How incredibly fortunate we’ve been! Fifty years ago, a small band
of locals and second homeowners launched the first Civic Association
on the North Fork. Why New Suffolk?
This historic hamlet has a look and a feel like no other… Everyone
who lives here or visits gets it in their own way, but all understand
that it is unique and special, the envy of those who only wish…
In this Fiftieth Anniversary Newsletter, you’ll read individual takes on
what makes New Suffolk “New Suffolk.” You’ll see why preserving
its character even as it evolves has been so important to so many people
over the years.
The Founders’ Mission Statement states the Association’s purposes
and has not changed. It has guided all successive NSCA Boards in
their work.
MISSION STATEMENT
The Purposes of this Association shall be the following:
1. To protect, conserve, and if possible, improve the rural atmosphere
and unique beauty of this village;
2. To protect, maintain and promote the property values situated
within it’s boundaries;
3. To secure the maximum amount of public services from the State,
County and Town agencies for the village and it’s residents;
4. To stimulate the public interest in civic affairs, and to encourage
and sponsor such social activities for the members of the Association
as, in the judgment of the Board of Directors, may tend to advance
the purposes of the Association.
If you are not a member of the NSCA, please sign up at : www.newsuffolkcivicassociation.com
and help us continue the good work.
Thank you.
Accomplishments, programs and events, past and present, initiated by
the NSCA since 1986. Some of these have become permanent,
• Worked with Southold Town to change local speed limit to 30 mph
from 35 mph.
• After 1993 fire destroyed iconic Post Office and General Store,
NSCA succeeded in convincing the USPS not to merge 11956 into
Cutchogue. Worked with USPS management to identify possible
sites and USPS finally contracted with Corky Maul on lease.
• NSCA volunteers landscaped new PO grounds and provided bench
and bulletin board, maintaining site as a community resource.
• Completed several years of NSCA volunteers’ tree planting throughout
the hamlet with trees gifted or discounted by local nurseries. This
program inspired formation of Southold Town Tree Committee
which continued our program throughout the Town.
• Conducts hamlet and beach cleanups annually.
• Worked with NS Common School District and raised funds to build
a new playground entirely with volunteer labor.
• Continue to initiate and support school projects including upgrade
of softball diamond, establishment of petanque court, and Summer
concerts/picnics on ball field.
• Sponsor annual breakfast to raise funds for special teacher projects
at school.
• Conducted residential Christmas lighting programs with prizes and
caroling and established tradition of sailboat “medallion” lighted on
Main Street.
• Raises funds for special Association projects thru annual tagsales/
bakesales on ball field.
• Established 4th of July Parade and reading of Declaration of Independence
since 1993. Succeeded in getting Robins Island to sponsor 4th
of July picnic at Town Beach.
• Succeeded in working with Peconic Land Trust, Southold Town,
and then property owner, to preserve New Suffolk Waterfront.
• Monetary gifts to New Suffolk graduates.
• Created, purchased and displayed signs for safety guidelines during
Covid-19 pandemic
• Made donations to CAST.
MEMORIES
As part of our special 50th Anniversary edition, we have compiled some letters from residents about their special memories or reasons for why they love New Suffolk. Our very special hamlet continues to capture the heart of everyone who visits. It is the very lucky that get to call New Suffolk home and enjoy it year round. We hope you enjoy these memories as much as we did!
Michèle Chaussabel wrote:
My husband and I came to new Suffolk from Brooklyn 40 years ago. We enrolled our kids in the New Suffolk School and hoped for a better life out here. I had planned to go back to New York City when they
graduated, but I fell in love. New Suffolk is, and always will be, my home. The supermarket
is gone, the ice cream parlor, and Walter’s store are gone, but the school is still here, and much
remains the same. The squirrels still run across the phone lines and the baby rabbits nest in my garden. The beach is still uncrowded and now we have the petanque court. And the good and caring people are
still here. I have so many reasons to be happy that I stayed.
David Noonan wrote:
We love New Suffolk’s little grid of streets and its school and ball field in the center. We love that it is off the main path, surrounded by the bay, harbors and marshes. And we love the mix of people who love
it: artists, Europeans, city people, longtime residents, retirees, young couples, doctors and plumbers. And you can walk to its two bars.
Doris Brautigan wrote:
My First Summer in New Suffolk. A friend and I shared a cottage near the crossroads of NS Avenue and
NS Road with the iconic blinking red light. I was sleeping on a July morning, when I heard a bell ringing along with a clackety sounding and some voices. I looked out the window and saw a ragtag looking group of people pulling a wagon on NS Road. I was so curious as to what they were doing that I quickly dressed and followed them down to the waterfront. A gentleman with a fine voice proceeded to read the Declaration on Independence. I don’t think I ever appreciated what a beautifully written document it was til that day. The
reading was followed by a very loud boom from a miniature cannon!
he whole scene reminded me of the Bicentennial celebration in the Robert Altman movie Nashville.
Years later I shared this memory with our friend Joe McKay and he told me that it was either himself or John reading the Declaration and that it was the first celebration in 1993.
Tom Samuels wrote:
I grew up as a summer kid in the 1960’s on Nassau Point, overlooking New Suffolk across the harbor. The old Oyster House and boat sheds created a very distinctive profile from our vantage point. My brother, sister and I took sailing lessons at Old Cove Yacht Club, and we drove our Boston Whaler there, and to pick up odd items for our mother at the IGA market.
In the late 1980’s, my wife and partner, Nancy Steelman, and I rented the Old Harbor House after moving back to the North Fork to set up an architectural practice. Our neighbor, Fran Glander, leaned across the hedge one day, to tell us about a house for sale nearby. An 1840’s farmhouse, it was somewhat of a wreck, surrounded by overgrown vegetation, set way back off New Suffolk Road. We immediately fell in love with it and its possibilities. Two kids and thirty-plusyears later, we could not be happier with our now restored house andbarn, set in our beloved garden, surrounded by trees. During those years, we became involved in the NSCA, with me on the board and a term as president, where we worked on many projects, including the creation of the 4th of July Parade, the Waterfront project and innumerable community clean-ups and pot-lucks. Our kids, Kate and Erik, attended the School, where we volunteered to help enrich the multi-age program. Ourselves sailors, they too learned to sail, and became instructors at OCYC. Aboard successive
sailboats, each named Skilligalee, we have been racing all these years on Wednesday nights ‘round Robins Island, and in the Peconic Bay Sailing Association regattas. Walking our faithful yellow lab Emma, I
became very familiar with the beaches, in all seasons and times of day.It is, indeed, on and near the Peconic Bay that one truly appreciates the wonder and beauty of the East End, and the special way New
Suffolk fits in. We have always treasured the hamlet and cherished our many
close friends and neighbors. The spirit of New Suffolk is that of warm, sharing and dedicated people who together love this place. That spirit will live forever in our hearts, and we consider ourselves
supremely lucky to call New Suffolk home.
Joe McKay wrote:
I drove down to New Suffolk in Spring 1981 because of a billboard on Rte 25 picturing a big juicy hamburger “at the Galley Ho on the water in New Suffolk.” I discovered a beautiful new world of wooden
bridges with signs “SLOW SWAN CROSSING” over creeks and marshes on my way “downtown.”
A 3-legged dog lay sunning in the intersection of First and MainStreets, traffic slowing as smiling drivers edged around him. The scene opened up on a tiny waterfront hamlet with the North Fork
Shipyard at its center, crammed with boats of all kinds, a Post Office/ General Store and the Galley Ho whose burgers and seafood turned out to be out of this world.
“Funky” is the word I used later with friends and family to tell them about this magical place I’d discovered, where I imagined I might live the rest of my life. I was forty-three then. The rest is history!
CHANGES – Joe Polashock
Have things changed in New Suffolk? You bet they have. My family moved here in the spring of 1947. New Suffolk was what it is now times ten. A bustling summer community with lots of business. Boarding houses, cottage rentals, restaurant/bars, sweet shops, fishing stations, boat yards and many other means for people to make a living. In the summer the population swelled with people to takeadvantage of all New Suffolk had to offer. This cycled up and downover the years, some being better than others. Many vacationers and visitors liked it so much that, when they retired, they moved here full time and now we find their grandchildren buying second homes here. Many of these new arrivals were not always appreciated by the “locals” for their sometimes outspokenness as well as being in favor of and demanding change. The old timers, among whom I include myself, liked the status quo and didn’t like the idea of change but it was and is coming. Fortunately, some of these “new comers” came with good fresh ideas and an eye to protect what we have. I for one
appreciate these people who are willing to help protect and preserve what we have and not let it lead to over-development and overcrowding. Our civic association is the oldest on the East End as far as I know and it was started by “newcomers”. Thank them and join them to help protect our precious lifestyle and resources. I have said in the past, we have to stay vigilant. All the things we don’t want are right
on our doorstep.
Dominique and Kris Randolph-Rué wrote:
“There is no poetry; only proofs of poetry”.
– Jean Cocteau
If you were to look at New Suffolk through a kaleidoscope, you would indeed find so many “proofs of poetry” that would both enchant your eye and strike your imagination: its charming white-sanded small beach, its happily singing multicolored birds, its bohemian and practical wooden cottages, its glorious gardens, its calm and shaded streets, its Place du Village where friendly villagers play epic games
of Pétanque and others games, its picturesque bays and harbors.
Yet for us, New Suffolk’s most bewitching “proofs of poetry” are to be found first in its unique “peninsular light” which at sunset bathes everything in gold. How magical it is then to watch the gold-bellied
seagulls and the gilded sails of the boats passing by! Then comes dusk and the mysterious verses of its dark-inked skies, where myriads of stars, endlessly still and endlessly moving, whisper a long forgotten
secret: You are then at the heart of a poetical proof—an idyllic village that is both human and heavenly.
Lauren Grant wrote:
Our New Suffolk
I learned to sail in New Suffolk, at the Old Cove Yacht Club, when I was nine years old. Thirty years later, my husband and I purchased a weekend escape cottage in Cutchogue and became regular weekenders.
When we were both laid off in 1992, we moved to Cutchogue full time and as we sat across from each other in our cozy living room one night, with toes touching, we realized it was time
for more room.
Having spent every weekend during those thirteen Cutchogue years at the NS Beach, or at the Galley Ho, or at Legends, or visiting friends here, we were keenly aware that New Suffolk was calling to us. We knew we had to live in this town and luckily found our home on Grathwohl Road. We have never regretted it for a moment. The sense of community, the love of tradition and a town of loving people have made us happier than most deserve. I frequently sit looking across the street at the creek and the marsh and thank heavens we were blessed with a home we love and a community that can’t be beat!
NEW SUFFOLK CIVIC BOARD MEMBERS
President Joe Polashock 734-6704
1st VP Michelle Roussan 521-5375
VP, Membership Yvonne Boutges-Duffy 631-965-3579
Recording Sec. Angus Maitland 646-472-4405
Treasurer Libby Fannon 734-2043
Directors Andy Uterano 917-561-7374
George Cork Maul 734-8035
Tony Meisel 734-7560
The New Suffolk News, published since 1991 by the
New Suffolk Civic Association, Inc. is distributed free to all
New Suffolk Post Office boxholders and
Civic Association members several times a year.
CONTACT INFORMATION
New Suffolk Civic Association
PO Box 642, New Suffolk, NY 11956
www.newsuffolkcivicassociation.com
Facebook: @ilovenewsuffolk
Instagram: Ilove_newsuffolk
