September 2005 Newsletter

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Upcoming Meeting - September 1 st , 2005,

Doors Open 7:30 p.m., Meeting starts at 8:00 p.m.

Directions to the Town of Islip Recreation Center, Ronkonkoma Beach Pavilion at Lake Ronkonkoma off Rosevale Ave. (631) 467-3308

From the LIE: Exit 59, Ocean Ave North to Rosevale Ave. bear left to 1 st traffic light, turn right at light into park, left into parking lot, building is at the end on your right.

From Sunrise Highway: Exit 49 Lakeland (Sayville) continue north crossing Veterans Highway, merge w/Ocean Ave, continue north under LIE & follow the directions above.

And now few words from the President (or chief bottle nut notes)

The September meeting will be on Thursday, September 1 st ! This is one of those sneaky months, where the first Thursday also happens to be the first day of the month. So mark your calendars!!

This was quite a summer, between the heat, the humidity, and the lack of rain it will not be soon forgotten I am sure. So for the evenings program, how about we bring in all the Summer Surprises members have found at their favorite digging spot, flea market, antique shop, or picked up at a show or you name it! I know I have several, how about you? I know I always enjoy seeing the neat things members turn up!

However, something else happened this summer, which I will admit, it took both myself and Laura, completely by surprise.

Very near the end of May, I think it was on the last day of the month, Tuesday the 31 st -which happens to be our anniversary. A letter arrived from John Feldman for us; it contained a bunch of material from the Federation. It was entry forms for the FOHBC Newsletter contest, and Writer's contest. I did not look at it twice, and put it aside. Laura spotted it, and she asked about it, I told her what it was, and she said why don't you enter?

I had no intention of entering; I am someone who does not win jack as a rule, so I was all for saving the postage. She nagged a little, as the deadline was tomorrow, June 1 st for entries. So she went off to work, I thought about it, and after Anna was in bed, I worked on gathering up the materials required for the entries. We really do not have many spare newsletters around, so had to print the majority out, along with the articles for the Writers contest. I was still working on it when she came home at 11pm, so we both worked on it until at least midnight.

I took everything to the post office the next day, mailed it, and promptly forgot all about it. That is the wonder of my mind; I can forget all that important stuff, but some little piece of trivia, totally worthless, unless you're watching Jeopardy, well, it will be filed away and remembered for forever (I can a test to this really well!) !

Fast forward to Wednesday August 3 rd . Laura calls me at work, which is not uncommon, and boy, is she very excited. I am figuring the house fell down, or the pool blew up, you know, important stuff like that. Well, she tells me that we won the FOHBC newsletter contest for best newsletter! My reaction was you must be kidding me, but she said no, she had a letter from the FOHBC in her hand.

Yes fellow members, this clubs newsletter placed 1 st in the nation. We were thunderstruck (and wanted to know how many other newsletter we beat out) .

I contacted the President of the FOHBC, John Pastor, and we were told the FOHBC would be presenting a plaque to the club at the National Show, held in Michigan the weekend of August 13 & 14. With such short notice we would never be able to make it, as both of us were working that weekend, and as such we were not planning on attending the National, so there were no hotel or airline reservations either. So I made a few phone calls to club members who have attended National shows in the past, and was thrilled that none other than John Feldman would be at the National, and he would be pleased to accept the award on behalf of the club. I thought this was perfect, as John was the one who sent the paperwork to enter to us. So, I want to give John a very big THANK YOU for picking up the plaque from the FOHBC for the club.

Sayville's Dairies: When the Milkman Rang Twice

By Mark Smith

Part Three and The End For Now

Now, on to West Sayville!!! West Sayville is a smaller community than Sayville, and there are only two dairy farms with milk bottles that I am aware of from West Sayville.

First is the largest and most well known farm of John Bentima, which began bottling milk in the late 1920's or early 1930's. Located on Montauk Highway and the corner of Rollstone Ave in West Sayville, this was perhaps the oldest farm in continuous use in the Sayville/West Sayville area. The main house which stood just a few feet from the road was constructed in the 1790's by the Hulse family, and the family graveyard is today located in the center of the housing project that marks the site. The old barns and homes stood until the mid 1980's when they were demolished to make way for the Dutchman's Cove complex that stands there today. John Bentima named his farm "South Side Dairy". Now, do not confuse this with the "South Shore Dairy", which was in a different town! The Bentima family plot is in St. Ann's Cemetery, behind the Friendly's restaurant on Montauk Highway. A variety of bottles survive to entice the collector. There are embossed examples with "SOUTH SIDE/DAIRY/JOHN BENTIMA" in the letter plate, and red pyroglazed examples with "SOUTH SIDE DAIRY/JOHN BENTIMA/WEST SAYVILLE LI" and "SOUTH SIDE DAIRY/TEL NO/LT 9-1024". The pyroglazed examples also feature catchy slogans such as "They came to visit, not to stay, return our bottles every day".

The only other dairy in West Sayville that I am aware of is that of James Salvatore. James Salvatore operated the Indian Neck Farm in West Sayville from about 1940 into the late 1950's or early 1960's. Now the name Indian Neck Farm is interesting. Here is why. In present day Oakdale, on the east side of Locust Ave, south of the LIRR tracks (it was called West Sayville at the time) used to stand the farm of Frederick Bourne. Now, you ask, who the heck is he? Mr. Bourne, or Commodore Bourne as he was also referred to, owned the Singer Sewing Machine Company at the turn of the century. He constructed a summer home in Oakdale, which survives today as St. Johns University (it was known as LaSalle Military Academy for many years). His hobby was the breeding and showing of horses, and he constructed this farm on Locust Ave. for that purpose. The farm had electric power, a railroad siding, running water and heat, all unheard of in the 1890-1910 time! The buildings lasted until the 1980's, when all but the 120 foot tall concrete windmill/water tower that at one time had supplied water to the farm, and his home, were demolished to construct the Windmill Gate housing development. The two foot thick steel reinforced poured concrete windmill stood until 2005, when someone thought it was a hazard, and it was demolished. Took 6 months to take it down! I just hope my banks vault is built half as well as that old windmill! Anyway, Mr. Bourne named his horse breeding farm Indian Neck Farm!

Now, as for James Salvatore, to my knowledge he did not have any cows, but had his bottles filled for him. One fellow I worked with, now departed, recalled a fellow selling milk out of the old farm buildings in the 1950's. He even showed me the spot where the guy dumped the bottles, which is now under Matthews Road in Oakdale. He used to make a few dollars shooting rats in the dump. The old barns also housed a sofa bed manufacturing operation for a time, stored boats, and cars and housed animals over the years. There are embossed bottles marked "JAMES SALVATORE / INDIAN NECK / FARM / WEST SAYVILLE LI" and pyroglazed examples marked "INDIAN NECK FARM / DAIRY / LT 9-2187."

Now, this is not all the dairy farms in Sayville or in West Sayville. There are other people who delivered milk, but for whom we know of no bottle at the present time. Some on this list are Charles Gross in the 1920's, Albert Rueb in the 1950's, Frank Porkopius in the 1940's, and Mrs. Minna Malinoski in the 1940's. Frank Porkopius was a pretty good deal, with a stated delivery base of 236 quarts per day, and 172 customers! Mrs. Minna Malinoski was about half that size. Perhaps they never had bottles, or none have survived to this day. Not to be forgotten, there is in West Sayville on Cherry St. (Cherry Ave. today) in 1931 the Miller Brothers.

My want list of Sayville milk bottles is permanent, and has been ongoing for a good 20 years. If you ever have any for sale, either single or a group, please contact me. I would welcome the chance to present offers.

Please contact Mark Smith, 10 Holmes Court, Sayville NY 11782-2408, on the net libotle@optonline.net or call me at 589-9027. Thank you very much!

In closing, I would like to thank several people for their help both past and present with information for this piece:

Linda Conron, Sayville Historical Society

Mike Katsar, Long Island Antique Bottle Association

Frank Bennet, Long Island Antique Bottle Association

Oh and the wife for finding some taking pictures and in general being super about my bottles

BROADWAY DAIRY

A First Person Account by Charlie Oelkers

Courtesy of the Sayville Historical Society

One of the largest Dairies on the south shore of LI was the Broadway Dairy. It was located north of Montauk Highway and west of Broadway, occupying the area where Lowell Road, Wyandanch Drive, Harp Lane, and Budenos Drive are today. Included in the farm was the area that the Grange, Ball Fields and Tennis Courts now are located. Earlier in the century it was known as Archie Browns Farm. Sometime in the 1920s the first section was purchased by John Budenos, a Lithuanian immigrant. John had worked previously for, I believe it was the Bourne Estate, walking from Sayville daily. John was a very hard worker and saved his money, which paid dividends a few years later. This area had a TB epidemic, and many milk cows had the disease and were destroyed, so they couldn't infect more people. John was able to go upstate to a unaffected area and purchase new cows to fill out his herd. He was able to expand his business, when other farmers were not able to supply their customers, they lost them to John who was able to do so. His business thrived, while other farms struggled, and in the 1930s he was able to acquire the farm of Herb Parkhill, which adjoined his on the west. Several old building were now on or surrounded by the farm. There was a very old house that was located where the Dentists Office is now on the comer of Lowell Road. I couldn't estimate its age but the timbers were hand hewn, so I feel it would date to the mid 1800s. Father east. on the curve of Old Montauk Highway, were two more buildings. the house probably dated to the late 1800s, and next to it was a large wooded building about 50 feet wide and 100 feet deep that was three stories high, that was originally Gilliams Furniture Warehouse, later AI Tuckers Plumbing Supply, and last by Leis-Swan Furniture, a part of Castro Convertible. All three were razed by 1965, to be replaced by the present occupants. Another interesting item had to do with the residents of long ago. One of the farm hands, Berk Nash, had a collection of Indian Arrow Heads and Spear Heads that he picked up while tilling the fields. The farmland would have been on the west side of Lowell Road, the area east of Seville Bvld. was wooded. Apparently there had been a hunting trail along the edge of those woods, and arrows that had missed their target can still be found occasionally today. After obtaining the Parkhill Farm, John moved many of the buildings onto the west edge of his original farm. The barn was turned east and west, and a T shaped addition ran to the north. One building was utilized as a tractor shed, to house the farm equipment. The barn was destroyed by fire on a Sunday Morning in August, 1961, believed set by boys playing there. The barn was a complete loss, injured one farmhand and the loss of several cows and one calf. Motive power for the farm was provided by a variety of ways. A team of large draft horses, an old steel wheeled tractor nicknamed Bonecrusher, a caterpillar type, and finally by a new Farmall with rubber tires. With the addition of the second barn John now had a herd of over 80 cows. For many years delivery trucks brought milk to many homes and businesses, and also to local schools. By now all milk had to be pasteurized, and a extension to the main barn did this, then refrigerated it, and bottled the milk for delivery early the next morning. The farm house and barns were demolished by the Town in the mid 1960s. One building remains in use. The large garage is now the Exhibit Hall at the Sayville Historical Society on Edwards Street Today you can still see where the farm had been. At the north end of the Grange there is a cluster of trees, most growing since the farm existed. In the center of the grove there are two Cedar trees that flanked the front porch. Next you will find two large Maples that stood on either side of the driveway. Past that grove there are three Maples that lined the driveway along side of the main barn. From there to Broadway Ave there was a garden to grow vegetables for all the farm hands. To the north of them is a split trunk White Oak that was on the north side of the road that led to the back barns, and also anchored the fence gate from the pasture. If you were to follow the road winding along the side of a hill and snaking to the rear barns. Back there also were chicken coops, pig stys, and the other buildings to house hired hands. Continuing north there is a split trunk White Oak near the Restrooms. That stood on the north end of a small pond that was fed by rain water, cow urine, and a series of springs father north. Other springs followed down the valley, forming several small ponds and a stream that ultimately passed thru a culvert and under Montauk hwy and into Lotus Lake. The largest of the ponds, the one in front of the windmill, was large enough for ice skating before all the springs were disturbed. The first line of trees west of Broadway was a fence line when farming was abandoned. It consisted of weeds and seedlings that grew under the barb wire fence where machines couldn't cut them down. Both fields on the east side of the valley show a narrow gully running down the center where the furrows from the last plowing exist One year the plowing would be toward the center and would leave a ridge in the middle and a depression on the edges. The next year the plow would throw the soil to the outside and the last furrows would leave a gully in the center. The large stand of trees along Montauk Hwy has grown since the buildings were demolished. At one time that was fanned and completely cleared land. When John sold his land to developers in the early I 960s, he had one wish- to live out his last years in comfort and in a new house. Fate had other plans, for he was stricken with cancer and passed away before his house was finished.

Wanted

The L.I.A.B.A. Library!

Thanks,

Laura

It is missing in action, if you know who has it or if you do, please, please contact Mark and let us know. You can contact us via phone (631)589-9027, via email libottle@optonline.net or via snail mail to

Mark Smith 10 Homes Court, Sayville, NY 11782-2408 - Thanks, Laura