Delivering comfort means more than just filling tanks with oil or tuning up a burner. It means helping others, and giving our time and effort to make others feel happy, healthy and well cared for. For these reasons, we at Charter Oil, have strong ties with the community. We are involved in many community activities and charitable causes and are proud to deliver true comfort to our friends and neighbors in Massapequa - as we have been since 1959. To learn the story about Massapequa,
click here.
The Story of Massapequa
Massapequa, is an unincorporated, 33-square-mile community in the Town of Oyster Bay. It surrounds and dwarfs the Village of Massapequa Park, with which it shares a school district and other services. As of the 2000 census, Massapequa had a total population of 22,652.
Massapequa has always been a family-oriented community - a tradition that began over 300 years ago, when John Townsend, a real-estate speculator from Rhode Island, bought the land from the Marsapeaque Indians and gave the land tract to his daughter when she married Thomas Jones in 1690. The original estate included over half the area that is now Massapequa, as well as other property on the South Shore. After the Revolution, the fact that the Joneses had been Tories prevented them from owning land. One daughter, however, married a scion of the politically acceptable Floyd family and her son, William Floyd-Jones, inherited his grandfather's estate. The Floyd-Jones family cemetery is still visible behind Massapequa's Old Grace Church. Jones Beach State Park, just across bay, takes its name from the family.
Massapequa was originally known as South Oyster Bay, but was changed when the LIRR (Long Island Railroad) placed the sign contradicting the original name.
The houses in Massapequa are ample, with large yards for children to play in. A few spacious Victorian houses date from the 19th century, when Massapequa was a resort for the wealthy. Many are split-level ranches from the 1950s, but some, with red tile roofs and stucco walls, were built in the mid-1920s when William Fox, the movie producer, branched out into real-estate development, wishing to make Massapequa the ''Hollywood of the East.'' His dream toppled with the stock market crash in 1929.
A major attraction of Massapequa is its school system, which its officials call one of the best in Nassau County. Massapequa School District currently has six elementary schools (grades K-6): Birch Lane, East Lake, Fairfield, Lockhart, McKenna and Unqua; one middle school (grades 7-8): Berner; one pre-high school (Grade 9): Ames, officially designated "Massapequa High School, Ames Campus"; and one high school (Grades 10-12): Massapequa High School.
The Massapequa district's students consistently score above state averages on standardized tests, and about 80 percent of the high schools' graduating classes have gone on to higher education in recent years.
Famous Massapequa natives include the Baldwin brothers - Alec (who was born in Amityville), Daniel, Stephen and William. Actors Steve Guttenberg, Jerry Seinfeld and Helen Slater; composer Marvin Hamlisch; Twisted Sister band member Dee Snyder; and transgender pioneer Christine Jorgensen also lived here. Streets of Massapequa were shown in the Oliver Stone film "Born on the Fourth of July", which was based on the book of the same name by Massapequa native Ron Kovic.
Massapequa is the location of the well-known Long Island hotspot All-American Drive In, which was featured in the Travel Channel's "Hamburger Paradise."
