Information, News, and features from Montauk Library’s local history collection.
A large billboard reading “Welcome to Montauk, America’s Outstanding Summer Resort,” greeted tourists as they arrived for the summer of 1947. The Montauk Surf Club and Pool parking lot was full of coupes and station wagons that delivered travelers to the seaside retreat. Guests loafed around in the public pool, while others enjoyed the cabanas… Read more »
Montauk, or Manatacut, or Meuntacut, or Montaukut, is thought to come from an Indigenous word for “fort country.” The word suggests a lookout, most likely from on high and far away, as at Fort Hill, which European settlers also called “New Fort” and today is the home of Fort Hill Cemetery. Formerly the site… Read more »
National Library Week is a national observance sponsored by the American Library Association and libraries nationwide. It was established in 1958 with the theme “Wake Up and Read.” This year’s theme is “Drawn to the Library,” celebrating what draws people into the library. Before 1980, Montauk had no library to draw people in. Library services… Read more »
The contemplative young woman in this postcard turns out to be Diane Duca Delprete, now 78 and living in New Jersey. She was about 13 or 14 when the photograph was taken in the 1950s, one of three decades when her family would spend two weeks each summer camping at Hither Hills State Park…. Read more »
Imagine driving up a meandering dirt driveway lined with ornamental trees, a horse-riding track on your left, a watchtower home to a fancier of pigeons on your right, greenhouses stocked with tropical plants, and a private zoo replete with gazelles and peacocks, all surrounding a Spanish-Moor-styled estate. Does this sound like Montauk? While contemporary estates… Read more »
It’s that time of year when we write a post about the Montauk St. Patrick’s Day Parade, sharing some aspect of its founding or the history of its organizers–the Montauk Friends of Erin. Last year we posted a cartoon by Frank Borth depicting a colorful parade of marchers, floats, and balloons rounding the plaza. The… Read more »
“A great force of engineers and surveyors is now engaged at Montauk,” the County Review reported in November of 1925. “They have dug a channel from Great Pond to Block Island Sound, and the pond was drained last week. In two hours it fell 11 inches.” Known today as Montauk Inlet, that channel was… Read more »
Leisuramas were small, cookie-cutter vacation homes built in the Culloden Shores subdivision of Montauk in the early 1960s. They were designed to be affordable and came conveniently pre-furnished from top to bottom. “All you need is a key and a six-pack,” Frank Tuma, who managed their construction, was rumored to have said. The marketing of… Read more »
In Carl Fisher’s mind, apparently, there was nothing an Aerocar couldn’t do. Designed by Glenn Curtiss using lightweight materials and applying aerodynamic principles, the trailer could be hooked to a Hudson Light Runabout to create a land yacht for cruising America’s virgin highways. Fisher hoped to drum up interest in manufacturing several classes of… Read more »
Winter birdwatching in Montauk draws a dedicated and frostbitten crowd who are rewarded for their resiliency with abundant scoters, razorbills, loons, eiders, and many species of dabbling ducks amassing along the shorelines, lakes, and ponds. “It was agreed that Montauk was a marvel in the feathers department, particularly in the off-season and after a spell… Read more »