Jesse Halsey Autobiography

Epilogue

When I was a boy the North Main Street in the Spring was either a rushing torrent or a muddy slough. The melting snow all the way from Long Springs sought its hurried way to the town pond or rather the swamp that then extended as far north as Capt. George White’s lot (Jagger Lane). I have gone from our back gate in a row-boat all the way to the pond and could of course gone on to the beach. My playmate, Lewis Hildreth, as we were sailing shingle boats from a footbridge, fell off and was swept away. I “hollered” with all my lungs and Mr. Charles Seldon (Halsey) ran down and pulled him out. (We were about five years old.)

When the water had gone the frost came out and with the churching of darn wagon wheels the clay became a veritable “slough of despond” through which the horses wallowed, the wheels cutting ever deeper. The sod was cut from tree line to tree line through some put out rails to save the sod and keep the traffic in the roadbed.

Once, coming home from Camp’s Pond with a load of pine wood as we passed “Uncle Sam” Bishop’s he called out, “Pick a good rut, Charlie, you’ll be in it till you get home.”

There was quite a hill coming up toward our place, from what is now Powell Avenue (as the contour of the lawns on the east side of Main St. will reveal) and it was hard pulling for the horses. Main St. is none too straight following an old cow path likely which eased these (small) hills by circumventing them (circumnavigate would be a better word under the two conditions I have mentioned). When the mud had gone and Mr. Dan Phillips had guided the road scraper through the village with two teams tandem pulling the machine, with the oncoming of summer dust took the place of mud and only after the “Yorkers” came was any attempt made to sprinkle the streets.

The first watering carts were low box affairs made locally by George Culver or Andy Jagger that with a trap bottom backed into the town pond (Lake Agawam) and when they were full the horses drew them out and the bottom closed. When they reached the proper place on the street the driver opened the gate and the water ran out through some perforations in a pipe, leaving a trail about six feet wide. A limited area was patrolled, Main St. from the beach to Seely’s Store (no Catina’s) and First Neck Lane—not much more. Later came the windmills installed by the Southampton Village Improvement Association and big Studebaker cars that carried a thousand gallons (I estimate) were circulated over a wider area. One of the big windmills was located back of our barn with an immense tank that furnished a bountiful supply not only for the [railroad] watering cars, but piped into our barn and cow-yard, watered our stock. Before that time it was my daily duty after school to man the old log pump that stood by the back door and pump water that ran through wooden troughs to the barn-yard. Ultimately, the water also piped into our house.

These and other windmills disappeared gradually after the Water Works were built. The pumping station was (and is) north end of the Village. At first it was a pneumatic system, there was no standpipe as at present. In case of fire, the air pump was started and pressure pushed up. Everyone was very proud of the quality of the water—“it never saw the air till it reached your faucet.” Some of the city people had it bottled and sent to their New York homes. One enthusiast took a supply on a shipboard to Europe with him! The trenches were all labouringly dug by hand. Often they caved in before the mains could be laid. With a succession of rains, a stretch on Windmill Lane caved in six times before the pipes finally were in. The man (Johnson) who took that assignment at so much a foot said that “he was gipped, by Jimminy.”

In the haunts of my boyhood on the Millstone Brook Road is a spring. It was in a setting of great oaks on a knoll sloping down to the bay, the deep shadows made a setting for ferns, a place of rare beauty. As I came along one day I found an artist painting the scene.

Some months later, coming to the same spot I found men taking samples of the water for chemical analysis and biological tests. A great house was rising across the road and the engineers were looking for an uncontaminated abundant water supply.

The next summer on a hot August afternoon I came along and there was a scout troop, weary with the hike and hot and thirsty. They were drinking greedily from the spring of the abundant bubbling water.

Religion is like that; it has three aspects: 1) the aesthetic that takes in shape in architectural form and liturgical that expresses deep meaning in sonorous and meaningful phrase; 2) the theoretical as in theology and philosophy; and above all 3) the practical, it meets human needs.

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

Lizbeth H. White | Read before a meeting of Southampton Colony Chapter, D.A.R. March 15, 1927

Continued from last week:

When the library was built in 1895, Job’s Lane as a street was still unimproved. From an old scrapbook we glean the following: “Job’s Lane beginning at Main Street; its course is due west and it ends in Windmill Lane. Its grade is downward and having only surface drainage, at every heavy rainfall two roaring torrents rush westward to find sea level, tearing ugly gullies on either side of the way. The sidewalks are above the level of the street and their edges chopped and ragged, with grass and weeds unkempt.

“This ancient thoroughfare which for more than 200 years has been a quaint by-way has suddenly become a popular and populous mart. Here are the emporiums of Howell, Gray, Bellows, Schenck, Fanning, Bishop, and Post. The merchants too have devised horseblocks place din front of their stores to facilitate the exit of ladies from their carriages for victorias and dog carts are many in the land.”

After the incorporation of the Village in 1894 with Mr. Albert J. Post as President, J.W.F. Howell, George H. Hallock, and George F. Wines as Trustees, improvements came rapidly. The Telephone Co. and Electric Light Co. were established within a year and Job’s Lane rivaled Main Street in the attention of the new officials. One of their first efforts was to widen the narrow street to the required three rods and this was gradually done as improvements were made and shops rebuilt.

The first section after the Library was built, Mr. Samuel L. Parrish, to whose interest and enterprise Southampton owes so much of her development, carried out his conception of an Art Museum and botanical gardens. Some time before this he had purchased from Dr. John Nugent the Zephaniah Rogers corner on Main Street and made it his home. Failing to secure the desired frontage for his plan on Main Street, he turned his attention to Job’s Lane and there just beyond the Library he purchased the property which was the beginning of the Art Museum.

The central part of the building was completed in 1897 and a remarkable collection of art objects were placed within. Each year the collection has been developed and the building several times enlarged until the Parrish Art Museum stands today an impressive memorial—speaking in terms most eloquent of the deep interest and abiding affection for Southampton and her people of Mr. Samuel L. Parrish and his brother, James.

We could continue indefinitely the story of Job’s Lane and its inhabitants who through the years have played their part and passed into history. The Howell boys built their homes on the Lane on either side of the store. These all have passed to others except one—Aunt Jane remains with face as rosy and smiling as when she came a bride forty odd years ago. The old Howell home is now owned and has lately been remodeled by Mr. Wallace Halsey and here Principal Sabine made his home during the first years of his residence here.

A fire recently destroyed much of what was the Howell’s store but the portion which was the feed annex has been for several summers the exclusive shop of Peck & Peck.

Mr. Albert Reeves years ago removed his barn and farmyard from the Lane, improving it with the building which in October 1902 became the home of the Southampton Press. So even the newspaper came to Job’s Lane! Somewhat later Mr. Reeves removed from the corner the house which—though several times remodeled—had marked the entrance to the Lane for two hundred years. This stands on the south end of the lot on South Main Street, leaving the corner vacant and so it has remained until the present time but, as we write, the foundations are being laid for a block of stores which are to be ready for occupancy in June. “Normandy Farmhouse” is the design of the architects, we are told, unlike anything Southampton has yet seen, and a far departure from the simplicity of the Colonial designs, which are both the charm and heritage of our ancient town. Though we are sure the building will be an improvement which was sure to come, let us long remember the vacant lot in the heart of our business section with its rows of rambler roses along the Lane.

To return again, it is pleasant to recall the stores of Hirshfield, the clothier,--(was not this our first--?), Raynor, Mabs, the tailor, Rosen, Jedlicka, Platt, Post and Kent, Martin and Lefevre, and ------

On the north side of the street, Mrs. Isham has built her home and Mr. Wich his drug store. Oh! forty years ago, Mr. W.J. Post bought the home of Frederick Fanning and built his shoe store beside it. The store is now the McGurn Market and the house is owned by Robert Day. After W.D. Van Brunt removed his plumbing business to Main Street, the building was used for a number of years as a meat market by Valentine Schenck and after him came the Gilmartin Bros., to have a part in the more progressive Southampton. The modest shop of Fordham & Elliston has become a landmark of Job’s Lane as have also its proprietors. Let us not forget Simon Rhodes, another of God’s handymen, who counted his time as nothing and charged only for materials. He could do anything from mending a skate to painting a picture of a whaleship and do it well. The shop is still there quite recreated by artist Hollenbeck. In assign we must not forget Mr. Biggs. It was indeed a tiny shop where you could buy almost anything from a marble to a house lot, even an ice cream cone. We cannot resist relating here the incident of the small boy—now one of Southampton’s leading physicians—who went to the City with his mother to do Christmas shopping. She noticed that he looked around a good deal but evinced no desire to do his errands. When she inquired the reason he said he had decided to wait until he returned home for he could “do better at Biggs’s.”

It would be interesting to speak of the man new shops, which, during the past few years, have made Job’s Lane a busy and attractive place especially in the summer season. Gown shops, Real Estate, offices and automobile showrooms have sprung up like mushrooms and so transformed the Lane that even two years have wrought a complete change. Too much cannot be said of the work of the Village Improvement Association, which under the efficient leadership of Mrs. Arthur B. Claflin has created sentiment, which has so transformed the Lane that every little shop, new or old, has been recreated. A touch of bright colored paint, a box of flowers, a row of hollyhocks to screen a wall or driveway, has worked wonders. It is no wonder that tourists who have traveled the length and breadth of our country come to us and say they have seen nothing anywhere more beautiful than our beloved Southampton.

To be sure, Job’s Lane is narrow and congested and without the diversion of traffic to Nugent Street which has taken place in very recent years the problem would be far more difficult.

If we think of it, as it has always been in reality, a bridge between two important sections of the Village, Job’s Lane becomes no longer a narrow street.

The men of ancient days who opened the street, Job Sayre and Edmund Howell, could think only in terms of the slow moving ex-team but could they have foreseen the tings which were to come to pass in this, our twentieth century, we are sure they would have given us a much wider street and have marveled unceasingly at all that the future should unfold.

Text courtesy Lizbeth Halsey White Files, Southampton Historical Museum Archives and Research Center

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

MEMORIALS OF THE NORTH END: Part Two

by Lizbeth Halsey White

We often wonder what has become of our old houses for they were built to last for generations, but having no fire protection, except buckets and a well sweep, very many of them were reduced to ashes. The old David Jagger homestead on the North Sea road, built in 1707, was burned February 8, 1891. This farm was allotted to John Jagger I, before 1667, and some of the land is still owned by his descendents. For many years a lane opened this farm out to the North End of Main Street. The road passed just to the south of the Samuel Bishop homestead but it was closed some years ago. The Revolutionary Patriot of the Jagger family was Ebenezer Jagger and it was his son, Ebenezer, who in 1805 bought from the estate of Isaac Post the farm now owned by Hubert A. Jagger.

This frontage extended as far north as the road to Seven Ponds. In many of the records this road is known as Bishop’s Lane, but the name seems to have fallen into disuse. Let us see to it that the old names of our streets are retained.

The Albert Jagger farm across the street descended from his grandfather, Deacon Moses Culver. In 1799, Daniel Foster and his wife, Phebe, sell to Moses Culver, Blacksmith, his house and home lot, bounded north by Samuel Bishop, south and west by land of Samuel Post. Mr. Albert Jagger also was a “Fortyniner” and his letters written during this adventure have preserved to us the story of the Sabina and the ensuring experiences in the gold fields. He is also noted in the village for the daguerreotypes which he made so successfully and which have preserved for us the likenesses of his contemporaries.

Next north to the home of John Bishop were those of Daniel Sayre and his brother Francis. These were sons of Thomas and brothers of Job, for whom Job’s Lane was named. The home lots of Francis and Daniel Sayre would extend today from Mrs. Wilmun Halsey’s north and would include Roe’s Hotel. There is a curious record dated June 2, 1701: “It is ordered by the trustees that John Foster Jr. and Isaac Halsey Jr. shall go to Daniel Sayre and give him legal warning to throw out the Town’s land that he has taken in upon ye front of his home lot adjoining to ye Main St. within one month or expect to be sued by the Town for trespass.” Daniel Sayre moved to Bridgehampton and as he died only six years after this incident he must have moved soon after he had set back his fence. The property of Daniel Sayre is known to us as “Charles Selden’s” and is now the home of his son, Charles R. Halsey, and his daughter Mrs. Anthony Wilde. The place has descended to them from the Great-Grand-Sire, Paul Halsey, whose name is among the Patriots of the Revolution. Layton Avenue was laid out through this farm and the let on the north was originally a part of it. This for some time was owned by Joshua Halsey, whose name is also on the honor roll of the Revolution. The house now standing on the property was built in the 70s by the Eldredge brothers of Sag Harbor but for a number of years it was associated with the name of Daniel Y. Bellows who with his family made it their home. The house when built was an innovation, for it was close on the street with a basement entrance, and steps on either side leading up to the main floor. Its builders had visions of a city block, which even yet has not materialized.

On the land to the north occupied by Francis Sayre his descendants lived for one hundred and seventy years.

In 1822, Stephen Sayre and his wife Elizabeth sold to Moses Culver a “tract of land with dwelling house and buildings” 20 acres, price $1,000. This is the quaint old Cape Cod house still standing, given to Phebe Culver by her father. Phebe married Samuel Sanford who in 1843 was one of a committee to purchase land for the Methodist Church in Good Ground. In 1851, they sold the place to Septa Jackson who moved here from East Hampton. It is from the lips of his daughter, Mrs. Sarah Terry, that we have heard much delightful reminiscence of the neighborhood she knew as a girl. Their nearest neighbor on the south was Cabel Halsey, and on the north Peter Fournier. Across the street was only open fields from Lewis Sandford’s (whose home was where Leon Terry now lives) as far as Albert Reeves (now owned by Albert Roger). This field was known as Post’s Lot, as it was owned by Capt. George Post, and here Edward White says he drove the cows to pasture when a boy.

It was in the early 70s that Capt. Daniel Havens built the house on the hill which was his home for many years. With its terraced garden it has always been an attractive landmark. Here, Principal John G. Peck lived for several years when he first came to Southampton. The hill, still vacant, was purchased by the Catholic Society with the intent that their church would be built there. It is still owned by them and the North End children have a coasting place in winter.

John Rogers built his home at the foot of the hill and in the late 70s the Thompson Bros. built for a boarding house the building, which for some time has been owned by the family of the late Henry N. Clark.

The store at the north was added to accommodate The Sea-Side Times, Southampton’s first newspaper. This paper was established in 1881 by Walter R. Burling, who established local newspapers in several other villages and he was known as the veteran newspaper editor of Long Island. Two of his sons remain in Southampton to carry on his important contribution to the community.

The Sea-Side Times after a time became the property of Charles A. Jagger, who was its editor at the time of his death in 1914. Dr. Jagger edited also a series of periodicals known as the Southampton Magazine, which has preserved to us many incidents of early and more recent local happenings which otherwise would have been lost to the future.

The home of Peter Fournier is now a part of the south wing of Ree’s Hotel. The grandfather of Peter Fournier came to this country about 1750 and settled in Southold. He went as a Refugee to Connecticut during the Revolution and fought in the third line. His name is signed—Francis Fournier, Frenchman. So we know that he was one of the many gallant representatives of that country who gave not only their sympathies but their service also to the struggling colonists in their efforts to achieve independence.

After the war he settled in Red Creek and he was known for his vineyards. Of the large family of Peter Fournier, only two remained in Southampton. John Fournier built the house next north and nearest the Railroad Station and “Arabella” will be long remembered for her quaint eccentricities.

It was Mrs. Sarah Terry who told us of the building of Mr. Wm. R. Post’s house, which she said was called a mansion because it had a cupola.

As long ago as 1836, a piece of land of several acres on the north side of the Pelletreau property was sold to Captain James Parker, who was a whaling captain. In 1849, he went with the Sabina to California, where he died April 29, 1851. His stone is in the old North End Cemetery with that of his four wives, the last of whom we knew as “Aunt Milly Parker.”

Captain Parker’s daughter Charlotte became the wife of Wm. R. Post who bought the property of the estate of his father-in-law and built the palatial home which was the wonder of its day and still remains one of the most beautiful homes of the village.

Wm. R. Post was born in the South End—the son of Captain James Post and his wife Hannah Rogers. He was a man of excellent business ability and became the leading citizen of the community. He was Supervisor of the Town, Elder in the Presbyterian Church, and Superintendent of its Sunday School. If there was anything anybody wanted to know they went to Mr. Post. He was very tall and well proportioned and carried himself with the dignity, which befitted his position in the community.

He was very fond of young people and had a way of asking questions about things in our geography or arithmetic, which we ought to know and didn’t know. The writer remembers sitting upon the high stool before his office desk and one of the questions asked she has never forgotten. She had never to her knowledge heard anyone say, in school or out, how many towns there are in Suffolk County, but it didn’t take her long to find out. Many children thought him stern but our mother’s children knew him for his kindly smile and friendly greeting as he came to the back door each morning for the milk.

Mr. Post married for his second wife, Mary, one of the five daughters of Jonathan Fithian. Squire Fithian came to Southampton as a very young man (1818) and taught first in the District School and afterwards in the Academy. He was born in East Hampton, where his ancestors had settled early in its history. He married Abigail, daughter of Thomas Sayre, and their home was built upon the lot now occupied by Willis Corwin. The large acreage next north now owned by Edgar Hildreth was for many years known as the “Fithian Lot.” Five lively girls and a genial father and mother made their home a popular social center and the name of the “Fithian Girls” became a synonym for life and mirth and wholesome fun. They all married except one, but this is another tragedy of the California gold-lure.

Squire Fithian filled the office of Town Clerk in Southampton for twenty years. He was Justice of the Peace from 1828 until his death in 1865. He also served several terms as Supervisor of the Town. In Volume IV page 288 of the Town Records, Wm. S. Pelletreau, who at that time was Town Clerk, has included a memorial to the memory of Jonathan Fithian. In the published address of Mr. Pelletreau, delivered at the 250^th anniversary of the settling of the town (1876) after eulogizing the soldiers of the Civil War, he concludes, “Let the greenest wreath and the fairest flower of today be brought as a tribute to the memory of Jonathan Fithian, the incorruptible magistrate, who living enjoyed the confidence of this citizens and dying left no nobler soul behind.”

After the death of her husband, “Aunt Abbie” went to live with her daughters “up the river” in Newburgh. As her life went out there was born across the street from her old home in the North End, a baby girl and Abigail Fithian lives on, a reminder of the neighbor and friend so greatly beloved.

Courtesy Lizbeth Halsey White Files, Southampton Historical Museum Archives and Research Center