National Volunteer Week

Keeping history alive in Wantagh, Seaford

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Local history museums in Seaford and Wantagh are filled with pictures and artifacts that show what these communities were like in simpler times. Behind these great collections are people who have acquired the items, catalogued them and educate the public about the past.

The Seaford Historical Society and Wantagh Preservation Society are both volunteer-based organizations, relying on people from the community to keep the past alive. Seaford’s museum is located in an old schoolhouse on Waverly Avenue, while Wantagh uses its first train station, relocated 50 years ago from Sunrise Highway to Wantagh Avenue.

Claire “Cookie” Reisert and Carol Poulos have an appreciation for Wantagh history. They are both lifelong residents of the community, and their roots go back generations. Reisert’s family came to Wantagh in the 1920s, while Poulos’s great-grandfather was the town blacksmith in the 1890s, and later the custodian at the wooden schoolhouse on Beech Street.

“I was always interested in history,” said Poulos, the second vice president of the Preservation Society and curator of the museum. “I just always thought it was important to take care of the past, preserve records.”

She first got involved with the Freeport Historical Society, helping with its record keeping, and has been part of Wantagh’s local history group for five years. Poulos spends much of her time scanning records, and sharing photos on the Preservation Society’s Facebook page.

Reisert got involved a decade ago at the urging of then-President Jeff Saparito, the same man who bought and restored her grandfather’s old farmhouse on Willoughby Avenue.

Her connections to Wantagh run deep as her grandparents on her mother’s side were among the founders of St. Frances de Chantal Church. Reisert is a trustee for the Preservation Society, and makes sure there is food and refreshments available for all of the group’s meetings and events.

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