Club and Mill History in the Remaking in Oakdale Newsday - March 16, 2008

In 1973, the members of the South Side Sportsmen's Club held an auction. Before their Oakdale headquarters - built as a tavern in 1820 and converted to a clubhouse in 1866 - was turned over to the state to become a park, the men gathered to sell off nearly everything inside it. The furniture went. So did the Steinway grand, the stuffed fish, even the teapot with a broken handle. The stove, circa 1820, was auctioned, too. Gilbert Bergen, park ranger for what is now called Connetquot River State Park Preserve, was there. And he wants it all back. "At that time, the state was interested in the property and they weren't thinking about furnishings and that sort of thing," said Bergen, 78. Now, of course, it seems a shame that all those items - from fishing rods to works of art - were dispersed, he said. Bergen has been steward of the place since 1960, when it was still a private club. For a century, it catered to some of the most prominent names in New York business and politics. Distinguished visitors Presidents Theodore Roose- velt and Herbert Hoover visited, likely retiring to the club's billiard room for a drink next to the ornate Franklin stove. Now Bergen and a group of supporters called the Friends of Connetquot River State Park Preserve are working to restore the historic clubhouse and nearby flour mill to their former states. They're asking descendants of club members to donate or loan back the clubhouse's original furnishings. And the state, with financial support from the Friends, is restoring the 18th-century mill. The park's 3,473 acres first belonged to the Secatogue Indians, who named the river "Connetquot," which means "Great River." In 1684 and 1697, they sold the land on both sides of the river to William Nicoll, the father of Islip Town. Nicoll built the Oakdale Grist Mill around 1750. Used by local farmers to grind corn - called "grist" - and wheat, the mill had a horizontal wheel beneath the building that was propelled by the flowing water. In 1820, Eliphalet Snecedor opened the Snedecor Inn, a stagecoach stop along old South Country Road. Forty-six years later, his wealthy patrons, who came for the excellent fishing and hunting, bought the property to form a private club. "We are very fortunate that the old gentlemen who had the South Side Sportsmen's Club were here," Richard Remmer, former president of the Friends, said while standing next to the mill, which soon will be lowered onto new foundations. "They had the means to preserve the building," he said. "It's the only horizontal water mill left probably anywhere on the East Coast, if not in the United States." Getting the mill working again Most mills were converted to vertical wheels in the late 1880s, not long after the sportsmen's club was founded and the Oakdale Grist Mill stopped operating, Remmer said. After a $150,000 restoration of the deteriorating structure, Remmer hopes to make it a working mill again. That will cost another $150,000. So far, the Friends have raised $105,000 to contribute to the project. The park currently operates a 19th-century hatchery, stocking the river with trout. Connetquot also features 50 miles of hiking, horseback riding, cross-country ski and nature trails. It also offers educational programs and tours of the old clubhouse. Inside that three-story shingled lodge, Friends members and park staff walk through expansive rooms, pointing out a few original furnishings that have been recovered - or reproduced. The billiard room once again features its antique Franklin stove, on loan from the New-York Historical Society, to which it had been donated. The Friends have commissioned replicas of several rocking chairs, also for the billiard room. Two original John James Audubon prints - "Canvas-backed Duck" and "Dusky Duck" - hang in the men's dining room, but the dining set in the ladies' dining room doesn't do justice to the original Windsor chairs, said Linda Kasten, 54, a park staff member who once worked in the club's kitchen. Bergen has an inventory of 300 items auctioned in 1973. The pieces were considered private property of the club's member-shareholders, and were not included in the sale of the buildings and land to the state for $6.5 million. The proceeds of the auction were split among the members. Remmer, 52, who remembers coming to the club as a boy with his father, would like to see the return of an oak card table, with a top that came off to reveal a green felt playing surface for poker. He also hopes to re-equip the kitchen, which used to serve Clams South Side, a type of clam hash. But Bergen will be happy to see even the broken teapot. "We're really not choosy at all," he said. "It was all interesting. It's just nice to have them come home." Copyright © 2008, Newsday Inc.