The Queens immigration waves

The Queens immigration waves

Coterminous with Queens County since 1899, the borough of Queens is the second-largest in population (after Brooklyn). Queens is the most ethnically diverse urban area in the world. 

In later years, Queens was the site of the 1939 New York World's Fair and the 1964 New York World's Fair. LaGuardia Airport, in northern Queens, opened in 1939. Idlewild Airport, in southern Queens and now called JFK Airport, opened in 1948. American Airlines Flight 587 took off from the latter airport on November 12, 2001, but ended up crashing in Queens' Belle Harbor area, killing 265 people. In late October 2012, much of Queens' Breezy Point area was destroyed by a massive six-alarm fire caused by Hurricane Sandy. 

Neighborhoods:

• Flushing, one of the largest neighborhoods in Queens, has a large and growing Asian community. The community consists of Chinese, Koreans, and South Asians. Asians have now expanded eastward along the Northern Boulevard axis through Murray Hill, Whitestone, Bayside, Douglaston, Little Neck, and eventually into adjacent Nassau County. These neighborhoods historically contained Italian Americans and Greeks, as well as Latino Americans.


• Howard Beach, Whitestone, and Middle Village are home to large Italian American populations.


• Ozone Park and South Ozone Park have large Italian, Hispanic, and Guyanese populations.


• Rockaway Beach has a large Irish American population.


• Astoria, in the northwest, is traditionally home to one of the largest Greek populations outside Greece, it also has large Spanish American, Albanian American, Bosnian American, Bulgarian American, Croatian American, Romanian American and Italian American communities, and is also home to a growing population of Arabs, South Asians, and young professionals from Manhattan. 


• Maspeth and Ridgewood are home to many Eastern European immigrants such as Romanian, Polish, Serbian, Albanian, and other Slavic populations. Ridgewood also has a large Hispanic population.


• Jackson Heights, Elmhurst, and East Elmhurst make up an conglomeration of Hispanic, Asian, Tibetan, and South Asian communities.


• Woodside is home to a large Filipino American community and has a "Little Manila" as well a large Irish American population. There is also a large presence of Filipino Americans in Queens Village and in Hollis.


• Richmond Hill, in the south, is often thought of as "Little Guyana" for its large Guyanese community.


• Rego Park, Forest Hills, Kew Gardens, and Kew Gardens Hills have traditionally large Jewish populations (historically from Germany and eastern Europe; though more recent immigrants are from Israel, Iran, and the former Soviet Union). These neighborhoods are also known for large and growing Asian communities, mainly immigrants from China.


• Jamaica Estates, Jamaica Hills, Hillcrest, Fresh Meadows, and Hollis Hills are also populated with many people of Jewish background. Many Asian families reside in parts of Fresh Meadows as well.


• Jamaica is home to large African American and Caribbean populations. There are also middle-class African American and Caribbean neighborhoods such as Saint Albans, Queens Village, Cambria Heights, Springfield Gardens, Rosedale, Laurelton, and Briarwood along east and southeast Queens.


• Bellerose and Floral Park, originally home to many Irish Americans, is home to a growing South Asian population, predominantly Indian Americans.


• Corona and Corona Heights, once considered the "Little Italy" of Queens, was a predominantly Italian community with a strong African American community in the northern portion of Corona and adjacent East Elmhurst. From the 1920s through the 1960s, Corona remained a close-knit neighborhood. Corona today has the highest concentration of Latinos of any Queens neighborhood, with an increasing Chinese American population, located between Elmhurst and Flushing.

Racial composition		1990]	1970	1950
White		57.9%	85.3%	96.5%
—Non-Hispanic		48.0%	n/a	n/a
Black or African American		21.7%	13.0%	3.3%
Hispanic or Latino (of any race)		19.5%	7.7%	n/a
Asian		12.2%	1.1%	0.1%

Some main European ancestries in Queens as of 2000 include:

• Italian: 8.4%



• Irish: 5.5%



• German: 3.5%



• Polish: 2.7%



• Russian: 2.3%



• Greek: 2.0%

The Hispanic or Latino population increased by 61% to 597,773 between 1990 and 2006 and now accounts for 26.5% of the borough's population. Queens is now home to hundreds of thousands of Latinos and Hispanics:

• Queens has the largest Colombian population in the city, accounting for 76.6% of the city's total Colombian population, for a total of 80,116.



• Queens has the largest Ecuadorian population in the city, accounting for 62.2% of the city's total Ecuadorian population, for a total of 101,339.



• Queens has the largest Peruvian population in the city, accounting for 69.9% of the city's total Peruvian population, for a total of 30,825.



• Queens has the largest Salvadoran population in the city, accounting for 50.7% of the city's for a total population of 25,235.



• The Mexican population in Queens has increased 45.7% to 71,283, the second highest in the city, after Brooklyn.

• Chinese: 200,205; 39.8% of the city's total Chinese population.



• Indian: 117,550; 64% Asian Indian population.



• Korean: 64,107; 66.4% of the city's total Korean population.



• Filipino: 38,163; 61.3% of the city's total Filipino population.



• Bangladeshi: 18,310; 66% of the city's total Bangladeshi population.



• Pakistani: 10,884; 39.5% of the city's total Pakistani population.

Art:

In the 1940s, Queens was an important center of jazz; such jazz luminaries as Louis Armstrong, Charlie Parker, and Ella Fitzgerald took up residence in Queens, seeking refuge from the segregation they found elsewhere in New York. Additionally, many notable hip-hop acts hail from Queens, including Nas, Run-D.M.C., Kool G Rap, A Tribe Called Quest, LL Cool J, Mobb Deep, 50 Cent, Nicki Minaj, and Heems of Das Racist.