125 Years Ago 1899
From The East Hampton Star, December 8
The East Hampton branch of the Needlework Guild of America displayed at the lecture room Tuesday evening the collection of garments received for distribution this year. There were 169 articles, some of which will be sent to the United Charities Association, New York City, and many more reserved for local use.
Last year 139 articles were distributed to local charities, the winter being an unusually severe one, and there being several cases of sickness among the needy on the outskirts of the town. This year the harvests have been bountiful and work plentiful for all who are willing to accept it. We trust many to whom we have heretofore given will be able to help themselves.
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The canning of cauliflower, which has recently been taken up by the Hudson Canning Company, of Mattituck, promises to make the canners and the farmers on the east end of Long Island rich. So far the experiments have proven entirely successful, and up to the present time the Hudsons have put up about 800 cases of this famous Long Island crop.
At the beginning of the cauliflower season they conceived the idea of preserving cauliflower, so that it could be supplied to the markets year round. Experiments proved that the crop could be preserved, and now the canning company’s experts have reached a degree of perfection in preserving it whereby all the whiteness is retained.
100 Years Ago 1924
From The East Hampton Star, December 5
Concerning recent rum-running conditions on eastern Long Island, there is truly “nothing new under the sun.”
Long Island had its rum-running fleet 225 years ago. Before that time it was famed (or defamed) for pirates and smugglers. There were mitigating circumstances. Often tax burdens and customs tolls brought about bad conditions. As now, with some people certain laws were held unpopular. It was not considered a crime to break such laws. Perhaps some of this old-time spirit, and the word is used with no sense of punning, still prevails.
Our historians of the past speak of the piety of the Puritan founders of the Hamptons settlements. There is no doubt about their accuracy applying to earliest years. But by the time Sag Harbor had become settled there must have been an influx of radicals. In a centennial address at the Presbyterian church, the orator of the day said: “The founders of the Harbor were enterprising and energetic and capable. They were not very strong on piety. It has to be recorded as an important fact that of the men who have written their names large in the business life of the community, very few were professing Christians.”
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When envelopes were first made, the sealing flaps were ungummed and were closed by applying at the point of the sealing flap a wafer of sealing wax. About 1840 there appeared on the market envelopes with a small “lick of gum” about half an inch square at the point of the sealing flap, and this very soon supplanted the wafer of wax.
75 Years Ago 1949
From The East Hampton Star, December 8
It could happen here — but it’s not likely. New York is suffering from an acute water shortage. East Hampton has always been fortunate in the quality of its water, and the quantity has always been adequate, with the exception of some of the driest and hottest summer days when sprinklers were going round the clock and some areas of the village, farthest from the Home Water Company’s plant on the Bridgehampton Road, suffered from low pressure. That has now been corrected by the erection of a new pumping plant on Oak View Highway, the highest point anywhere around, so that residents of streets in that area are expected to get very satisfactory pressure next summer, even during the sprinkler season.
But it is just possible that with the shifting of population farther and farther out from the big city, eastern Long Island may eventually find itself short on water, something we take very much for granted.
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Philip Barry, one of this country’s leading playwrights for more than twenty years and for a number of years a summer homeowner here, died suddenly of a heart attack in his New York apartment, at 510 Park Avenue, Saturday. He was 53 years old.
50 Years Ago 1974
From The East Hampton Star, December 5
Bureaucrats, lawyers, and scientists assembled at Southampton College Tuesday to resume a seemingly endless task of burying alleged atomic hazards in paper. They were still at it yesterday and today, and will continue tomorrow, every day next week, for two weeks in January, and for no one knows how long after.
The Long Island Lighting Company wants to build two nuclear plants in Jamesport, on the North Fork. It hopes to finish one by 1981, the other by 1983. They are expected to cost $1,550,000,000. Together with a third plant at Shoreham, for which LILCO already has a State and Federal permission and which it hopes to finish by 1978, they are meant to supply 70 percent of Long Island’s electricity.
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A finger-jabbing shouting match between public officials and a member of the press livened up what had hitherto been a routine executive session Tuesday of the East Hampton Town Board.
Tempers began to fly near the end of the meeting when it became clear that none of the three Republican members of the Board was proposing a resolution endorsing the extension of the Sunrise Highway.
An article that appeared in Newsday had speculated that the Republicans would introduce such a resolution, and that they would be voting for it.
25 Years Ago 1999
From The East Hampton Star, December 9
“Obviously regrettable,” said Thomas Knobel, the East Hampton Republican Chairman, this week on the conviction of a former Suffolk Republican chairman, John Powell, for conspiracy and extortion.
“My heart is with John in this very stressful time for him and his family,” said Marietta Seaman, the Southampton Town Clerk, and until recently treasurer of the Suffolk Republican Committee.
Mr. Powell, who as the county G.O.P. chief had been the most powerful political figure in heavily Republican Suffolk, was found guilty last week by a United States District Court jury of taking $20,000 in monthly payments from a trucking company owner to get preferred access to the Brookhaven Town landfill. Mr. Powell had been the Republican Committee chairman for Brookhaven Town as well as Suffolk County.
“I always had the feeling it would be tough getting a fair trial, being a politician,” said Mr. Powell, 39, after the verdict Thursday. “I learned one thing today: Innocent people do go to jail.”
Sentencing is set for Feb. 2. Meanwhile, Mr. Powell also faces trial on racketeering and grand larceny charges in connection with the stolen-truck ring in which he allegedly participated.
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The Montauk Playhouse Community Center Foundation is officially in business. The foundation has been granted the not-for-profit status it applied for last summer, meaning it will now be able to accept tax-deductible donations.
Joan Lycke, the foundation’s chairwoman, announced the good news on Monday at a meeting of the playhouse’s advisory committee.
