For some, “Umbrella Beach”’ might evoke a wide stretch of sand dotted with brightly colored parasols. But that’s not the case with Umbrella Beach in Montauk, familiar locally as the site of July Fourth fireworks, the shore of the Benson Preserve, and, currently, the staging area for a major beach sand replenishment project. Umbrella Beach… Read more »
The first known aerial photograph was taken over Paris by Gaspard-Felix Tournachon, a French photographer and balloonist, in 1858. Tournachon used a wet plate collodion process that required the photographic material to be prepared, exposed, and developed from a portable darkroom while aloft in a basket suspended from a gas balloon. From the 1880s to… Read more »
The Montauk Air Force Station operated from 1951 to 1981. Previously, the property had been used as a World War II coastal defense station disguised as a coastal fishing village. Subsequently, most was absorbed into Camp Hero State Park or used by the town for affordable housing. Originally from Pennsylvania, Ed Crasky had served as… Read more »
Is it any wonder that conspiracy theories abound when it comes to Camp Hero? Consider the shroud of secrecy in January 1942 when the Army purchased 468 remote acres in Montauk to use as a battery site “and for related military purposes.” “Secretary of War Stimson signed the petition, filed in Federal Court, Brooklyn, which… Read more »
We’re trying something different for this week’s Throwback Thursday — sharing a photograph from our archives that we don’t know much about and asking for your help in identifying or recollecting the people, places, and stories behind the image. What we do know is that this photograph is of a Montauk Community Church variety/talent show,… Read more »
Montaukers of a certain age may recollect some of the people and places in this chamber directory. They might even remember using a two-letter telephone exchange prefix: MP for Montauk Point, for example. The directory comes from a collection of printed materials and ephemera promoting Montauk restaurants, hotels, and the Montauk Chamber of Commerce… Read more »
Until one has loved an animal, a part of one’s soul remains unawakened. — Anatole France, 19th-century French poet, novelist, and journalist Clearly in agreement are more than 70 people who sent in photos of their “babies” for a Montauk Library community slideshow called “Pets of Montauk.” Dogs frolicking on the beach, cats curled on… Read more »
A nasty horse named Humpty Dumpty gets a kick out of throwing riders. A bathtub morphs into a UFO and lifts off. A little girl wins a baby elephant in a mail-in coupon contest. A surfcaster hooks a mermaid off Montauk Point. The imagination of the illustrator Frank Borth extended all the way from drawing… Read more »
Before you start, sample the rum and check for quality, begins a recipe for Christmas rum cake in Montauk Cooks with Friends. Like many community cookbooks, it features recipes from local residents and was published to raise money for a local organization, in this case the Friends of the Montauk Library. The cookbook came out… Read more »
On December 7, 1923, the East Hampton Star reprinted, on its front page, a fish tale that had appeared a few weeks earlier in the Newark Evening News. Of course it mentioned the largest striped bass caught by surfcasters in a blitz near Montauk Point so far that season – 42 pounds. “But not this… Read more »