Did you know that the desert scenes of Rudolph Valentino’s 1926 film, “Son of the Sheik,” were filmed on Fire Island, at Smith Point? Crews from Famous Players-Lasky crossed a temporary bridge over Great South Bay put up by an early real estate developer—and con artist—named Frederick J. Quimby. People called it “Quimby’s Bridge.”
Quimby bought up land and named it “Tangier Manor” after the colonial official “Tangier” Smith, who owned the local St. George’s Manor and all the land between there and Smithtown. Unfortunately, Quimby ran off with the proceeds and was later arrested in Kansas City.
The filmmakers thought the then-towering sand dunes were an excellent substitute for the Arabian desert. Loss of coastline and poor land management have since reduced them to almost nothing. Even though the Army Corps of Engineers and the town spend tons of money and sand every year, the ocean is now creating breaches that join the sea to Long Island’s mainland.
We once owned a small mirror with a photo on one side, a souvenir of my father’s brother Bill’s marriage to a lovely young woman named Dolly Brancato. The shot was done like the famous Richard Avedon photo of Rudolph Valentino and his then-wife, “Natacha Rambova” (née Winifred Kimball Shaugnessy), in profile with bared shoulders. I must say that, in it, they could have passed for doubles of the movie stars.
We later gave the mirror to a relative who did not appreciate it. Quimby’s Bridge collapsed in 1927 and was not replaced until 1959 by a modern version. That bridge itself is now overdue for replacement.
Valentino divorced Rambova. He died young of appendicitis and was mourned for many years, a black-veiled “mystery woman” leaving a single red rose at his mausoleum in Hollywood every year.
William Floyd Parkway, originally an unlit two-lane road, leads to the new bridge at its southern end. I have a second cousin living in Smith Point. South Shirley is now proud host to two 7-11s, a Burger King, a Taco Bell, a Kentucky Fried Chicken, and a Wendy’s (I could go on, but I won’t).—Kathryn Nocerino