Holly Signoretti picks out a book at the Book Revue in Huntington village. Photo by Kimberly Brown
People are continuously told that change is inevitable but sometimes those changes can hit a human right in the heart, especially if it involves a goodbye.
Many residents along the North Shore of Suffolk County and surrounding areas were saddened to hear of the closing of Book Revue in Huntington Sept. 10. After more than 40 years of being the go-to place for book lovers, like many other businesses, the owner struggled during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The store had to shut down for three months during the pandemic, and once the owner reopened the doors, the Book Revue struggled to get back on its feet.
Despite talking with the building landlord to come to a compromise, in the end the back rent was impossible to pay back, and it was initially announced last month that the store would close Sept. 30.
With inventory starting to thin out, the store was closed Sept. 9 for employees to organize the shelves, and on Sept. 10 people were invited to come in and take books for free. By the afternoon, the store was cleaned out and Book Revue doors were closed for business permanently.
Its owner Richard Klein posted on Facebook that while the store was now closed to the public, he would be in touch soon. Customers hope so.
Not only was Book Revue the place to go to pick up some literature, but it was also a social center. Many residents remember going to the store as a child or a parent to enjoy Toddler Time with stories, live music and dancing. There were groups to discuss favorite reads, and celebrity book signings with authors such as Alan Alda, Hillary Clinton, Whoopi Goldberg, Clinton Kelly and more.
The store also offered a diverse selection of books with extensive arts and music sections as well as a section dedicated to local subjects written by Long Island authors.
More than a place to shop or socialize, the Book Revue also drew people to Huntington village. When people come to shop at an iconic store, they usually will stay a while in the area and stop by other shops or get a bite to eat. The closing of such a business could lead to a domino effect in the village.
Our communities need more independent book stores like this former Huntington staple, ones that flourish and elevate the quality of life in a village. It’s a shame that the landlord and Klein couldn’t come to an agreement. However, the community will be forever grateful to Richard and his brother Bob, who retired from the business earlier last year, for their service to the community and providing years of happiness to Long Islanders.
Here’s hoping that another vibrant business that hosts events will come into the building to keep one of our bustling villages alive with the excitement Book Revue once did.
Gallery North presented its 55th annual Outdoor Art & Music Festival in Setauket on Sept. 11 and 12. Thousands of visitors attended the two day event which featured over 90 exhibitors, music and food. Next up for the gallery is the return of its outdoor holiday markets, in collaboration with the Three Village Historical Society, on Saturdays, Nov. 27, Dec. 4, 11 and 18. For more information, visit www.gallerynorth.org.
The members of The Ward Melville Heritage Organization board said protesters only know part of the story about their negotiations with the owner of a popular restaurant in Stony Brook Village Center.
After Pentimento Restaurant, owned by chef Dennis Young, announced on its Facebook page at the end of July that it would be closing Sept. 30 due to their lease not being renewed with Eagle Realty Holdings, customers and former employees began protesting the decision.
Eagle Realty, which this year paid $725,000 in real estate taxes, according to President Gloria Rocchio, is a wholly owned subsidiary of the not-for-profit WMHO. The realty company leases the commercial businesses in Stony Brook Village Center as well as a few offices and residential homes surrounding the shopping center.
In the last few weeks, protesters have rallied in front of the restaurant as well as Rocchio’s home. The supporters created a Save Pentimento Restaurant Facebook page and posted a petition on Change.org.
There were also campaigns to call and email all of the board members which include Richard Rugen, chairman of the board, and trustees Mary Van Tuyl and Charles Napoli. People have been calling the WMHO office, too.
Rocchio said a couple of times a box truck and car have been parked in front of her home with Save Pentimento signs, and at a Sept. 12 protest, a person was banging a pot.
Rugen said as president, Rocchio has taken “the black eye.”
The board feels the protests exacerbated the problem instead of letting the trustees work things out with Young and his lawyer. The trustees said they were working on the issue with the owner for eight months.
“That’s what’s so frustrating,” Rugen said. “The demonstrations and so on, especially in front of Gloria’s house, have actually exacerbated the problem to the point where it was no longer viable.”
Napoli said people don’t have all the facts and the board was just trying to get clarity, while the public has labeled them “demons.” The board members said they have had a good relationship with Young through the years, and he’s always paid his rent on time. Rocchio described Young as “a wonderful chef.”
Napoli said the protests were “counterproductive.”
“It was unnecessary,” he said. “It could have been resolved, just between us and Dennis.”
Van Tuyl, who has received numerous calls at home and her business, added that the protesters know who the board members are but the trustees don’t know who the people are calling and emailing them.
“That’s a scary situation for anyone to be in,” she said.
Rocchio said it was difficult for her and board members to comment on the lease situation to the press and residents as the terms of a lease and negotiations are normally kept between the lessor and lessee. She added that each lease is for a different length of time.
“These are landlord-tenant matters that are negotiated, and you really don’t discuss in public,” Rocchio said.
Young and the restaurant’s manager, Lisa Cusumano, said in previous interviews with TBR News Media that they were supposed to notify the landlord a year before the end of the lease term about the intention to renew. Young, who wants to retire in the near future, said he forgot due to trying to keep his business afloat during the COVID-19 pandemic. A few months ago, someone he knew wanted to buy the business, but he was told the lease could not be extended. If Young was able to sell the business, the restaurant would remain as Pentimento, and he and Cusumano would continue to work there as well as the current staff.
The board said they were open to extending Young’s lease but not for as long as he originally asked for. When they proposed a shorter length of time, their offer was rejected by him. The board members added that they interviewed the buyer Young suggested as well as others. They suggested a couple of them to Young. However, when the potential buyers contacted the restaurant owner, he didn’t provide them with the information they needed to make an offer.
There was one more caveat, Rocchio said, as obligations in a present lease have to be fulfilled before letting another person buy a business, and the septic system needs to be replaced. Cusumano said in a Sept. 16 The Village Times Herald article that Young has maintained the septic system properly and replaced it approximately 10 years ago.
Rocchio said the current septic system had been reviewed by the Suffolk County Department of Health Services when it was installed, and the architect who designed it used the standard specification for a restaurant with 125 seats. However, according to the board, the septic system that is a dedicated system for the kitchen, interior of the restaurant and outside patio has been overtaxed. It doesn’t handle or affect the bar area or the bar bathroom.
The owner had expanded the restaurant years ago by taking over a former clothing store. While he didn’t have enough funds to finish the project, the board said Eagle Realty Holdings put up the rest of the money. In the event that he sold the business, the realty company would be repaid.
“It was to our benefit for him to sell the business,” Rocchio said.
She said with the restaurant closing at the end of the month Eagle Realty will not be paid back the money, and it will be responsible for the new septic system.
In a Sept. 16 The Village Times Herald article, Cusumano said that the restaurant’s last day would be Sept. 30.
“We walk away after 27 years with nothing,” she said.
Napoli said they were doing everything they could to help Young.
“No one on the board wants to hurt Dennis,” Napoli said. “Everyone, all the trustees, want him to get something for the restaurant. For 27 years, he has served this community very well and the community has supported him, and we’ve encouraged it. We’ve worked together. It would be only fair that he did get something.”
Abraham Woodhull and Caleb Brewster meet to convey intelligence for General Washington. (Locke mural Setauket Elementary School)
“… by the assistance of a 355 [lady] of my acquaintance, shall be able to outwit them all.” (Abraham Woodhull to BenjaminTallmadge 15 August 1779 — The Washington Papers, Library of Congress)
BENJAMIN TALLMADGE, organizer and leader of the Revolutionary War Setauket spies, was born in Setauket in 1754. He was the son of the minister of the Setauket Presbyterian Church. The home where he was born is still standing in Setauket at the end of Runs Road. Tallmadge grew up in Setauket and attended school here with his close friend Abraham Woodhull.
When the Revolution began in 1775, Tallmadge enlisted in the Continental Army and by February 1777, he had been promoted to the rank of major. In the summer of 1778, General Washington appointed him head of his secret service and tasked Tallmadge with establishing an espionage network against the British in New York City. To conduct this vital undercover operation on Long Island, Tallmadge chose his boyhood friend Abraham Woodhull. Tallmadge and Woodhull chose other friends and neighbors from Setauket to assist them; men and women who could be trusted and who would prove to be so discreet in all their contacts that many of their identities would never be discovered.
ABRAHAM WOODHULL was a descendant of Richard Woodhull, an early Brookhaven Town leader and magistrate. He was born in 1750 on his family’s farm in Setauket, and he was a farmer by occupation. From the beginning of the Setauket Spies in 1778, Woodhull was in charge of day-to-day operations. His code name was Samuel Culper, and the spy operation came to be known as the Culper Ring. Woodhull was referred to as Samuel Culper Senior after he recruited Robert Townsend, who was given the code name Samuel Culper Junior. Not only did Woodhull direct field activities, but he also risked his life countless times by personally collecting information in New York and on Long Island.
Woodhull was responsible for evaluating the reports received from all sources, determining what was to go forward to Washington’s headquarters and seeing that the dispatches were carried across the Sound by Caleb Brewster. Woodhull’s health was poor, and he lived in constant fear of discovery. Despite his fears, Woodhull carried on his duties as a Patriot spy and in a 10 April 1779 letter to Tallmadge wrote, “… and rest assured that I endevour to collect and convey the most accurate and explicit intelligence that I possibly can. And hope it may be of some service toward alleviating the misery of our distressed Country, nothing but that could have induced me to undertake it. . .” (The Washington Papers, Library of Congress)
CALEB BREWSTER was perhaps the most bold and daring of the spies. After the August 1776 Battle of Long Island in Brooklyn, Brewster joined the Continental Army with the rank of a lieutenant of artillery.
In spite of his service designation, one of Brewster’s tasks throughout the war was to command a fleet of fast-sailing whaleboats, operating from the Connecticut shore against British and Loyalist shipping on Long Island Sound (known as the “Devil’s Belt”). Each whaleboat was about 30 feet in length, equipped with sails and oars, and with 12-15 fully armed men. This, together with his knowledge of the Long Island shoreline, his work as a mate on sailing ships, and his boyhood association with Benjamin Tallmadge, made him an ideal choice to carry intelligence back and forth across the Sound.
ANNA SMITH STRONG, great grand-daughter of Setauket’s Lord of the Manor William “Tangier” Smith, devised a wash line signal system, according to Morton Pennypacker in his book “George Washington’s Spies on Long Island and in New York,” published 1939, to identify for Abraham Woodhull the whereabouts of Caleb Brewster’s whaleboats, so Woodhull could find him and pass along messages for General Washington.
As detailed by Pennypacker and embellished by Strong family historian Kate Strong, to avoid detection by the British it was necessary for Brewster to hide his boat in six different places, each identified by a number. Nancy Strong, as she was known by friends and family, hung her laundry from the line in a code formation to direct Woodhull to Brewster’s location. A black petticoat was the signal that Brewster was nearby, and the number of handkerchiefs scattered among the other garments showed the meeting place. Using the most ordinary of personal items and improvising on the most ordinary of personal tasks, she made an extraordinary contribution to the Patriot cause. Kate Strong’s True Tales indicate her information was corroborated by scraps of paper, deeds and letters in her possession, as well as documents she saw or was told about by Pennypacker (True Tales, “In Defense of Nancy’s Clothesline,” 1969).
CAPTAIN AUSTIN ROE, as the courier later known as Long Island’s Paul Revere, was the member of the Setauket Spies most visible to the British and Tories in Brookhaven. Roe ran a tavern in East Setauket where food and drink were served and where travelers could stay overnight on their way to or from the east end of Long Island. The original location of the tavern (it was moved in 1936) was along what is now Route 25A, just west of Bayview Avenue. The site is marked by a state road sign which details a few of the most important facts about Austin Roe and the tavern.
Austin Roe used his position as a tavern owner to justify his 110-mile round trips. While in New York, Roe gathered supplies he needed for the tavern, and expensive materials and goods for Nancy Strong. These trips provided the cover he needed to obtain spy messages. Roe made numerous trips to Manhattan, sometimes as often as once a week. The roads were heavily traveled by British and Loyalist troops and by highwaymen (thieves and robbers). Roe would receive intelligence directly from Robert Townsend, the messages written in code or invisible ink. He would ride back to Setauket and pass the information to Abraham Woodhull.
ROBERT TOWNSEND (code name Samuel Culper, Jr.) coordinated the efforts of the spy network in New York. We will probably never know all the spies who contributed information on British movements, but we do know that Townsend, a resident of Oyster Bay before and after the Revolutionary War, was the principal contact in New York for most of the period between June 1779 and November 1783.
The valuable intelligence transmitted by the spies led to the capture of Major Andre, who was hanged as a spy on orders of General Washington, and the discovery of Benedict Arnold’s plot to turn over West Point to the British. The Culper Spy Ring also supplied Washington with information that enabled him to prevent the British from attacking the French army and navy after they arrived in Newport, Rhode Island, in July 1780 to support General Washington. The most important contribution of the Culper Spy Ring was to provide General Washington with accurate and detailed intelligence. In many instances, Washington was able to check the veracity of information received from other sources by comparing it with intelligence received from the Culper Spy Ring.
Beverly C. Tyler is Three Village Historical Society historian and author of books available from the society at 93 North Country Road, Setauket. For more information, call 631-751-3730 or visit www.tvhs.org.
Meet Big Bill Tory at the Sherwood Jayne House during Culper Spy Day. Photo from Preservation Long Island
UPDATED! This article was updated on 9/17/21 to reflect a change to the schedule of events (in bold).
By Heidi Sutton
On Saturday, Sept. 18 from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., the Three Village Historical Society, Tri-Spy Tours and the Long Island Museum will host a day of spy-related tours and activities for the 7th annual Culper Spy Day, named for the Culper Spy Ring founded by Benjamin Tallmadge, George Washington’s chief intelligence officer during the Revolutionary War.
The annual event is the brainchild of Margo Arceri, who first heard about George Washington’s Setauket spies (including her favorite spy Anna Smith Strong) from her Strong’s Neck neighbor and local historian, Kate W. Strong, in the early 1970s.
Diane Schwindt of Stirring Up History, pictured with Margo Arceri, will offer colonial cooking demonstrations during Culper Spy Day. Photo from Mari Irizarry
“Kate W. Strong, Anna Smith Strong’s great-great-granddaughter, originally told me about the Culper Spy Ring when I used to visit her with my neighbor and Strong descendant Raymond Brewster Strong III. One of her stories was about Nancy (Anna Smith Strong’s nickname) and her magic clothesline. My love of history grew from there,” she said in an interview in 2015.
Seven years ago Arceri approached the Three Village Historical Society’s President Steve Hintze and the board about conducting walking, biking and kayaking tours while sharing her knowledge of George Washington’s Long Island intelligence during the American Revolution.
Today, Arceri runs the popular Tri-Spy Tours in the Three Village area, which follows in the actual footsteps of the Culper Spy Ring. “I have to thank AMC’s miniseries Turn because 80 percent of the people who sign up for the tour do so because of that show. And now that Turn has come to Netflix it has taken this community to an entirely other level,” she said.
It was during one of those tours that Arceri came up with the idea of having a Culper Spy Day, a day to honor the members of Long Island’s brave Patriot spy ring who helped change the course of history and helped Washington win the Revolutionary War. After a successful five-year run, last year’s event was sideswiped by COVID-19 and was presented virtually on Facebook Live.
Meet costumed docents from Oyster Bay’s Raynham Hall on the grounds of the Three Village Historical Society. Photo by TVHS
This year the family-friendly event returns but on a smaller, more intimate scale as participants will have the opportunity to visit eight locations in Setauket, Stony Brook and Port Jefferson to learn about the patriots who risked their lives through tours, spy stories, colonial cooking demonstrations, historic letters, musical performances, and many children activities.
Escorted by Arceri, Mrs. Q of Karen Q. Patriot Tours of NYC will be on location live on social media and in costume visiting many of the locations. With the exception of the Sherwood Jayne House, all events are free.
While the Three Village Historical Society has remained closed since last January, it will reopen for the one-day event. Mari Irizarry, Outreach and Communications Manager at the Society, is ready to welcome visitors. “We miss our community. There is so much rich history, heritage and culture that is part of the Three Villages and beyond and we are excited to share it on Culper Spy Day,” she said.
Arceri’s favorite part of the day is “seeing all these organizations coming together as a whole. It really is our Revolutionary story,” she said. “Everywhere you turn in the Three Villages you are looking at an artifact, and as the historical society believes, the community is our museum and I would really love to put that on the forefront of people’s minds.”
Schedule of Events:
View Revolutionary War artifacts from the collection of Art Billadello at Emma S. Clark Memorial Library on Culper Spy Day.
1. THREE VILLAGE HISTORICAL SOCIETY, 93 North Country Road, Setauket. Located in the circa 1800 Bayles-Swezey House. Here you can take part in oudoor events including an invisible ink demonstration; Spy Stories on the TVHS Porch from 12:30 to 1:30 p.m.; view a patriotic quilt display and demonstration and take part in colonial crafts with the Daughters of the American Revolution Anna Smith Strong Chapter; Author’s Row: come meet authors Beverly C. Tyler, Selene Castrovilla and, Claire Bellerjeau, available for book signings; view Revolutionary War letters from Stony Brook University’s Special Collections; take part in spy games and meet costumed docents who will talk about Raynham Hall, Culper Jr. and their Culper Spy connections; and enjoy a live colonial cooking demonstration and samples with Diane Schwindt of Stirring Up History. 631-751-3730.
2. THE STUDIO AT GALLERY NORTH, 84 North Country Road, Setauket. Visit The Studio to enjoy free Revolutionary War era arts and crafts for children throughout the day. Guests will have an opportunity to create a Tin Punch ornament or a chance to create a decoder & color a quilt square. Activities will occur on the patio, just outside the Studio. 631-751-2676.
3. EMMA S. CLARK MEMORIAL LIBRARY, 120 Main St., Setauket. The library (circa 1892) will present a concert featuring 18th century songs the trio Rose Tree from 12:30 p.m. to 2 p.m. on the Library lawn. View Revolutionary military paraphernalia from the collection of Art Billadello in the Library’s lobby. Kids can enjoy a craft from noon to 3 p.m. 631-941-4080. Please note the previously scheduled bubble and comedy show on the lawn from 11 a.m. to noon has been canceled.
4. CAROLINE CHURCH AND CEMETERY, 1 Dyke Road, Setauket. Built in 1729, this timber frame building has maintained its Colonial appearance. Now an Episcopal church, during the Revolutionary War the Caroline Church was Anglican and a Colonial extension of the Church of England. The graveyard contains the remains of six Patriot soldiers as well as soldiers from World War I and II. View the inside of the church from the vestibule and tour the cemetery with docents from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Just added! Setauket Presbyterian church next door will be offering tours of their cemetery from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.. 631-941-4245.
5. PATRIOTS ROCK HISTORIC SITE, Main Street, Setauket (across from the Setauket Post Office). This glacial erratic boulder is said to be the location of the Battle of Setauket on Aug. 22, 1777. Stop here between 10 a.m. and noon to meet representatives from the Three Village Community Trust who will discuss the importance of Patriots Rock and its local and environmental history. 631-689-0225.
6. THE LONG ISLAND MUSEUM, 1200 Route 25A, Stony Brook. The museum is a Smithsonian Affiliate with permanent and changing exhibitions on American history and art, along with the finest collection of horse-drawn carriages in the country, some of which belonged to Revolutionary War heroes. Visit the History Museum between noon and 5 p.m. to view the newly uncovered Culper Spy Ring letter and see LIMarts Collaborative Art Group doing a plein air painting / sketching on the grounds that day. 631-751-0066.
7. SHERWOOD-JAYNE HOUSE, 55 Old Post Road, East Setauket. Originally built around 1730 as a lean-to saltbox dwelling, the house and farm were maintained as an operational farmstead for over 150 years by members of the Jayne family. Visit with Big Bill the Tory aka William Jayne III, who will explain the noble intentions and virtuosities of King George III and tells you the TRUTH about Washington’s pesky band of renegade spies! Program runs continuously from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Masks must be worn inside. $5 per person, children under 5 free. Pre-registration is recommended at www.preservationlongisland.org.
8. DROWNED MEADOW COTTAGE MUSEUM, corner of West Broadway and Barnum Avenue, Port Jefferson. The Revolutionary War-era Roe House was originally constructed circa 1755 and Phillips Roe, a member of the Culper Spy Ring along with his brother Nathaniel and cousin Austin, was known to have lived there. Visit the cottage between 10 a.m. and 4 p.m. and attend an unveiling with Mayor Margot Garant at 11 a.m.
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Participating organizations for the 7th annual Culper Spy Day include Tri-Spy Tours, Three Village Historical Society, Stony Brook University Special Collections, Emma S. Clark Memorial Library, The Long Island Museum, Raynham Hall, Drowned Meadow Cottage, Preservation Long Island, Gallery North, Karen Q’s Patriot Tours NYC, Anna Smith Strong Chapter of the National Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution, Stirring Up History, Three Village Community Trust, and Caroline Church of Brookhaven
For more information, call 631-751-3730 or visit www.tvhs.org
Preserving the oceans of the world will take more than putting labels on sensitive areas or agreeing on an overall figure for how much area needs protection.
It will require consistent definitions, guidelines and enforcement across regions and a willingness to commit to common goals.
A group of 42 scientists including Ellen Pikitch, Endowed Professor of Ocean Conservation Sciences at the School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences at Stony Brook University, recently published a new framework developed over more than 10 years in the journal Science to understand, plan, establish, evaluate and monitor ocean protection in Marine Protected Areas (MPAs).
“We’ve had MPAs for a long time,” said Pikitch. Some of them are not actively managed, with activities that aren’t allowed, such as fishing or mining, going on in them. “They may not be strongly set up in the first place to protect biodiversity. What this paper does is that it introduces a terminology with a lot of detail on when an MPA qualifies to be at a certain level of establishment and protection.”
These scientists, who work at 38 institutions around the world, created an approach that uses seven factors to derive four designations: fully protected, highly protected, lightly protected, and minimally protected.
If a site includes any mining at all, it is no longer considered a marine protected area.
Fully protected regions have minimal levels of anchoring, infrastructure, aquaculture and non-extractive activities. A minimally protected area, on the other hand, has high levels of anchoring, infrastructure, aquaculture and fishing, with moderate levels of non-extractive activities and dredging and dumping.
Using their own research and evidence from scientific literature, the researchers involved in this broad-based analysis wanted to ensure that MPAs “have quality protection,” Pikitch explained. “The quality is as important, if not moreso, than the quantity.”
The researchers are pleased with the timing of the release of this paper, which comes out just over a month before the United Nations’ Convention on Biological Diversity, which will meet virtually in October. Over 50 countries, including the United States, have already agreed to protect 30 percent of the ocean by 2030.
Pikitch called this a “critical time to get this information in front of decision makers.” The meeting will occur in two parts, with the second one set for an in-person gathering in China in April.
The point of the paper is to “help clarify what is an MPA, how do we distinguish different types and their outcomes,” Pikitch added.
The people who attend the CBD meeting range from high level government officials all the way up to the president of small countries.
About a decade ago, an earlier convention targeted protecting 10 percent of the oceans by 2020. The world fell short of that goal, with the current protection reaching about 7.7 percent, according to Pikitch.
Indeed, amid discussions during the development of this new outcome-based approach to MPAs, some researchers wondered about the logic of creating a target of 30 percent within the next nine years even as the world fell short of the earlier goal.
Some people at the meetings wondered “should we be pushing these things when a lot of them are failing?” Pikitch recalled of a lively debate during a meeting in Borneo. “Part of the answer is in this paper. These [earlier efforts] are failing because they are not doing the things that need to be done to be effective. It definitely helped us inform what we should be thinking about.”
Enabling conditions for marine protected areas go well beyond setting up an area that prevents fishing. The MPA guidelines in the paper have four components, including stages of establishment, levels of protection, enabling conditions and outcomes.
The benefits of ensuring the quality of protecting marine life extends beyond sustaining biodiversity or making sure an area has larger or more plentiful marine life.
“More often than not, it’s the case that MPAs do double duty” by protecting an environment and providing a sustainable resource for people around the area, Pikitch said. Locally, she points to an effort in Shinnecock Bay that provided the same benefits of these ocean protection regions.
In the western part of the bay, Pikitch said the program planted over 3.5 million hard clams into two areas. In the last decade, those regions have had an increase in the hard clam population of over 1,000 percent, which has provided numerous other benefits.
“It demonstrates the positive impact of having a no-take area,” Pikitch said.
At the same time, the bay hasn’t had any brown tides for four straight years. These brown tides and algal blooms can otherwise pose a danger to human health.
By filtering the water, the clams also make it easier for eel grass to grow, which was struggling to survive in cloudier waters that reduce their access to light. With four times as much eel grass as a decade ago, younger fish have a place to hide, grow and eat, increasing their abundance.
Being aware of the imperiled oceans and the threats humans and others face from a changing planet has sometimes been a struggle for Pikitch.
The marine researcher recalled a time when four hurricanes were churning at the same time in the Atlantic.
“I went to bed and I have to admit, I was really depressed,” Pikitch said.
When she woke up the next morning, she had to teach a class. She regrouped and decided on a strategic message.
“This is reality,” she told her class. “We have to accept this is the world we made. Everything we do that can make a positive difference, we do.”
Pikitch is encouraged by the work done to develop a new MPA framework.
These protected areas “provide a sustainable pathway to ensure a healthy ocean and to provide a home for future biodiversity,” she said.
The Thompson House sustained flooding in East Setauket. Photo from WMHO
With Hurricane Ida taking lives and causing destruction from Louisiana to New York, New Jersey and Connecticut, some scientists see longer term patterns reflected in the power and destruction of this storm.
Kevin Reed, associate professor at the School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences at Stony Brook University, said a group of experts on the topic are working on research related to the climate impacts on Ida. No specific timeline is set for such an analysis, which would be similar to what the World Weather Attribution initiative is doing.
“It’s more and more clear that there’s some connection” between a warmer climate and more severe storms,” Reed said. The sooner scientists can make that link, the “more impactful and useful” any such statements or determinations could be.
While Reed hasn’t done any formal research yet on Ida, he has considered some of the specific aspects of this storm.
Rainfall rates of over 3 inches per hour, which set a record in Central Park, are “what you would expect in terms of climate impact.”
Previous modeling work indicates that increasing global temperatures raise the likelihood of extreme rainfall.
Reed hopes researchers can build methodologies and refine their approaches to apply what they know about climate to severe weather events like Ida, which command attention as they approach, once they make landfall and, in their aftermath, as cities and states rebuild.
What’s clear from some of the work he’s done is that “climate change is not a long-off problem, it’s already changing storms” in terms of the amount and intensity of rainfall.
The recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report emphasized that climate change is increasing the rainfall from storms.
Reed suggested it would help in terms of prevention and planning to develop ways to refine the understanding of the link between climate change and storms.
Researchers should “produce this type of information, almost at the same frequency as weather forecasts.”
Larger storms have become a topic on people’s minds in part because disruptive weather events like hurricanes Ida (2021), Laura (2020), Dorian (2019), Florence (2018), Harvey (2017) and Matthew (2016) seem to happen so much more frequently.
Scientists are continuing to try to “quantify the impact” of how the characteristics of an event might have changed because of a warmer climate, Reed said.
Research has been evolving to address society’s most pressing and urgent questions.
Indeed, climate change can and likely has contributed to heavier snowfall events, despite the broader trend towards warmer temperatures.
Some scientists have linked the melting of Arctic ice to the weakening of the polar vortex, enabling colder air to come south toward the continental United States and, in particular, the Eastern Seaboard.
The impacts from climate change are “going to get larger and more significant,” Reed said. “We have an opportunity to mitigate that. If we reduce our emissions the world will warm by half a degree to a degree. That still is offsetting potentially disastrous impacts of going beyond that.”
Recognizing the impact of climate change is a necessary step in reducing the likelihood of future extreme and variable weather events.
The kind of changes necessary for a sustainable future “takes leadership at the national and international level,” Reed said.
From left, Dr. Korbin's wife, Seth Korbin, MD, and Legislator Bridget Fleming at the Suffolk County Legislature office in Riverside on Thursday, September 9th.
Seth Korbin, MD, joint reconstruction specialist at Stony Brook Orthopaedic Associates and clinical associate professor at the Renaissance School of Medicine at Stony Brook University, was presented a Proclamation by Suffolk County Legislator Bridget Fleming this week in acknowledgement of his rescue of a man, woman and her 7-year-old son from the waters in Hampton Bays on Wednesday, August 25.
After deciding to go surfing in the ocean off Dune Road, Dr. Korbin noticed three people clinging to a boogie board and realized that they were caught in a rip current. He first brought the 7-year-old boy to shore, and then went back out for the man and woman. Everyone was safe and no medical attention was needed, thanks to the quick and selfless actions of Dr. Korbin.
“I shouldn’t have…” “If only I’d known…” Whether it’s an outright wrong, an unwise decision or a missed opportunity, we humans tend to harp on the past, often to the detriment, or even paralysis, of our present endeavors and future potentials.
Some would advise us to let bygones be bygones and get on with our lives. We are physical beings, and the laws of physics (at least as they stand now) dictate that time runs in one direction only. So why not simply put the past behind us, especially since the past is behind us whether we put it there or not?
It’s advice we do not take. We continue to feel responsible for what was, continue to attempt to rewrite our histories, continue to regard our past as something that somehow still “belongs” to us. Something in our nature refuses to let go, refuses to reconcile itself with the one-directional flow of time.
Yes, we are physical beings; but there is something in us that transcends the physical. Man is an amalgam of matter and spirit, a marriage of body and soul. It is our spiritual self that persists in the belief that the past can be redeemed. It is our connection with the spiritual essence of our lives that grants us the capacity for teshuvah — the capacity to “return” and retroactively transform the significance of past actions and experiences.
What is this “spiritual essence” with which we seek connection? And how does it enable us to literally change the past? Not just man, but every object, force and phenomenon has both a “body” and a “soul.” A thing’s body is its physical mass, its quantifiable dimensions, its “hard facts.” A thing’s soul is its deeper significance — the truths it expresses, the function it performs, the purpose it serves.
By way of example, let us consider the following two actions: in a dark alleyway, a knife-wielding gangster attacks a member of a rival gang; a hundred yards away, a surgeon bends over a sedated patient lying on the operating table. The “body” of these two actions are quite similar: one human being takes hold of a sharp metal object and slices open the belly of a second human being. But an examination of the “soul” of these two events—the desires that motivate them, the feelings that suffuse them, the aims they seek to achieve—reveals them to be vastly different deeds.
In other words, man is a spiritual creature in that he imparts significance to his deeds and experiences. Things don’t just happen — they happen for a reason, they mean something, they further a certain objective. The same event can therefore mean different things to different people; by the same token, two very different events may serve the same purpose and elicit identical feelings, imbuing them with kindred souls despite the dissimilarity of their bodies.
The body of our lives is wholly subject to the tyranny of time — the “hard facts” cannot be undone. A missed flight cannot be unmissed; a harsh word uttered to a loved one cannot be unspoken. But the soul of these events can be changed. Here we can literally travel back in time to redefine the significance of what occurred.
You oversleep, miss that flight, and never show up for that important meeting. The initial significance of that event: your boss is furious, your career suffers a serious setback, your self-esteem plummets. But you refuse to “put the past behind you.” You dwell on what happened. You ask yourself: What does it mean? What does it tell me about myself? You realize that you don’t really care for your job, that your true calling lies elsewhere. You resolve to make a fresh start, in a less profitable but more fulfilling endeavor. You have reached back in time to transform that slumbered hour into a wake-up call.
Or you have an argument, lose your cool, and speak those unforgivable words. The next morning you’re friends again, agreeing to “forget what happened.” But you don’t forget. You’re horrified by the degree of your insensitivity; you agonize over the distance that your words have placed between the two of you. Your horror and agony make you realize how sensitive you truly are to each other, how much you desire the closeness of the one you love. You have reached back in time to transform a source of distance and disharmony into a catalyst for greater intimacy and love.
On the material surface of our lives, time’s rule is absolute. But on its spiritual inside, the past is but another vista of life, open to exploration and development with the transformative power of teshuvah.
This Yom Kippur, let us reflect on the challenges, pains and the “pulling back of our slingshots” in the last year to ensure that they serve as stimulants and inspirations for collective good health and much personal growth in the year ahead.
Shana Tova!
Rabbi Motti Grossbaum is director of programming and development at Village Chabad Center for Jewish Life & Learning in East Setauket.
Joe, the gentleman at the supermarket register, asked me the routine questions.
“Did you find everything okay?”
“Do you have a rewards number?”
I nodded and typed in my cell phone number.
At the end of the order, I carefully watched the total, waiting for the moment he asked me whether I wanted to donate a dollar or round up my total.
Instead, it looked like the cost declined, even after applying all the discounts. In order to be sure, I had to remove my glasses, which allow me to see at a distance, but not to read.
Yes, the total decreased by 5%. Just as I was about to thank him, I went slack jawed behind my mask. Staring closely at the total in the register, I realized he had given me the senior discount.
I pondered what to do. I could tell him I’m not a senior. Then again, maybe anyone over 35 was a senior. Okay, fine, 40. Alright, 50.
Anyway, I thanked him for ringing me up, told him to stay safe and headed to the car, where I promptly checked the age for a senior discount at my supermarket. Yup, just as I suspected. He gave me the discount well before I was eligible.
As I loaded the groceries in the car, I wondered whether this was a freakout mid-life crisis moment. Maybe this was the universe’s way, through Joe, of reminding me that I’m not a kid anymore.
Then again, I thought, steadying myself behind the wheel, maybe Joe had just typed that senior discount button by mistake. Maybe he felt generous or, perhaps, he was giving everyone a senior discount, just to stick it to his bosses.
I have an image of myself that doesn’t align with what other people see, or even what I notice in the mirror. Somewhere along the lines, my brain imagined that the younger, fresher, more energetic version of me continued to type on my computer, yell at the TV when the Yankees lost, and maneuver through my life.
My body, and the unwelcome hair that seems to wave from my ears, has offered reminders about the passage of time. Recently, my son, who is still waiting for his freshman year to start in earnest after New Orleans recovers from Hurricane Ida, asked me if I wanted to have a catch.
Excited for some father-son bonding that doesn’t involve electronics, I readily agreed. Besides, it’s been a few years since he asked. I am no longer his coach and he has numerous athletic friends and former teammates who can launch balls across a field.
The first few throws felt comfortable, as my fingers reached for the familiar seams and tossed the ball back at his chest.
“Okay, move back,” he instructed.
A few throws later, he asked me to move back again.
“Wait, what?” my arm begged, to a brain that tried to hit the mute button on muscles, tendons, bones and rotator cuffs begging me to stop engaging in such unaccustomed activity.
Pretty soon, he was throwing lasers from the next county and I was trying to figure out if I could strap the ball to a nearby bird to return it to him.
Instead, I ran 20 steps, rotated my hips and snapped my shoulders in an effort to minimize the strain on my arm.
“Good idea,” he yelled. “You should soft toss it back to me.”
Soft toss? That was one of my hardest throws!
Two days later, we repeated the same routine. The second time, my arm instantly hurt. I might imagine that I’m 25 or even 35, just as I might imagine I can fly.
I can enjoy some consolation: the senior discount saved me enough money to buy an ice pack for my throbbing shoulder.
Yes, we are physical beings; but there is something in us that transcends the physical. Man is an amalgam of matter and spirit, a marriage of body and soul. It is our spiritual self that persists in the belief that the past can be redeemed. It is our connection with the spiritual essence of our lives that grants us the capacity for teshuvah — the capacity to “return” and retroactively transform the significance of past actions and experiences.
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