Sag Harbor history: $200G grant will prevent past from 'being erased,' Eastville Community Historical Society director says

Georgette Grier-Key, executive director of the Eastville Community Historical Society, shed a tear when she heard the news: The Sag Harbor-based historical society had received a $200,000 grant from New York State.

Grier-Key was in Albany on Sunday at the New York State Association of Black, Puerto Rican, Hispanic & Asian Legislators annual conference when Gov. Kathy Hochul made the announcement. Grier-Key told Newsday it was meaningful to receive the money during Black History Month and at a time when "our history is being erased."

"People want to stop talking about slavery. They want to stop talking about civil rights," she said. "This is our job more than ever. It's important to continue telling the history."

The Eastville Community Historical Society, founded in 1980, preserves the historic St. David AME Zion Church, as well as its cemetery. It also pushes for preservation of the cultures of Black, Indigenous and people of color in the Sag Harbor area, Grier-Key said.

The society has a collection of historical artifacts, such as photographs and manuscripts. It also maintains pieces of contemporary art, she said.

The grant money will go toward capital improvements for the church, the cemetery, and the Heritage House that serves as the group's headquarters.

"New York State is deeply rooted in rich history, and it is crucial that our students and communities have the opportunity and space to learn about the significant people and movements that formed the society we live in today," Hochul said in a statement.

Kathleen Cunningham, executive director of the Village Preservation Society of East Hampton, said in an interview with Newsday that "it is widely believed" the church was a stop on the Underground Railroad, and retained an important role in the area after slavery.

"Churches were the center of communities," Cunningham said. "It's particularly important for underrepresented communities to have those visual assets maintained in a recognizable way."

Grier-Key said she wants to create a climate-controlled open storage area to display more of the historical society's archives in the Heritage House. She is hoping to do some mitigation work in the church and in the cemetery, where she wants to raise some stones and remove dangerous trees.

It is all part of the historical society's mission to "tell the story of the enslaved and free Africans that settled on the East End of Long Island," she said.

"History is being erased, dismissed, disregarded," Grier-Key said. "It's a call [to] action for us to continue to hold up the banner of telling our history. The good, the bad, the ugly."

By Joshua Needelman

joshua.needelman@newsday.com

Joshua Needelman covers the Town of North Hempstead for Newsday. A Long Island native and University of Maryland graduate, his work has appeared in publications including The New York Times and The Washington Post.