Two Black men were shot and killed by a police officer in Freeport on a cold winter morning in 1946. Another was wounded. All three were brothers, two were World War II veterans dressed in their military uniforms. The ensuing outcry and investigations would spread far beyond the south shore of Long Island and bring the story of racial tensions on Long Island to the national level. [Read more…] about The Ferguson Brothers Lynching on Long Island (Podcast)
Long Island
Robert Moses: The Man New Yorkers Love to Hate
Robert Moses is the man many New Yorkers love to hate. This is in no small part due to his own hubris and the impact he had on the people living in the path of his massive construction projects. Add to that Robert Caro’s hard hitting 1974 biography The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York (Vintage Book, 1975) and you’ve got a reputation that is hard to live down. [Read more…] about Robert Moses: The Man New Yorkers Love to Hate
Death By Fire And Ice: The Steamboat Lexington Calamity
In January 1840 the steamboat Lexington left Manhattan bound for Stonington, Connecticut, at four o’clock in the afternoon on a bitterly cold day carrying an estimated one hundred forty-seven passengers and crew and a cargo of, among other things, baled cotton.
After making her way up an ice-encrusted East River and into Long Island Sound, she caught fire off Eaton’s Neck on Long Island’s north shore at approximately seven o’clock. The fire quickly ignited the cotton stowed on board. [Read more…] about Death By Fire And Ice: The Steamboat Lexington Calamity
Records Reveal an Overlooked Hero of the Culper Spy Ring
In late 1777, Patriot and Long Island-native Selah Strong was arrested for what in present-day terms would be regarded as spying. While Selah’s spouse, Anna “Nancy” Strong, and his close friends would be considered part of George Washington’s Culper Spy Ring, only a few historians have included Selah as a member.
This network of spies operated during the Revolutionary War and smuggled information out of the British headquarters in New York City via British-occupied Long Island and across the Long Island Sound, eventually to the Commander-in-Chief himself. By re-examining primary sources for the first time in hundreds of years, Selah’s heroic role in the Culper Spy Ring finally comes to light. [Read more…] about Records Reveal an Overlooked Hero of the Culper Spy Ring
Culper Spy Ring At Drowned Meadow, Long Island
Today we dive back into a discussion of the Culper Spy Ring, turning our attention to the area of Port Jefferson, Long Island or, more appropriately, its original incarnation of Drowned Meadow. The village of Port Jefferson is opening the Drowned Meadow Cottage Museum inside the 18th century home of Culper ring member Phillips Roe. [Read more…] about Culper Spy Ring At Drowned Meadow, Long Island
Ferguson Brothers Lynchings on Long Island: A Civil Rights Catalyst
In a book dedicated to Wilfred Ferguson, the son of Charles Ferguson, teacher and historian Christopher Verga resurrects the story of two Roosevelt, New York brothers killed by a Freeport police officer in 1946.
Verga opens The Ferguson Brothers Lynchings on Long Island: A Civil Rights Catalyst (History Press, 2022) with an account of the long history of racism on Long Island and in the Freeport area including Ku Klux Klan activity. The background to the 1946 killings takes up the first third of the book. The book is well researched and referenced with extended quotes from official court documents and newspaper accounts. [Read more…] about Ferguson Brothers Lynchings on Long Island: A Civil Rights Catalyst
Long Island’s Barrier Beaches: Gilgo Culture & History
Long Island’s barrier beaches are fascinating places. Stretched along the south shore of the island, they persist through much of Long Island history as wild natural landscapes constantly shifting and remolded by the Atlantic Ocean. And despite the storms and shipwrecks and isolation, people have persisted in thinking “I want to live there.” [Read more…] about Long Island’s Barrier Beaches: Gilgo Culture & History
Cranberry Bogs of Long Island: Some History & Natural History
Nearly everyone has enjoyed the several products derived from the fruit of the cranberry, but few people are familiar with the ecology of this interesting plant or the role it has played in many local economies and histories.
Today the cranberry industry is an important. part of the agricultural economy only in Massachusetts, New Jersey, and Wisconsin. But many other parts of the country were at one time involved in cranberry production. [Read more…] about Cranberry Bogs of Long Island: Some History & Natural History
Revelations From William Sidney Mount’s Long Island Paintings
William Sidney Mount was known for his keenly-observed portraits and scenes of everyday life on Long Island during the first half of the 19th century. He portrayed farmers, fiddlers, tradesmen, and workers in their natural haunts, laughing, singing, and enjoying life. [Read more…] about Revelations From William Sidney Mount’s Long Island Paintings
Hempstead Plains Environmental & Cultural History
The Hempstead Plains were once a defining feature of Long Island. Covering some 40,000 acres, the Plains stretched from the Queens border in the west to the Suffolk border in the east, creating a sea of waist-high grass in the middle of what is now Nassau County.
Remnants of the Plains still remain, most notably in a 17-acre segment on the campus of Nassau Community College preserved by the Friends of Hempstead Plains. [Read more…] about Hempstead Plains Environmental & Cultural History