Jonathan Baker (1853-1923) was born to Capt. Edward M. Baker and Rosalie Miller Baker three years before his father died in 1856. His widowed mother raised Jonathan and his older brother, Edward Mulford Baker (1849-1910), alone, taking boarders into the family home at 118 Pantigo Road.
Rosalie continued to take on boarders until at least 1870, according to the census, and that year, in addition to boarders and her two sons, her home also included Edward’s wife and baby.
By the 1880 census, Jonathan had married and was operating a farm on the property. Rosalie no longer took in boarders, and Edward lived in another house nearby. That same year, Jonathan ran for public office, becoming East Hampton Town supervisor, a position he held until 1890. In 1882, he began building a new house on the family lot, expanding it four years later. It’s not clear if the new house is shown in Childe Hassam’s 1882 etching of Jonathan’s farm, but it gives a sense of what a more rural Pantigo Road looked like.
One might wonder if their childhood experiences colored the brothers’ choices later in life, since Jonathan and Edward both took on roles in which they oversaw public services for the poor. Edward served as East Hampton’s overseer of the poor, and Jonathan served in that role for Suffolk County, as well as superintendent of the county’s almshouse and chairman of its Child Welfare Board.
Jonathan and his wife, the former Sarah Jane Peters, raised two daughters, Rosalie and Mary. By 1900 the family officially resided in Brookhaven, where Jonathan’s work with social services and local government had led him to move. He retained the property on Pantigo Road throughout those years, and even though the family appeared as Pantigo Road residents in the 1920 census, Jonathan’s profession was described as superintendent of the almshouse.
In October 1920, he became the newly incorporated East Hampton Village’s first board president (a role later known as mayor), serving until 1922. He died the following year.
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Andrea Meyer, a librarian and archivist, is the head of the East Hampton Library’s Long Island Collection.
