Long Island’s Endangered Historic Places
Every other year, Preservation Long Island compiles a list of historic places on Long Island that are endangered. Each list is a mix of structures from different periods of time, […]
Category: Preservation
The Our Hamptons Podcast
Your idea of the Hamptons on the East End of Long Island may include images of supersized mansions and extravagant parties, but there is an older, richer Hamptons history beneath […]
Bellport Preservation with Victor Principe
A tree-lined street running gently down to a flat blue bay, flanked by over two hundred years worth of American architecture. Bellport in all its glory, from its founding by […]
Returning to the Culper Spy Ring
Today we dive back into a discussion of the Culper Spy Ring, turning our attention to the area of Port Jefferson or, more appropriately, its original incarnation of Drowned Meadow. […]
Restoring Thornhill’s Pharmacy with Matthew La Piana
Thornhill’s Pharmacy has overlooked the center of Sayville from the corner of Main Street and Gillette Avenue for over a century. This is actually the second location of Sewell Thornhill’s […]
Remembering Lillian Barbash
We’re rebroadcasting our interview with Lillian, Cathy and Susan Barbash about their family and their fight to stop Robert Moses from driving a road down the middle of Fire Island. […]
Preservation Awards: Oakdale Historical Society
Maryann Almes, president of the Oakdale Historical Society, joins us to discuss the organization’s role in preserving and celebrating the history of Oakdale. Located in Islip on the south shore […]
Preservation Awards: The Fordham Mill
The Fordham Mill (also known as the Tuttle-Fordham Mill or the Brick Mill) in Remsenburg was a local landmark long before it caught the eye of John Kanas. Growing up […]
Preservation Awards: Babylon’s Oak Beach Life- Saving Station
Welcome back to the awards ceremony. Today we hit the beach to talk to Mary Cascone, Babylon Town Historian, about the Oak Beach Life-Saving Station. Perched between the Great South […]
Preservation Awards: Sea Cliff Firehouse
The preservation awards ceremony continues! Today we speak with Erinn McDonnell of the village of Sea Cliff in Nassau County. Erinn managed the restoration of their 1931, Tudor revival-style firehouse […]
Preservation Awards: SANS Sag Harbor
It’s a preservation party and you’re all invited! We’ve teamed up with Preservation Long Island to help celebrate their 2020 Preservation Awards. Over the next week we’ll be posting interviews […]
John Warren’s Almanack
We travel this week to the Adirondacks (virtually speaking) to talk with John Warren, founder and publisher of New York Almanack. Formerly known as the New York History Blog, the […]
Where Old New York State Newspapers Live On
Our sojourn through the hallowed pages of the Suffolk County News from 1920 hit a speedbump this week when it turned out that no digital copy was available online. To […]
Someone Lived Here
The places we live are filled with the stories of our lives, told room by room like chapters in a book. So how do you read a home? That’s what […]
We Were the Whalers
We return today to the sea to consider the whale. More specifically, we talk with Brenna McCormick-Thompson of the Whaling Museum and Education Center in Cold Spring Harbor. Brenna is […]
Living with the Pandemic
Two museum directors, one public librarian, an artist, a researcher, and a journalist. We’re spending time today catching up with past guests to see how they’re faring. The result is […]
The LaGrange Inn on Higbie Lane
The LaGrange Inn was a storied stopping point along Montauk Highway from the 1700s when it opened for business with a Higbie at the helm. It remained a local landmark, […]
Still There on Christian Avenue
History is not the full story if not everyone gets to tell it. And in places where the traditional records are scarce or silent, where do you look for answers? […]
Remembering Gene Horton
We were saddened by the recent news of the passing of Gene Horton, Blue Point historian, former social studies teacher, tour guide, storyteller, friend and colleague. To honor Gene’s memory […]
Working on the Rail Road
David Morrison knows his railroads, from his six books on LIRR history to his extensive research collection to his years overseeing thirty-nine stations. With his seventh book due out from […]
Saving Long Island’s Endangered History
Every other year, Preservation Long Island compiles a list of endangered historic places in need of saving. Sarah Kautz, their Preservation Director, joins us to discuss the four sites chosen […]
Not Your Grandmother’s Museum
If you haven’t visited a Long Island museum in a while, now would be a good time. Erin Elizabeth Becker will tell you why. Erin is the Visitor Services & […]
Come for the beach, stay for the local history lecture.
More than a beach or a brand, Southampton has a history that stretches back thousands of years with the Native Americans in North America. The coming of English settlers in […]
Saving Lake Ronkonkoma
We’ve interviewed people who have restored houses and inns and even old race cars but how do you go about restoring a lake? We conitnue our conversation with Evelyn Vollgraff […]
Still Waters Run Deep
 The waters of Lake Ronkonkoma have seen it all: Native Americans, English settlers, Broadway actresses, 20th century resort-goers and automobile racers. No one knows this better than Evelyn Vollgraff, […]
The Local History of Ghosts and Spirits
 Don’t call her a ghostbuster. Kerriann Flanagan Brosky approaches her investigations of the paranormal on Long Island with a photographer’s eye and a historian’s perspective. She has long been […]
Fighting Fires, Saving History
 Who knew that firehouses were such deep sources of local history? In the town of Islip, they are overflowing with trophies, photos, devices, and mechanisms going back to the […]
Washington’s Spy Letters
 We’ve been tracking the history of the Culper Spy Ring for a while on the Project but today we go to the source – two primary sources to be […]
Remembering Gil Bergen
 On this episode, we honor the memory of Gil Bergen, superintendent of the Connetquot River State Park Preserve, and his long service to the Park and the memory of […]
The South Side Signal Newspaper
Henry Livingston came to Babylon in 1869 and founded the South Side Signal. He made an immediate splash advocating for Babylon to split from the town of Huntington and went […]
SPLIA’s Endangered Historic Places 2017
Sarah Kautz, preservation director of the Society for the Preservation of Long Island Antiquities, joins us to discuss their new list of most endangered historic places on Long Island. From […]
Picturing the Past
Jeremy Dennis is in pursuit of the past, intent on documenting the historical and sacred sites of indigenous people on Long Island. His project, On This Site, restores a map […]
The Colored Girl from Long Island
Today we talk with Sandi Brewster-walker about her life and her family’s history. Not only do the Brewsters have deep ties to North Amityville and the Native American community on […]
Sayville’s Gilded Age Boss Architect
Isaac H. Green, Jr. was the man to call if you needed a house built around the turn of the last century on the South Shore of Long Island. As […]
If Seeds Could Talk
Long Island was once known as “The Garden of the States.” Farms and nurseries and orchards filled the landscape from Queens to Quogue and everywhere in between. Many interesting questions […]
Morton Pennypacker: Long Island Spy Hunter
Frank Knox Morton Pennypacker was many things: author, printer, collector, antiquarian, and…godfather of AMC’s hit Long Island historical drama Turn? It was, after all, Pennypacker’s diligent research into (and just […]
The Coolest Field Trip You’ll Ever Take
When an athletic, thrill-seeking millionaire builds a mansion hideaway on the outskirts of the city, stocking it with a technologically advanced fleet of cars, boats and airplanes along with trophies […]
Old Mansions Never Die
George Davies’ younger days would be the envy of any boy. During the Great Depression in Oakdale, he and his brothers had the run of Pepperidge Hall, a giant 19th-century […]
5 Surprising Ways Historic Preservation Can Save Long Island
What better way to celebrate National Preservation Month than by interviewing Jason Crowley, Preservation Director of the Society for the Preservation of Long Island Antiquties (SPLIA)? Jason comes to Long […]
Stories of Storm and Sea
Folklorists would make good podcasters. They are used to finding interesting people and getting them to tell good stories. Take Nancy Solomon for example. As the executive director of Long […]
“My Kind of Conservationist”
It’s 1962 and a Nor’easter has just torn through Long Island. In its wake is another storm, Long Island Parks Commissioner Robert Moses with his plan to build a […]
Battling Robert Moses
Karl Grossman has been an investigative reporter on Long Island since the early 1960s. Barely in his twenties, he cut his journalistic teeth at the Babylon Town Leader taking on […]
A Neighborhood of History
Eastville endures. Through the rise and fall of the whaling industry, over the long slow death of slavery, past the rising tide of development on the East End of Long […]
Peter Fox Cohalan Part II
Suffolk County Historian Peter Fox Cohalan is back in session for part two of our interview. This week we get deeper into the history of Islip, traveling all the way […]
Holding Court with Peter Fox Cohalan
Peter Fox Cohalan was named Suffolk County Historian in 2012 but in many ways he’s been preparing for the role his whole life. In fact, the Cohalans and history go […]
Lightning Strikes: Saving the Wardenclyffe Lab in Shoreham
The historic site you want to preserve is up for sale for $1.3 million dollars. The good news: New York State will give you $850,000. The bad news: you have […]
Hooked on Tesla
Jane Alcorn was hooked on science from an early age but it was not until a friend clued her in to the Wizard of Electricity that she became hooked on […]
The Lost Lords of the Manor
We’re back for part II of our interview with Dr. Gaynell Stone, executive director of the Suffolk County Archaeological Association and now accomplished filmmaker. Her connection to Stephen Mrozowski’s work […]
An Island of History Under Our Feet
Dr. Gaynell Stone was instrumental in the creation of Readings in Long Island Archaeology and Ethnohistory, the series of reference books that, starting in the 1970s, pulled together the foundational […]
Moriches and the Terry-Ketcham Inn
Growing up in the Moriches, Mary Field noticed what most people didn’t. As old buildings were being torn down, she wondered who would remember what had gone before. What followed […]