Street names in the Hamptons tend to fall into three categories—with exceptions of course. First and most colorful are descriptive names such as Soak Hides Road, Hither, Middle and Further Lanes, Two Holes of Water Road, and Toilsome Lane (East Hampton), and Toylsome Lane (Southampton). Then there are the many Native American borrowings such as Sagaponack Road, Mecox Lane and Accabonac and Apaquogue Roads.
Family names make up the third category. Almost all of the old family street names are derived from British surnames simply because the earliest white settlers came from England, although they first put down American roots (usually for ten to twenty years) in what is now Massachusetts and Connecticut before crossing Long Island Sound in the mid-seventeenth century to the new settlements on the East End. A few like Samuel Sherrill got here by shipwreck.
Would you like a street in the Hamptons named after you?
One way is to create a subdivision road that will be dedicated to the town and become public. This involves a lot of money for the land and the roadbuilding, and might be considered a trifle showoff-y unless your name is something like Trump and you are in the habit of affixing your name to skyscrapers and things like that. East Hampton and Southampton planning boards have no fixed criteria for naming new streets (other than not duplicating something in the fire district) so you’d have a reasonable chance of success in seeing your name lettered on a concrete post or street sign.
An extreme approach would be to change your last name to, say, Gin or Meadow or Lily Pond or Georgica. Or even Main or Montauk. This however is not likely to impress too many people at this time and is liable to be resented by grandchildren and great grandchildren for many years to come.
The other sure fire way is to be patient. Hang around the Hamptons for a really, really long time, and it just seems to happen. Ten or twelve generations usually does the trick. By that time, however, you can never be sure if it was named for your branch of the family or for your cousin. But no one outside of an occasional historic society buff can either.