Trimming Square, Washington Square, Franklin Square.
Wikipedia's history says the area sat near the middle of the Hempstead Plains and was known as Trimming Square, then Washington Square from 1851. In the 1870s the Postal Service wouldn't accept another "Washington" name, so locals chose Franklin Square. Walt Whitman taught at the Trimming Square school for three months in 1840. A 1929 bid to incorporate as a village failed when the Town of Hempstead denied the petition, so Franklin Square is still an unincorporated hamlet. By 1952 the farms were all gone, replaced by new houses.
The Census numbers match. The Bureau's latest five-year survey counts about 10,100 homes, with a median year built of 1954. 45% went up in the 1950s and 17% in the 1940s, 16% are older than 1940, and only 8% were built after 1980. 88% are single-family detached and 9% are two-family homes. 83% are owner-occupied.
A 1950s house is now about 70 years old, and many here have been expanded with a dormer bath, a finished basement or a second unit. That puts more fixtures on a main drain that may be original. When more than one fixture drains slowly, we clear the main before anyone talks about digging. In a two-family house, a blocked shared main can back up into the lower unit when the upper unit runs water.
Mostly gas, but oil hangs on.
The ACS shows 63% of Franklin Square homes heat with utility gas, 28% with fuel oil and 6% with bottled or tank gas. Switching to gas means new gas piping to the equipment, and often to the water heater, range and dryer. We do the gas line work. We don't sell or deliver oil.
Your water: the Franklin Square Water District for most homes.
The district, at 895 Schroeter Avenue, served about 20,000 people through more than 5,163 services in 2025, according to its 2025 water quality report. Part of the hamlet is served instead by the Water Authority of Western Nassau County, which counts about 1,500 meters in its portion of Franklin Square.
The district's report says its five wells draw from the Magothy aquifer, though Well No. 3 wasn't used in 2025. It adds sodium hydroxide to raise the pH and reduce corrosion of mains and household plumbing. All four active wells have air-stripping towers for volatile organics, Wells 1 and 2 have carbon filters for PFAS, and Wells 4 and 5 add advanced oxidation and carbon for 1,4-dioxane and PFAS. After treatment, 1,4-dioxane tested from non-detect to 0.23 parts per billion, under the 1 ppb limit, and total hardness ran 36.1 to 42.8 mg/L, which is soft. A leak survey of the district's own system found 15 underground leaks, all repaired. If you see a jump in your water bill, the leak may be on your side of the meter; that's where leak detection comes in.
Sewer, not cesspool.
The Nassau County Department of Health lists Franklin Square as publicly sewered, with Nassau County Public Works as the local sewer authority (516-571-6841). A backup is usually your house line to the street. If sewage comes up through a basement floor drain because the street main is backed up, a backwater (sewer check) valve on the house line is designed to stop that. We install them.
Permits.
Plumbing and gas permits go through the Town of Hempstead Building Department (One Washington Street, Hempstead), which also handles plumber licensing.
