Villages

In the Springs house of John and Alice Marlin some 500 boxes of documents — the personal archive of his mother — bring to life the crushing, cruel realities of World War II and of living under a hostile occupying force.

Back in March, Peter Zegler and Bob Beck, metal detectorists, saw an opportunity to uncover some East Hampton Village history after learning of plans to renovate the fields at Herrick Park, and they requested permission from the village board to get to work. The basketball court had been laid over an expanse of undisturbed soil, and soon their metal detectors were beeping with excitement.

This is the best time of year to observe chimney swifts locally as they burst through the skies over our villages. You’ll never see a chimney swift land, or even come close to street level. In their daily circuits, they can fly 500 miles a day in pursuit of something like 12,000 flying insects.

From a shotgun-wielding skirmish in the Prohibition wars of 1923 to the momentous day in 1998 when Suffolk County banned smoking in bars, it happened here.

“It was only June 2021 when we first saw a scattering of symptomatic foliage in a client’s garden, and two years later, most beech trees have been impacted at some level,” one master arborist said of beech leaf disease, which is threatening the survival of beech trees from forests to estates.

The Bokalift 2, an approximately 750-foot-long vessel that will be used to install foundations for the South Fork Wind farm, arrived off Newport, R.I., last week and is now at the wind farm’s site, in a federal lease area around 35 miles off Montauk Point. 

The Last Gasp, published by East Hampton High School’s class of 1912 as part of its graduation festivities, is one of the earliest student publications in the Long Island Collection.

The New York State Department of Motor Vehicles has unveiled a new $60 custom license plate featuring the Montauk Lighthouse. Only, there is one problem.

You read it here first. Make that second, as these entries are reprinted from past Stars for your pleasure and edification.

Residents of the East End awoke Saturday morning to a hazy sky and the distinct smell of something burning, which got stronger through the week as a result of the wildfires raging in the Canadian provinces of Quebec and Nova Scotia. The smoke resulted in air quality alerts that canceled outdoor activities of all sorts.

A GoFundMe campaign has been launched to raise money for members of a former Montauk family who were victims of a knife attack in Florida that police described as an attempted murder-suicide.

A large crowd watches a baseball game in this glass-plate image. Most likely the players are part of the East Hampton Baseball Club, first mentioned in The Star in 1895.

The anniversary of the 1942 interception of Nazi saboteurs who landed near Atlantic Avenue Beach will be observed on Saturday at 6 p.m. at the Amagansett Life-Saving and Coast Guard Station.

With air quality levels in Suffolk County sitting just under 200, a level considered unhealthy and nearing very unhealthy, on Thursday morning, some people accustomed to working outside took the day off. For most, however, it was a regular day, despite the peach-colored air.

Rabbi Aizik Baumgarten of Chabad of the Hamptons in East Hampton donated one of his kidneys to Terri Levin Davgin, a longtime congregant who was suffering from kidney failure. “When there’s an opportunity to help, we help. I thanked God for the opportunity for the chance to save a life,” he said.

Generations of the Dominy family built the bits and pieces that made life work in the 18th century. East Hampton Village is nearly finished with a $2.3 million restoration of the house and shops that will be known as the Dominy Shops Museum.

“There was a real focus on domestic violence and other important social causes during Covid,” Francesca Odell, co-president of the Retreat’s board of directors said at the All Against Abuse benefit Saturday. “And, now that we’re coming out of that, I think there’s a tendency to think that those issues aren’t as crucial. But when you look at the root causes of domestic violence, they’re all still present.”

A look back at headlines from years past.

To share in Pride Month with the L.G.B.T.Q.+ community is "a loving embrace," the founder of Hamptons Pride, Tom House, told a huge crowd in Herrick Park on Saturday after the conclusion of the second East Hampton Village Pride Parade. It "goes beyond tolerance and acceptance. . . . It says, 'We value you and we're better for your presence; we're so glad you're here.' "

“This is not an easy holiday. It’s not an easy thing to lose someone in service for our country,” said Jimbo Theinert, the guest speaker on Memorial Day in Sag Harbor, and brother of First Lt. Joseph J. Theinert of Shelter Island, who was killed by an improvised explosive device in Afghanistan on June 4, 2010.

Wedding traditions are as numerous and varied as the couples marrying, and one for many Jewish couples is the huppah, a canopy meant to represent the home soon to be shared by the couple. At the Jewish Center of the Hamptons, the huppah is not merely a temporary structure for weddings, but rather a permanent outdoor art installation.

Building on the resounding success of last year's inaugural event, Hamptons Pride is once again hosting a parade through East Hampton Village and a big after-party in Herrick Park on Saturday to celebrate L.G.B.T.Q.+ individuals and allies at the start of Pride Month.

The Friends of the Long Pond Greenbelt, the Southampton Town Trustees, and the Nature Conservancy have installed 13 split-rail fences at sensitive junctures along the greenbelt to discourage mountain bikers, e-bikers, dirt bikers, and A.T.V. riders. But they get ripped out.

The year 1973 saw the rise of women in East Hampton Town politics, while 1998 saw the rise of the Rennert property in the Sagaponack dunes.

As installation of the South Fork Wind farm’s monopile foundations nears, the first American-built offshore wind substation is making its way to the site. A ship carrying the substation set sail from Ingleside, Tex., on May 24. The 1,500-ton, 60-foot-tall substation will sit on a monopile foundation within the 12-turbine, 132-megawatt wind farm, collecting the power generated by the turbines and connecting it to the electrical grid.

The stirring strains of “You’re a Grand Old Flag” grew louder as Monday’s Memorial Day parade made its way from Main Street to Hook Mill in East Hampton Village. But the patriotic music, the magnificent spring sunshine, and the seeming entirety of East Hampton Town’s Little League participants and their parents belied the solemnity of the occasion.

Memorial Day observances in East Hampton and Sag Harbor Villages on Monday were both solumn and celebratory, as people lined the streets in both villages to salute veterans and remember the fallen. 

Abigail Balnis and Gabriel DeWalk were married on April 29 at the Randall House in Greer, S.C. The groom’s uncle Jonathan Powell officiated.

The East Hampton War Memorial seen here, installed for Veterans Day in 1924 adjoining the North End Cemetery, is traditionally decorated as part of the village’s Memorial Day observances.

Montauk’s Westlake Marina, a family-owned and operated business for nearly 60 years, has been sold to Hildreth Real Estate Advisors, which according to the Traded NY platform paid $14 million. In Amagansett, Hildreth Real Estate Advisors previously acquired the 136 Main Street and contiguous 11 Indian Wells Highway parcels in Amagansett’s commercial district.