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Appendix 1: Unintended Village
Even without a railroad, Hicksville might have taken root at that ungainly intersection. But as events unfurled, three fundamental ironies, unintended consequences of actions taken elsewhere, played crucial parts in Hicksville's history:
- The railroad that triggered the permanent settlement of Hicksville was focused on quickly moving people between Boston and Manhattan. It had intended to ignore the spot on which Hicksville took root.
- The reason the village developed when and where it did was a nationwide calamity, prompted by the Bank of England's raising its lending rates. One suspects that the British bankers did not have Hicksville in mind when they set their new rates.
- Hicksville finally was able to begin transforming itself into a thriving suburb because a railroad on the mainland, one which had no interest at all in Hicksville, decided to take its trains across a river on the opposite side of Manhattan from the LIRR.
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