When the historic “March for Farmworker Justice” stopped to have lunch at the Ridgewood Democratic Club on their way from Smithtown, L.I., to Albany in May 2016, it seemed incongruous that the farmworkers would choose such an urban setting for a brief respite during their 200-mile march to the state capitol. Old timers in the room that afternoon explained that the choice of Ridgewood was not strange at all, considering its long agricultural history.

They explained that for centuries, Ridgewood was primarily farmland, used to supply crops to markets in nearby Brooklyn and Manhattan. The area that is Ridgewood today was originally home to the Lenni Lenape people until a deed was agreed upon with the Dutch West India Company. Europeans began settling in the region, beginning with Dutch settl

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