed community, highlighting amenities such as gas, water, and electricity, along with its walkable proximity to downtown and the train station—and notably low taxes.

Some homes were constructed by Artistic Homes, while other lots were sold to independent builders. The parcels were generously sized; 141 originally sat on a 100’ x 100’ lot. In 1977, 60 feet of the rear yard was subdivided to create a new lot, the original garage was removed, and a second home was built.

From about 1930 until his death in 1951 at age 77, the home was owned by John Francis Carew, a New York State Supreme Court justice. Local newspaper accounts suggest he also had a lighter side: he was fined $3 for running a red light in 1935 and $5 for speeding in the village in 1940.

Despite the later subdivision of its backyard, this stately residence retains much of its original character and presence.

03/19/2026

🎓 Calling all RVC high school seniors with a passion for history!

The Rockville Centre Historical Society is excited to offer a $500 scholarship to a graduating senior who loves exploring the past and plans to continue studying history in college (no declared major required!).

📍 Must be an RVC resident
📚 Demonstrated interest in history
🎓 Applied to a 2- or 4-year college

🗓 Deadline: April 1, 2026. See link to apply in bio!

03/06/2026

The home at 275 Lakeview Av began its life c.1835 as the farmhouse for a 40-acre property on what was then the northeastern outskirts of Rockville Centre. In 1860, after retiring from the sea, Captain Edwin Wallace purchased the property for $3,200. Like many early residents of the village, he was a Maine-born sea captain. A Civil War veteran and mariner for more than 30 years, he soon became one of the community’s early civic leaders and a strong advocate for incorporating the Village. Captain Wallace also proved to be a visionary when it came to land and development. Recognizing the growth potential of LI, he built Morris Av north of Lakeview through his property, making the surrounding land more attractive for future development. By the 1880s, after many years in the Lakeview Av farmhouse, Wallace built a larger home at 117 Maple Av. That house later made way for what is now the Village Green. His contributions to the community were significant: he donated land where RVC’s power plant stands on Maple and Morris, and he hosted the village’s first trustee meeting in his home shortly after incorporation in 1893. When Wallce died in 1907, the village honored him in a remarkable way—local stores closed at 1 p.m. so residents could participate in the funeral procession down Village Av. After his death, his grandson Edwin Wallace Jr. returned from Oregon to care for his grandmother. Following in his grandfather’s footsteps, he became deeply involved in Village affairs. A World War I veteran, Wallace Jr. went on to serve as Village trustee and later Village President (mayor) at just age 29. In 1923, he began selling off the old Wallace farmland for residential development. At the time, the land was estimated to be worth $3 million—a remarkable return on his grandfather’s original $3,200 investment. Over the decades, the farmhouse was home to several village families, including A.H. Lennox (whose home had one of RVC’s earliest phone numbers, 139-W), WWII veteran Ellis Baker, the Brock and Rowland families, and Charles Alessi, a SSMS guidance counselor. Nearly two centuries later, the historic farmhouse still stands telling the story of a captain and RVC’s early growth

03/03/2026

Thanks to all for attending our first RVC Historical Spciety 2026 Speaker Series with LI author and historian Bill Bleyer. It was fascinating to learn more about Long Island’s role in the American Revolution as we approach our 250th anniversary. Thanks to Bill for his time and rich content. Can’t wait to read his new book, “George Washington’s Long Island Spy Ring!” Stay tuned for our next event!

02/20/2026

The story of 222 Sunrise Highway began around 1919 when this purpose-built printing plant rose to serve the South Side Observer, a local newspaper that stretched back to 1865 as RVC’s first paper, The Picket, began chronicling daily life on the South Shore.
In 1921, publisher James E. Stiles launched the Daily Review from this building, merging several historic local papers into one voice for Nassau County. By 1937, Stiles combined the Nassau Daily Review with the Nassau Daily Star, creating the Nassau Daily Review-Star. From the presses inside 222 Sunrise Highway came the news of wars, weddings, village politics, and school sports for more than 40,000 readers at its peak in the 1940s. For decades, the rumble of printing presses echoed across Sunrise Highway as thousands of papers left the building each day.
The newspaper was sold in 1949 and printing stopped in 1954, ending an 88-year lineage of local journalism that began with The Picket. But the building did not fall silent.
In the years that followed, the presses gave way to new forms of media and community life. For years after, the Pennysaver of South Nassau and Queens was housed on the first floor, while upstairs was the home of Long Island News and The Owl. The building continued to evolve with the village—at one point home to Leggz dance studio on the second floor and most recently becoming the lively restaurant we know today. For more than a century, 222 Sunrise Highway has adapted to the changing rhythms of Rockville Centre. Though the presses are gone, the building remains a quiet witness to the place where Nassau County’s daily story was once printed.

02/08/2026

Ever wonder how Hewitt got its name?

01/27/2026

The Davison Park development began in the 1890s on land owned by Clarence DeMott Davison (1859–1909), a prominent local landowner. Davison built a large family home that still stands at 26 Rutland Avenue. When he laid out the neighborhood’s street grid, he named the first north–south street Davison Avenue and the next two after his children, Marion and Lewis. (A younger child, Mildred Edith, was named after Clarence’s wife, Edith.)

Clarence Davison died unexpectedly at the age of 50 from a heart condition, leaving Edith to raise their three young children. When his son Lewis turned 21, he married Florence Alma de Costa, a local woman from a wealthy Oceanside family. The de Costa family were also major landowners and philanthropists, donating part of their estate for the construction of South Nassau Hospital and developing numerous theaters across Nassau County, including the iconic Strand Theatre in Rockville Centre.

Believed to be a wedding gift, Florence and Lewis Davison moved into their new home in 1920—on Davison family owned land just one block from Lewis’s childhood home and fittingly located on the street that bore his name. The couple had one daughter, Alma, born in 1924, and employed a live-in servant, Minnie. Lewis worked as a salesman for a to***co company.

In the 1960s, Lewis moved permanently to his summer home in Wading River. He passed away in 1982 and is buried at Greenfield Cemetery in Uniondale.

The current owners purchased the home in 2000 and have thoughtfully restored it inside and out, preserving a 106-year-old residence with deep and meaningful ties to the early history of Rockville Centre.

01/25/2026

Across the street from Captain Whittemore at the intersection of North Village and Maine Avenues, in what was called “the Grove” in RVC due to all the large chestnut trees, another Maine-born mariner, Captain John W. Gallison (1824–1897) built this Victorian residence in 1870. At the time, it was the northern terminus of Village Ave with just woods to the north. The property had a large daisy field in the rear, numerous crab apples and over 50 towering oak trees. In 1882, the home and land were purchased for $300 by the Corbett family and family members continued to live in the home until the mid 1940s.

Captain Tristram Thurlow Corbett (1846–1908), was born in Cutler, Maine, to Captain Daniel and Abigail Corbett. Tristram—like Whittemore and RVC’s other sea captains—began his seafaring life as a young teenager, following in his father’s footsteps.

At just 26 years old, he assumed command of the Lena Thurlow after his father died from injuries sustained in a hurricane-related sailing accident near the Bahamas. Corbett’s first wife, Jeannette, often traveled with him and made one poignant request: if she were ever to die at sea, she wished to be buried back home in Maine. Tragically, while sailing with Tristram near Cuba, she succumbed to a tropical illness at the age of 26. Lacking a coffin, the crew transported her body in a cask of rum, and she was laid to rest in Old Cutler Cemetery in Maine.

In 1876, Corbett married Clara Lavinia Willeby. Together they had three children—Willeby, Olive, and Eugenie—and the entire family continued the seafaring life. Remarkably, Eugenie was born aboard one of her father’s vessels, the Olive Thurlow. The three children continued to live their adult lives in RVC with Olive remaining in the N. Village Ave house until it was sold to Elizabeth Murphy and demolished in 1947. She then moved to 79 Riverside Dr. and Williby to 94 Grand Ave.

After the house and its barn were demolished in March 1945, the Mayfair Co-op building was constructed in 1950 and still occupies the site.

Address

28 Hempstead Avenue
Rockville Centre, NY
11570

Telephone

+15166330196

Website

http://www.rvchs.org/

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