After the Battle of Long Island in the fall of 1776, British forces re-gained control of New York from rebel forces. Until 1783, they commanded the southern portion of the colony-turned-state. A consequence of the British occupation was that New York — New York City, in particular — became a beacon for American Loyalists. Thousands […]
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In the spring of 1939 all the world converged on Flushing, Queens to cast a hopeful eye on the future. With George and Ira Gershwin’s Dawn of a New Day as its anthem, the 1939 World’s Fair promised a peek at the “World of Tomorrow.”[1] Flushing Meadows-Corona Park played host to the international exposition. The […]
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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 […]
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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 […]
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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. […]
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Introduction The wartime experiences of Colonel Richard Floyd IV, a wealthy Brookhaven landowner and influential judge, provide an intimate lens through which to view the varied Loyalist perspectives on the Revolution. Richard IV, who was a steadfast Loyalist throughout the entire Revolutionary War, was one of only three Suffolk County Loyalists named in the 1779 […]
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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 […]
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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 […]
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The William Floyd Estate today comprises 613 acres of land bordering Moriches Bay and the original Old Mastic House on site was lived in by at least eight generations of family members from 1718 to 1976. It is run today by the National Park Service and is a separate operating unit of Fire Island National Seashore. […]
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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 […]
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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 […]
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