Every week, the Montauk Library Archives fulfills historical reference and research requests from local newspaper reporters, documentarians, podcasters, authors, and the like. You may have seen images from our archives last month in the East Hampton Star’s article “Carl Fisher’s Montauk, 100 Years Ago” or aired on a recent episode of the Smithsonian Channel’s Mysteries from Above.
Every so often, we are contacted by a family detective conducting genealogy research or someone who stumbled upon a family member in one of our online collections, exhibits, or Throwback Thursday posts.
The latter was the case with Ellen S., who found her father in the black-and-white photograph among surfcasters in Montauk pictured above. The photograph is one of many reproductions from our archives on exhibit at the Montauk Yacht Club.
Ellen came across the photograph while visiting Montauk this summer. “This is really such a tremendous discovery for us,” she said, “our dad passed away in 2001… He used to call the fish his children and when he arrived back home with his catch (assuming he caught something), he used to make my brother, sister, and I pose with the fish, for ‘family photos.’”
Lauren Maguire, author of the Substack series The Heirloom Detective, contacted the archives for materials related to Camp Wikoff—Montauk’s quarantine and recovery camp for veterans returning from Cuba during the Spanish-American War in 1898—hoping to glean insight into her great-grandfather’s military history.
“The photographs from the Montauk Library opened a window into a forgotten chapter of both national and family history. Family lore had it that my great-great-grandfather ‘charged up San Juan Hill with Teddy Roosevelt,’ but the archives revealed something far more human and meaningful. He was serving in the Hospital Corps at Camp Wikoff, cooking for soldiers recovering from the Spanish–American War—embodying the quiet heroism of those who did the unglamorous but essential work of war,” wrote Lauren in an email.
The comments section on social media and individual blog posts are a great place to engage with the library’s archival materials, local history department staff, and other patrons.
In response to a post about restless spirits at the Montauk Manor, one patron remarked, “My family owns a condo on the first floor and we stay there every summer. I have had several experiences, but one last summer really convinced me the Manor is haunted…I looked at the giant window across from me and saw what I believed was my mother’s reflection at the base of the stairs. As soon as I addressed her it looked like she went up the stairs very quick. I followed up the stairs just to find no one up there. I was completely alone. I do know a bit about the paranormal and sometimes spirits mimic people you know to make you feel comfortable around them.” Click here to read the full story and comments from other readers with similar haunting experiences.
Some comments are so incredible that they warrant their own blog post.
Diane Duca Delprete saw herself in a postcard reproduced in one of our Throwback Thursday posts. She left a comment, and we reached out by phone to hear her story. The photograph was taken while Diane was about 13 or 14, camping with her family at Hither Hills State Park. She never saw the image, which was turned into a postcard, until she came across it online 65 years after it was taken. You can read the whole story here.
Connections like these never cease to excite us, although they come as no surprise, since local families and community members donated a majority of the materials in the library’s archival collection. This includes family photographs, home movies, correspondence, and papers documenting the history, culture, and community of Montauk.
Do you have a collection like this you want to see preserved in the library’s archive? Contact archives@montauklibrary.org for more information.
Try searching your relatives, family surname, classmates, or places of interest in our collection of over 3,300 digitized items on New York Heritage Digital Collections. Share your memories and findings in the comments below.
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