Villages

Why isn’t the long-tailed duck more celebrated? It’s crazy looking, gregarious, easily seen, cackles like a stuttering kazoo, hilariously belly-flops when it lands, and hangs out in bad little duck posses. It’s even controversial.

“We’ve been a community center since 1908 and have never had a proper bathroom,” said Hilary Osborn Malecki, president of the Wainscott Sewing Society, which maintains the Wainscott Chapel. The chapel has existed all this time with only an outhouse, but that is about to change.

Deep into The Star’s past . . .

This photograph, taken by Leonard L. Lester, shows the East Hampton Presbyterian Church covered in a thick blanket of snow. There’s no date, but the photo technology clearly indicates that it was taken after 1920, most likely between 1930 and 1960, when a remodeling was started.

As we enter a new year and come upon the second anniversary of the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic, it is time once again to review the most current guidelines for testing, quarantine after exposure, and isolation while infected with Covid-19. This is particularly necessary as the Centers for Disease Control recently updated their guidelines to reflect the latest known data about the rising Omicron variant, which has spread at an incredible pace.

Starting Monday, anyone traveling through the heart of Sag Harbor Village might experience traffic snarls, as National Grid begins replacing the gas main underneath Main Street. Workers will be on site between 7 a.m. and 4 p.m.

Spurred by an avalanche of positive Covid-19 cases over the holiday season among families, kids, and teachers, virus-related impacts have been fast and furious in coming to South Fork schools.

Ripped from the storied pages of The Star . . .

The push to expand access to Covid-19 vaccines continues on the South Fork, with East Hampton Town adding five additional vaccination clinics in February and Stony Brook Southampton Hospital moving its clinics to the Greek Orthodox Church of the Hamptons to accommodate more appointments.

Founded in 2005 by Douglas Mercer, the Wellness Foundation announced its closing just before Christmas. The organization worked closely with local school districts, helping to make healthy food a priority, and ran Wellness Challenges for adults that encouraged a holistic approach toward a healthier lifestyle.

The first day of the new year was drizzly and drab, and, to some, depressing, though you wouldn’t have known it had you been at East Hampton Village’s Main Beach or at the Beach Lane road end in Wainscott for the New Year’s Day plunges that afternoon.

The Village Preservation Society of East Hampton has awarded a $5,000 grant to the Anchor Society of East Hampton, a recently formed nonprofit organization seeking to open a year-round general store in the village that would offer daily necessities as well as a haven for neighbors to meet and greet each other

When he leaves East Hampton for retirement, Richard Barons will leave behind big shoes to fill — most likely a pair of shoes dating back to the 18th or 19th century, donated by a family that lived here for generations and whose original owner, judging by the worn soles, might have been a merchant or a schoolteacher.

The peninsula separating Accabonac Harbor and Gardiner’s Bay is known as Gerard Drive today, but over the years it has had many different names.

As the highly contagious Omicron variant emerges as the dominant strain of Covid-19 infecting New Yorkers, comments from weary physicians here underscored the surprising speed with which the virus has been spreading.

A La Mode Shoppe, a handcrafted, small-batch, allergy-free ice cream operation, has announced it will take over the space on Newtown Lane formerly occupied by the popular Scoop du Jour.

Many of us are once again struggling with a sense that this pandemic will never end. History tells us this isn’t the case, that this pandemic, like all of the others that have come before, will eventually cease and life will return to some semblance of “normal.”

Residential real estate transfers made history on the South Fork again in 2021, with record-high sales totals, record-low inventory, and a lightning-fast pace at which deals are being made. It was a frenzied year, described by industry professionals as a seller's market in which cash is king, bidding wars are common, and inventory is low.

From the pages of Ye Olde Star.

East Hampton Library will collaborate with LTV to preserve and make freely available noteworthy content in LTV’s archive of more than 22,000 programs, depicting more than a century of East Hampton’s history.

From the pages of The Star of yore.

Skye Qi Marigold and Patrick Timothy Boyle were married at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in East Hampton on Dec. 11 by the Very Rev. Denis C. Brunelle.

The omicron variant of Covid-19, known to be more contagious than previous variants, is causing virus cases and hospitalizations to rise fast.

If there’s any doubt that people are concerned about rising Covid-19 numbers on the South Fork, countywide, and across the state, one need only drive by East Hampton Town’s Covid testing site on Stephen Hand’s Path. The facility ran out of tests and closed early on Tuesday, and Wednesday morning, the line of people waiting for tests was 50 cars long.

The Robert David Lion Gardiner Foundation has awarded a $1,500 grant to LTV to support its Bill Fleming Project. The money will be used to assist in digitally preserving “The East End Show,” which Fleming, a longtime East Hampton attorney, hosted for 34 years until his death in 2018.

This photo from the Springs Historical Society’s archives shows a decorated evergreen tree floating on a platform in Pussy’s Pond in Springs. Based on the photo technology, the image probably dates to the 1980s or early 1990s.

If you are lucky enough to encounter one of these visitors from the north, the number-one rule is to simply keep your distance.

New York State’s beaches were given a grade of “C” in the Surfrider Foundation’s 2021 State of the Beach report. The annual report aims to inform the public and decision makers on the current status of their coastlines and how they are being managed.

The Christmas spirit is alive and well in East Hampton, though for a couple of days the Kiwanis Club wasn’t quite certain of that after discovering the theft of 60 to 70 trees from their charity sale in Amagansett.

The Montauk Historical Society has received a $100,000 grant from the Ludwick Family Foundation for the restoration of the Montauk Lighthouse tower.