OLD LEFFERTS HOUSE TO BE TORN DOWN


1 February 1906 
Brooklyn Standard Union 

     The old time LEFFERTS house, on the south side of Fulton street, between Bedford and Nostrand 
avenue, and nearly opposite Arlington place, is about to be torn down.The ancient Dutch structure, 
standing at an angle to the present line of Fulton street has long been an interesting relic of 
the past.  It has had especial interest in this respect since it has been used as a shop for the 
sale of antiques.  Before that time it was occupied for a time as a real estate office after its 
use as a dwelling had been given up.
     
	For a century and a half it was the home of successive families.  Built in pre-Revolutionary 
days, it belonged to Nicholas BLOOM, at the time of the struggle for independence. Like the LEFFERTS 
homes of that day, one nearly opposite on the north side  of Fulton street, on the Rem LEFFERTS farm, 
and the other to the west of what is now Bedford avenue,then the Clove road, on the Leffert LEFFERTS 
farm, it was occupied by British officers when their troops were encamped in the vicinity of what 
is now Franklin avenue and Bergen street.
     
	Shortly after the close of hostilities the house passed into the possession of Major Charles 
TURNBULL, who had been one of the British officers, and who had decided to make his home in the new 
land.  He rebuilt the house, but did not long occupy it for in 1791 it was purchased by Leffert  
LEFFERTS, who added the property to his farm .  He left it to his son John, and it remained in the 
LEFFERTS family for about two-thirds of a century, when it passed into other hands.  The last owner 
who occupied it for any considerable period was John Bentley.  W.B. Greenman, the present owner, 
will have stores erected on the  site, which is in the heart of the Bedford business district.
      
	In speaking of the demolition of the old house a man well acquainted with it said,	
"It seems a great pity that the old time structure could not be removed to a new site where it would 
make a suitable home for another generation or two."

It would be an ideal structure in the country, surrounded by spacious  grounds, as it was when it 
was built in the old village of Bedford four Corners.  There diverged from the road from Brooklyn 
to Jamaica, which ran on the same line as the present front of the old house, the Clove road to 
the south, leading to Flatbush, and the Cripplebush road to the north, running to  Bushwick and 
Newtown.   The Bedford avenue of to-day follows part of the lines of these two ancient highways.  
The old house has seen many changes in the period of transformation from the rural quiet of the 
middle of the eighteenth century to the bustling activity of the beginning of the twentieth. Now 
it must pass into oblivion with the rest of its contemporaries.


Transcribed by: Lorraine Conroy
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