Keith Snedecor was scheduled to give a lecture about the history of the South Side Sportsmen’s Club in late June. The Historical Society of Islip Hamlet was excited to host it, and I had planned to assign a correspondent to cover the talk. The subject was interesting, and the promotional materials displayed a picture of his warm, friendly face. The heart attack that took him on May 11, at the age of 62, shook the South Shore Long Island historical community.
“It is with great sadness that we share that our dear friend Keith Snedecor has passed away,” wrote the Oakdale Historical Society on their social media page a few days later. “Keith was a gentle giant of a man who took great pride in the Snedecor family history and their role in introducing this beautiful part of Long Is- land to the rich and famous. For many years, Keith placed wreaths and flowers on the graves of his ancestors… he now joins them, and we mourn his loss.”
Snedecor was a descendant of Snedecor’s Tavern, which was established along the Connetquot River over two centuries ago, taking advantage of a recent expansion of a stagecoach line in 1820. The pristine scenery of the tavern’s location, combined with the fact that, Eliphalet, Snedecor’s wife was said to be an excellent cook, and the presence of good recreational fishing, made the tavern a favored stop among New York City’s elite, and even a destination in itself.
In a short video featuring Snedecor — produced by the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation, and Historic Preservation (NYS OPRHP) shortly before his passing — he explains that his family’s tavern became so popular over time that sometimes the elite who liked to frequent it couldn’t get a reservation. So a group of high-profile businessmen got together to purchase it, along with the surrounding grounds, and they organized the South Side Sportsmen’s Club in 1866, making the tavern its club headquarters.
Names on the club membership roster included Ulysses S. Grant, General William Tecumseh Sherman, Andrew Carnegie, sugar baron Henry Osborne Havemeyer, and cousins John Ellis and Theodore Roosevelt. However, the Snedecor family remained involved, serving as managers of the club well into the early 20th century.
South Side Sportsmen’s Club and its lush property were sold to New York State in 1963. In 1973, it was designated as Connetquot River State Park, under operation by the NYS OPRHP. The tavern was added to the National Register of Historic Places that same year. The park’s status was then elevated to a State Park Preserve in 1978.
The family guardianship tradition was carried on with Keith Snedecor.
The historic tavern fell into a state of deterioration over the years, and discussion about privatizing and converting it to a bed and breakfast began circulating. The idea gained traction when Gov. George Pataki appointed Bernadette Castro as State Parks Commissioner.
Snedecor circulated a petition against the idea, gathering over 2,500 signatures, according to a 1996 New York Times report. That same year, he established Friends of Connetquot River State Park. This important step created a way to raise funds to refurbish the building, turn it into a public museum, and support other projects—like opening a trout hatchery, reintroducing quail and wild turkeys to the preserve, and restoring the Nicoll Grist Mill on park grounds in 2019.
His quest extended beyond preserving a family legacy. His sincere interest in environmental conservation and educating others remained a driving force behind Friends of Connetquot River State Park.
Snedecor lived a modest life in East Islip, working as an accountant for Northrop Grumman to make a living. Local libraries and historical societies along the South Shore would regularly invite him to hold public talks, where he kept the story of his family’s tavern and the Sportsmen’s Club alive.
A memorial service was held for him at St. John’s Church in Oakdale, and a portion of his ashes was scattered outside the family tavern to which he dedicated much of his life. He is survived by his brothers: Rick, who lives in Patchogue; Robert, of West Islip; and his sister, Joanne Gunther, who lives in Cary, North Carolina.
“Keith was a lovely, caring, generous, and patriotic man,” wrote Friends of Connetquot President Janet Marie Soley. “He was an encyclopedia of knowledge regarding the history of Connetquot River’s South Side Sportsmen’s Club. He loved Connetquot as if it were his own, which it sort of was. The development of Islip town would have been very different if his great, great, great, great, great-grandfather had not operated the tavern at the Nicolls Grist Mill along South Country Road. With his passing, it is now the responsibility of the Friends of Connetquot and the docents to tell the story of how Islip came to be.”
