Living Land Acknowledgement
The Matinecoc Indians were an Algonquian tribe which formerly inhabited Flushing before the arrival of the Dutch and the English in the 1640s and 1650s. The Matinecoc territory extended from northwestern Long Island in Queens County to Smithtown in Suffolk County. Settlements were in Flushing, Glen Cove, Cold Spring Harbor, Huntington, and Northport, with seasonal fishing outposts along the coast of Long Island Sound.
Our Sands-Willets House is on a wide area of land that was the ancestral homeland of the Matinecoc, who were displaced by colonialism. We acknowledge the impacts on all Indigenous people and lands over centuries of colonialism and strive toward a greater inclusion of all people and beliefs.
“HERE REST THE LAST OF THE MATINECOC” – (NYPL)
In 1931, the City of New York widened Northern Boulevard and reinterred remains from the Indian Cemetery to the Zion Episcopal Church in Douglaston.
Sources include:
The New York Public Library Digital Collections
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https://www.matinecocktribalnation.org/the-indians-of-long-island
