Afer a 27-year wait, the Shinnecock Indian Nation received federal recognition as a tribe on Monday afternoon from United States District Court Judge Thomas C. Platt. The nation filed an application for recognition with the Bureau of Indian Affairs in 1978.

In a statement, the Shinnecock Indian Nation Tribal Board of Trustees said, "the federal court issued a historic ruling acknowledging the Shinnecock Indian Nation as an Indian tribe . . . and ruling that the Shinnecocks clearly meet the criteria for tribal status." The trustees are expected to hold a press conference soon.

Whether such judicial recognition confers the same rights as recognition by the Bureau of Indian Affairs is under debate. Roberta Hunter, a lawyer who lives on the reservation, said it did not, but added that the Shinnecocks would continue with the B.I.A. process hoping that the bureau might move faster than it has in the past. "We'll have to stay focused" while moving forward with the petition, she said.

Judge Platt's decision does not automatically place the tribe on the Bureau of Indian Affairs list of federally recognized tribes, but does give them the right, in his opinion, to develop their properties without approval by the United States.

Nonetheless, the judge declined to offer a summary judgment on whether the tribe could develop its Westwoods property in Hampton Bays as a casino. That issue will still have to be resolved at a trial.

Politicians across the board continue to oppose a casino at the site.

Michael Cohen, an attorney at Nixon Peabody who is representing South-ampton Town in its litigation against both the casino and the land claim filed by the Shinnecocks against the town, said that it continues to be the town's position that the Westwoods property does not qualify as "Indian country" under the law, and that "town zoning law applies, local law applies, and state anti-gaming law applies." The land is currently zoned for two-acre residential use.

As to Judge Platt's recognition, Mr. Cohen said, "it's a long way from recognition to casino gaming assuming that the recognition that Judge Platt seems to have granted is in any way binding on the federal government." As long as the Shinnecocks are not on the B.I.A. list they cannot "under any circumstances be allowed to game."

Tom Schlosser, a partner in the firm Morisset, Schlosser, Jozwiak, and McGaw, which specializes in federal Indian law, said that "any determination of federal recognition isn't going to mean much until federal agencies accept it."

Mr. Platt quoted the Shinnecock's brief in the case, which itself cited numerous precedents for judicial decision. "Federal courts have held that to prove tribal status . . . an Indian group must show that it is a 'body of Indians of the same or a similar race, united in a community under one leadership or government, and inhabiting a particular though sometimes ill-defined territory.' "

Mr. Platt said the cases cited "establish a federal common law standard for determining tribal existence that the Shinnecock Indian Nation plainly satisfies."

In the cases the Shinnecocks are party to, none appears to involve a feder-

al agency. If federal agencies are not named in an action, Mr. Schlosser said they "won't consider themselves bound" by a decision in those cases.

Mr. Schlosser said a 1975 case, in which the Passamaquoddy Tribe successfully sued the Secretary of the Interior for refusing to recognize it, could be a relevant model for further action by the Shinnecocks, if there is resistance to add them to the federal register.

In the case of the Passamaquoddys, Mr. Schlosser said their establishment of federal tribal rights also led to the settlement of their main land claim. The Shinnecocks filed suit this past summer claiming rights to portions of Southampton Town.

The Shinnecock trustees said given Mr. Platt's decision, "we believe it's time for the State of New York and the Town of Southampton to stop fighting the Nation and work with us to reach a comprehensive and just solution to our claims."

Mr. Cohen described that land claim case as "in the earliest stages." He said he did not believe the judge's decision would affect the defenses that the town planned to use in the case. He did agree that "a land claim under the [non-intercourse act] can be brought by an Indian tribe that is recognized even if it has not been recognized by the B.I.A. but there are a host of requirements for any tribe to make out a land claim." Mr. Cohen added that there were land claim cases that have gone on for decades in New York State.

There are other issues complicating the Westwoods casino matter. In the Supreme Court decision City of Sherrill v. Oneida Indian Nation, the court said that tribes could not extend the rights associated with its reservation to newly acquired land. Mr. Platt said in his decision that Westwoods, if proven to be acquired by adverse possession, "must be considered in its present independent status."

Westwoods is not contiguous to the area historically recognized as the Shinnecock Reservation. The Shinnecocks' rights to it stem from the need for lumber not present on the reservation for firewood and fencing. Whether the Shinnecocks' rights to the land are unbroken or whether their rights to it were recognized after legal title was held by someone else in Colonial times could make a difference in what right they have to develop a casino there.

The nature of the Shinnecocks' title has been questioned by Southampton Town's legal representatives, even though the land has not been taxed by the town or the state since 1850.

Ms. Hunter said it "felt great" that the "federal judiciary have issued a decision of this kind acknowledging our existence." As an attorney who has worked since the 1970s on the issue of federal recognition, she said the decision from a federal judge in the Second Circuit had a "great weight to it."

Personally, she said it was a great legacy for the children on the reservation. As they grew up, her own three children watched Ms. Hunter in meetings on the matter. The decision will give them "a great sense of their place in the history of the East End of Long Island and the State of New York. It's an unbelievable, emotional experience."

As good as it felt, she pointed out that the nation did not need the decision to feel its own validation. "We're strong in our own self-governing and self-existence . . . it's great to have recognition within that system, but it's not our system."

Democrats were the victors across the board in East Hampton Town on Tuesday night, securing every key office and winning complete control of the town board.

"Certainly the voters detected that the Democratic team was the group best suited to keep East Hampton on a track that would make things better," Bob Schaeffer, the co-chairman of the Democratic Committee, said yesterday. As far as he knows, this is the first time in East Hampton history that the Democrats have enjoyed such a sweep.

"I think it means a continuation of the progressive work that the McGintee administration has started."

Supervisor Bill McGintee will go on to a second term, Councilwoman Pat Mansir, who ran on the Democratic ticket for the first time, will have a third term on the town board, and their running mate, Brad Loewen, will have his first.

Fred Overton, who also switched tickets, won 58.5 percent of the vote for town clerk, according to unofficial results from the Suffolk County Board of Elections, besting Len Bernard, a former town board member and town budget officer. Mr. Overton has served as the clerk for six years.

The Democratic highway superintendent, Christopher Russo, easily beat his opponent, Juliette Parker, to win a ninth term. He was also the high vote getter of the day with 4,185 votes, or 67.5 percent. Town Justice Catherine A. Cahill was not far behind him, winning 3,869 votes to claim a victory over the Republican Richard Haeg and Stuart Vorpahl of the Independence Party.

In a much closer race, the Democratic candidate, Eugene DePasquale III, also appears to have won a second term as town assessor. He had just 270 votes more than Tim Bock before absentee ballots were counted, but those tend to favor Democrats in East Hampton.

The only wins for the Republicans were for town trustee. The G.O.P. took six of nine seats on that board, but two incumbents, Thomas E. Knobel and Timothy A. Kromer, were unseated.

Aside from that race, the Democrats had much to celebrate yesterday. "I think it's an affirmation of the work that we're doing," Mr. McGintee said yesterday. "We have a message. We have something to offer to the people, and we don't hold any punches."

"Sometimes if you have to do something you have to do it, and I think people like that and people support that," he said. "We are representative of everybody in the community. We all come from different backgrounds, and are more geared toward problem solving."

Mr. McGintee won re-election by a comfortable margin of 760 votes. With 3,659 pulling the lever for him, he got 55.8 percent of the vote. Mr. Walker got 2,899 votes and won in Wainscott, one district in East Hampton Village, and one in Montauk.

In the town board race, Ms. Mansir was the high vote getter, winning 3,690 ballots. Mr. Loewen got 3,157 votes. Trailing him by 289 votes was Bill Gardiner, a second-time candidate. Larry Penny, his running mate, won 2,361 votes.

Mr. Gardiner was one of the top two in nine of 19 districts, but it was not enough to overcome Mr. Loewen's strong showing in Sag Harbor, Springs, and several districts in East Hampton.

The election was a blow for the Republicans, who lost the supervisorship and a town board seat two years ago and will now find themselves with few representatives at Town Hall.

"I think they focused on singular issues without any significant plans or ideas for future improvements in East Hampton," Mr. Schaeffer said, adding that the town's G.O.P. seems to be in "disarray."

Mr. Knobel said his party would probably meet in the next 10 days to "vent remarks, comments, and concerns" about the election. That meeting will guide the Republican Party as it moves forward, he said.

None of the Republicans but Mr. Knobel stopped by the Democratic gathering spot at Rowdy Hall to concede defeat and congratulate the winners, "which is unusual in races such as this," Mr. Schaeffer said. Other than that, the victory could not have been sweeter.

"We are extremely pleased and happy with the outcome," he said.

Fred E. Bird, captain of the Flying Cloud party boat of Montauk, says the sea bass fishing is the best it's been in years. Some of the bass are big, up to six pounds, and they are plentiful. So are porgies.

Sea bass are not striped bass, of course. The pretty, coal-black fish with white flecks are one of the best tasting in the sea, and are a favorite, baked, on the Asian-American menu.

Captain Bird specializes in bottom fishing, but the bottom rigs have to pass through the water column to get to the bottom. On the way, the bait has been attacked by truly large bluefish recently. Captain Bird reports gorilla blues, including a 141/2 pounder on Sunday. The Flying Cloud sails every day, all day, starting at 7 a.m.

Wind A Problem

The rumor that striped bass were blown away by the big storm of a week ago is not true. Fritz Hubner, captain of the Mistress Too charter boat said there were not as many keepers (28-inch or longer) as before the storm, but there were still plenty around. He said the problem for charter boats has been the wind.

Joe Gaviola, an organizer of the ongoing and hard-fought Montauk Locals surfcasting tournament for stripers, said Tuesday that there were plenty of fish around. The dropping temperature and white water, and the appearance of large herring, snapper blues, cormorants, and searching gannets, added up to exciting fishing for the next several weeks, perhaps a month, Mr. Gaviola said.

His brother, Dennis, caught three 20-pound bass Tuesday morning and a number of "rats," as fishermen refer to bass in the four to six-pound range.

Eating Well

"The gannets are looking around," Mr. Gaviola said of the large white birds with blue, rapier beaks, and black-tipped wings. They and the bigger bass and blues gang up on the herring this time of year in a spectacular aerial and submarine attack that beachcombers as well as fishermen should watch for.

Bass fever is high to the west as well. The Altenkirch's Precision Outfitters shop in Hampton Bays reports that the heavy surf "out front" on the ocean beaches has not only kept casters at bay, but seems to have got the bait knotted up in Shinnecock Bay.

Tuna Arriving

One Altenkirch scout found bass in the 20-pound class in the back of the bay in three feet of water. Stomach contents included eels, baby fluke and flounder, and squid, proving to the Tackle Shop that the bass were eating well in the bay, and that both bass and prey would likely spring for the open ocean as soon as the weather cleared.

Calmer weather should also spring tuna fishermen from their harbors. The surface temperature offshore is in the 60s, which means it's higher below and still hospitable for the migrating tunas.

The fly fishing has obviously suffered in the recent winds. Nevertheless, Paul Dixon of Dixon's Sporting Life shop in East Hampton and the To the Point charters out of Montauk, reports excellent fly fishing for striped bass as recently as Saturday.

Herring Around

That day, Ken Turco, a To the Point guide, hooked a bass estimated at over 40 inches under the concession stand near the Montauk Lighthouse. The fish fought for 15 minutes before straightening the hook and escaping. Mr. Turco was casting a hammerhead fly tied by Long Island fly designer Bob Linquist.

Mr. Dixon added that the days of the three-species grand slams are not gone. The false albacore were still around, he said, as well as the blues and bass. It could still be a marine fly fisherman's dream, especially with the big herring making their entrance.

Bait And Lures

Harvey Bennett of the Tackle Shop in Springs, who runs his small-boat charters from Accabonac Harbor, said that on Friday he traveled to Fort Pond Bay and found false albacore there. Nine were caught on a fly and released. Heading east, he encountered bass boiling at False Point. Great fly fishing again.

He said it was worth mentioning that surf fishermen casting from Gerard Drive were using bait (clam bellies) as well as swimming lures to catch keeper bass. It's late to be catching big bass so far up the Peconic/Gardiner's Bay estuary.

Mr. Bennett also announced good "coot" shooting, using the local name for sea scoters. The limit is four per day.

Each year since 1985, when a series of brown algae blooms devastated the East End scallop population, the opening day of scallop season has dawned with a mixture of hope and frustration. While it is still too early to tell - scallopers only began towing their dredges in state waters on Monday - experts point to signs that could indicate the slow rebirth of the valuable fishery.

In an effort to permit slower-growing scallops a chance to have a fall spawn, both the State Department of Environmental Conservation and East End townships have delayed, by a month, the opening of this year's scallop season in the waters they manage. The scallop season in East Hampton, Southampton, and Southold will begin on Nov. 21.

November replaced October despite the fact that whatever scallops are harvested will compete with the November opening of beds in Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard. A small area on Cape Cod opened on Oct. 20, the rest of the Cape on Monday.

Stuart's Seafood in Amagansett and the Seafood Shop in Wainscott buy most of the local scallop production. On Tuesday, Bruce Sasso, Stuart's owner, explained the tricky science of buying and selling the shellfish that now enjoys seafood's equivalent of a cult following.

He said that because scallops are scarce, and because the price for Cape Cod scallops opened lower than expected, buyers are caught between the need to keep baymen happy (by not shopping for their product elsewhere), and the spending limits of their consumers.

"We're paying more than Cape Cod," Mr. Sasso said, and more than Southampton's primary buyer, the Cor-J shop. He went on to predict that the retail price would run between $20 and $22 per pound, depending on weather and other variables.

Mr. Sasso said the season would probably get off to a good start, but that the harvest would probably dwindle in a month's time, as it did last year. Last season, Lake Montauk seemed to have been the most productive area, although the harvest was still very small when compared to pre-algae days.

Greg Rivara, a scallop specialist with the Cornell Cooperative Extension, reported that some baymen were able to get their 10 bushel limit - 20 per boat with two baymen fishing - around Robbins Island on Monday.

Calvin Lester and Nick Havens pulled their boat up to the Northwest Harbor launching area at about 11:30 on Tuesday morning after working the southeast part of the harbor for about three hours. The baymen had only five bushels between them.

"There's no grass. It doesn't take a rocket scientist. There's no grass to hold the bugs. They blow ashore," Mr. Lester said. The scarcity of the scallops' eelgrass habitat is one explanation for the failure of scallops to return to one of the most productive beds on the entire East Coast. In 1984, the year before the brown tide descended on the East End, 278,532 pounds of scallop meats were harvested from the Peconic Estuary according to the D.E.C. Fewer than 2,000 pounds were shucked in 2002, with little increase since then.

"There used to be 150 boats in here. You'd be done by 9, but at noon you could still find 40 in a dredge," Mr. Lester said, recalling the season's opening days before the brown blooms.

It isn't only the eelgrass shortage. Steve Tettlebach, a professor of marine science at Southampton College, and others, have theorized that a low population of widely-scattered scallops cannot produce enough fertilized spawn to resurrect the population.

As a result, the Bay Scallop Spawner Sanctuary Evaluation Project was created last year in cooperation with the state D.E.C., the Nature Conservancy, Southampton College, and Cornell Cooperative Extension. The project is supported by a $150,000 grant from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, through the state's wildlife grant program.

Bug scallops from the East Hampton and Southold hatcheries were placed in a small area on the east side of Northwest Harbor and in other East End water bodies. Spat collectors, mesh bags essentially, were then placed around the harbors in an effort to gauge the success of the density theory.

Speaking of Northwest, Mr. Tettlebach said: "We found more scallops this fall than in the early summer. We've been catching spat pretty much steadily since mid-July, low numbers then, then it began to pick up." He said he was surprised not to have found more scallop larvae after witnessing, for the first time in his career, the massive spawning of scallops in the sanctuary.

"But conditions are now perfect. The biggest sampling was on Oct. 7. We caught 500 [larval] scallops at 11 sites, about 66 collectors. Most were between two and six millimeters. It suggests a fall spawn, good news," Mr. Tettlebach said. Orient Harbor and Hallock's Bay on the North Fork are also being studied.

"This is the first year we are doing this. We're hoping the plantings will contribute. There's a positive sign, not huge, but they're around." Mr. Tettlebach said.

Southampton Hospital announced yesterday that its president and chief executive officer, Annette Leahy, had resigned on Tuesday. Bill Kowalewski, the hospital's chief operating officer, also resigned, according to a spokesman.

The board of directors, in a press release, announced that John N. Kastanis, most recently president and chief executive officer of the Hospital for Joint Diseases in Manhattan, would serve as interim C.E.O.

Mr. Kastanis is credited with transforming that hospital into a profitable operation with growth in both its revenue and volume. According to the release he was also instrumental in "crafting the strategic plan to develop a new health system comprised of New York University Medical School hospital affiliates" and Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City.

The announcement comes on the heels of weeks of speculation and increasing distrust and frustration on the part of employees and medical staff at the hospital. Doctors affiliated with the hospital, most speaking on the condition of anonymity for fear of legal reprisals, welcomed the news of a new director.

Howard M. Sklarek, a pulmonologist affiliated with the hospital, said, "In my opinion the medical staff thought the direction the hospital was going in did not meet the mission or the strategic plan of being the best community hospital in the country." He added that he was not a board member so could not comment on their opinion, but thought their actions were a validation of the talent and efforts of the entire staff.

One doctor described Mr. Kastanis as "the real deal," someone who truly understood the state health care system. He said the medical staff viewed Ms. Leahy, who was from Massachusetts, as an outsider and found her reliance on consultants to be evidence of her lack of knowledge of how to run a hospital in New York.

In fact, Mr. Kastanis served on the 2004 board of the Healthcare Association of New York State. He is also on the advisory board of the Mount Sinai School of Medicine graduate program in health care administration. He has a house in Water Mill and is a registered polo player from Southampton.

One doctor affiliated with the hospital said that there was growing concern among employees that the imperiled financial situation and the culture of intimidation in the hospital would eventually affect patient care. Many good employees who have left in recent years, but still live locally, would probably return to the hospital under new leadership, he said.

On Saturday, according to staff members, employees were brought in one by one to speak to the board about their concerns. Ms. Leahy and Mr. Kowalewski were said to have stood outside the door writing down each entrant's name.

The meeting appears to be a result of a "grass-roots effort" among the employees, one doctor said. A petition was circulated among them stating there was no faith in the management and no communication between the management and staff, according to someone familiar with it.

Donna Sutton, a hospital spokesperson, would not comment on the meeting and said that board members would also not be available for comment.

Despite the recent problems and bad feeling, staff members said that they were proud of the work they did and felt that they were what was keeping the hospital together. "We need a hospital here, everybody has to rally behind it," one said.

The Rev. Peter Larsen, the hospital board president, gave the staff his support in the press release. He stated that a recent review by the Joint Commission on the Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations praised the "high quality of care provided throughout the hospital. That is a testament to the outstanding work and dedication of the hospital's employees and medical staff."

The pilot of the twin-engine Cessna 411 that crashed on a street in East Hampton Village on Oct. 23 was not licensed to fly twin-engine airplanes, according to a preliminary report released this week by the National Transportation Safety Board. The report said that the plane's left engine might have malfunctioned, but did not give a definite cause of the crash.

William Holdgate, a 50-year-old contractor from Nantucket, Mass., was killed when the plane crashed on Mill Hill Lane at 1:40 that afternoon. He was en route from Jefferson, Ga., to Nantucket, and it was his first flight in the plane, which he had bought in 2003.

Mr. Holdgate had 350 hours of experience flying single-engine planes since he was licensed in 1979, according to Federal Aviation Administration records. Private pilot certification requires between 35 and 40 hours of flight and a written test. Licensed private pilots are permitted to fly single-engine planes in good weather.

Although Mr. Holdgate had flown more than the 180 to 250 hours required for a commercial pilot license, James Brundige, the manager of East Hampton Airport, said that 350 hours is not a lot of air time for an experienced pilot.

The manager at the Nantucket Airport said that Mr. Holdgate was only known to fly single-engine planes and had kept an ultralight plane at the airport for about a year.

The F.A.A. requires that pilots over 40 be certified by an approved medical examiner every two years. Mr. Holdgate received medical certification in January 2004.

Investigators said that a loss of power in the left engine was a possible cause of the crash. Safety Board investigators discovered a hole in the top of that engine's crankcase. Portions of a connecting rod cap and bearing were found in the oil sump. One piston had seized and connecting rods were broken and blackened from heat. It is not clear if the heat was caused by the engine or by several small fires that surrounded the wreckage after impact.

Damage to the right engine appeared to have been a result of the crash, inspectors said; that engine had not malfunctioned in flight.

Although the body of the plane was crushed, the rudder and the vertical stabilizer were still connected to the cockpit controls, the report said.

The previous owner of the plane, John Schisler of Georgia, told Luke Schiada, the N.T.S.B. investigator, that the Cessna was stored at the Jackson County Airport in Georgia until Mr. Holdgate picked it up on Oct. 23. According to the Safety Board, the plane's most recent annual inspection was made in June 2004. Mr. Schisler said that in the six years before he sold it, the plane was flown for just 30 hours.

The Safety Board said that a final report might not be available for at least a year. The cause of a helicopter crash in East Hampton in November 2002 was released 16 months after the accident.

Negative Messages Heard In Both Towns

The voters in East Hampton and Southampton Towns will go to the polls on Election Day, Tuesday, having been witness to unusually aggressive and negative campaign advertising. Even though the number of civil debates held by community organizations was greater than usual this year, animosity got the upper hand.

In East Hampton, the campaign season is ending on a particularly sour note, with the town Democratic leader threatening to sue his opponents for libel. In Southampton, a candidate for Supervisor has accused the incumbent of masterminding his ex-wife's smear campaign.

Even with such major issues as the widening of the main runway at the East Hampton Town Airport, the proposed transfer of control of waterfront construction to the Trustees, and the management of the town recycling and composting plants, voters have been inundated with campaign literature of an increasingly personal nature.

Voters Guide

An eight-page "voters guide" published by the Town Republican Committee took the angry exchange to a climax last week, and prompted the warning of a lawsuit. This week the town Republican leader, Robert Davis, denied he or the committee had any hand in writing it.

Instead, his predecessor, Perry B. (Chip) Duryea 3d, who remains a committeeman, took credit for the mailing, which went to about 7,000 voters in town.

Deflecting criticism, Mr. Davis was quick to say the Democrats threw the first punch by sending out three mailings, on bright yellow paper, which misrepresented the Republican position on the East Hampton Town Airport, super stores, and preservation of Gardiner's Island.

Question Of Graft

Christopher Kelley, the town Democratic leader, however, said "anything we did that was an attack was based on statements in the record, or positions the candidates took in the past, or the incumbents' job performance. Those are all legitimate." However, he called their mailings "bullshit. Fight me on the issues, disagree with me, but don't accuse my candidates of being immoral or criminal."

Asked about the newsletter, Mr. Duryea said yesterday, "I didn't do the actual writing but I was the one who orchestrated it." He added that East End Republicans, the campaign ccount he controls, would pay for it rather than the committee. He declined to say who had written the text.

The newsletter questions whether Democrats were responsible for "graft" in connection with the East Hampton Housing Authority's apartment complex on Accabonac Highway. It also portrays incumbent Supervisor Cathy Lester as untrustworthy, with a Pinocchio nose that grows progressively larger in seven otherwise identical photos.

Suit Planned

In a statement issued Monday, Mr. Kelley said he planned to sue the Republicans "over lies and innuendo published in the mailing" and would also file a complaint with the County Board of Elections.

Mr. Kelley, who was the Housing Authority's lawyer for many years, said the suit would ask for millions in damages for himself and other as yet-unnamed defendants. They could include Margaret deRouleaux, the former authority chairwoman, and her companion, Stanley Blumenstein. (A letter on the subject from Mr. Blumenstein appears in this issue.)

The newsletter suggested most of $1 million of authority debt went to Mr. Kelley's law firm - Twomey, Latham, Shea & Kelley - and to the project's architect, "who just happened to be affiliated with" Mr. Blumenstein.

Personally Liable?

Mr. Kelley's statement went on to say the Republican Committee was unincorporated and that its members could be held personally liable for any damages. "I hope these people are prepared to hire attorneys, and, for the sake of my kids' college fund, I hope they all have equity in their homes," he said in the statement.

Mr. Duryea shot back, "They're cry babies. They've been lying throughout the campaign and yet they cry when someone calls them on it."

Commenting on the tone of the campaign, Anne Riordan, co-president of the League of Women Voters of the Hamptons, said, "When this happens, the voters get deflected from the issues. Then they're not voting on how their town will be governed the next two years. They're voting on personalities and rumor. . . . Innuendo should have no place in it," she said.

More Control

Mr. Davis said the Republicans had a few subcommittees working on campaign strategy, including one led by Mr. Duryea. In addition, Lona Rubenstein's L.B.L. Associates was hired by a couple of candidates, and Jerry Della Femina's Jerry and Ketchum ad agency in Manhattan created print ads for Thomas Knobel, the Supervisor candidate.

"Maybe there should have been more control from the top. I have had to depend on information from a lot of different people, and it was overwhelming at times. We'll find out Tuesday night whether it worked or not. But, from my experience, there will be definite changes made," he said.

In Southampton, the election campaign was thrown a curve when the Democratic candidate for Supervisor, Arthur DiPietro, was accused of all kinds of wrongdoing by his ex-wife, Helen Parker. In response, he accused his Republican opponent of masterminding his former wife's barrage.

No Single Issue

Supervisor Vincent Cannuscio has denied any involvement in Helen Parker's accusations, which are described in a separate story.

As in East Hampton, there has been no single issue that has crystal

The Long Island Community Foundation, which has supported the good works of nearly 40 East End nonprofit organizations, marked its 20th anniversary at a party in Amagansett on Oct. 18, where officials announced a $20,000 grant to a newly formed land preservation coalition here.

The Community Foundation's officials also outlined plans to expand its East End presence - plans they expect will be aided by news that a Bridgehampton resident for 32 years, who is determined to remain anonymous, has created a "charitable remainder trust," which will put "millions" of dollars in the foundation's hands after his death for "things that are important to him and to the future of the East End."

Anonymity Goal

The charitable trust, arranged through the foundation, is an example of how an individual can assure that nonprofit groups of the donor's choice benefit financially in perpetuity, while maintaining the donor's anonymity, something not possible through other means, Marilyn Oser, a Community Foundation spokeswoman, explained.

Ms. Oser said the foundation can help individuals of modest means wishing to make smaller contributions to organizations here. The foundation's professionals invest the monies, she said, and its board assures the continued "integrity" of the donations, as well as the charities'.

Banks and others who can act on behalf of donors "tend not to want to handle small accounts," Ms. Oser said.

Through a community foundation, donors can designate specific nonprofit beneficiaries - East Hampton Meals On Wheels, for example - or they can give to a general "community response fund," for "the elderly of the East End," for example, or "youth at risk." Such designations would leave specific grant decisions in the hands of the Community Foundation.

New Coalition Gains

The organization's officials claim that working through a community foundation is more economical in arranging donations than through a private attorney or financial adviser. The Community Foundation charges an annual administrative fee of either 2 percent of the amount of grants paid, or 2/10 of 1 percent of an individual fund's total assets, whichever is higher.

A member of the New York Community Trust, the nation's largest community foundation, the Long Island Community Foundation last year gave $1.9 million in grants to a variety of nonprofit organizations, most on Long Island, and about $400,000 on the East End.

The $20,000 grant announced at the Oct. 18 anniversary party went to a new coalition called the East End Initiative For Regional Land Conservation and Planning, comprised of the Group for the South Fork, the Peconic Land Trust, the Nature Conservancy's South Fork-Shelter Island Chapter, and the North Fork Environmental Council.

It is the first of several $20,000 grants Ms. Oser said the Community Foundation will make here, and throughout Long Island, from monies raised specifically for this anniversary year.

East End Seminar

Officials said they expected to open a satellite South Fork office, probably in the Bridgehampton National Bank's main office. The organization is headquartered in Jericho. It will hold its first East End seminar, free to lawyers, accountants, and other financial advisers, on Nov. 18, from 8:30 to 11 a.m. sponsored by the Community Foundation in cooperation with the Bridgehampton Bank and the Peconic Land Trust.

The morning's speakers will be William R. Ginsberg, a Hofstra University law professor and member of the law firm of Sive, Paget & Riesel, and Rochelle Korman and Joseph P. Scorese of Patterson, Belknap, Webb & Tyler. Both law firms are in New York City.

Philanthropic Center

The Community Foundation is guided by a board of advisers. Jill Tane, its chairwoman, said its goal was to become "the center for philanthropy on Long Island." She said the Community Foundation helps residents "become the philanthropists they dream of being."

The East End will have its own advisory committee which will determine annual allocation of the fund's proceeds here.

Beneficiaries of the Community Foundation include a wide range of organizations, concerned with health, child care, animal welfare, the arts, and land preservation.

Robert C. Merton of Harvard University, the son of the famous Columbia University sociologist Robert K. Merton, who lives on Hither Lane, East Hampton, was awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics with Myron S. Scholes of Stanford University for their work on the pricing of financial instruments called options.

Mr. Merton, at 53, is the youngest economist ever to receive the Nobel Prize.

"Puts" and "calls" - the right to buy or sell an asset at an agreed-upon price and time - had been traded for centuries by canny traders in such markets as tulips in 17th-century Holland, wheat in 18th-century France, or fish in 18th-century Sweden.

New Formula

The work of Mr. Merton and Mr. Scholes made clear the similarities underlying these traditional options.

"When you look hard enough, it turns out there are options everywhere," said Mr. Merton at a news conference at the Harvard Business School. Auto insurance, home mortgages, school loans, contingent compensation, deposit insurance can all be characterized as options, and the two economists demonstrated, with an exact formula, that the underlying principles of valuation are essentially the same for all of them.

Thousands of traders and investors now use the formula to value stock options in markets throughout the world.

First Buy At 10

"If you ask what idea in the last 50 or 60 years coming from economic research has had the biggest impact on the world, this is it," said Avainash Dixit, an economics professor at Princeton University.

Mr. Merton was born in 1944 in New York City and always had a keen interest in markets and trading. He bought his first share of stock at the age of 10.

Asked whether his father had influenced him, Mr. Merton said that for the last 30 years he and his father had "pretty much talked every day, and often several times a day."

From The Start

"Mathematics was for him a language from the very early years," said his father.

The economist received his Ph.D in economics in 1970 from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and now teaches at the Harvard Business School.

In what might seem some kind of prescience about her stepson, Harriet Zuckerman, Robert K. Merton's wife and vice president of the Mellon Foundation, is the author of "Scientific Elite," a book about Nobel laureates in the United States.

Members of the Writers Guild of America East remain on strike outside Wainscott Studios, protesting the hiring of nonunion workers by the producer of the children's show "It's a Big, Big World." Guild members refused to work for Mitchell Kriegman of Big Big Productions for what they described as less than half of the industry minimum in May, and began picketing when he hired nonunion workers.

According to press releases from the guild, Mr. Kriegman offered to pay $5,000 per episode when $12,000 is the industry minimum. Mr. Kriegman has maintained that production companies pay writers on shows such as "Sesame Street" much less than the guild's minimum, and that higher guild wages are generally not met. The guild began picketing the studio on Aug. 8.

Since then, the production company has made three offers, one as recently as two weeks ago, but all were refused by the guild. Yesterday, Mr. Kriegman maintained that all along his "desire has been to have a deal," and he said that an agreement was near. Mona Mangan, the executive director of the Writers Guild East, said that they are "ironing out some details" of an agreement, but a final compromise might not be near. "It could end in five minutes or it could end who knows when," she said.

On Friday, the 89th day of protest, the picketers on Industrial Road had dwindled to five; in August they numbered about 20 people.

Also gone from the scene was a 15-foot tall inflatable rat. The rat had been on loan from Musicians Local 802. It had to be returned when those workers went on strike at Radio City Music Hall in Manhattan last Thursday.

In recent days, a number of complaints about the noise made by the picketers have been filed with the East Hampton Town Police Department - last week alone, police responded to five complaints. A picketer filed a harassment complaint last week when a car pulled up to her chair in the picket line.

Amanda Bell, a guild organizer, said on Friday that picketers have kept the noise "at the same level" since they began, and said that the group "will escalate" if they find it necessary. "We've been fairly careful about noise," Ms. Mangan said. Mr. Kriegman said that the picketers failed to acknowledge the "positive steps" that he and the union have taken in their negotiations.

Recently, one striker read selections from classified ads through a bullhorn: "Three bedroom apartment in pristine condition. . . ." Others yelled and shook tambourines at the occasional passing car.

Mr. Kriegman said that no one at his studio is complaining about the noise, but that his neighbors, Plum TV and WVVH-TV, are "upset" about it. "My heart goes out to everyone in the community that has had to deal with this," he added.

Max Scott, who rents space at LTV Studios, said his work requires that sound be carefully controlled, and that strikers using bullhorns have "completely frustrated" him. He said that the strikers have been "rude" and "belligerent," and speculated that they have been "hired to scream and yell with megaphones."

In the last two months, he has called the police over 20 times and asked the town attorney if there were legal avenues to pursue.

Because the studio is across the road from East Hampton Airport, higher decibel levels are permitted than in other areas. Town code allows for public assembly on public space, even after 7 p.m., when most loud noise is generally prohibited, so the police cannot issue summonses.

Mr. Scott said that he had placed a stereo system outside his studio and "blasted them with bagpipes," but the police told him to turn down the volume.

"We've had some terrible incidents out there," Ms. Mangan said.