An Ash Heap

The “valley of ashes” as portrayed in a graphic-novel adaptation of The Great Gatsby: A pile of coal ash in the dump created in the swamp adjacent to the Flushing River, circa 1920: The site was drained and cleaned up for the 1939-40 World’s Fair, and has been the Flushing Meadows-Corona Park ever since. The name is a good reminder that the word “meadow” in a place name in the New York area typically means it used to be a swamp.