[The Beatles arrive at John F. Kennedy International Airport, 7 February 1964]
I have a particular soft spot for the Queens (NY) neighborhood of Forest Hills because 1) My dear college friend Myra grew up there and I visited her family’s apartment often, spending time with her warm generous parents and sibs 2) My parents spent the first night of their honeymoon at the Forest Hills Inn (see photo below).
[A view down Queens Boulevard, near its intersection with Yellowstone Boulevard in Forest Hills.]
So it was fun to return briefly last Sunday with Myra as well as my son and husband who were relative newcomers to Forest Hills. (Once a fan of the HBO show “Entourage,” my son did wear a “Queens Boulevard” t-shirt inspired by the show until it was in tatters.) We did a quick tour of the fancy part of town with its English-village Tudor-style brick buildings (my friend lived elsewhere, in a high-rise overlooking 12-lane Queens Boulevard, although she admits she didn’t always correct people who assumed she lived in the fancy part) including the Inn and the famous West Side Tennis Club where the U.S. Open was held between 1915-1920 and 1924-1978 (As a kid, I attended a few times there…in the 1970’s, not the early 1900’s.) I also found out for the first time that Myra SAW THE BEATLES !!! at the tennis club when she was all of 7 years old with her older brother. Her biggest memory is of swarms of girls crying outside the venue. When she asked her mother why they were crying, her wise mum replied “Because the Beatles have to go back to England.”
The main characters of Entourage.
We also ate some good appetizers at Agora, a local Greek restaurant, that got a shout out in a recent travel story about Forest Hills. See: Forest Hills is a Gorgeous Queens Neighborhood
TakeBetsywithyou 