The Merokee were part of the greater Montauk tribe that loosely ruled Long Island's Native Americans. The hamlet of Wantagh was inhabited by the Merokee tribe of the Metoac in the mid 1600s. This area was located at the meeting point of Franklin Square, Garden City South, and West Hempstead. During the 1830s, poet Walt Whitman was the schoolmaster of the Trimming Square school district for three months. Over the years, West Hempstead has been visited by some of history’s great leaders including President George Washington, Martin Luther King Jr., Mrs. It was during this time that inventor and aviator Orville Wright lived here. The train station was originally called “West of Hempstead” and eventually became the hamlet’s namesake. In 1891, the Rail Road built a station on Hempstead Turnpike west of Hempstead Village. Historians claim West Hempstead got its name from the Long Island Rail Road. It is said that the settlers paid a mere $100 for the 64,000 acre tract of land that is now called West Hempstead.
Robert Fordham and John Carman crossed Long Island Sound by rowboat to negotiate with the local Indians for land which they desired to build a new community. Close to three Long Island Rail Road lines and with its own exit on the Southern State Parkway, West Hempstead’s draw as a centralized location has always attracted a diverse group of people. The hamlet of West Hempstead was once a dense woodland used by the Algonquin Native Americans for a gathering place because of its central location.
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