James S. "Uncle Jim" Remsen (October 1811,

Queens Village Queens Village is a mostly residential middle class neighborhood in the eastern part of the New York City borough of Queens. It is bound by Hollis to the west, Cambria Heights to the south, Bellerose to the east, and Oakland Gardens to the north ...

, New York – August 21, 1887) was a landowner and developer of

Rockaway Beach, Queens Rockaway Beach is a neighborhood on the Rockaway Peninsula in the New York City borough of Queens. The neighborhood is bounded by Arverne to the east and Rockaway Park to the west. It is named for the Rockaway Beach and Boardwalk, which is the l ...

as a major amusement district in the 19th century. He is also known for his development of Canarsie and

East New York East New York is a residential neighborhood in the eastern section of the borough of Brooklyn in New York City, United States. Its boundaries, starting from the north and moving clockwise, are roughly the Cemetery Belt and the Queens borough li ...

Brooklyn Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...

. Remsen managed to acquire title to a large portion of the peninsula, and was known to promulgate a railroad project linking the Canarsie and East New York neighborhoods, which provided ferry passengers to Rockaway Beach. He took William Wainwright, who was to become a prominent Rockaway developer in his own right, as a partner in 1876.

References

* Seyfried, Vincent F., ''The Long Island Rail Road: A Comprehensive History'', Part Five, published by the author, Garden City, Long Island, 1966. 1811 births 1887 deaths 19th-century American businesspeople Date of birth missing Landowners and developers from Rockaway, Queens People from Queens, New York Place of death missing American people of Dutch descent {{NYC-stub