Featured image above: "The museum in the winter, early 1970's", courtesy of the Wantagh Preservation Society. This image can be found in the Wantagh Museum digital collection on New York Heritage Digital Collections website. Accessed 10-28-24 https://nyheritage.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collection/p16694coll122/id/1178/rec/81
Long island Archives
Transcending Barriers: Opening Archives, Opening Minds
January/February 2025 Volume 32 Issue 1
Whaling Museum and Education Center at Cold Spring Harbor Introduces "Whale on Wheels" The Whaling Museum and Education Center at Cold Spring Harbor will be unveiling their latest education tool and it's a BIG deal! How big? Approximately 45 feet long and 250 pounds! With initial funding through the LILRC Innovation Grant, the museum placed an order for the custom inflatable whale with Landmark Creations in Minneapolis, Minnesota in July of 2024. The whale was received at the end of November with additional funding from the Robert David Lion Gardener Foundation to defray the remaining fabrication costs. It will be the only traveling whale of its kind in New York State. Despite a 1987 international ban on whaling, sperm whale populations have been slow to recover, and are currently listed as endangered under the Endangered Species Act. The inflatable whale is designed with realistic scars on its body, such as squid scars on its face, propeller scars on its tail, and entanglement scars from fishing lines, demonstrating the everyday threats to real whales. The museum's education team (see images) are currently reshaping the structure of their offsite program offerings for Long Island schools and libraries to include the whale. If you think this is just a giant inflatable toy, think again! A unique aspect of the whale is that viewers will be able to step inside to view its internal organs and digestive system printed on fabric. The whale will star as a unique tool to educate viewers about our region's incredible maritime history and our ocean's largest citizens. Brenna McCormick-Thompson, the museum's Curator of Education, shared her thoughts. "Our whale will enable people to have a very physical - and hopefully emotional - encounter with a life-sized representation of one of the ocean's most incredible creatures. This unique educational tool will not only bring students eye to eye with these animals, but allow them to step inside and literally see what makes them tick. Our team is excited for the ways this whale will help us bring Long Island's whaling past to life, while also facilitating conversations about the ecological concerns these animals and our oceans face in the future. We're so grateful for this new addition to our teaching arsenal and can't wait to share it with communities across Long Island and beyond!" Stay tuned for more information - including a future name for the whale!
Save the Dates for these Upcoming Workshops In 2025 there will be a continuation of the beginners series on core functions of archival management. Registration will be opening soon for the following workshops. Save the dates and look for more information in the coming months: Archival Reference and Access for Beginners Wednesday, February 19, 1:00-2:00 PM Archival Security for Beginners Tuesday, April 29, 1:00-2:00 PM Archival Outreach for Beginners Thursday, June 12, 12:00-1:00 PM Researching Government Information with Shikha Joseph, Nassau Community College Library Wednesday, March 26, 10:00-11:00 AM
Welcome New Member Malverne Historical and Preservation Society www.malvernehistory.org
Latest Digital Collections Added to NY Heritage Helen Rogers Collection and Prints Collection Whaling Museum and Education Center of Cold Spring Harbor Sea Captains of Rockville Centre Phillips House Museum Planting Fields Foundation Films and Planting Fields Buildings & Grounds Planting Fields Foundation Cahill, Stayton, and Eurell Families Collection Montauk Library
Long Island Archives - January/February - p. 2
The Long Ago Literary Corner Recently released and upcoming books about Long Island history
Long Island Archives - January/February - p. 4
Q&A with Richard A. Wines, author of A Farm Family on Long Island's North Fork: The Lost World of the Hallocks and Their Sound Avenue Community As a descendant of the Hallocks you have a unique perspective. How did you frame the story of this family to maintain objectivity? In some ways, being a descendant of the Hallocks and having grown up in their community gave me a unique perspective and understanding of the story –– as well as access to sources. However, my wife and I are both professionally trained historians. We know it is critical to attempt to understand our own biases and to look for stuff that participants didn’t want to talk about –– or may have purposefully hidden. We also know it is important to put the Hallocks’ story in context of what was going on in the larger community, the town and the nation. As with any kind of local history, it is important to attempt to maintain an outside perspective. Moreover, to find a publisher and an audience, it was important to write a book that would appeal beyond the Hallock’s small community –– which has largely disappeared anyway. Outside of your personal collection, where else did you search for primary and secondary sources? How did you find the research experience to be? Of course I worked with the archives of the Hallockville Museum Farm. We are fortunate that the Hallock family not only cherished and wrote about their history, but also saved a lot of material. My mother, Virginia Wines, collected numerous local diaries and other primary source materials into 23 massive scrapbooks now part of the Hallock collection. Online newspaper archives and manuscript census returns were also critical, as was the Riverhead Town Historian and the collection (and librarian) of the Suffolk County Historical Society. These sources provided essential clues to parts of the story that the family never talked about –– such as the series of scandals in their church and the hiring of a substitute for Halsey Hallock so he wouldn’t need to serve in the Civil War. Military and census records available online were also important. Having easy access to diaries and first-person accounts from family and community members has many advantages. However, public records and newspaper accounts sometimes can provide an important fact check. For instance, the Hallocks conveniently could not remember when one of their ancestors married his second wife. They thought it was 30 years after his first wife died in childbirth. But a chance discovery in a Sag Harbor newspaper revealed that the second marriage was only a few months after the first wife’s death – timing that may explain some unusual family dynamics. Use of public records also raised other questions. Halsey Hallock was fond of telling his daughter’s young music students that his first vote for president was for Lincoln, but neither he nor his family ever discussed how he evaded the Civil War draft three years later. They may not have known that the substitute hired in his place was killed in one of the war’s final battles, but they certainly never talked about that! Similarly, while the family celebrated Capt. Zachariah Hallock’s service as a minuteman before the American Revolution and used that as a basis to qualify for the membership in the Daughters of the Revolution, they never discussed what happened during the long years that the British occupied Long Island –– when he not only failed to join his more patriotic neighbors as a wartime refugee in Connecticut, but also signed an oath of loyalty to the King. The Hallocks’ community was wracked by scandal and controversy in the middle decades of the 19th century that cumulated with the minister allegedly burning down the church. However, family diaries and local sources contain only the most tangential and enigmatic references to these events. Church records, all in the Hallockville archives, also paper over much of the discussion. Allegedly the author’s own mother may have purposefully destroyed some less savory records. But press accounts, especially the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, filled in much of the missing details –– and likely conjured up some more juicy details that never happened. Topics of slavery and racism on Long Island are either ignored or misrepresented. Did you receive any pushback from the Hallockville community? Both slavery and the impact of racism are important topics – and part of the story. As a professionally trained historian, I wanted to cover both. I’ve been talking about these subjects a lot recently as part of the North Fork Project researching the record of slavery in the area. Numerous ancestors of Halsey and Emilie Hallock were enslavers –– something they never acknowledged or discussed even while being ardent supporters of Lincoln and the Civil War. The North Fork Project hasn’t received any pushback from the community -- and a fair amount of interest. What were your unexpected finds? Perhaps the biggest surprise was finding in a newspaper list that Halsy was drafted late in the Civil War. Research in town records then revealed that the town treasurer hired a young German immigrant to serve in Halsey’s place – a common event in this area as Republican politicians made sure that their sons did not need to fight. A family member loaned funds to the town to financial substitutes. Research in online databases then revealed that the young man was fatally wounded in one of the last battles of the war. While the Hallocks may not have known about the substitute’s fate, they certainly knew that Halsey evaded the draft –– but never talked about that! Another surprise occurred while reading the copious diary of a Hallock cousin in the 1860s. He never records any aspects of his courtship of the next-door neighbor’s daughter – until suddenly one day he records that they were preparing the house for his wedding that evening. Similarly, Halsey Hallock kept a detailed diary for several years while attending the Franklinville Academy and courting his first wife –– but didn’t write about that courtship until 75 years later. What were your frustrations? I wanted a longer book – more background, more images – but every press has its limits! However, readers will benefit from the significant shortening. Is there anything in particular you would like potential readers to know? For me, what is most interesting is the amount of conflict in this little community –– even though they were ethnically and economically homogeneous, all went to the same church, had been together for a couple of centuries and were mostly interrelated by blood and marriage –– somehow, they divided bitterly on every issue. Not unlike today! Available now for purchase through SUNY Press , Amazon, or check wherever you purchase your books on local history. (https://sunypress.edu/Books/A/A-Farm-Family-on-Long-Island-s-North-Fork).
Long Island Archives - January/February - p. 5
Happy New Year, fellow Archives Newsletter Readers! I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday season and new year celebration. The Accessing Archives Program had a prosperous and productive 2024 and I look forward to an equally productive 2025. We wrapped up 2024 with our final partnership with the Farmingdale Public Library (FPL). With the assistance of their local history librarian, Natalie Korsavidis, and LILRC's Nicole Menshise, we organized and rehoused collections that were donated to the library. This included mostly paper material with some textiles, video tapes, and audio tapes. Above you can see the before and after of the project once the collections were weeded through, organized, re-foldered , boxed and labeled. Along with reorganizing these collections, Nicole and I unframed dozens of photographs, inventoried a collection of half inch open reel video tapes from the 1970s, and a collection of reel to reel tapes from the 1960s, rehoused approximately 900 slides and encapsulated two large panoramic photographs. You can see some of that work in the pictures to the right. Most of the materials were archives from the library's history, with some of the materials donated by former trustees and employees like Debbie Podolski, the former Director of Farmingdale Public Library. Other donations trickled in over the years from familiar family names from Farmingdale like Hantusch, Ketcham, and Meyerstein. Most notably are the School board records and trustee minutes from the 1960s and 1970s. FPL was very pleased with the work we accomplished and it was wonderful to have Natalie, who is an archives student, dig in and work with us when she could. Since this project was mainly a rehousing project, I took the yearbooks that had been previously digitized in 2019 and added those to New York Heritage Digital Collections. You can visit the yearbooks from 1950 to 2005 here at the Farmingdale High Yearbooks digital collection: https://nyheritage.org/index.php/collections/farmingdale-high-school-yearbooks 2024 was a busy year with nine locations visited. Stay tuned for the projects coming in 2025. As you read this, I’m currently working with the Sayville Library on some collections and will update you on that work in the next newsletter.
Long Island Archives - January/February - p. 7
LATEST FROM THE ACCESSING ARCHIVES PROGRAM By Robert Anen
Designed by Freepik
Welcome the LILRC's GOVERNMENT RESOURCES AND RECORDS MANAGEMENT COMMITTEE page. Sharing online portals and forums for government agency and publication information. ABOUT: Congress.gov is the official website for U.S. federal legislative information. The site provides access to accurate, timely, and complete legislative information for Members of Congress, legislative agencies, and the general public. Congress.gov is developed and maintained by the Library of Congress using data originated and owned by the United States Senate and the United States House of Representatives. Offices involved in supplying legislative information to Congress.gov include the Secretary of the Senate, the Senate Sergeant at Arms, the Senate Recording Studio, the Office of the Clerk of the House, the House Recording Studio, the Government Publishing Office, the Congressional Budget Office, and the Congressional Research Service. The Technology Timeline on the Legislative Branch Innovation Hub highlights similar and complementary legislative branch agency efforts. The Congress.gov Enhancement Timeline lists new and enhanced features and functionality, including the addition of new collections, starting with the beta launch of Congress.gov in September 2012 and continuing through the current release. New releases of Congress.gov occur approximately every 4 weeks. Congress.gov is usually updated the morning after a session adjourns. Consult Coverage Dates for Congress.gov Collections for the specific update schedules and start date for each collection.
Want to join? Go to LILRC.org/government-information-committee
All House and Senate roll call votes! Search all bills, resolutions, and amendments! Download the latest Congressional Record!
Long Island Archives - January/February - p. 9
LILRC's Technology Assistant Grant Funding Projects That Promote Long Island History Congratulations to the following institutions who received funding from the LILRC's Technology Assistance Grant opportunity in the latest cycle. We look forward to seeing their projects engage new audiences! Below are excerpts from the grant applications submitted. The Jewish Historical Society of Long Island In 2025, JHSLI will be creating a museum exhibit that celebrates 150 years of Jewish community on Long Island. This will be housed at the Suffolk County Historical Society Museum in Riverhead beginning in June 2025. An important interactive element for this exhibit will be a video booth where visitors can record their own personal stories and Jewish experiences in Nassau and Suffolk Counties. Rocky Point Historical Society We request an HP Officejet Pro 9125e printer and an Epson Perfection V600 scanner. We expect to receive a large donation of archival photographs from a former member and need a permanent scanning solution. Our museum has recently begun class visits of first graders from the Frank J. Carasiti Elementary School. We cannot allow students to handle fragile documents and photographs. We need to make good quality copies available to them and their teachers. We also add images to our facebook page and webpage in order to reach a larger audience in the community. Roslyn Landmark Society The Roslyn Landmark Society seeks to create a virtual walking tour that can be made freely available to the public on the organization’s website...The village’s Main Street Historic District features over forty pre-Civil War structures and the organization holds stewardship over several extremely significant historic properties, including the oldest known house still standing in Nassau County, and a historical archive. This project will also enable us to incorporate a substantial portion of our archival material within the virtual tour to better engage with the public and expand access to these materials, including many historic photographic images. Three Village Historical Society It has been 13 years since our "SPIES!" exhibit was first installed, and it has remained largely unchanged. However, with the arrival of our new collections and exhibits coordinator last year, we have envisioned a cutting-edge upgrade for the "SPIES!" exhibit. This ambitious project requires new technology and software to bring our vision to life... Specifically, we plan to purchase a touch screen television with STORY app software, along with tablets to introduce an interactive element to the exhibit. This will allow visitors to engage with the exhibit in new and dynamic ways. TVHS is proud to collaborate with approximately 3,500 students from various school districts across Suffolk County each year. This partnership provides many students, especially those from traditionally underserved communities, with the unique opportunity to engage with their local history in a fun, hands-on, and enriching way which can foster a sense of identity and belonging, while also building a cultural awareness and appreciation.
Long Island Archives - January/February - p. 10
Long Island Archives - January/February 2025 Editor: Nicole Menchise, Digitization and Archives Coordinator LILRC - 627 N. Sunrise Service Rd., Bellport, NY 11713, www.lilrc.org.