Our Hamptons

The Long Island Railroad's “Cannon Ball” made its first trip to Montauk from Jamaica, NY in 1890, and operated until the 1970s. The continuous service was provided on weekday afternoons from Long Island City until 1951 when service was then provided from Penn Station. Originally, the Cannon Ball was a train composed entirely of parlor cars – the epitome of luxury – and many regarded the Cannon Ball as a prestigious way to arrive in the Hamptons. But the real conversation of the Cannonball starts with the history of the LI Rail Road. Most of the effort out here was in the 1890’s, and a lot of it grew out of one man’s dream, Austin Corbin, who was a very wealthy banker in New York. He became President of the Long Island Railroad in 1881. As soonas he got onto this job, he had a lot of problems because he inherited a railroad that was bankrupt and actually had been formerly three different railroads. Once he put those together after about a year or so, he turned to the fulfillment of his dream and that was, not necessarily to build a railroad to the end of Long Island. His objective was to shorten the distance by water, over the ocean, between England and New York.

Esperanza and Irwin welcome Sarah Kautz, the Executive Director of the Southampton History Museum. The question is an intriguing one: Did the Mayflower Pilgrims land at Conscience Point, Southampton as well as Plymouth Rock? Through a fun and free wheeling conversation, Sarah shares some thoughts and theories illuminating a fascinating part of American history, within the boundaries of eastern Long Island.

While Esperanza and Irwin both share their personal connections to the Art Barge, this extraordinary story speaks for itself. While Victor and Mabel's lives were devoted to Art, they couldn't have been more different. Victor was one of 11 children of Italian immigrants, Mabel an only child descending from the original settlers of our country. Victor created the education department at MOMA, while Mabel was the Art Department Chair at Rye High School. But it's their arrival to remote Lazy Point, Amagansett in the 1940's, and tugging a decommissioned naval vessel from Jersey City to the shores of Napeague Bay remains a source of wonder to this day.

Esperanza and Irwin go back to a far quieter Springs, September 1970. George Sid Miller's farm field became the launch site for a dream — and the scene of a tragedy. Three young adventurers set off in the Free Life, a hot air balloon bound for Europe, in a daring attempt to cross the Atlantic. But the balloon and its passengers vanished without a trace, leaving behind a mystery that still haunts the community today.In this episode, we explore how the Free Life launch shook the close-knit Springs neighborhood that embraced it as its own, and the lingering questions asked for over 50 years. What drove the crew to take such a risk? And how did this brief moment in aviation history leave such a lasting impression. A story of youth, ambition, community, and loss — told from where it all began.

In this special episode, we sit down with Pulitzer Prize-winning architecture critic Paul Goldberger to revisit his seminal 1983 New York Times article, "The Strangling of a Resort." Over four decades later, we explore how his observations about overdevelopment, zoning failures, and the clash between preservation and profit still echo through the East End today. What has changed? What hasn't? And what does the future hold?Join us as we reflect on the past, examine the present, and consider what it will take to preserve the character of eastern Long Island in the face of relentless growth.

Esperanza and Irwin discuss all things Yard Sale with Sheril Antonio. Sheril's professional career as Senior Associate Dean and Professor at Tisch School of Arts at NYU speaks volumes, but on a different platform. In the early 2000's, Sheril and Irwin were a yard sale couple, spending countless Saturday mornings traveling the back roads from Southampton to Montauk. The journeys may have started as a quest for objects, but the story line quickly changed. It became less about the object, more about the stories, the culture, the people. Most of all, the indelible memories that remain.

Esperanza and Irwin delve into the Prohibition Era, 1920 to 1933. There apparently were lots of hands in the till, making money from Prohibition on Long Island, or Liquor Island, as one prominent minister was quoted as saying. Carl Fisher, who's Island Club on Montauk's Star Island was the most glamorous speakeasy of its time, with patrons like Ernest Hemingway and NYC Mayor Jimmy Walker. Arthur Benson, where $250,000 worth of alcohol, a staggering amount in 1925, was confiscated from his 4000 acre estate. But it was the fishermen and baymen involved as well, eluding not just the authorities like the Coast Guard, but pirates and mobsters, like Al Capone, while transporting alcohol throughout Long Island and into NYC. With further involvement from Temperance Societies in the early 19th century, to the KKK's support of prohibition in an effort to appear patriotic, we were amazed at all the story lines that converge in this podcast. Listening is Believing.

Esperanza and Irwin discuss the trajectory of the Hampton Classic over the years. It's origins started as the annual Horse Show in Southampton in the early 1900's, overlooking Lake Agawam. It flourished to the point of some horse enthusiasts forming the Southampton Riding and Hunt Club in 1922. The depression created a long hiatus for the show until the early 1950's, and its rebirth as a fundraiser for the Parrish Museum. In the 1970's it moved to Dune Alpin Farm in East Hampton for a bit, and has been at its current Bridgehampton location since 1982. Its expansion into one of the premier events of its kind in the world, mirroring the ever rising profile of eastern Long Island.

Esperanza and Irwin didn't intend for this podcast to go 59 minutes, our longest episode to date. Jerry Torre's fascinating story, as a teenager in his friend Billy's Lazy Point fishing cottage, to his work on the Geddes estate on Lily Pond Lane is riveting. But his years living and working for the Beales at Grey Gardens, his involvement in the Maysles documentary and his personal recollections is at the the heart of this special podcast.

Esperanza and Irwin discuss the preservation of Barcelona Neck and The Grace Estate in East Hampton's Northwest Woods. The land was bought for $6.3 million from collector Ben Heller in 1985 after a referendum, the largest and most expensive public land purchase ever undertaken here at the time. The Nature Conservancy contributed $500,000 to the cost. Randall Parsons, who, in his former post as an East Hampton Town councilman, was instrumental in negotiating the purchase described at the time a Town at the crossroads. "There were subdivision applications in on Barcelona Neck [across Northwest Harbor], the Grace Estate, and Hither Hills in Montauk. It was the first time that people really rose up and said this is not what we want" The purchase was made after a prolonged public debate. Opponents argued against borrowing so much money, saying that if the Grace Estate were developed, town zoning laws would sufficiently limit development at far less expense. But fast forward 40 years, and imagine this much acreage with houses, condominiums and...

Esperanza and Irwin welcome Hannah Lasurdo. Hannah is a Miller, one of the oldest East End families, going back generations. Hannah shares her formative years honestly, including her personal struggles. But what Hannah truly explores is the intangible that we never seem to adequately explain. What is it about this place, that continues to draw us, despite the drastic changes evident to all.

Esperanza and Irwin reflect on the Lost Montauk, from a terrific article written by Henry Osmers for the Montauk Historical Society. Curiously, Montauk often doesn't get the historical respect, for lack of a better term, than other East End villages or hamlets do. We'll visit First House, the Montauk Island Club, Sandpiper Hill and the Wyandanee Inn and more in this homage to Montauk's rich history.

Esperanza and Irwin talk about the Shinnecock Summer School of Art, the first outdoors Art School in the US, founded in 1891. Students had the opportunity to learn from the renowned artist William Merritt Chase. Now, Chase was and is a well known Artist. But it was the Art Village cottages, grouped near the studio in the Shinnecock Hills, that is the off-radar part of the story. These properties, in different styles on curving streets created its own sense of wonder. What presented itself was almost whimsical, a storybook like setting. Best of all, it exists to this day. Listening is believing!

Esperanza and Irwin discuss the beginnings of the Southampton Summer Colony, inspired by Dr. David Goddard's "Colonizing Southampton". In September of 1863, a young Manhattan physician of means by the name of Theodore Gaillard Thomas went by horse and wagon out to visit the farms and rural villages of Long Island with his wife. The trip lasted many days. The couple spent their first two nights in Babylon staying at a rooming house, then pressed on to Quogue, Southampton, East Hampton and Montauk, finally spending a night out at the lighthouse with the keeper and his family there. During this sojourn, Thomas fell in love with the simple though bucolic communities of eastern Long Island and, after returning to Manhattan, vowed that sometime in the future he would return with some friends with the intention of establishing a summer colony there. He had become charmed by the farmland that went down to the ocean, the single Main Streets with the Presbyterian Church, the blacksmith shops, feed stores and dry goods stores that marked what were essentially old New England Communities. Dr. Thomas is considered to have been the founder of the Southampton Summer Colony as we know it today. Within four years, he had persuaded many others to build there. By 1882, there were 30 summer owners (a dozen “cottages”) where five years earlier there had been none. Two years later, Dr. Thomas and others in that group met in a Fifth Avenue apartment in Manhattan to found what was then called the Southampton Village Improvement Association to “beautify the principal streets” and “see to the removal of nuisances” so as to make Southampton even more attractive to possible future summer residents. As you might have imagined, they soon came into conflict with the local residents of the community—there were about 500 of them, who were enjoying the town as their ancestors had for 200 years before—farming the land, fishing the waters and otherwise engaging successfully in rural activities. Sound familiar?

Esperanza and Irwin welcome Ellin and Eliabeth Saltzman. In the early 1960's, Ellin and Renny Saltzman hired a 33 year old architect named Richard Meier to design a modernist family home in East Hampton. Small by today's standards at 4000 square feet, Ellin and her daughter Elizabeth reflect on 5 decades of summers spent in an ever changing East Hampton, as well as the future of their iconic home. A not to be missed Our Hamptons podcast.

Esperanza and Irwin discuss the proliferation of dairy farms on the east end in the not too distant past. If you define a dairy as any farm with more than eight cows, there were once 42 operational dairy farms in East Hampton alone, according to the East Hampton Farm Museum. At that time, “most of the milk was for local consumption,” said Robert Hefner, historic preservation consultant for East Hampton Village. By the 1960s, most dairies on the East End had been shuttered, with the last two operating into the early 1980s—Carwytham Farm in Bridgehampton and Cow Neck Farm in North Sea. We'll focus primarily in East Hampton with the Sherril, Hardscrabble, and Dune Alpin Farms. The dialogue about the Gould and Tillinghast farms, and their subsequent merger to form G&T took us to a side story: the beloved G&T Chicken House on Race Lane.

Esperanza and Irwin first met in 2000, when Esperanza was operating her art gallery, Art Solar on North Main Street, East Hampton. Irwin became a client of the gallery (though it took him a year to buy his first painting!). More importantly, it opened up a dialogue between Esperanza and Irwin, conversations that transcended Art, including the type of subjects you hear today on the podcast. I guess the groundwork for Our Hamptons started well before its May 2022 inception. Listen, and go back in time to where it all started, and how it got here!

Esperanza and Irwin talk about the storied (and sordid) history of Ocean Castle, on Meadow Lane, Southampton. In 1929, the stock market crash doomed many, but apparently, not William F. Ladd. Apparently, his alleged bootlegging operation supported an unimaginable lifestyle. He commissioned the prestigious architectural firm of Peabody, Wilson and Brown to design what was described as a multi room fairy tale on over 300 feet of oceanfront. The next owner, Robert Harris rents the house in 1963 to fellow summer resident Donald Leas Jr, who hosts an after party there that trashes the place, including breaking 1600 windowpanes. By 1978, the eccentric theater producer Roy Radin acquires the property, hosts a nightmarish party that leads to sexual assault. And this pre-dates Barry Trupin, who in the midst of constructing Dragons Head down the road, rents the property and literally installs Coney Island within it! Too much to describe here, but listening will be believing!

Esperanza and Irwin leave their usual comfort zone and head into more uncharted territory. Calverton has the last, large swath of Long Island grassland, and has been protected to a degree. If you visit the area, there doesn't seem to be much development or planning, although proposals exist. It's home to an enormous FedEx distribution center, a large recycling business, along with tiny farmhouses and farms. We''ll tie in the Calverton Executive Airport, the Grumman Corporation's impact on LI, and its Memorial Park on 10 adjacent acres.

Esperanza and Irwin welcome Dr. Susan Van Scoy, Professor at St Joseph's University and author of The Big Duck and eastern Long Island's Duck Farming Industry. Susan describes the rich history and sheer dominance during duck farming's heyday in the 1950's. 75% of all ducks served in restaurants across the country came from Long Island. But as suburbanization pushed eastward, rising land values, along with stricter government regulations made farming ducks untenable. A fascinating look at on often overlooked part of the East End's history.