Sag Harbor became ethnically and culturally diverse earlier than our other villages—by about a century and a half.
In the golden years of American whaling, from the 1820s to the 1860s, Sag Harbor, as the third most important whaling port in the United States, was prosperous, outward looking and quite international. Walking from the Long Wharf down Main Street, you might have seen a Moby-Dick mix of whalers from Cape Verde and the Azores, from the Pacific Islands and Far East, from Portugal and Brazil, as well as a multicultural United States contingent—home-grown Yankees, Native Americans and African-Americans. You might even have seen Herman Melville strolling along.
As whaling declined, a cotton mill was built in the village, attracting weavers and textile workers from Scotland and Ireland. The mill later burned but industrial life went on. Workers from Germany and Eastern Europe emigrated to labor in the watchcase, hat and cigar factories, and in a brass foundry. They came and many stayed.
The African-American community first attended the Methodist Episcopal Church, and in 1839 built their own St. David’s A.M.E. Zion Church, a landmark structure still actively used. Land for the first Jewish cemetery was acquired in 1890. Congregation Adash Israel, built in 1896, is the oldest synagogue on Long Island.
Sag Harbor was a busy deep-water port at the time of the American Revolution—and remains so today. Pleasure boats have replaced schooners in the slips of its beautiful, protected anchorage, but today’s craft are elegant, floating reminders that commerce and a cosmopolitan worldview shaped Sag Harbor history.