Back to the beachfront

Historic lifesaving station in E. Hampton is returned to beach, from where Nazi spies were foiled in WWII.

There are times when it’s easier to move a 100-ton house than an 86-year-old man.

On Wednesday, in an event praised by East End historians, the old Amagansett Life-Saving Station, a largely forgotten relic of Long Island’s maritime past, was painstakingly carried half a mile to the beachfront where its presence thwarted a Nazi spy operation in 1942.

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Yet Joe Cullen [CORRECTION: Coast Guardsman John Cullen thwarted an operation by Nazi saboteurs in Amagansett in 1942. His first name was incorrect in a story Friday. PG. A15 ALL 5/26/07], who happened upon a group of German soldiers on a foggy beach all those years ago, said yesterday it’s unlikely he will ever return to Amagansett to see the house in its original spot.

“It’s too far - I don’t want any part of it,” said Cullen, now living in Chesapeake, Va., said in a telephone interview yesterday. “But I remember it well.”

Cullen, who raised his family in Westbury before moving away, spoke about his run-in with the Nazis and reaped military honors.

The U-boat incident was just one among many important moments in the building’s history, said Richard Barons, executive director of the East Hampton Historical Society.

“I think it’s right next to the importance of our lighthouses,” Barons said. “It’s a major icon for the whole history of Long Island’s maritime experience.”

Built in 1902, the wooden house was donated to the Town of East Hampton by heirs of the late author and book editor Joel Carmichael, who in 1966 saved the structure from demolition by purchasing it for 75 cents - about $4 today.

Carmichael paid $10,000 to move the building to his 2.3-acre property on Bluff Road, where for 40 years it served as a cottage. The property is now being offered at $6.25 million.

Amid some community protest, the building was hoisted on wheels and led to a patch of beachfront behind the East Hampton Marine Museum. By this time next year its interior will mimic what it was at the turn-of-the-century and exhibits will tell its history.

The Amagansett house is one of just a few remaining lifesaving stations that were run by the Coast Guard after it merged with the U.S. Lifesaving Service in 1915.

Its survival is extraordinary because the house in its original context tells the story of “when the sea was our highway,” Barons said.

Yet roving houses are not uncommon in the Hamptons. Since the 17th century, homes have been moved to steer clear of traffic or accommodate rising tides.

More recently, a parade of historic barnhouses was donated to East Hampton town by Adelaide de Menil, an heiress to the Schlumberger oil fortune. The company that moved the lifesaving station and the de Menil house, Davis Construction, has been doing it for four generations.

And in a few months, an 1810 schoolhouse known as the Hook School and owned by East Hampton town also will be moved to the town seat.

“If you are late for lunch here,” said Peter Garnham, executive director of the Amagansett Historical Society, “you can say, ‘I’m sorry, I was delayed by a house.’ I have.”

Newsday