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East Hampton

Introduction

From the Montauk Lighthouse to the Victorian mansions of Sag Harbor, from the hoary byways of East Hampton Village to the enduring beauty of Gardiners Island, East Hampton Town presents a rich cross section of Long Island history.

The town was founded April 29, 1648, with the purchase from the Montaukett Indians of about 31,000 acres of land reaching from the eastern boundary of Southampton to Hither Hills. Most of the small colony of first settlers were from Lynn, Mass., who had tight ties to their fellow English pioneers in Connecticut.

In fact, it was two Connecticut colony governors who swung the deal with the Indians for the land. Nine years earlier, in 1639, Lion Gardiner had bought the island that bears his name, located three miles north of East Hampton, which has been owned ever since by the Gardiner family.

Between 1658 and 1686, about 10,000 more acres were bought at Montauk to be held in common by the freeholders of East Hampton for use as summer pasture for their herds of cattle and sheep.

Town settlement began along what is now Main Street in East Hampton Village. But soon the community branched out, building roads to Northwest, a section of town where the first port was created (decades before Sag Harbor's founding in 1730), and to the meadows of Accabonac (Springs)] and the grazing lands of Wainscott.

A gristmill was built at Northwest in 1653, eliminating the initial dependence on Southampton for grinding grain. Carpenters, blacksmiths and the like had to be invited in from other communities at first, but self-sufficiency came quickly.

Early government ties to Connecticut were broken in 1664 when the Dutch surrendered New Netherlands to the British, and Long Island - reluctantly on the East End - became part of the colony of New York.

By the time Sag Harbor was established, the town was exporting hides, beef, tallow, pork, hoops, staves, cattle, horses, shoes, grain and fish to the West Indies and elsewhere. When the Revolution ended, Sag Harbor became the state's leading customs port.

The town today, with a population of about 16,800, is most noted as a summer resort and playground of the rich and famous, and for its picturesque farms and open space, including a world-class fishing center at Montauk.