Frances Gardiner Collins made no bones about preferring animals, horses in particular, to most people. Nevertheless, there was a warmth behind her tough-talking exterior, her cowboy boots, unfiltered cigarettes, jeans, silver-and-turquoise belt buckle, and her beat-up station wagon with its dogs, saddles, and a whip antenna that connected her to the Coast Guard Auxiliary.

    Fanny, as she was known, died at the age of 92 on Jan. 8 in a retirement home in Virginia. Her daughter Frances Gardiner lives nearby.

    People who didn’t know her background might have recognized her as a character, and wondered where she came from. The answer was well known here: She was a member of the 16th generation of Gardiners, the first English family in East Hampton, whom some viewed as local aristocracy.

     Lion Gardiner, East Hampton’s first white settler, was given the island that bears his name by Charles I of England in 1629, after battling the Dutch in Connecticut, where he also sided with the Montauketts against the Pequots. He had already received the island from the Indians for a token that took the form of a large black dog, Dutch blankets, and powder and shot.

    Frances Gardiner Collins was born on March 13, 1919, a daughter of Winthrop Gardiner Sr. (who was born on the island) and the former Isabel Tasker Lemmon of Virginia. It might be said that she had horses in her blood.    

    John Gardiner, her grandfather, raised standard-breed horses on the island. At the time, the island had a half-mile-long track where Mr. Gardiner schooled horses as trotters. At one time there were over 100 horses on the island. Her maternal grandfather, Col. Richard Dulany, started the first national horse show in the 1840s, the Upperville, Va., Horse and Colt Show.

    Fanny Gardiner grew up in the Gardiner house on James Lane in East Hampton Village, where her family lived until her father inherited the Gardiner Brown House on Main Street, which is now the headquarters of the Ladies Village Improvement Society. She attended schools in Virginia and Massachusetts. Her siblings, Isabel Gardiner Mairs and Winthrop Gardiner Jr., who was married to Sonja Henie, died before her.

    In an extended interview with The Star in 1985, Ms. Gardiner Collins said, “They couldn’t keep me out of the barn when I was 2.” She was given a pony a year later. At 4, she began taking English riding lessons on a horse named Punch and another named Judy, and, at 7, she won her first blue ribbon. Although qualified, she told the interviewer, Joanne Furio, why she did not enter the National Horse Show in 1929.

    “I could ride any horse, but not having formal instruction in English, and not having a show horse and four grooms, I didn’t go.”

    She traced her lifelong desire to “do some good” for animals to a lesson from an uncle, Jonathan Thomas Gardiner. She was riding down Main Street one day and stopped to help a box turtle get to the other side. Her uncle saw her from a distance. When he learned why she had dismounted, he reached into his wallet and gave her a $5 bill. “‘This is to remind you never to be so busy you cannot help,’” he said. The gesture was powerful, she said, not only because of its message, but because “$5 was a lot then.”

    From 1934 to 1936, she was an amateur rider for the Rolling Rock Hunt Club in Pennsylvania and showed on “the circuit” in Southampton, East Hampton, the North Shore, and Smithtown. Eventually, she came to prefer riding western style.

    “English horses are kept up a great deal. You can’t go doodly squat down to the Candy Kitchen and tie them up to the hitching post. You live on a quarter horse.”

    As a kid, she trotted around town on her horses. In the 1920s she was noticed by the eminent artist Thomas Moran, who did an etching showing her hitching a pony to a post on Main Street.

    Over the years, Ms. Gardiner Collins worked as a  breeder at local stables, including Stony Hill and Dune Alpin Farms, and helped deliver well over 50 foals. She also boarded horses and taught riding at her own stable in Springs.

    In the mid-1960s, she worked for Dr. Leon Star at the Startop Ranch in Montauk. “I had 100 percent breeding and 100 percent foaling. If you are a horseman, that means a lot. It means each horse that comes in there was pregnant when it left. There are very few thoroughbred farms that can say that. I don’t handle horses like other people,” she said.

    When not riding or caring for horses, Ms. Gardiner Collins was often seen in her boat on Gardiner’s Bay. As a longtime active member of the Coast Guard Auxiliary, she was the first to alert The East Hampton Star to the crash of T.W.A. Flight 800 on July 17, 1996. She once said she would retire “when they put me in a box.”

    Ms. Gardiner and Ed Gardiner (same spelling, no relation) were the parents of her daughter Frances, who was a Star reporter for a time. She said her father, who died in 1955, was a popular radio personality who helped create and starred in the show Duffy’s Tavern. The couple’s relationship was brief.

 Ms. Gardiner Collins later married Philip Collins. Their daughter, Mary Gardiner, an East Hampton Town Trustee who ran Pig Pen Produce, a farm stand on Three Mile Harbor Road in East Hampton, died in 2007.  

    In recent years, Ms. Gardiner Collins could be found most days having lunch at John Papas restaurant on the Reutersham parking lot in the East Hampton business district, across the pavement from her childhood home.

    “Her long life is a testament to unfiltered Camels and black coffee,” said Gardner (Rusty) Leaver, who owned the Deep Hollow Ranch in Montauk until recently. Mr. Leaver and Ms. Gardiner Collins had a partnership that offered riding lessons for a time in the late 1960s.

    “She was a dyed in the wool horse girl. She lived with horses,” Mr. Leaver said. She could walk into a room with her cowboy hat on, he said, and remind people of a piece of local culture, the western influence with which the long established horse and cattle culture of East Hampton and Montauk had become imbued.

    “When I was a kid I saw her as Annie Oakley, irascible, one of the great storytellers,” Mr. Leaver said.  

    In 2004, Ms. Gardiner Collins left East Hampton for South Boston, Va., to be closer to her daughter Frances. “Mother had so much to her name,” her daughter said. Plans for a springtime memorial will be announced.   

    A master carpenter and furniture maker, William Clifford Vail of Indian Hill Road in East Hampton died Friday at Stony Brook University Medical Center. He was 59. According to his longtime partner, Bobbi Lee Sayler, the cause of death was leukemia, which resulted from lengthy chemotherapy and radiation treatments for Hodgkin’s disease.

    Mr. Vail was enthusiastic about his work and “was so proud that he brought pictures home to show everyone,” Ms. Sayler said. He worked for Reich/ Ekland Construction of Shelter Island for about 20 years. On the job and at home, Mr. Vail was known as a man who liked to talk. “He was a conversationalist,” Ms. Sayler said.

    He was also a great reader, especially interested in American history, and always had a dog “or three,” usually mutts rescued from a pound, Ms. Sayler said. He treated them as if they were his children, she said. He found time, too, to go clamming and picking mussels in the bay. He valued his sobriety, Ms. Sayler said, having abstained “for 26 years through the grace of God and Alcoholics Anonymous.”

    Mr. Vail was born on March 29, 1952, at Southampton Hospital to William C. Vail and the former Dolores Darnell. The Vail family has long ties to East Hampton, though he grew up in Southampton Town and went to Westhampton Beach High School.

    After graduating from high school with a Regents scholarship in 1971, he went to the State University at Delhi, from which he obtained a degree in agriculture. After college, he lived briefly in Colorado before returning to Long Island in 1978.

    He is survived by his sisters, Elizabeth H. Gallaer of Medford and Mary A Paparella of Princeton, N.J., as well as his stepfather, Edward H. Conklin, formerly of East Hampton, who now lives in Maine, a niece, two nephews, and a great-nephew. His parents died before him.

     A memorial for Mr. Vail has been set for April 16 at 10 a.m. at Emanuel Lutheran Church in Patchogue and at 11 a.m. on May 7 at St. Michael’s Lutheran Church in Amagansett, with lunch to follow. Mr. Vail was cremated, and his ashes are to be spread at Cedar Lawn Cemetery in East Hampton.

    Ms. Sayler suggested that donations could be made in Mr. Vail’s honor to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, Box 4072, Pittsfield, Mass. 01202, or to the American Heart Association, Box 417005, Boston, Mass. 02241-7005.

    A heart that Lawrence Wesley Miller III carved into a tree at Albert’s Landing is an enduring memento of his love of his wife. He carved it and the pair’s initials back in 1983, three years after their marriage, and it remains today.

    Mr. Miller died of pneumonia on March 11 at Southampton Hospital. He was 54.

    An 11th-generation Bonacker and Amagansett resident, Mr. Miller, who was known as Butch, spent much of his time at Accabonac Creek, or “Bonac Crick.”

    His family said Mr. Miller “put his heart into everything he did.” He enjoyed the arts — painting, writing, and music — and worked as a house painter, carpenter, and mechanic.

    In addition to his creative endeavors, Mr. Miller was devoted to his family. He married the former Vonda K. Lester in 1980 and the couple had four children. They were his “top priority,” his family said. Last summer he and his wife celebrated their 30th wedding anniversary with a renewal of their vows.

    Mr. Miller was born to Lawrence Wesley Miller Jr. and Ellen Bennett Miller on Aug. 7, 1956, at Southampton Hospital. He grew up in Springs and attended the Springs School and East Hampton High School.

    He is survived by his wife and four children: Derek J. Miller, Cregg A. Miller, and Alexandra R. Miller, all of Springs, and Joshua Lawrence William Miller, 14, of Amagansett. Three sisters, Vanessa Bock of East Hampton, Deborah Follenius of South Carolina, and Frances Silipo of Springs, also survive.

    Funeral services were held at the Yardley and Pino Funeral Home in East Hampton on March 14 and at the Amagansett Presbyterian Church the next day with the Rev. Steven E. Howarth officiating. A private burial followed.

    Memorial donations have been suggested to the Joshua Miller Trust Fund in care of Suffolk County National Bank, 351 Pantigo Road, East Hampton 11937, or P.O. Box 446, Amagansett 11930.

    Visiting hours will be held tomorrow from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Yardley and Pino Funeral Home in East Hampton for Dianna Lee Kane, a lifelong East End resident who died at North Shore University Hospital in Manhasset on March 28 following a long illness. She was 61.

    Born on Feb. 2, 1950, in Southampton to Hester Lelia Hayes-Graham and Richard Lee Hartwell, Ms. Kane graduated from the East Hampton schools and studied at cosmetology and business schools on Long Island.

    Over the years she had been an administrative assistant, seamstress, hair stylist, and home and office cleaner, working briefly at The East Hampton Star and then becoming housekeeper and personal assistant for Tinka and the late Bud Topping in Sagaponack, a post she held for 25 years. According to her family, “She considered the Topping family her very own.”

    Ms. Kane was called alternately Di, Diola, and Di-Di. Her children said she was known for “her skillful manner for telling it like it is.” She was an active member of the Calvary Baptist Church in East Hampton, and a funeral service will be held for her there at 1 p.m. on Saturday. Ms. Kane, who loved music, sang in its choir.

    She also enjoyed cooking with her children, and going to the beach. Before her illness, Ms. Kane could often be seen on the front lawn of her house on Morris Park Lane working out to Jane Fonda. She also was known for her sewing talent and had made several wedding dresses.

    Ms. Kane is survived by four children, Jolyn Renee Hopson of Arlington, Va., Sharmon Lynn Hopson-Allen of Brentwood, Deven Kane of West Islip, and Lorenzo Lee Smith, also of Brentwood.  A sister, Marion Hayes-Bruno of Patchogue, also survives.

    Her parents died before her, as did a son, Melville Douglas Hopson Jr., a brother, Gregory Graham, and her ex-husbands, Melvin Hopson and Jack (John) Kane. Six grandchildren and one great-grandchild also survive, as do nieces and nephews, other members of her large, extended family, and her confidante, Charlene Walker of Bridgehampton.

    “Dianna was a fighter in every sense of the word,” her children wrote. “She fought to overcome many obstacles throughout her life. She fought for what she believed in, she fought for her children, grandchildren, and family members, and she fought for her life until the very end. . . .”

    James M. Struble, a carpenter and master craftsman who lived in East Hampton for the past 25 years, died here on March 28. He was 44.

    Mr. Struble was a member of an antique car club and volunteered at soup kitchens.

    Born on April 25, 1966, in Massapequa to Walter F. Struble and the former Gertrude Nestor, he attended Amityville Memorial High School.

    Mr. Struble is survived by five sisters, Mary Marks of Morehead City, N.C., Catherine Bird of Lindenhurst, Anne Struble of East Hampton, Patricia Hankinson of Aspen, Colo., and Carol Struble of New Paltz, N.Y. Three brothers, Christopher Struble of Bay Shore, William Struble of Oakdale, and Walter Struble of East Hampton, also survive.

    A service for Mr. Struble, who died of an alcohol-related illness, was held on Friday at Della Femina restaurant in East Hampton.

    Queen Davis-Parks, who touched the lives of many East Hamptoners as a teacher at the John M. Marshall Elementary School and as a devoted member of Calvary Baptist Church, died at home surrounded by family on April 6. She was 63 and had cancer.

    Born on July 11, 1947, at Southampton Hospital, Ms. Davis-Parks was the daughter of Girlie Lee Hayes and the former Jenny Hill of East Hampton, the 12th among their 13 children. She was named Queen Elizabeth Hayes because the famous ocean liner arrived in New York when she was born, and the street she lived on in East Hampton, Queen’s Lane, was named for her by her father, a master carpenter.

    Ms. Davis-Parks attended East Hampton schools. She began her teaching career as an aide at the East Hampton Day Care Center, then received a bachelor’s degree from Southampton College in elementary education cum laude. She went on to be awarded a master’s degree in science. She went into teaching as a divorced, single mother of two.

    She and Leon Parks were married on Valentine’s Day in 1983 and became the parents of two additional children. Like his wife, Mr. Parks had a long career in the schools here, as a social studies teacher and assistant principal at East Hampton High School.

    “. . . What drove Queen the most [was] her love for her husband, four children, and four grandchildren,” her family wrote. “Her door was always open” for the many children of relatives and friends “when the need arose,” they added.

    Neil O’Connell, a former principal of John Marshall, recalled being new to the district and excited at the prospect of Ms. Davis-Parks becoming a third-grade teacher. “My own son was in her class,” he said, “and had a great year.” In her 27-year tenure at John Marshall, she was among the first to include multicultural studies. She also was cited for her innovative and inspiring teaching style.

    In a biography written for the press, her family wrote: “One week her students were allowed to open their own restaurant. In so doing, they learned the math involved in fixing prices for the meals, the science in creating a recipe that is both delicious and wholesome, and the grammar and art necessary to create an appealing menu. The next week, they were runaway slaves on the Underground Railroad, using historic clues to navigate and astronomy to search for the North Star. . . .”

    Spreading knowledge also was a focus of her work at Calvary Baptist Church. She not only raised money for the Sunday school, but was costume designer for a number of youth productions. To celebrate Black History Month, she developed and produced a full-length film, “Cry for Freedom,” in which community as well as church members had roles.

    Her love of the church was notable even as a child, the Rev. Dr. Connie Jones of Calvary Baptist said. “Nothing would keep her from Sunday school,” even though she was the youngest of their group of friends. As an adult, she helped the church “when things weren’t going right,” Ms. Jones said. She noted that Ms. Davis-Parks was a soprano soloist and member of the church’s combined choir, whose favorite song was “God Specializes.” She also was a church trustee and had been chairwoman of its culinary department and its 50th anniversary banquet.

    In addition to her husband, Ms. Davis-Parks is survived by three daughters, Aleta Williams of Washington, D.C., and Amy Parker and Tiffany F. Parks of East Hampton, and one son, Gregory Parks of Washington, D.C. Makesha Joyner of Washington, D.C., who lived with the Davis-Parks family for many years and was considered a daughter, also survives, as do two brothers who were Tuskegee Airmen, Lee Hayes of East Hampton and Robert Hayes of Pensacola, Fla., her sisters, Helen Hillman of East Hampton and Eleanor Williams of New York City, four grandchildren, and, among many nieces and nephews, a niece whom she thought of as a sister, Rita Barnard of East Hampton. She was predeceased by her parents and eight siblings: Willie Hayes, James Hayes, Glenn Hayes, and George Hayes, and Hester Hayes-Graham, Evelyn Carter, Jenny Jones, and Dixie Jayne Casiel.

    A wake will be held at Calvary Baptist Church from 4 to 7 p.m. tomorrow, with the funeral there on Saturday at 1 p.m. Burial will be at Cedar Lawn Cemetery in East Hampton. The family has said they would prefer donations to the Queen Davis-Parks Scholarship Fund, which is being established in her honor, rather than flowers. They may be sent to Suffolk County National Bank, 351 Pantigo Road, East Hampton, in care of Sarah Almeraz.

    In learning of Ms. Davis-Parks’s death, the Right Rev. Michael Weeder, a family friend who is soon to become the archbishop of St. George’s Cathedral in Cape Town, South Africa, wrote to the family. “Your reflections on the life of your mother speak to a harvest of values and her impact on the lives of your family and the many you mention. What a qualitatively rich life.”     H.S.R.

   Howie Jablow, who had served as Southampton Hospital’s director of respiratory therapy since 1978, died last Thursday at Stony Brook University Medical Center after a short illness. A resident of Water Mill, Mr. Jablow was 59 years old.

    In addition to his position at the hospital, which he “so enjoyed and put his heart and soul into,” his family said, Mr. Jablow enjoyed sharing his knowledge through educational programs for students and with several skilled nursing facilities in the area. He was a founder of the Long Island Respiratory Care Managers Association, a trustee for the Water Mill Community Club, and a member of the Long Island East Ski Club.

    Mr. Jablow was born on Sept. 17, 1951, to Florence and Milton Jablow. He was raised in New Hyde Park and graduated from St. Joseph’s College, receiving his M.B.A. from Dowling College.

    According to his family, Mr. Jablow had a great curiosity for all things, and even built his own house with help from how-to books and his friends and family.

    Family was a priority for him. Aside from his wife, Pat, Mr. Jablow is survived by his three daughters, Janine Jablow Balnis of Springs, Caitlin Jablow of Westhampton, and Brianne Jablow of Arizona. He also is survived by his mother, his brother, Scott Jablow of Arizona, and many nieces and nephews, and had been anxiously awaiting the birth of his first grandchild at the end of the month.

    A service was held on Sunday at the Brockett Funeral Home in Southampton. Rabbi Jan Uhrbach of the Conservative Synagogue of the Hamptons presided.

    The family has suggested memorial contributions to the Southampton Hospital Foundation, 240 Meeting House Lane, Southampton 11968-5090, the Dominican Sisters Family Health Service, 103-6 West Montauk Highway, Hampton Bays 11946, the Water Mill Community Club, P.O. Box 182, Water Mill 11976, or the Conservative Synagogue of the Hamptons, P.O. Box 1800, East Hampton 11937.

    An Amagansett man escaped with injuries that were not life-threatening after a Friday crash on the Napeague stretch of the Montauk Highway in which his truck flipped on its side.

    East Hampton Town police reported that the injured man, Gustavo Torres, the superintendent of the Windward Shores Ocean Resort on Napeague, told them a man driving a tan Toyota Tundra pickup passed him in a no-passing zone, then suddenly slammed on the brakes. According to Mr. Torres, he was forced to choose between veering toward Cyril’s Fish House, which was crowded with its usual roadside bar patrons, or the right shoulder.

    On Monday and again Wednesday, during conversations with The East Hampton Star, Mr. Torres described his injuries as moderate, and he said pain was preventing him from resuming work. He said that his breathing had been difficult since the accident, which sent him to the emergency room at Southampton Hospital.

    Mr. Torres said that his 1995 Mitsubishi Montero had rolled onto the driver’s side when its wheels left the paved shoulder and reached roadside grass. He was pulled from the vehicle’s passenger-side door by a man who arrived moments later.

    He described what happened in a Monday conversation: “After my job, I was going to the Montauk I.G.A. I got to the highway. There was not traffic. I pulled out and was going 45, 50 miles per hour. I was in no rush.”

    Going on, Mr. Torres said he had seen the pickup “come up fast.” He alleged that the driver “tried to hit me in back. He came too close a couple of times. I thought he was drunk or something.”

    “I put my blinker on to the right to let him pass. He passed me and stopped completely. I saw his brake lights. I tried to avoid a collision. I pushed my brakes. I saw the smoke coming out of my tires. I was going side to side. I thought I was going to die.”

    Police reported that the man who Mr. Torres alleged caused the accident turned out to be Mark E. Dombrowski, 55, of Montauk. They ticketed him with passing in a no-passing zone, a traffic violation. East Hampton Town Police Detective Lt. Chris Anderson said yesterday that police were continuing to look into the matter.

    Detective Anderson said that in giving police a statement at the scene of the accident, Mr. Torres had not mentioned his belief that he was intentionally cut off by Mr. Dombrowski. Mr. Torres said police had spoken with him again this week.

    Mr. Dombrowski, a retired New York City firefighter, had been charged in 2005 — and then cleared — of third-degree assault as a hate crime, a felony, following a roadside struggle after he allegedly forced a Latino man, Luis Ochoa, also of Montauk off the road. Had Mr. Dombrowski been convicted he could have faced a maximum four-year jail term.

    The charges were dropped, however, when Mr. Ochoa’s injuries were deemed insufficient for the assault charge by the Suffolk district attorney’s office. Conviction would have required a sustained physical injury, which had not occurred. It was reported in news accounts from the time that in advance of his court appearance, Mr. Dombrowski, of his own accord, attended anger management sessions and an anti-bias class.

    Mr. Dombrowski referred requests for comment to his lawyer, Gordon Ryan of Amagansett, who had no comment.

    Rightly or wrongly, Mr. Torres believes malice was to blame, and said he has retained legal counsel.

    Mr. Torres said that it was his opinion that “When somebody does something like that, he’s trying to kill somebody. I have plenty of years driving, trust me.”

    Mr. Torres said he was a safe driver and said he was happy living on the South Fork.

    “I really enjoy the area. I clean the beach in front of the resort. I call in when I see seals that need help on the beach. I really love this area. I have a 10-year-old daughter. Thank God she was with her mother at that time.”

The East Hampton Town Police Department has said that the human remains found on a Gardiner's Bay beach Sunday were, according to the Suffolk medical examiner, those of a 20-to-30-year-old man of unknown ethnic background.

In a release to the media Tuesday morning, authorized by East Hampton Chief Ed Ecker, police said that the autopsy, completed Monday, had determined that the man had been small in stature, and that there were no obvious signs of trauma. Chief Ecker confirmed reports that the body was found without a head.

A local resident walking his dogs found the body at about noon Sunday in the surf line between Big Albert's Landing Beach and the Bell Estate. An East Hampton Town Marine Bureau officer was the first on the scene; he confirmed that the body was human. The town police dive team was called in to search the surrounding area. After an investigation on the beach, the body was taken to the Suffolk Medical Examiner's office in Hauppauge.

East Hampton Town police are continuing their investigation, in conjunction with the medical examiner's office and Suffolk police. Police have asked that anyone with information about missing persons in the area phone the town detective division at 631-537-7575.

    The Emergency Communications Department of East Hampton Village put out a press release and began a brochure campaign this week to alert the public that when calling 911 for help, providing certain details can prove critical: the name of the cross street, and as specific an address as possible.

    The department answers 911 calls from Montauk Point to Bridgehampton. As the release pointed out, “there are six separate fire and ambulance departments and three police departments” in that coverage area.

    The call for greater public awareness of how the 911 system works comes in the context of the death of Lanny Ross, a former Amagansett fire chief, in November. He had a heart attack, and his wife, Sherri, called 911 and gave her exact address, 419 Montauk Highway in Wainscott; dispatchers; however, routed emergency personnel to a duplicate street address in East Hampton. It was not until 13 minutes after her initial call that help arrived.

    In that case, the address information provided was indeed quite precise, though the tape of the 911 call reveals that it was not until dispatchers asked Ms. Ross for a cross street that they realized their mistake. Mr. Ross was pronounced dead at the hospital. Sherri and Lanny Ross’s estate has filed a notice of claim against East Hampton Village and the various departments and entities (including the village police) involved in the incident, leaving open a window of opportunity to sue for damages.

    The village’s press release also assured readers that, “Help is being sent while we are on the phone with you; answering our questions will not delay help!”

    A spokesperson for the Village Emergency Communications Department, reached by phone yesterday, said no particular incident inspired the public-relations push, and insisted this was simply an education campaign conducted in light of the massive annual influx of out-of-towners that will commence in earnest this week and accelerate over the summer.