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Copiague

It Could've Been Marconiville

Beginnings: Like neighboring Amityville, Copiague's main reason for being in the early days was its harbor. The water drew settlers such as Zebulon Ketcham, Nehemiah Heartte and Abraham Wanzer, who built mills to grind corn or saw wood along the region's waterways.

Washington Ate Here, Too: Both Amityville and Copiague claim the historic moment when America's first president sat down to dinner at Zebulon Ketcham's Inn during Washington's 1790 tour of Long Island. The inn was located where Deauville Boulevard meets Montauk Highway. (A plaque marks the spot.) Though the plot today clearly lies in Copiague, the region was, at one time, known as East Amityville.

Turning Point: Besides East Amityville, Copiague also was referred to as Huntington South and Great Neck at various points in its history. But the hamlet finally got its own identity in 1895. The residents chose Copiague, an Indian word meaning ``sheltered harbor.'' Five years later, the railroad came. And, in 1903, the hamlet got a post office.

It Could Have Been Marconiville: In 1906, a young Italian engineer named John Campagnoli purchased a large tract of land along Great Neck Road north of the railroad tracks. A close friend of inventor Gugliemo Marconi, Campagnoli renamed the area Marconiville and built a hotel of the same name facing the railroad station. Even though Marconi was a frequent house guest of Campagnoli's, the name didn't flatter the physicist into settling permanently in Copiague. The hotel didn't stay long either. The Marconiville Hotel burned to the ground in 1925. Only Marconi Boulevard remains.