from "Job’s Lane, Southampton, 1663-1927: Part C"

by Lizbeth Halsey White | March 24, 1927

As this is history and we must be impartial, let us know cross the square to the opposite corner on Pond Lane. Here for many years stood the little old shop where drinks were sold by one known as “Old John Ware,” which name may not have been so much indicative of his age as that much popular opinion was against the business in which he was engaged.

Though he sold whiskey and gin to their fathers he also sold candy to the children and fire-crackers too on the Fourth of July. He was patriotic for he erected a flagpole across the street on the hill in front of what is now the Legion property. A little old cannon was there also where the boys celebrated on patriotic occasions. One Fourth of July morning, we are told, John Ware poured into the cannon such a charge of powder that it below itself to pieces and so great was the concussion that windows in the shop were broken. One stormy night when the snow lay deep on the square the little old shop went up in smoke.

from Southampton Magazine c 1913

In the old North-end Cemetery, well down to the west end, there is a double stone engraved with the names of Benjamin and George Ware who gave their lives for the Union. These were twin sons of “Old John Ware.”

His successor was “John Hen” who had a real saloon on the corner facing Job’s Lane, and whose jovial dispositions helped the business to flourish. He called his corner “Hell’s Half-Acre” and the sign over the door read in acrostic “John Hen’s Place.”

In 1870 or 1872, the Howell Brothers built their grocery store and Job’s Lane began its career as a business centre. The Post Office was also here when there came a break in the Republican administration long enough for a Democratic Postmaster to be appointed. Mr. George R. Howell filled the position as Postmaster most acceptably.

In 1876, the centennial of our country’s birth, the erection of a Liberty Pole by the Village was deemed a very appropriate and desirable way in which to remember the event.

The year before (1875) there had been wrecked off Shinnecock Point a vessel loaded with salt. Her name was the Annie C. Cook and her timbers lay on the beach for she was a total wreck.

Through the enterprise of some public spirited citizens among whom were Edgar Greene, Charles Bennett, Moses Phillips, Phyrrhus Concer, and Capt. Charles Goodale, one of the masts of the Annie C. Cook was brought from the beach and set up on the common at the foot of Job’s Lane, now known as Monument Square. Mr. Sylvanus Bennett contributed the topmast and his son Charlie made the cross trees.

The pole blew over once in a storm and was reset in concrete and the vessel’s spar stands today, proclaiming old Glory to the breeze as staunch and firm as when placed there fifty years ago.

Text courtesy Lizbeth Halsey White Files, Southampton Historical Museum Archives and Research Center | Historic images courtesy Southampton Library