![]() ![]() ![]() Moses believed in simply knocking everything down and starting over whereas Jacobs believed in building upon the existing community fabric. Moses was the antithesis of my personal urban planning model, Jane Jacobs and Jacobs battled Moses throughout much of her activist life. It was Moses’s favoring of highways over mass transit that helped create the model for today’s suburban sprawl throughout the United States. Today, Suffolk County’s population is more than 1.5 million – not including summer vacationers. In 1953, when Moses proposed the “Central Motor Expressway” to then Governor Dewey, Suffolk Country - Long Island’s western county, had a population of about 270,000. It was New York’s modern-day Moses, the “Master Builder,” whose vision - for better and worse - was for a system of new bridges and roadways that literally paved the way for west to east migration. With the completion of the Brooklyn Bridge in 1883, the first non-boat connection was made connecting Long Island to the “mainland.” But in no small measure, Robert Moses is the father of modern Long Island. By 1844, the predecessor of the Long Island Railroad completed service connecting the west end to the east end of Long Island. It is the resting place for “Sag Harbor’s early residents of Revolutionary War Patriots, Whaling Captains, Portuguese Seaman, African Americans, and the founding fathers of the village.”īeginning in the mid 1800’s, efforts increased to provide better access from New York to Long Island. Since 1997, the church’s space has been shared by the Conservative Synagogue of the Hamptons.Īdjacent to the church is the Old Burying Ground with its first internment in 1767. The original 185 foot steeple was destroyed in the hurricane of 1938. It is an example of the Egyptian revival architecture of its day. The current building and its life as the First Presbyterian Church of Sag Harbor dates from 1844. In 1840, Sag Harbor was home port to 63 whaling ships. Sag Harbor, with it’s safe north shore harbor, replaced the less Southampton harbor along the Atlantic, and was home port. In 1766, the church became the Old Whalers Church as Sag Harbor became a center of the South Fork whaling industry. By the late 1700’s, the first “oil boom” - whale oil - drove much of the early American economy. It was originally known as the Old Barn Church owing to the areas farm origins. This church’s history provides a capsule of the area’s history over more than 300 years. ![]() Small, depressed enclaves of Native Americans continue on the South Fork. Of course, the aboriginal native residents occupied this land long before the arrival of the Dutch and English and they suffered the same fate as most Native Americans in the face of the European onslaught. By the late 1600’s the English reined supreme throughout as New Amsterdam became New York in 1674 - following a series of conflicts between the Dutch and the English. In the mid-1600’s, English Puritans began to arrive, extending the New World base they established in Plymouth Colony. At the base of the river New Amsterdam was established. In 1609, Henry Hudson, representing the Dutch East India Company, sailed up the river that would eventually bear his name. That leaves lots of interior land where modest-sized farms continue the farming tradition that stretches back to the earliest Dutch settlers in the 1600’s. The premium residential land hugs the shore and provides ocean views. Where swordfish once thrived, today it is said that “swordfish are as common as a virgin in Times Square after midnight.” The early 1990’s saw the collapse of the cod population and the sudden decimation of commercial fishing throughout the North Atlantic. In addition to its status as summer resort more Key West than Hampton, Montauk is the center of what remains of Long Island’s once thriving commercial and sport fishing industry. Sag Harbor sits on the north shore.Įast of Amagansett is a long, arrow stretch of road that dead ends in Montauk. As a result, Long Island’s South Fork is a veritable Madison Avenue of farm stands.įrom west to east along the Atlantic shore, communities includes Quogue and Hamptom Bays, Southampton, Water Mill, Bridgehampton, Sagaponack, East Hampton and Amagansett. For seasonal farm stands, the South Fork is a perfect storm that includes a long agricultural legacy and a large, sophisticated, affluent vacationing summer population with time and interest in at home vacation dining. On the south, it is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean. Principal among these are Peconic, Noyac and Gardiners Bay. ![]() On the north it is bordered by a series of bays that separates the North and South Forks. The South Fork of Long Island extends along Route 27 - Montauk Highway - from Riverhead to Montauk. If you are not viewing it there, just click on the title and you’ll go there. This post is part of a series of On the Road Farm Stand Series It is best viewed at the blog site. ![]()
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