Skip to main content

Norma Mae Edwards With Sled, 1938

Thu, 01/07/2021 - 06:42

In this photo from January 1938, Norma Edwards appears lying on a sled, with mittens and a hat, half covered in snow at 13 years old. The photo is part of the Carleton Kelsey Collection, digitized in partnership with the Amagansett Historical Association.

Norma Mae Edwards grew up on Fireplace Road in Springs. She was born on May 30, 1924, to Alice Look Edwards and Irving Lane Edwards. Norma was an only child, but she had two very close childhood friends from her neighborhood: Judith Miller and Alice Miller (Rogers). In her oral history, Norma shared a picture from 1934 of herself and her friend Alice Miller sitting on a sled that looks like the one she's using in this photo.

The reverse of the photograph bears a stamp from Earl Gardell, an enthusiastic amateur photographer whose family ran one of the local dairies. The location where Norma posed on the sled is not clear, but the note on the reverse reads "Golf Links at Night." Multiple golf courses were open locally by 1938, but it's most likely the closest golf course would have been the Maidstone Club. There's another photo in the Carleton Kelsey Collection of Norma in the same outfit, standing up with a snowy open area behind her.

In the years following this picture, Norma went to nursing school at Bellevue Hospital in Manhattan after completing high school locally. She worked in the hospital for almost a decade, including many years in the emergency department. While working in the city, she resided in the hospital's nurses' residences.

In 1943, she married her high school boyfriend, James Corwin, who was killed during World War II only a few weeks after their wedding. Norma later married Philip Marder, a dentist, with whom she had three children. Norma returned to her family's house in East Hampton to raise her children, continuing to work as a nurse. Norma and her family remain active in the community.

Andrea Meyer, a librarian and archivist, is the head of the East Hampton Library's Long Island Collection.

Villages

A ‘Good Trouble’ Protest Up Next

Weeks after the “No Kings” rally brought an estimated 1,200 people to East Hampton Town Hall, another demonstration to protest the Trump administration will happen next Thursday, with a nod to the late civil rights icon John Lewis.

Jul 10, 2025

Item of the Week: On the F.H. Warner Bakery

This photo from The Star archive shows the F.H. Warner Bakery, built in 1893 and sometimes known as the Montauk Bakery, when it stood next to the Methodist Church, near Hook Mill.

Jul 10, 2025

Bluebirds Thriving in East Hampton

“I think this is the most concentrated spot for bluebirds in all of New York State,” said Joe Giunta on a drizzly Saturday morning as he walked along a segment of a bluebird trail on Daniel’s Hole Road, adjacent to 600 acres of relatively open space.

Jul 3, 2025

 

Your support for The East Hampton Star helps us deliver the news, arts, and community information you need. Whether you are an online subscriber, get the paper in the mail, delivered to your door in Manhattan, or are just passing through, every reader counts. We value you for being part of The Star family.

Your subscription to The Star does more than get you great arts, news, sports, and outdoors stories. It makes everything we do possible.