Category: Reviews

Marilyn E. Weigold Peconic Bay: Four Centuries of History on Long Island’s North and South Forks. Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 2015. Pp. 336. ISBN: 9780815610458. Cloth, $24.95. Whether you are stranger to the East End or are intimately familiar with the area, Marilyn E. Weigold’s work describing “one of the last great places in the […]

Ellen NicKenzie Lawson. Smugglers, Bootleggers, and Scofflaws: Prohibition and New York City. Albany: SUNY Press, 2013. Pp. 151. ISBN: 9781438448169. Paper, $19.95 The Prohibition Era brings to mind the Mafia and the government G-men who sought their elimination. But there is also a maritime component to this story. Ellen NicKenzie Lawson examines the movement of […]

Edward P. Kohn, editor. A Most Glorious Ride: The Diaries of Theodore Roosevelt, 1877-1886. Albany: SUNY Press. 2014. Pp. 322. Photos, index, glossary. ISBN: 9781438455150. Hardcover, $29.95. On Saturday, April 1 1877, while at Newtonville, Massachusetts, Theodore Roosevelt entered into his diary: “Arvicola riparia. Hesperomys leucopus. Melospiza palustris. Loxia curvirostra. Salamandra. Rana damitans and palustris. […]

Harrison Hunt and Bill Bleyer. Long Island and the Civil War: Queens, Nassau and Suffolk Counties During the War Between the States. Charleston, SC: The History Press, 2015. Pp. 170, photographs. ISBN: 9781626197718. Paper, $21.99. This book fills in an important gap in Long Island’s history. No major Civil War battle ever occurred on Long […]

Robert B. MacKay, editor. Gardens of Eden: Long Island’s Early Twentieth-Century Planned Communities. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2015. Copyright by the Society for the Preservation of Long Island Antiquities. Pp. 303. Illustrations, index. ISBN: 9780393733211. Hardcover, $65.00. Oh, let us fly without delay Into the country far away, Where, free from all this […]

Richard F. Welch. General Washington’s Commando: Benjamin Tallmadge in the Revolutionary War. North Carolina: McFarland, 2014. Pp. 204. Photos, notes, bibliography, index. ISBN 978-0-7864-7963-4. Softcover, $35.00. Richard Welch offers a comprehensive biography of Setauket native Benjamin Tallmadge, an important, though little appreciated, figure in the history of Revolutionary War spy-craft and intelligence gathering. His book […]

Natalie A. Naylor. Women in Long Island’s Past: A History of Eminent Ladies and Everyday Lives. Charleston: The History Press, 2012. Pp. 192. ISBN: 9781609494995. Paper, $19.99. Natalie Naylor has written an excellent account of the often overlooked role of women in Long Island’s history. As the title suggests, it includes both women whose names […]

John A. Strong. Running on Empty: The Rise and Fall of Southampton College, 1963-2005. Albany: Excelsior Editions, SUNY Press, 2013. Pp. 325. ISBN: 9781438446967. $85.00 cloth, $29.95 paper. This is an exceptionally well-written narrative history of the Southampton branch of Long Island University. In many ways, the tale of the Southampton campus, an outlying branch […]

Frank J. Cavaioli. Farmingdale State College, A History. Albany: SUNY Press, 2012. Pp. 316. ISBN: 9781438443676. Cloth, $29.95. Electronic, $29.95. Before discussing this comprehensive history of what is now Farmingdale State College, I offer two general comments. One is that every college and university deserves to have a history – one that recounts the tale […]

Robert Maggio and Earlene O’Hare. Port Jefferson. Charleston, SC: Images of America, Arcadia Publishing, 2013. Pp. 127, photographs. ISBN: 0738598178. Paper, $21.99. Tricia Foley and Karen Mouzakes. Yaphank. Charleston, SC: Images of America, Arcadia Publishing, 2012. Pp. 127, photographs. ISBN: 0738592951. Paper, $21.99.    Recently, I read in the real estate section of a Long Island […]

Charlene Mires. Capital of the World: The Race to Host the United Nations. New York: New York University Press, 2013. Pp. 328. ISBN: 9780814707944. $30.00 cloth, $25.00 paper. There was a moment, seventy years ago, when the world’s hopes for peace centered on northern Nassau County. Before the United Nations (UN) took up residence along […]

Mac Griswold. The Manor: Three Centuries at a Slave Plantation on Long Island.  New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2013. Pp. 480. ISBN: 9780374266295. Paper, $18.00. Mac Griswold’s book details the fascinating history of her discovery and exploration of Sylvester Manor, a relic of Long Island’s past located on Shelter Island, and family owned for […]