Walt Whitman: Straight out of Paumanok
Two hundred years ago, the man who broke American poetry wide open was born in West Hills, Long Island. His house remains a shrine and place of pilgrimage for fans […]
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 & […]
Clarence H. Robbins: All About the Horses
Clarence H. Robbins was a master of hounds and horses, a gentleman jockey and trainer, and a member of Brooklyn’s Gilded Age elite. Come explore this forgotten Long Island figure […]
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 […]
Genealogy and You
Linda Metzger is the Long Island Genealogist. On today’s episode, you’ll hear how she turned a hobby into a career working to uncover the lost, complicated, and often forgotten stories […]
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, […]
Tracing the Whale Design
Dr. John Strong, professor emeritus of Southampton College, has spent a career pursuing the history of Long Island’s Native Americans. His latest achievement is bringing to life the earliest […]
God Bless Us, Every One
You haven’t missed it! There is still time to attend the Charles Dickens Festival in Port Jefferson on December 1st and 2nd. Don’t know about the Festival? Don’t know […]
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 […]
The Night That Dowling Burned
In honor of Labor Day, we return to the subject of Long Island volunteer firefighters. Last episode, Tom Rinelli and Connie brought up the infamous 1974 fire at Dowling […]
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 […]
Revisiting the 18th Century Alien Weasel Influx on Long Island
Matthew Montelione is back to discuss his new fantasy comic book series set in Revolutionary War-era Long Island. If you are a fan of history, JRR Tolkien, or the […]
Anna Smith Strong, Long Island Patriot
Margo Arceri grew up with history. A native of Strong’s Neck in Setauket, she learned early on the stories of Anna Smith Strong and the role she played in […]
Long Island’s Notable Women
Behind every great woman is another great woman and Natalie Naylor is bringing them to light. Her book Women in Long Island’s Past (History Press, 2012), highlights the accomplished […]
Postcards from Huntington
PJ Novak wrote the history of Huntington on a postcard. A librarian, archivist and dedicated deltiologist, she is also the author of Huntington from the Postcard History Series of […]
Ducks on Ice
The Long Island Ducks personified an era and a brand of hockey. From 1959 to 1973, they fought, checked, and slashed their way through the Eastern Hockey League and […]
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 […]
We Bought a Newspaper
Mary Lou Cohalan and her husband bought the Suffolk County News along with three other couples in the late 1960s. Her resulting career as the first woman editor of […]
Chris Bodkin’s Book of Sayville
Chris Bodkin is a man with a keen eye for detail and a deep love for his hometown of Sayville. We’ve published our interview with him in three parts – […]
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 […]
Time in a Bottle
Mark R. Smith saves time in a bottle, literally. His antique bottle collection preserves the memory of local dairies, pharmacies, hotels and more. It also tells the story of a […]
Mother Newsday
Bob Keeler wrote the book on Newsday, a candid history detailing the origin story of Long Island’s original tabloid. Started in 1940 as the “toy” of Alicia Patterson, the paper […]
The Soldier City of Suffolk County
Imagine a city rising from the fields of Suffolk County in the early 20th cenutry, a wooden metropolis covering almost 20,000 acres. It has its own post office, theater, library […]
Making Gatsby Great
Few authors are more synonymous with a place and point in time than F. Scott Fitzgerald. His Great Gatsby came to define the 1920s and cast a golden aura across […]
Longwood Stories
Melanie Cardone-Leathers is the Local History Librarian at the Longwood Public Library. Today she regales us with tales covering three centuries and many locations. There is Benjamin Tallmadge burning the […]
In the Heart of Roosevelt
Carol Gilliam is the Black Heritage Librarian at Roosevelt Public Library where she oversees a collection dedicated to black culture and history. On this episode we discuss the growth and […]
Out of Bayville, Endlessly Rocking
Bill Bleyer has a knack for finding history – or maybe it finds him. He had front row seats for Woodstock, did battle with Robert Moses, and got tear-gassed at […]
The Cuban Giants of Long Island
It’s the summer of 1885 and an industrious and itinerant hotel man named Frank P. Thompson is making history on Long Island. Working for the season at the Argyle Hotel […]
The Hurricane of 1938
We’re looking back to the Hurricane of 1938 on this episode. Called “The Long Island Expresss” by some, “The Great New England Hurricane” by others, remembered by all who lived […]
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 […]
Floyds Like Us
If you were to name the most famous Floyd on Long Island before the outbreak of the Revolution, chances are it would not have been William Floyd. His cousin, Richard […]
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 […]
Jack Ellsworth, Long Island’s Big Band Man
Jack Ellsworth, born Ellsworth Shiebler, won acclaim and a loyal following over a 60-plus year career in broadcasting on stations from WHIM to WALK and WLIM. Just as importantly, he […]
Pirates of the Connetquot
George Munkenbeck, Islip Town Historian, discusses the history of the town from it’s possibly piratical origins to its surprising connections to WW I and the Suffragist movement. And to all […]
Rocky Point, Einstein and Me
What’s a summer bungalow without a machine shop, a kiln and a working loom in the living room? Add in piles of beach stones waiting to be sculpted, framed pictures […]
La Salle Military Academy
Things were changing on the south shore of Long Island in the 1920s. In the area of Oakdale, a prototypical Gold Coast, the great mansions of the last century were […]
Patchogue: Queen City of the South Shore
If you wanted something back in 19th-Century Long Island, chances are they made it in Patchogue: lace, twine, lumber, crinoline, wrapping paper, blankets, award-winning yachts. A sprawling arrangement of brick […]
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 […]
Making Puppets Come Alive
If the Muppets are all you know of puppetry then this episode will be an eye opener. Beyond the antics of Kermit the Frog and earlier popular acts such as […]
Bill and Pat Colson: The Art of Living
Bill Colson was a stand-out basketball player from Sayville High School (’47). In the Korean War he served as an Air Force cryptographer until, stricken by polio, he returned to […]
The Long Island Suffrage Playbook
Women in most states could still not vote at the turn of the last century. The suffrage movement was stalled and icons such as Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. […]
The Jewish Community on Long Island
Genealogist Rhoda Miller and the Jewish Genealogical Society of Long Island recently published Jewish Community of Long Island from Arcadia Press. The book tracks the development of Jewish communities across […]
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 […]