These stones are the ghosts of a forgotten era in Queens history, entombed in a shabby sidewalk.
They come from a grist mill built in Dutch Kills around 1657 that helped turn the economic fortunes of western Queens.
[Photo caption: Author Bob Singleton (l.) with Richard Melnick on Queens Plaza corner.]
The Colonial-era relics, among the oldest European artifacts in the borough, are cemented into a sidewalk along Queens Plaza, with only their tops visible.
"People walk on them every single day, and I'm sure they think that they are manhole covers," said Debbie Van Cura, of Long Island City, who teaches sociology at LaGuardia Community College.
"Nobody really understands fully what they are."
That will soon change.
The millstones will be disinterred and displayed in a park to be created along Northern Blvd. as part of a $43 million city project to overhaul the traffic-choked plaza.
"Now, they will get their due," said Van Cura, who is also a member of the Greater Astoria Historical Society.
Another member of the society, Bob Singleton, who recently published a book about the Queensboro Bridge, gave a talk in Astoria recently about the stones' significance.
"Tidal mills are the most important thing that launched New York to greatness," he said.
New York mills ground wheat into flour and exported it to Great Britain and its far-flung colonies in a triangular trade that spurred the fledgling city's growth.
"If you take a look at the coat of arms of New York, you will see two kegs," Singleton said. "Those are flour barrels."
The Dutch Kills mill is thought to have been the oldest of a handful of western Queens mills that existed during Colonial times, Singleton said.
Dutch settler Berger Jorrisen built the mill along Dutch Kills in 1657.
The present-day site is in the Sunnyside Yards, roughly where the East Side Access tunnel is being dug to connect the Long Island Rail Road to Grand Central Terminal, Singleton said.
The mill was torn down in 1861 to make way for the railyard.
The Payntar family, who owned the mill property at the time, saved the stones and displayed them outside their home near what is now Queens Plaza, Singleton said.
They were mortared into the sidewalk outside the former Long Island Savings Bank building sometime after the Payntar home was razed in the early 1900s.
