125 Years Ago 1898
From The East Hampton Star, February 4
The mercury went below zero this morning before sunrise.
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Frank Cartwright has begun his ice harvest and has a large force of men at work on Lily pond.
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Our town clock, with brazen face and hands outstretched, still insists that it is half-past two o’clock.
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A special meeting of Clinton Cycle club was held Monday night, and although there was a wild storm in progress there was a good attendance of enthusiastic wheelmen. The business in hand was the consideration of ways and means for building bicycle paths on Main street, as designated and set apart by the Commissioner of Highways.
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The method of washing the face daily is of great importance, as even if one only washes it twice a day the operation has to be gone through 700 times in the course of a year, and this would naturally affect it for good or evil. Highly scented or highly colored soaps should be avoided, and one which gives a soft lather and does not cause any feeling of irritation is the best.
100 Years Ago 1923
From The East Hampton Star, February 2
The returns on all kinds of game reported on licenses issued in Suffolk county follow. The fact that the license was issued in Suffolk county does not necessarily indicate that the game was taken in this county:
Ducks, 36,285, a decrease of 2,413; cottontail rabbits, 14,919, a decrease of 7,130; quail, 3,011, a decrease of 3,528; greater yellowlegs, 1,426, a decrease of 3,124; muskrats, 1,331, a decrease of 1,740; gray squirrels, 1,997, a decrease of 330; coots, 1,184, an increase of 83; jack rabbits, 483, a decrease of 280; wilson or jacksnipes, 566, a decrease of 60; geese, 981, an increase of 561; grouse or partridge, 390, an increase of 18; woodcock, 502, an increase of 146; snowshoe rabbits, 315, a decrease of 30; skunks, 72, a decrease of 256; pheasants, 408, an increase of 123; red foxes, 221, a decrease of 53; black-bellied plover, 314, an increase of 95; gallinules, 16, a decrease of 188; mink, 51, a decrease of 109; golden plover, 653, an increase of 507; opossum, 95, a decrease of 10; raccoons, 54, a decrease of 26; brant, 239, an increase of 155; rails, 52, a decrease of 26; bobcats, 37, a decrease of 22; black squirrels, 21, a decrease of 12; deerbucks, 15, a decrease of 2; fox squirrels, 0, a decrease of 14; fishers, 0, a decrease of 8; gray foxes, 7, an increase of 2; otters, 2, a decrease of 2; number of licenses, 8,197, an increase of 509.
75 Years Ago 1948
From The East Hampton Star, February 5
The Ladies’ Village Improvement Society met on Monday in Guild Hall, Mrs. A. Victor Amann presiding, Mrs. Charles Juckett and Mrs. Kennell Schenck reading secretary’s and treasurer’s reports, and Mrs. Frank Bartholet and Mrs. Harry Escalette entertaining at tea, assisted at the tea table by Mrs. Frederick Yardley and Mrs. James McGuirk, who poured, and Mrs. Samuel Cline.
Town Pond and its skating facilities were brought before the society by Mrs. Maude Taylor. It was voted to empower Mrs. Taylor to take whatever steps she can for more lighting at the Pond and perhaps flooding the surface for smoothness this year; and to present an estimate for what improvements may be needed for next year.
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The question of mail delivery was brought up at the last meeting of the Village Board; and the Ladies’ Village Improvement Society discussed it on Monday. Postmaster Samuel Cline says that East Hampton has had such an increase in business during the past year that we will probably become a first class Post Office at the beginning of the next fiscal year in July 1948, although no official notice of the change has been received, as yet. A first class Post Office can have carrier service, if the public demands it and fulfills certain requirements.
50 Years Ago 1973
From The East Hampton Star, February 1
The list of American prisoners held in Indochina received from the North Vietnamese government last Saturday did not include the name of Air Force Major Robert A. Lodge, who has been missing in action since his plane went down 70 miles northeast of Hanoi last May.
His parents, Mr. and Mrs. Raymond Lodge of Hampton Waters, East Hampton, and Columbus, Ohio, had not held much hope, but yesterday his sister, Mrs. Ronald Ostaff of South Fairview Avenue, Montauk, said the absence of his name from the list seemed final evidence to them of his death.
“We assume he didn’t make it,” Mrs. Ostaff said.
Major Lodge’s death would bring the total number of men who have lost their lives in the Vietnam conflict whose families lived in East Hampton to three, as far as can be ascertained.
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A memo on the Town “scenic road system” and a public hearing to consider tentative approval on a cluster development that is proposed to be a part of it were the dominating topics at the meeting of the East Hampton Town Planning Board in Town Hall.
The Town’s professional planner, Thomas M. Thorsen, presented a three-page memo outlining what he described as a need for a scenic road system as a means of implementing the Town’s open space ordinance, which, in his view, “offers the best overall answer to future development practice wherein much of the natural and cultural amenities of the site can be protected or enhanced.”
25 Years Ago 1998
From The East Hampton Star, February 5
A winter storm that pummeled the Atlantic shore last week with flood tides and waves estimated at over 16 feet has left a massive erosion-control project in Bridgehampton in tatters, its owner charging vandalism, and the Southampton Town Board and Trustees scrambling to gain control of a situation that threatened other oceanfront houses and W. Scott Cameron Beach at Mecox.
On Monday, at a joint meeting with the Trustees, the Town Board ordered William Rudin of Dune Road to remove from the beach the remnants of the woven plastic tubing used in his massive “subsurface dune restoration system,” some of which had drifted as far west as the Shinnecock Inlet.
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“No one has planned outdoor concerts here,” declared Stephen B. Latham, the newly elected chairman of East Hampton’s newly formed Recreation Commission, at a meeting last week on the RECenter, the youth center slated for construction at Gingerbread Lane Extension and Lumber Lane in the village.
“That was never part of the plan, and the Zoning Board can impose that restriction as a condition” of the special permit needed to build in the residential zone, said Mr. Latham.
Rumors had been circulating that outdoor concerts would be staged at the center, with listeners congregating on an outdoor bank of steps extending to the second story.
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More land in East Hampton was given subdivision approval in 1997 than in any other year since 1991, and the amount of new commercial square footage approved was up more than two and a half times from last year.
