Flushing, New York, is the historic seat of religious diversity in the United States. When New York was still New Amsterdam in the mid-seventeenth century, a group of settlers in the small town of Vlissingen (Flushing's Dutch name) were approached by the Quakers, who wished to use one of their homes for prayer services. The good people of Flushing happily complied. When Governor Peter Stuyvesant heard about it, he was furious. He had recently lost a battle with the first community of Jews in America, whom he had tried to evict from New Amsterdam. His employers at the Dutch West Indian Company, whose business interests always trumped local bigotry, reversed his expulsion order, and the Jews remained. Now, Governor Stuyvesant sought to evict the Quakers, and told the people of Flushing that they were in no manner to allow the Quakers to conduct worship services in their homes. The Flushingites were appalled, and got together to write what became known as the Flushing Remonstrance of 1657, telling Stuyvesant that they had no intention of complying with his order.

A Quaker Meeting House was eventually established in Flushing. Their present building dates from 1697. Jews, however, were slow to arrive here. The first Jewish congregation was the Conservative Temple Gates of Prayer, still located here on Bowne Street. But the first liberal Reform congregation was the Free Synagogue of Flushing, founded in 1917 by the Women's Hebrew Aid Society, under the consultation of Rabbi Stephen S. Wise of Manhattan. Rabbi Wise had recently founded a Free Synagogue movement, of which the Flushing institution became a part.

When the property on the corner of Sanford Avenue and Kissena Boulevard was purchased, downtown Flushing was about to emerge from its bucolic roots into a bustling community. The construction of the Queensboro Bridge and Queens Boulevard already brought the borough out of isolation. The subway system went as far as Corona and would reach Flushing by 1928. From the end of World War I through the 1920s, Queens underwent a population explosion of 130%. The first Synagogue house was the stately pillared mansion designed by the noted architectural firm of McKim, Mead & White, which stood on a corner of the lot. It was moved to the Sanford Avenue frontage of the synagogue property in 1926, to make room for the grand structure which is the sanctuary of the Free Synagogue of Flushing today. This neo-classical building, designed by Maurice Courland, features a massive portico supported by four Ionic pillars topped by a pediment inscribed with the words of Isaiah, “For mine house shall be called a house of prayer for all people.”

A walk up the stately steps leads into a magnificent sanctuary where dark green pilasters support the walls upon which rest the enormous dome. Stained glass windows, crafted in Czechoslovakia, surround the sanctuary in rich radiant colors. In the center of the domed ceiling that covers the entire sanctuary is a smaller stained-glass dome designed around a Star of David. In 1964, a three-story school building was added to accommodate the religious school and adult education classes.