The Knapps Lived HereOn a Sunday afternoon in 1959, in a small town on Long Island, 11 year old Ken Spooner watched along with most everyone as his personal playhouse, the Knapp Mansion, burned to the ground. Over 40 years passed before he would write a short story memoir of that day, triggering a very long journey through the first decade of the 21st century, to discover just who the Knapps were (no one seemed to know) and to find out who the arsonist was (that was the easy part). Through a folksy interwoven narrative, the reader discovers, as he did in realtime, the unwritten history of one of the Highest-Society, Lowest-Profile families America's gilded age has ever produced. Travel inside the many Knapp mansions, where 5 US Presidents and many icons of the 19th & 20th centuries were guests. This is Spooner's third book. |
Contents
Introduction | 1 |
Back And Forth To The Future | 31 |
Back To The Beach | 46 |
Back Home Again and Happy Thanksgiving To You Too | 60 |
Sarony Major Knapp and Palmer | 75 |
ADepressing Idea ABrighter Day | 93 |
The Flyboy Takes Flight | 108 |
A Death In The Family | 125 |
Will the Real Mrs Joseph Palmer Knapp Please Stand Up? | 180 |
Meanwhile Mainly Out in Mastic | 197 |
Catching Up With the Family | 216 |
Moving to the Country | 239 |
The Mastics in the 1930s Days ofDiscovery and End ofan Era | 260 |
If It Walks Like a Duck Get Its Address | 289 |
Business As Unusual Part III | 309 |
Home Again | 331 |
Turn of the Century A Turn of the Tide | 142 |
The Knapps Lived Here Too | 162 |
This Is My Story This Is My Song | 346 |
Common terms and phrases
acres American Lithographic Antoinette asked barn Bayview Hospital Beck Bellport Big Fat Slob Bimini boat Brooklyn brother building Butchie called chapter City Claire’s Clairedale Clark’s Collier’s Crowell Currituck Currituck County daughter Dixon Dodi Knapp ducks Ducks Unlimited early Fanny Fanny Crosby father fishing Floyd friends Game Birds guests Hampton Bays Hegeman Hemingway Home Guardian J. P. Knapp Joe Knapp John’s Joseph F Joseph Palmer Knapp Jude’s kids Knapp estate Knapp family Knapp mansion knew Larry later Lauderdale lived Long Island look magazine Margaret married Mastic Beach Mauran McIlwaine Miss Moriches mother moved never North ofthe Patchogue Penney Phoebe Phoebe Knapp Phoebe Palmer President printing probably Raskob road seemed sister Southampton started story summer Sylvia talk things Thomas Dixon thought told took town Wallace wanted week Willis York