What is now Babylon Town and Village was originally part of Huntington Town and known as South Huntington (or Huntington South). Lightly settled from 1689, its main industry, in common with much of the area along Great South Bay and South Oyster Bay (both actually lagoons), was the harvesting of salt hay, which was used as cattle feed and bedding.
When a coherent community grew up in the area by 1803, prominent local citizens sought to adopt a new name. An influential local lady, Mrs. Conklin, was used to living inland in what is now considered Dix Hills and was at unease with the home site that her grandchildren would be raised in. The bible-reading Mrs. Conklin compared the new hamlet to the biblical city of Babylon and proposed that name in apparent defiance of the area's rather bawdy reputation as a stop-over place for travelers on Long Island's south shore. Her son Nat was appalled by the use of an "unholy" name. The family legend states she replied: "But it will be a new Babylon." The name stuck, despite some effort to change it. The adjacent part of Islip town, an effective extension of Babylon, was originally considered as part of Babylon, or as East Babylon, but today is the hamlet of West Islip.
Babylon today is part suburban bedroom community, part small-town, and has a substantial shopping and business district. It is situated between West Babylon and West Islip at west and east, North Babylon on the northern boundary, and South Oyster Bay near its merger into Great South Bay on the south.
Today the village is best known for its restaurants and shops, and hosts shopping events during the fall as well as a popular crafts fair.
A statue of Robert Moses was erected in front of the Village Hall on Main Street (Montauk Highway) in 2003.
Babylon School District
Most of the residents of the Village of Babylon are served by the Babylon Union Free School District (UFSD). Since the school district lines are not coextensive with the village boundaries, as is common on Long Island, some residents of Babylon Village are in the West Babylon UFSD and, conversely, some residents of North Babylon go to the village schools, as well as residents of Oak Island, Oak Beach, Gilgo, West Gilgo, and Captree Island across the Great South Bay.
According to the 2000 United States Census there were 1,371 children between the ages of five and 18 living in Babylon Village. Most of these are served by the three Babylon School District schools:
- Babylon Elementary School, serves all students in grades K-2;
- Babylon Grade School, serves all students in grades 3-6. Both of these schools are on a single large campus running east from Ralph Avenue between on Park Avenue and Beverly Road;
- Babylon Junior-Senior High School, serves grades 7-12 in the original, but modernized and expanded High School building on North Carll Avenue between South Railroad Avenue and Grove Place, opposite the Babylon Railroad Station.
- Babylon Village Schools online
Babylon Village children who live in the West Babylon School District (all of Babylon Village west of Route 109 and all of Little East Neck south of Cambridge Drive) are served by these schools:
- John F. Kennedy Elementary School or South Bay School, both on the same campus west of Great East Neck Road, grades K-5;
- West Babylon Junior High School, serves students in grades 6-8, located at Old Farmingdale Road and Little East Neck Road;
- West Babylon High School, serves students in grades 9-12, at the junction of Route 109 (Babylon-Farmingdale Road) and Great East Neck Road.
The poet Walt Whitman, forced to find work after the Great Fire of New York in 1835 devastated the printing and publishing industry, took work at a number of Long Island "country schools." Among them was West Babylon's school, located midway between Little East Neck and Great East Neck Roads, just west of the current village boundary, and now occupied by a supermarket, where he taught in the winter of 1836-37.
Helpful Links For Babylon Village:
Babylon Village Library
Long Island Railroad Schedule & Fares
Search Homes For Sale in Babylon NY and across Long Island:
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