In Search of Legacy: Gene Austin

A series about the things we carry and the people who do the carrying.

Gene Austin: Streetcorner Historian

Gene Austin

Streetcorner Historian

Greenport, New York

Gene Austin’s is a Stirling Baby. That is, he was born in the Stirling Hospital in Greenport New York. There hasn’t been a baby born there in decades.

Vintage Postcard of the former Eastern Long Island Hospital in Greenport New York

A profound chronicler of his family’s history, Gene is forever on a mission of sharing a legacy intertwined with the very founding and development of the small coastal Long Island Village he was born into.

Perhaps the teller of tales owns the privilege of some embellishment.

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The Automatic and Captain Elbert “Butter” Austin. Courtesy Gene Austin collection

His father, “Butter” Austin became an oyster boat captain in the nineteen-forties, having worked his way up from deckhand aboard the Blue Points Oyster Company ships. His paternal Grandfather was a whaling Captain sailing out of nearby Sag Harbor.

Gene entered the Navy and served aboard the USS Intrepid, now a floating museum in New York City. During his service, the Intrepid was the stand-on vessel for the brink of the end-of-days that was the Cuban Missile Crisis. He and the crew plucked at least one astronaut and capsule out of the drink during the space race.

The future Cap’t Butter Austin, here a Deckhand for the Blue Points Oyster Company

I first met Gene when he brought some of his father’s artifacts to show me at our oyster bar. These included a well-worn photo of his young father as a deckhand in a publicity photo for the oyster company, as well as a deeply curled map of the oyster grounds. The map had been in the wheelhouse of the oyster boat for years, rolled into a window shade for quick access, the curl memory-baked into the chart by years of salt and sun.

Father’s Day oysters, gene seated next to a photo of his father at Little Creek Oysters

We hang a copy of his father’s photo on the bar's wall, and Gene will undoubtedly be seen having a Father’s Day oyster and a beer next to his old man.

Anyone within earshot will get all of these details and more. He is driven to record and share his history to hold down some aspect of a personal legacy of a life lived in a rapidly changing world.

In 2023, Gene assembled his family history and artifacts and took over the second floor of the tiny Stirling Historical Society building for public viewing and gave me a tour.

leg·a·cy

the long-lasting impact of particular events, actions, etc. that took place in the past, or of a person’s life.