Taking a tour in time: Peeking into Oakdale's artist colony

There’s a knock on Jeanne Mastrandrea’s door.

As she opens it, she’s greeted with a large assortment of flowers. Among them are dahlias, sunflowers, lavender, daisies, with splashes of pink and peach in between. A smiling face peeks out from behind the bouquet: Mastrandrea’s neighbor from across the street, who grew, picked and arranged the flowers in her own yard.

“Thank you!” Mastrandrea says before closing the door, gushing about how beautiful the pickings are and carefully deciding where to place them.

This isn’t unusual in Oakdale’s artist colony, residents say. Everybody knows everybody, and the street is meant for stopping and chatting.

“It’s almost like age doesn't even exist here,” says Mastrandrea, who is 28. She just moved here seven months ago. “Everyone is looking to be friends with everyone. It’s very freethinking and people are just very generous. I was walking down the block and looking at the full moon the other night, and I met four neighbors, all standing outside talking.”

In the artist colony, the roads are narrow and lined with homes that seem straight out of a fairy tale: small houses draped with ivy, pointed roofs, a brick archway towering over it all.

Some residents have remained for decades. Others just moved in this year. But the impact their neighborhood has had on them is clear: They all hope to uphold the history behind their remarkable homes.

Past lives

Located in the Idle Hour area of Oakdale, the artist colony neighborhood once served as a farm for William K. Vanderbilt's estate, which consisted of 900 acres and was built early in the 20th century. The name Idle Hour came from him, too: It was what he called his private railroad car and just about everything else, according to Town of Islip historian George Munkenbeck.

"Everything he owned, he called Idle Hour," he says.

The property included a bowling alley, tea house and a 110-room mansion, which was Vanderbilt's residence, according to Town of Islip historical records. The mansion was later owned by Dowling College. There's also a tall brick structure (known as the Clock Tower) that stands at nine stories high, and was once used as a water tower.

Noble arches, remnants of a barn that once stood on Vanderbilt's estate, welcome visitors to the colony. Vanderbilt housed chickens, pigs, ducks and more in buildings that were later converted into homes, says Munkenbeck.

Part of a notable family, William was the grandson of Cornelius Vanderbilt, known for his innovations in the railroad and shipping industries during the Gilded Age. William built the Long Island Motor Parkway, which opened in 1908, America's first modern highway.

After William K. Vanderbilt died, the 6½ acres of Idle Hour property was sold to Lucy Sawyer Pritchard Thompson and her son, William, in 1926. Thompson had been married to the vice president of what would become Texaco. She had a distinct vision for what the land could become: Oakdale’s oasis of creativity.

“She wanted to form a place where people could come and be artists, in a colony of other artists,” Munkenbeck says.

Residents say there aren't many artists living in the neighborhood today. However, Andy Warhol and Jim Dine were former residents, according to a New York Times article from 1974.

The artist colony was also home to a theater and a restaurant called the Tally-Ho Inn. Munkenbeck, along with current residents, have whispered about the restaurant operating as a speakeasy during its time. 

While walking through the neighborhood, it isn’t hard to envision its past lives as a grand estate and then an artistic haven. The building exteriors have largely been preserved due to the town issuing a PLP, or Planned Landmark Preservation Overlay District around 1974, says Munkenbeck.

“It’s pretty much as it was, without the animals of course,” he says. “There have been little changes here and there, but nothing significant.”

Lee Kennedy lives in what’s known as the Duck House: It’s short in stature, and the pristine white exterior is accentuated only by some simple orange trim and green vines hanging between sets of windows. It was built in 1890.

“This wasn’t a house for people,” Kennedy says, referencing Vanderbilt’s blueprint. “It was a house for ducks.”

Historical records show that the house's windows swing out at ground level on purpose: It was so the ducks could easily waddle in and out. Kennedy pays homage to that with three metal ducks on top of her mailbox and a statue on her front lawn.

Kennedy has lived here for 50 years. She remembers when she was introduced to the house. It was during a drive around the artist colony, and it was love at first sight. Kennedy fantasized about living there, and the day it went on the market, she and her husband called the real estate agent and it was theirs “sight unseen,” she says. They bought it for $75,000, “which was a lot at that time for this type of house,” she adds.

Along her way, Kennedy has absorbed the tales of her neighborhood and organized street fairs. She has also been a member of the Connetquot board of education for 23 years.

“I have a picture of my backyard from when it was a tennis court,” says Kennedy. “I also have the original shrubs here, since Vanderbilt’s time.”

She says that the children she raised in her home have learned to appreciate its beauty even more after growing up.

“We don't have amenities like the other homes,” she says. “Like those big, huge TVs. You can’t enlarge the house; if it's a small space, it’s a small space. You have to be a little different to want to live here.”

The appearance is a little deceiving: At 1,200 square feet, Kennedy’s home contains two bedrooms, two bathrooms and an attic.

“My house is not that small, but it's not that big,” she says. “Some are a lot smaller. But the payoff is the community; the payoff is the people.”

New in town

Jeanne Mastrandrea moved in January from her parents’ house in Hauppauge. She bought her home in the artist colony for $346,000.

“As soon as I stepped into the house, I knew it was what I wanted,” she says. “The old feeling of it, but that it was still new.”

The house is 800 square feet with two floors. Mastrandrea, who works for the tree care and utility service company Davey Resource Group, has heard that the community’s veterinarian once lived in her house. There’s a very small table that unfolds from a wall in the living room — she thinks the veterinarian could have used it while writing prescriptions.

That isn’t the only unusual characteristic of the house, which was built in 1890 and converted into a residential building around 1938, according to the town historian.

“There are no closed doors,” Mastrandrea says, which is perfect for Lorenzo, her 9-year-old pit bull/boxer mix who has the spirit of a playful puppy. “It’s a very open feeling.”

Kim Skillen arrived at the artist colony in February. Skillen, deputy superintendent of the North Babylon School District, had been looking to downsize after her daughter graduated from high school.

“The artist colony to me was this kind of historical, kind of quirky, artistic type of neighborhood, and it fit where I wanted to go,” says Skillen, 50.

Built around 1877, Skillen’s house was a barn with horse stables before being turned into a performance space. As a former high school social studies teacher, she found the history of the neighborhood was a strong selling point.

“This property in particular, when you walk in, it has the original barn doors and natural beams and structure,” she says. “It’s an old, rustic space. The front entrance has a very large peak to it, and you know you’re not walking into a cookie cutter house on Long Island.”

She’s also found that the space isn’t just perfect for her — Skillen’s daughter is studying fine arts at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.

“She said it's probably the first time we’ve lived in a neighborhood where she's felt comfortable being an artist,” says Skillen.

A home that never leaves you

Growing up, Lee Kennedy's son, Devin, says he would always see flashes of cameras coming from outside of his living room window, and hear the pitter-patter of feet just beyond his front door.

When you live in the Duck House, you get used to it. “When I come home, I have this amazing appreciation for the neighborhood,” says Devin, who is 37 and lives in Venice Beach, California. “I’ve realized how unique and different it really is, compared to all of my friends’ normal, suburban upbringings.”

Sometimes he’ll tell a new friend about what it was like being raised in a house that was “about 4 feet tall.”

“No one really got it until I showed them pictures, and then they understood I guess,” Devin says. But other times, people will know exactly what the artist colony is, even thousands of miles away.

Devin loves his old neighborhood so much that he named his advertising consultant business after the artist colony. He also has tattoos that say “Artist Colony” and “Idle Hour” on his legs. One of the walls in Devin’s apartment contains framed artwork and maps of the area. 

He dreams of returning to the artist colony someday, but for now has settled in places that still remind him of home.

“Because of that neighborhood, I find myself drawn toward more bohemian-like places,” Devin says. “I’ve lived in the East Village, I’ve spent time in Cherry Grove. I think that has a lot to do with being raised in a former artist colony, because of that spirit being around.”

That impact is not lost on him. Devin says his upbringing has led to realizations about his future.

“It’s funny, you grow up in this house and you’d think the expectation is, ‘I want a bigger house, I want taller ceilings,’ and you go to a friend’s house and it’s a normal situation as far as the infrastructure of the home,” he says. “Now that I’ve grown up, I think those homes are a dime a dozen. The Duck House is so charming and special that I’ve done a big reassessment of what I really want.”

By Rachel Weiss

rachel.weiss@newsday.com@RachMWeiss

Rachel Weiss joined Newsday in 2016. As a real estate/living multimedia reporter, Rachel writes feature stories and contributes to and appears in on-camera video packages. She was the lead reporter on Newsday’s LI Acts of Kindness series.