Second House Restoration Gets Underway In Montauk

East Hampton Town plans to restore the oldest house in Montauk.Town officials accepted a $453,442 bid last month from Ronald Webb Builder to restore Second House, which sits on Fort Pond and was originally built in 1746, with plans to return it to the way it appeared in the 1880s, when it served as a boardinghouse.

The Montauk Historical Society Board, which manages the currently closed Second House Museum, agreed to endorse the recommendations of Robert Hefner, East Hampton Town historic services director, in a report on March 2016. Mr. Hefner recommended that Second House be restored to look as it did in 1886, when George A. Osborne, the last livestock keeper employed by the proprietors of Montauk, departed.

“Second House will be undergoing the first phase of its restoration this year,” Kathryn Nadeau, president of the Montauk Historical Society, said on a rainy Tuesday afternoon while strolling through the house, which is empty.

The inner walls and ceilings have been exposed—“As it was stripped down to its bones, my heart grew fonder and fonder,” Ms. Nadeau said—and plans are being drawn up. An extension that was added in the 1900s will be taken down, she said, adding, “That room will become a porch area.”

Once the restoration is completed, the Montauk Historical Society hopes to offer educational programs for students, tourists and residents who wish to learn about the grassroots of American history within the Town of East Hampton. In addition, the Historical Society plans to construct an office space in the second story of the house.

A historic red-brick fireplace that is partially original is the first remnant that can be seen upon entering the house. “The whole house was centered around the fireplace,” Ms. Nadeau said.

Town records make reference to cattle grazing in Montauk as early as 1661. The East Hampton proprietors used Montauk as a pastureland and to handle and coordinate large numbers of cattle and sheep grazing on the Montauk hills. Three dwellings were built to house the shepherds.

First House was built in 1744 on land that is now part of Hither Hills State Park. First House was later rebuilt in 1798 but burned down in the spring of 1909. Third House, located two miles west of Montauk Point, was built in 1747; in 1806, the present Third House was built.

By the 1860s, all three houses began to attract travelers. Second House became a boardinghouse, and an additional wing was added to it in 1880 by Arthur Benson, who had purchased all of Montauk at an auction in 1879. An advertisement in 1900 noted that the house held 25 guests, each paying $10 a week to stay there. At that time, Ulysses Tillinghast Payne, who with his family ran the building as a boardinghouse, made extensive alterations and improvements.

Over the years the house had its share of notable boarders, including members of the Morgan, Pierrepont and van Rensselaer families, as well as the Gardiners. David Kennedy, a frequent summer visitor, purchased the house in June 1909 and turned it into a private summer residence, though he did operate it as an inn for a couple of years in 1934 and 1935.

In 1968, the Kennedy family arranged to turn the house over to the Town of East Hampton and the New York State Historical Trust. The town reached an agreement in 1969 for the Montauk Historical Society to operate a museum in Second House, which officially opened to the public on June 28, 1969. The society continues to manage the museum today, although it is not open at this time because of the need for renovations.