Sag Harbor Historical Museum

Historical Calendar Highlights

January 1st | 1772

The first stage route operated to Sag Harbor from New York.

January 1st | 1787

The first building in Sag Harbor constructed for the sole purpose of being a school house was erected in 1786-1787. It stood at the corner of Madison and Jefferson Streets on a lot given by Braddock Corey.

February 14th | 1924

Nancy Boyd marries Malcolm Willey.

February 20th | 1895

Annie Burnham Cooper married John Boyd of Brooklyn.

February 24th | 1766

A meeting is called to consult upon a House of Publick Worship in Sag Harbor.

March 12th | 1819
Otter Hose Company, the first volunteer Fire Co. in Sag Harbor and New York, is formed.
March 13th | 1941

Nancy Boyd Willey inherits the Annie Cooper Boyd House from her mother, Annie Cooper Boyd.

March 27th | 1854

The attic and roof of The Nassau Hotel, where the current People's United Bank is located, caught fire and through the gallant efforts of the fire department the builidng was saved. It was later known as the Hotel Bay View.

March 27th | 1897
The Sag Harbor Yacht Club was established. Prior to that there were two small clubs. The Maycroft Yacht Club and the Harbor Yacht Club. They combined to form one.
April 15th | 1726

Earliest record of a road from Sagaponack to Sag Harbor. 

April 22nd | 1862
The Union School was opened combining 3 former school districts and the building was located in the old schoolhouse on Madison Street
May 1st | 1877

The luxurious home of Dr. P. Parker King on Hampton St was purchased for $5,000 and turned over to the Marymount nuns. A school followed, The Academy of the Sacred Heart of Mary.

May 1st | 1909
The steam collier John B. Dallas of New York was rammed by an erratic torpedo owned by The Bliss Torpedo Company in Noyac Bay.
May 3rd | 1791
Josiah W. Hunting, one of Sag Harbor's early residents, opened his stage coach run from Sag Harbor to New York.
May 5th | 1742
The Town of Southampton appointed a committee to "go down to Sag Harbor and make a choice of a suitable place to build a wharf, and not charge the Town".
May 10th | 1791

The first issue of Long Island's first newspaper, "The Long Island Herald" was published by David Frothingham.

May 16th | 1844
The dedication ceremony for the First Presbyterian Church, built by Minard Lafeaver was led by the Rev. Joseph Copp in front of a congregation of 1000.
May 26th | 1817
One of three large fires in Sag Harbor.
June 1st | 1796

Joseph W. Foster listed as owning property, which is the current Annie Cooper Boyd House, "North of William Ball".

July 19th | 1894

Annie Cooper becomes engage to John Boyd.  "... there has risen a great & holy joy a deep sublime sweetness - a wonderful, unexpected, - unspeakable joy - for - on my third finger of my left hand flashes a beautiful diamond pledge of my own true lover's love ... he came, he saw, he conquered - it happened on Montauk Pt. - on a glorious day - the 19th of July." Annie Cooper Boyd wrote this in her diary on Sept. 5, 1894.  Seven years and three months, from the first day she met him.

July 23rd | 1902

Nancy Boyd, daughter of Annie and John Boyd, is born.

August 9th | 1923
Agents raided a home in Noyac confiscating 119 cases of bootleg whiskey. The liquor had originally come from Scotland.
August 15th | 1875
The New York and Montauk Steamboat Company was formed and several members of Sag Harbor,, such as Hannibal French, were directors, with offices located in the Alvin Building
September 1st | 1869
An article in The Sag Harbor Express is published requesting Village Trustees to name streets.
September 2nd | 1845
The Sag Harbor Academy opened offering classical and scientific subjects. it burned down four years later in 1849.
September 5th | 1820
Beebee Mill construction started. A flag would fly on it's roof whenever a ship was sited known as the "Flag on the Mill, ship in the Bay"
September 5th | 1894

Annie Cooper wrote in her diary this day of the man she would marry, "surely this is perfect love - I know he is not what I thought I was looking for - he is not rich, he is not handsome, he is not witty - nor yet brilliant - he is not a man of position in the eyes of the world - he is simple & only John Boyd - a man from Greenport - a wage-winner - a good - honest - noble man."

September 15th | 1776

The wharf in Sag Harbor was crowded with immigrants awaiting passage to Connecticut to get away from the British who were occupying Long Island.

September 24th | 1818

Joseph Foster, Jr. sells to William Cooper a triangular parcel containing a shop. This piece of property is north of the Foster house, today known as the Annie Cooper Boyd House.

October 7th | 1894

William H. Cooper dies, leaving the Annie Cooper Boyd House to Annie.

October 10th | 1794

Sag Harbor's first Post Office was estabished in a small lean-to attached to the home of the first Post Master Henry Packer Dering. East Hampton and Southampton relied on the Sag Harbor Post Office as neither had a post office of its own.

November 22nd | 1998

Nancy Boyd Willey dies leaving the Annie Cooper Boyd House to the Sag Harbor Historical Society.

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Annie Cooper Boyd Collection

Painter and iconic local figure, Annie documented both the manmade and natural landmarks of historic Sag Harbor. See below for a monthly feature from our extensive collection.

Polle's Creek North Haven
Polle's Creek North Haven