In 1925, a New York real estate boom, or "bubble" as they call them today, was in full bloom. Developers rushed to fill every swampy corner of the Rockaways to offer land for cottages. The photos presented here are reproduced from an auction brochure advertising 527 Edgemere/Arverne lots in a new development called Vernam Estate. The land was billed as the "only large vacant tract in the Rockaways," and stretched from Rockaway Beach Boulevard to Jamaica Bay between Beach 49th Street and Beach 59th Street.

"Property less than 1000 feet from the Atlantic Ocean and proposed boardwalk," was the headline on the brochure. Here is a panoramic view looking east down Rockaway Beach Boulevard, which is where today's bus garage is located. All the lands north of the Boulevard are sandy lots, awaiting anxious buyers to come down from the city with their 10% deposits.

If you have a good eye, you'll notice the Rockaway Roller Skate Rink down the block in the building that later became the Home Curtain Company's factory. Just about everything else in the photo is gone today, including the tent colony along the beach.

The Long Island Rail Road stopped operating it's trolley from Far Rockaway to Neponsit in 1926 and the tracks were placed on the concrete elevated structure in 1940. In 1955 the New York City Transit Authority became the Railroad's successor to the operation.

You'll notice that Beach Channel Drive was still sand as nothing existed north of the Boulevard. Prior to this fill being added for the development, the entire site was nothing but sedges and swamp.

If you wonder how Rockaway Beach Boulevard in Edgemere is north of the railroad but south of the railroad further down the beach, it's interesting to learn that the Boulevard crossed the tracks and Beach 56th Street. That crossing was also known as Far Rockaway Junction on the Railroad, but that's another story.

When Beach Channel Drive was finally constructed a few years prior to this photo, it was named Amstel Boulevard. The name was changed as it extended east and west in the 1930's.

The real estate bubble of the 1920's burst also, much as the one of this decade did. Property values in the mid 1920's often rose 150% in less than a month. But those things come to an end. An investor in Edgemere land in 1925 probably lost 80% of his investment in the 1930's. IF he held onto it long enough, it would not be until some thirty years later that he would regain his investment.