In this photograph, 12-year-old Mary Huntting Rattray (1927-2016) appears just past her ankles in the surf as she enters the ocean at Napeague in 1939. She wears a checkered swimsuit and gazes out at the waves. Her hair is cut in a long bob, fashionable for the period. A note on the back identifies the location, subject, and date: almost one year after the devastating Hurricane of 1938.
Mary was the only daughter of Arnold Rattray (1897-1954) and Jeannette Edwards Rattray (1893-1974), who bought The East Hampton Star in 1935, running it while raising their young family.
While September may seem late for swimming, those familiar with local waters know they are often warmest in early September, and Mary’s love of adventure and the ocean are well documented.
Mary’s parents both led adventurous lives in their own right and were drawn together by their travels. Her parents met while abroad in Asia, with Jeannette working as a journalist in China and Arnold in the Philippines working for a lumber company. After World War I, Jeannette traveled in Turkey while Arnold served as a government humanitarian aid worker. The couple married in 1925 and together went on to run The East Hampton Star. When Arnold died in 1954, Jeannette took over as full owner and editor.
Five years after this photo was taken, in 1944, Mary got shipped off to boarding school in Staunton, Va., for getting “caught once too often consorting after dark with soldiers and sailors from the military base in Montauk,” according to her obituary in The Star. As an adult, she lived in and traveled across Europe for many years, spending a great deal of time in Paris before returning to East Hampton.
Mary’s long ocean stare seems like a lovely send-off to the summer season, and to all of those for whom this weekend marks the start of a new adventure.
Andrea Meyer is the head of the East Hampton Library’s Long Island Collection.
