Gatekeeper to Suffolk's history to retire

There are five elaborately detailed models of sailing ships in Wallace Broege's office, and two paintings of ships under sail.

On the wall outside his office in Riverhead is a historic, early American flag, a display of duck decoys and several more paintings and portraits.

There is nothing remotely resembling a skyscraper or four-lane highway, strip mall or supermarket, which is just as it should be.

For nearly 37 years Broege has been the gatekeeper of Suffolk County's history, which is housed in a red brick building on West Main Street across from the Riverhead Public Library. But he's retiring at the end of the month.

Broege, 65, has run the Suffolk County Historical Society -- a not-for-profit organization that despite its name is not a county agency -- since 1975. He oversees a staff of about six and many more volunteers.

Proud of collection

In a way, he defines the history that school groups and visitors get to see.

"I certainly have a lot of freedom here," Broege said. "But a blank check -- that I don't have."

He's proud of many of the things in the society's collection. He lists the Hulbert flag -- a still-controversial part of the permanent collection believed to have been made by Capt. John Hulbert of Bridgehampton and carried by him and his militiamen from Fort Ticonderoga to Philadelphia in 1775 -- as one of the items he is most proud of.

"The Hulbert flag is the treasure of our collection," he said.

Oral history says the Hulbert flag, which has red and white stripes and 13 stars and was found in a home once owned by Hulbert, could have influenced the design of the nation's first flag. Scientific tests on the flag and examination of Hulbert's diary have failed to confirm or disprove that story.

Broege thinks the most impressive part of the collection is the Fullerton photographic images on glass-plate negatives.

Fullerton was Hal B. Fullerton, who in 1905 became head of the Long Island Rail Road's agricultural department, at a time when the railroad was trying to persuade potential customers to open farms in central Suffolk County.

Between 1890 and 1930, Fullerton's work for the railroad included taking thousands of glass-plate photographs of Long Island's farms and farmers, fishermen and duck hunters, street scenes and ports. Today the society has about 2,500 of the plates, and it expects to get several hundred more slides. 

Going digital

Oddly, just as Broege is exiting, a longtime project to create digital images from the vast Fullerton collection is showing more detail in the works than was previously obtainable through traditional processing.

Broege said new information from the plates, and possibly from some new research being done on the Hulbert flag, are just parting gifts.

With so much on hand and so much time spent with the items, he finds it hard to play favorites. He quickly adds that the society has a large textile collection -- including costumes and military uniforms -- and "some fine pieces of furniture. And ceramics. But the flag is the most controversial item in our collection . . . and textiles and samplers and coverlets and costumes. That's our real strength. And Indian artifacts . . . and we have an excellent research library."

It is, he admits, an eclectic collection, most of it from donations and one that has been growing since the society was founded in 1886. "We're the oldest historical society in Suffolk County," Broege notes.

The items in the society's collections can also be viewed in traveling exhibits and at special events. There are more than three dozen historical societies on Long Island.

Broege said he will sometimes stop to look at a piece of furniture linked to the family of William Floyd -- the Long Island signer of the Declaration of Independence -- or at a particular piece of pottery, less famous but very representative of a bygone era.

Sometimes, he just listens to the old building breathe.

Climate control is important when it comes to preserving old collections, and Broege listens for the creaks and whirs of the machinery the society relies on to keep wood from swelling or paintings from flaking because of variations in temperature. 

Expanding mission

Broege will be succeeded by Kathryn M. Curran, the society's public programs and exhibition development coordinator.

She wants to expand the society's mission while preserving its collections and making them more available. She's already run classes on how to take oral histories and write a journal, and she sees history as not just the static past, but the rapidly changing present.

Curran said she wants to try to capture Suffolk's role in the civil rights movement and to track the growing influence of the Shinnecocks.

"I see us as a Suffolk County mini-Smithsonian," she said.

Broege said the time has come to do things he wants to do with his wife, Jane, and three grown children, and even to play with his two dogs. "It's just time for me to move on."

But he doesn't rule out driving back to the old building from his home in Wading River a few more times after he retires, just to see what's on display.