Montauk

Montauk occupies the eastern end of Long Island, where a narrow peninsula reaches into the Atlantic. It is the homeland of the Montaukett, an Algonquian-speaking people who farmed, fished, hunted and made shell beads known as wampum. The beaches and waters around the peninsula also supported a whaling tradition in which Montaukett people took part.

In 1653 a force led by Ninigret attacked and burned a Montaukett village, killing warriors and taking captives, among them a daughter of the sachem Wyandanch. Colonial purchases progressively reduced Montaukett control over the peninsula, while families continued to work in whaling. The Mohegan minister Samson Occom came to teach among them in 1749. At the end of the peninsula, the Montauk Point lighthouse was completed in 1796 to guide vessels approaching the coast.