Land Surveyor in Mineola, Nassau County, NY

The central, flat, grassy part of Long Island was originally known as the Hempstead Plains. In the 19th century, various communities were started in this area. One of those communities was called “Hempstead Branch,” which would ultimately be known as “Mineola” later on.

Long Island was part of Henry Hudson’s original claim in the name of the Dutch East India Company dating as far back as 1609. In the 18th century, the Dutch and English settlers worked to clear farmland to start their life on the Hempstead Plains. It was in 1858 when this land was named after an Algonquin Indian Chief, Miniolagamika meaning, “Pleasant Village”. The name was later shortened and altered to “Mineola”.

From about 1787 until the 1870s, the area was the county seat for Queens, in a section then known as Clowesville, just outside the present village boundaries. The western portion of Queens became a borough of New York City in 1898, and in 1899 Nassau County was formed from the part of Queens that did not so consolidate. Voters selected Mineola (in the Town of North Hempstead) to be the county seat for the new county of Nassau in November 1898 (before Mineola incorporated as a village in 1906 and set its boundaries), winning out over Hicksville and Hempstead. The Garden City Company (founded in 1893 by the heirs of Alexander Turney Stewart) donated four acres of land for the county buildings just south of the Mineola train station and the present day Village of Mineola, in the Town of Hempstead.