- Mar 30, 2020
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Today I spent six hours in the woods detecting colonial sites. Must have looked at a couple dozen nails from the 1700's but nothing special. Near 50 degrees, ticks are out. Wading through some brush just before calling it quits I discovered two partially buried milk bottle circa 1930's. (When I metal detect I also look for bottles and arrowheads). I really like these because they were small town dairies that were an important part of my area's history. I have included part of a newspaper article for The Green Forest Farm owned by A. Cilli in nearby Sag Harbor, NY. Also some history of the Hardscabble Dairy Farm in East Hampton, NY where I live. Kind of long reads but great small town America history. Going back to this spot as I believe there is a small dump buried in the woods.
"The Cilli Farm story goes back to December 1908, when Vitale Cilli arrived in America from San Salvo, Italy, near Naples. His brother Anthony, who already was in the States, paid his steamship fare. To support himself, Vitale took a job digging ditches in Providence, Rhode Island. He soon moved to Sag Harbor and found work as a metal polisher with the Alvin Silverware Company, which had taken over the Watchcase factory.
Seeking to be his own boss, Vitale left that job after 14 years and started a taxi business, first with a Maxwell car and later with a Willys-Overland, which he bought for $1,100 cash. Since the railroad ended here, he often drove mothers and fathers to visit their sons at an Army camp in Montauk Point.
At the time, he was living on Rogers Street, where a small barn gave him space to keep a cow named Theresa.
Vitale enjoyed tending the cow and decided that the dairy business had possibilities, since everyone needs milk. In 1920, after saving every cent, he acquired a 10-acre plot in the village, bounded by Glover Street, Long Island Avenue and West Water Street. He then contracted to have a house built, paying $500 for lumber and $500 for the building. Vitale called his company Cove Side Dairy.
Meanwhile Antonia Maggio, a tiny redhead only 16 years old, had arrived from Sicily and landed on Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn, where she worked as a seamstress. Called Annie, she met Vitale when visiting her brother Jasper in Sag Harbor.
Vitale and Annie fell in love and married, and by 1922 they had decided to work together to build the dairy business. They, fortunately, raised a big family, three girls and four boys, because running a dairy is a constant, labor-intensive job — cows must be fed, watered and milked every day, and equipment washed and sanitized — and as they grew up, the children were able to help with chores.
Neighbor Robert Snyder remembers the dairy expanding with a barn in 1938, a milk house in 1939, and, eventually, a silo, a refrigerator house, a machine shed and a shingled farmhouse for the family. Snyder says he bought pasteurized milk from the farm for 35 cents a bottle.
Ange Cole remembers that there was never a day off. When she came home from school, her job was to wash milk bottles. At 5 a.m. and 5 p.m., the cows knew to enter the milking house, take their assigned stalls, and wait patiently to be milked by Dominick and John. If the cows were grazing on the water side, traffic on Glover Street was held up to allow them to cross the street to the barn.
In the 1930s, the brothers delivered milk by horse and wagon before graduating to a truck. After a hurricane that flooded the neighborhood, Dominick resorted to delivering by rowboat.
Following a lifetime of hard work, Vitale passed away in April 1964, leaving the business to Dominick and John. The brothers continued to work the farm with the help of local school kids who had to drink a glass of milk before they were paid.
The brothers finally closed Cove Side Dairy in 1980, after 50 years in business, when government regulations required extensive new equipment."
The Hardscrabble Farm family dates back to original colonial settlers of the town. This is from a 1928 article in the local paper:
"The 170 acre farm, actually called the Dayton Farm, was known locally as the Hardscrabble Farm. This large farm which has been in the Dayton family for the past four generations has been cultivated quite extensively for the past half century. Within the memory of the younger generation, when Mr. and Mrs. Josiah Dayton and Mr. Dayton’s father (Edward according to census records) made it their homestead, the farm was worked and it’s production was of quite some magnitude. For several years the Dayton brothers, including Josiah Dayton’s sons, Ralph, Edward T. and Robert J. Dayton did a truck business on a large scale. The farm was later converted into a modern dairy and under the ownership and management of the recent owner, R.J. Dayton, has grown to become one of the largest and best equipped milk producing dairies on eastern Long Island.
The Dairy is equipped with a large cow barn, which accommodates seventy-two milking cows which produce a large part of the milk that supplies the Sag Harbor and East Hampton Market. Mr. Dayton was one of the first local dairymen to conduct a tuberculin test. Other modern equipment includes one of the latest sanitary bottle washers, milking machines, coolers, sterilizers, etc."
"The Cilli Farm story goes back to December 1908, when Vitale Cilli arrived in America from San Salvo, Italy, near Naples. His brother Anthony, who already was in the States, paid his steamship fare. To support himself, Vitale took a job digging ditches in Providence, Rhode Island. He soon moved to Sag Harbor and found work as a metal polisher with the Alvin Silverware Company, which had taken over the Watchcase factory.
Seeking to be his own boss, Vitale left that job after 14 years and started a taxi business, first with a Maxwell car and later with a Willys-Overland, which he bought for $1,100 cash. Since the railroad ended here, he often drove mothers and fathers to visit their sons at an Army camp in Montauk Point.
At the time, he was living on Rogers Street, where a small barn gave him space to keep a cow named Theresa.
Vitale enjoyed tending the cow and decided that the dairy business had possibilities, since everyone needs milk. In 1920, after saving every cent, he acquired a 10-acre plot in the village, bounded by Glover Street, Long Island Avenue and West Water Street. He then contracted to have a house built, paying $500 for lumber and $500 for the building. Vitale called his company Cove Side Dairy.
Meanwhile Antonia Maggio, a tiny redhead only 16 years old, had arrived from Sicily and landed on Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn, where she worked as a seamstress. Called Annie, she met Vitale when visiting her brother Jasper in Sag Harbor.
Vitale and Annie fell in love and married, and by 1922 they had decided to work together to build the dairy business. They, fortunately, raised a big family, three girls and four boys, because running a dairy is a constant, labor-intensive job — cows must be fed, watered and milked every day, and equipment washed and sanitized — and as they grew up, the children were able to help with chores.
Neighbor Robert Snyder remembers the dairy expanding with a barn in 1938, a milk house in 1939, and, eventually, a silo, a refrigerator house, a machine shed and a shingled farmhouse for the family. Snyder says he bought pasteurized milk from the farm for 35 cents a bottle.
Ange Cole remembers that there was never a day off. When she came home from school, her job was to wash milk bottles. At 5 a.m. and 5 p.m., the cows knew to enter the milking house, take their assigned stalls, and wait patiently to be milked by Dominick and John. If the cows were grazing on the water side, traffic on Glover Street was held up to allow them to cross the street to the barn.
Every year, in July or August, Vitale would rent part of his property to the Hunts Brothers Circus — to the delight of Sag Harbor youngsters. An old-timer told me that the cows would line up at a fence to watch the circus elephants enter the grounds.
In the 1930s, the brothers delivered milk by horse and wagon before graduating to a truck. After a hurricane that flooded the neighborhood, Dominick resorted to delivering by rowboat.
Following a lifetime of hard work, Vitale passed away in April 1964, leaving the business to Dominick and John. The brothers continued to work the farm with the help of local school kids who had to drink a glass of milk before they were paid.
The brothers finally closed Cove Side Dairy in 1980, after 50 years in business, when government regulations required extensive new equipment."
The Hardscrabble Farm family dates back to original colonial settlers of the town. This is from a 1928 article in the local paper:
"The 170 acre farm, actually called the Dayton Farm, was known locally as the Hardscrabble Farm. This large farm which has been in the Dayton family for the past four generations has been cultivated quite extensively for the past half century. Within the memory of the younger generation, when Mr. and Mrs. Josiah Dayton and Mr. Dayton’s father (Edward according to census records) made it their homestead, the farm was worked and it’s production was of quite some magnitude. For several years the Dayton brothers, including Josiah Dayton’s sons, Ralph, Edward T. and Robert J. Dayton did a truck business on a large scale. The farm was later converted into a modern dairy and under the ownership and management of the recent owner, R.J. Dayton, has grown to become one of the largest and best equipped milk producing dairies on eastern Long Island.
The Dairy is equipped with a large cow barn, which accommodates seventy-two milking cows which produce a large part of the milk that supplies the Sag Harbor and East Hampton Market. Mr. Dayton was one of the first local dairymen to conduct a tuberculin test. Other modern equipment includes one of the latest sanitary bottle washers, milking machines, coolers, sterilizers, etc."
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