It may have been a gray, damp Thursday morning, with shops still busy making final touches as Memorial Day Weekend loomed large on Fire Island, but things felt a little warmer as vibrantly colored editions of Fire Island News (FIN) graced with the cover artwork of Margery Gosnell-Qua were loaded off the water taxi and onto wagons, and delivery rounds were made in Fire Island communities multiple communities including Atlatique, Cherry Grove, Davis Park, Fair Harbor, Fire Island Pines Kismet, Ocean Beach, Ocean Bay Park, Point O’Woods and Saltaire.
At 69, the publication celebrates its 70th publishing season, and in some ways, not much has changed. However, this summer, Fire Island News does double duty as it merges with its much younger sister paper, Great South Bay News. This move includes enhanced distribution throughout South Shore Long Island.
Precedent for this exists with us: some might remember the hybrid edition, known as Fire Island & Great South Bay News, was published over the summer of 2024, when Schneps Media became the fifth family in the chain of ownership since 1957. However, we take more of a magazine-with-a-newspaper approach this time, with South Shore real estate and lifestyle having its own dedicated section.
Overlap exists and always will. The tradition of keeping an eye on matters affecting the ferry gateway communities of Bay Shore, Sayville, and Patchogue spans decades. In turn, Great South Bay News picked up the mantle of including time-sensitive Fire Island news items when Fire Island News was not publishing over the winter.
And while we may draw a delineation along the shoreline’s borders, what we write about often remains fluid. Two such examples of this in our May 22 issue include the following:
- Earlier this month, elected officials from the South Shore towns and villages in Suffolk County gathered in Mastic Beach for a symbolic re-signing of the Declaration of Independence—similar events are happening around the country to celebrate the 250th anniversary of our nation’s founding—but this one took place on the grounds of the Fire Island National Seashore.
- FIN reporter Linda Leuzzi wrote a compelling article on an upcoming LGBTQ+ film festival. The coverage of such film festivals is not new territory for us, but the coverage of one taking place in Sayville is.
Fire Island News continues its proud tradition of covering subjects not easily found elsewhere. Our mission has not changed; our horizon line simply grew broader.
