Family members and friends of Roy Lee Mabery will be on hand Saturday for a celebration to rededicate the newly renovated and relocated basketball courts at East Hampton’s Herrick Park in his memory.
Mabery (whose surname is often spelled Mabry, including on the original dedication plaque) was a star athlete at East Hampton High School who died in a drowning incident off Albert’s Landing Beach in 1972, a death that hit the community hard because he’d been known as someone who embodied “everything that is good in the world,” according to Pete Carril, who had been the head basketball coach at Princeton University for 30 years before his death in 2022.
Starting at 11 a.m., there will be remarks from family members, village officials, coaches, and Hugh King, the village historian. Mabery’s father, Gilbert Mabery of Bridgehampton, will cut the ribbon, and William Hartwell, a close friend and former teammate, will throw a couple of ceremonial shots to christen the court.
All have been invited to attend.
