It was the Unkechaug Wessquassucks who lent his name to the Brookhaven waterside haven now known as Squassux, one of the many place names that reflect Long Island’s rich Native American history.
The guiding lights of the Indian pot maker’s kiln may have also contributed to the name of the historic district, Fire Place, an area aglow during Colonial times by the blazes set to guide ships through the inlet that connected Bellport Bay with the Atlantic. The shorefront of Squassux Point remains pretty much how he left it, an unspoiled expanse of wilderness nestled within the 2,550-acre Wertheim National Wildlife Refuge.
Modern ownership of the ancient lands began in 1780 when Samuel Carman, Sr. bought the mills along the river that bears his name and later opened a store, tavern, and Inn. Over the next century, the Carman family grew wealthy and influential and, by the mid-1800s, owned much of the land on the west side of the river, according to local Historian Marty Van Lith.
Carman’s son, Samuel Jr, had 12 children, and in the 1840s, one of them, Joseph Henry, was given about 30 acres, including Squassux Landing. Throughout most of the first 250 years of the settlement, the people who lived in Fire Place were farmers and fishermen, and Squassux Landing was one of the few places available to launch and moor a boat. Since there weren’t many residents, Joseph Carman didn’t mind his neighbors using his property along the river. When he died in 1894, Carman left the land to his two sons, who also let local residents use the property to launch their vessels.
The arrival of the Long Island Rail Road in 1880 brought significant changes to the Brookhaven Hamlet, and at Squassux Landing. Residents began building out their homes to accommodate visitors drawn by the ferries that ran from the end of Beaver Dam Road to Fire Island. Ownership changed In 1907 when the Carman estate, including the landing, was sold to Carman Lush, who had retired there from Hempstead. He was not as accommodating as the Carman family and closed the property to his neighbors.
James Post, whose family lived in the area since before the American Revolution and who was vice president of the Brookhaven Village Association, bought the 13-acre Squassux Landing site and let the community again use it freely. Post and his wife Elizabeth had three children: Jessie Wells Post, Helen Post Hubert, and Elisabeth Post Morrow. After their father’s death in 1945, they officially donated Squassux Landing to the village association.
The BVA board created a committee composed of several directors, chief among them was Bob Lyons, Jr, who developed and ran the landing until 1954 when they hired William Engelhardt Sr. as their first dockmaster, Van Lith noted. From around 1900 to World War II, ferries and boaters leaving from Squassux Landing enjoyed the Smith Point House located next to the Coast Guard Station on Fire Island. There was a hotel, restaurant, and bar with a dock and boardwalk to the ocean. It was washed away by the Long Island Express Hurricane of 1938 and was rebuilt, only to burn down shortly thereafter.
Following the war, a beach house and hotel opened just up the beach from the former Smith Point House called Paradise Beach, lasting until 1958. The following year, BVA president Bob Starke resigned to form a separate corporation that sold stocks and bonds to buy land on Fire Island for Brookhaven hamlet residents. He created the Fire Place Beach Club on a five-acre parcel just west of Bellport’s Old Inlet Club. Most of the Squassux boaters were members, according to records left by Van Lith.
In 1964, Long Islanders, recognizing the unique attributes of the oceanfront land, won passage of legislation creating the Fire Island National Seashore. The Old Inlet and Fire Place Beach Club properties were condemned and purchased by the government, which allowed a lease-back agreement for the Fire Place Beach Club to remain open until 1974, when it was demolished. Left behind were the Old Inlet Club dock, boardwalk, and buildings accessible to the public. They were washed out during Hurricane Sandy in 2012. The stunning stretch of beach is now part of the Otis Pike Wilderness Area, named for the former Congressman.
Back on the mainland, a 13-acre portion of Fire Place along Carmen’s River has been maintained by the Brookhaven Village Association since 1946. It retains the name Squassux in honor of its former indigenous inhabitant.