Montauk Weather: Tuesday was clear and mild after many days of low clouds and occasional small storms. For the next three days the sun may shine; the low eighties is possible by Thursday. At Tuesday noon the ocean waves were reported at 2.3 feet, air temperature 66 degrees, water 57.3 degrees, wind 4 MPH from the northwest, cloudless sky to horizon lines. Sunset 1800.

Backhanders

Anti-snob snobbery is a beloved Montauk character flaw, so the Gosman Family (who own Gosman’s Dock restaurants and markets) paid for an ad in The Easthampton Star [May 14, 2009] that shows the scruffy dog from Wizard of Oz standing beside a wood-slat lobster trap and the words:

“Friendly waitresses,

food you can pronounce,

killer views

and plenty of parking. ~

Toto, I have a feeling we’re not in the Hamptons any more.”

The End’s First Montauk History Editor

People named Fields have walked, fished and sailed in Montauk since 1639 or so. William Fields, who can trace his umpteenth Fields grandfather back to the settlement of Gardiner’s Island by Lion Gardiner and his English shipmates, believes that in Montauk are some of the wildest and strangest people on earth. He is an electrical engineer; he has served in the army, fixed the enormous missile-directing NORAD radar during the Cold War; he’s seen the world. His knowledge of Montauk is encyclopedic, and he has a hypothesis that Montauk is weird because of its geography.

“If you will notice,” he says, “Montauk is on a point of land that sticks out into the sea like the prow of a ship. In that way it’s like Key West, and Cape Hatteras, Cape May, Cape Cod. They’ve all got something about the people in common, and you know what it is but it’s hard to put into words. I think certain kinds of people are attracted by some unknown power, maybe even electrical, to little hooks of land sticking out into the sea. The people who live in Montauk are so crazy you can only marvel that they can exist in this world, but a lot of them do, mostly by pretending to be normal human beings when they get west of the Napeague Stretch.”

It turns out Bill Fields, who is a home appliance doctor (who makes house calls), knows and loves almost every weird Montauk creature he’s come across. He has agreed to help The End find and tell good Montauk stories, and as a sideline, to let us in on the world of electrical appliances and how to get the best out of them.

He has a bit of money-saving advice for those who have clothing washers in their home: “Use about half or less of the detergent you now use, no matter how little you use. If you get any more than an inch of foam on the wash water, you’ve got too much. The rinse cycle can’t deal with it. Your towels and clothes sop up the detergent and you can’t get it out. It dries on the clothing in the dryer. Next time you wash, you’ll find that even without adding any detergent at all, your clothes have enough soap in them to make an inch or more foam, which is more than enough for almost any wash. Take the tip. You’ll save money and improve the environment.”

Leadership Lesson

"Don't you be put out by anything," the Captain continued, mumbling rather fast. "Keep her facing it. They may say what they like, but the heaviest seas run with the wind. Facing it -- always facing it -- that's the way to get through. You are a young sailor. Face it. That's enough for any man. Keep a cool head."

~ Captain MacWhirr, from Typhoon, by Joseph Conrad