The Lyons family of Queens

Mrs. Lyons, wife of Mr. James Lyons, the lamp black manufacturer, of Evergreens, accompanied by her daughter Mrs. Mary E McNulty and her two children, Misses Kitty and Anna McNulty, are stopping at the United States hotel, Far Rockaway, where they will remain until the middle of September. 

Mr. Lyons will join his family next week, to take a well earned rest, as he has been very busy attending to a large New York City contract for furnishing the city with paving cement which proved to be very lucrative contract.  When Mr. Lyons leaves for the seaside he will take with

United States Hotel, Far Rockaway

him his bay team of thoroughbreds - John Bradburn and Dora Thompson.

The Newtown Register, Thursday, August 18, 1898.  "Local Happenings", page 5.

Obituary:

Mrs Cahterine A Lyons, widow of James Lyons, for almost fifty years a manufacturer of lampblack in Evergreen. l. I., died on Thursday at her residence, 505 Chestnut Street, Richmond Hill.  Mrs. Lyons was one of the founders of St. Brigid's Roman Catholic Church, and one of the oldest parishoners of St. Malachy's Roman Catholic Church.

Archive, NY Times.

St. Bridget's Roman Catholic Church was established in 1882, and was renamed St. Brigid's in 1895. The first church was a wooden structure which served until about 1922 when the present building was opened.

409 Linden Street at St. Nicholas Avenue
Brooklyn, N.Y. 11227

505 Chestnut Street. After moving away from their Evergreen mansion, Catherine must have decided to 'down-size'. This was most likely a middle class neighborhood in the early 1900s.

James Lyons piggery (Click to Enlarge)

THE LONG ISLAND GARBAGE WARS...

1885. Local enforcement harrassed Lyons Piggery which was polluting a local pond and putting a stench into the air. Click to enlarge.

In 1885 Long Island was applying pressure to manufacturers that were polluting the waterways. Lyons was able to prove that he was not polluting the NY City reservoir system. Click to Enlarge. Second Page: Click to Enlarge.

James Lyons elegant explanation of events. Based on the conversation in this article, it is clear he was quite bright.

Click to enlarge.

Funeral References: (These have been noted in some earlier articles. It is interesting that so many wakes were held in the Lyons mansion in Newtown.)

LYONS- Frank LYONS, infant, age 2 yrs 8 months.
Died from Diptheria at home of grandfather, Ridgewood Reservior, Evergreen L.I. Interment at Calvery Cemetery

LYONS-FINLEY - On Thursday, August 8, 1895, DELIE? A., beloved daughter of JAMES and CATHERINE LYONS and wife of WM. J. FINLEY.  Funeral from the residence of her parents, Evergreen (Ridgewood) on Saturday, August 10; thence to St Bridget's Church 10 A. M. where a solemn requiem mass will be celebrated for the repose of her soul.

Steven Garvey married into the Lyons family, but died in 1900 suffering from a long illness - described as a disease of the liver. Click to enlarge to read full article.

"A Rich History of Cemeteries, Parishes, Cholera and Reservoirs", Times Newsweekly Online.com

"If you look at a very old map of Brooklyn and Queens, I think you find the Evergreen cemetery owned the entire piece of property which now encompasses Evergreen, Trinity, Knollwood and Mount Judah cemeteries.  "My understanding is that in the 1880s, the owners of Evergreen never thought they would need all of that land so they sold parts of the "dormant" land to other cemeteries.  Evergreen being a non-sectarian Cemetery back then, meant that Catholics could not be buried there.
Mount Judah Cemetery is a Jewish cemetery in Glendale that is located on both sides of Cypress Avenue a short distance south of Cooper Avenue.  In the mid-1860s, the James Lyons family settled there on 33.1 acres.  Eventually he started a paper mill and a lamp black  works.  There were two ponds on his property, Mr. Lyons collected the garbage from restaurants and burned it to make lamp black.  It was a messy operations as was the paper mill.  Once Mr. Lyons was accused by a neighbor of dumping waste into the Ridgewood Reservoir.  Actually he had dumped waste into one of the ponds on his property.
Mr. Lyons died in the early 1900s.  Their daughter, Catherine, had married James O'Brien who was a New York State Senator.  In 1909, he introduced a Special bill which was approved to permit the Lyons family to convert their 33.1 acres into a cemetery.

In Mary 1913, work was begun on the conversion of the Lyons property into a cemetery.  The land was graded and filled in.  The paper mill and lamp black works were torn down.  The Lyons Homestead was retained to be used as the office of the superintendent of the cemetery.  A 1909 real estate map of the Lyons property appears to be identical with the current day Mount Judah Cemetery."

We know that the Lyons were on its board of directors for many years, and based on news articles of this time, converting property to cemetery plots was quite lucrative. It seems likely that the Lyons family profited from this venture long after they quit "melting down" dead pigs and garbage into black tar.

August 30, 1902, Wood Pulp News
James Lyons House burned; various Other fires
Within five years James Lyons, a manufacturer of roofing paper, of Evergreens, Queen's Borough, has lost (dollars indecipherable) by fires, and he has asked the police to search for an incendiary.  His house was burned on August 21, and the family escaped with only their clothing.  His barn, a block away, went up in smoke on August 22, involving a loss of $1,300.  A few weeks ago his paper factory, situated a mile or so from his residence was burned.  Four years ago Lyons had another fire, the largest most expensive he has had.  Then the buildings devoted to his tar paper and lampblack works were burned.  They were much larger and more substantial than the ones which were burned recently.