Another James Browne is a Legend in These Parts

Reflecting on a spring afternoon, James Browne, a spry octogenarian with a warm manner and an impish sense of humor, spoke from his room at Hertlin House, ensconced in the shelves of books and the photographic patchwork of memories adorning his walls.

"Look at all the books in this house," he said, bemused despite his familiarity with the surroundings. "I've always been a reader."

Not surprising for someone who has nurtured a passion for words and storytelling throughout his life, Browne enjoyed a 35-year career as an English teacher for the Bayport-Blue Point district (he retired in 1988). Initially, however, he admitted his path was not so certain - Browne had ambitions of becoming a lawyer or a journalist, honing his writing skills during stints as yearbook editor and sports editor of his high school paper, in addition to penning a column about baseball and the lives of fellow teenagers for the erstwhile Ronkonkoma Mirror. 

"I didn't know what I was going to do," he said, after receiving a liberal arts degree from Fordham University. "My aunt said to try teaching, so I tried it for year and I loved it. I was even accepted to Fordham law after I had started teaching, though I didn't follow up on it. I was happy where I was."

         Born in 1929 to James Charles Browne, Jr. and mother Nancy (nee' Shea), the younger Browne - Brooklyn-born but Ronkonkoma-bred - grew up on Rosedale Avenue near Duffield's Beach, where the Islip Town beach is now located, the second child in a family of four. He had two younger brothers - Peter was born four years later and Thomas four more years later - and a sister, Barbara, who was two years older. His father's mother, born in 1864, was the daughter of Dr. James Cattanach, a horse veterinarian of Scottish extraction, (the Browne name is of Irish lineage) who had lived in the area, also taking part in the first horse show at Madison Square Garden in 1880. He remembered his family fondly, adding that his father was a gifted athlete, excelling in a number of activities from boxing to running to swimming. 

"I'm the only one left, the keeper of the flame," he said, wistfully.

Growing up during the pavilion boom that prefigured the area's transition from summertime hotspot to suburban locale - the so-called "second wave" discussed in the the book "Three Waves," an account of local history with a focus on the successive "waves" of residents to the Lake Ronkonkoma area - Browne had inherited his father's love for the outdoors, pursuing pastimes ranging from lifeguarding and baseball to iceboating and ice skating during the winter months.

He also reveled in Ronkonkoma's reputation as a baseball town, playing second base for the Hollywood Hawks, named for Hollywood Beach (now the Brookhaven Town beach). Browne also recalled that one season before entering the farm system, an East End native and future Red Sox left fielder named Carl Yastrzemski played for the Ronkonkoma Cardinals. After World War II, a Sunday hardball league was begun that included three Ronkonkoma teams: the Cards, the Hawks and the Pirates.

"People would pull up around the field and honk their horns for the teams," he said. "All the players knew each other - we chased the same women, said inappropriate things. It was an awful lot of fun."

A former Navy pilot during the First World War, his father worked as a real estate appraiser for the Middle Island Land and Water Company, an incorporated name used by the wealthy Townsend family, who claimed ownership of the lake at the time of the younger Browne's birth. Private landowners with property along the shore, where many pavilions once stood, were capitalizing on the increasing popularity of the lake, and the company sought to collect what it perceived to be its fair share of the profits.

According to a chapter devoted to the company in the "Three Waves", "The Middle Island Land and Water Company demanded $100,000 plus costs of $30,000 to be paid to them by the property owners around the lake with the cost shared on the basis of frontage. Their right to do this was upheld in court. The deeds for property on the lake stated that the land went to the edge of Ronkonkoma Lake and terminated at the low water mark." Browne said his father would circle the lake in a boat, taking measurements.

"There'd be days when there were 30 buses lined up," he said, recalling how calendars advertised the lake would feature photos of different pavilions for each month. "They'd be open from Memorial Day through Labor Day."

A young Browne also lifeguarded at the lake, even holding the office of president of the association for several years. During his tenure, an exception to the no-motors-on-boats rule was made for a rescue boat, which was kept at Hollywood Beach. 

         Obtaining his teachers' license at Hofstra University, Browne began working in Blue Point Elementary School, later adding a Master of Arts in literature at Middlebury College's Bread Loaf School of English in Middlebury, Vermont in 1964. Working on the South Shore near the Great South Bay, he soon found himself excited at the chance to try a different sort of sailing.

"The only sailboat I'd been in was an iceboat," he said. "For some reason, I picked up sailing in my thirties. I had a 24-foot sloop that I bought in 1972, which I sold recently. I used to go out all over the place - I went on a cruise to Natuncket, one time I went into New York harbor, even went up the Hudson and the East River. But even in recent years, the first body of water to freeze up would be Lake Ronkonkoma."

Alongside his responsibilities as an educator, and after transferring to the high school, Browne worked as a guidance counselor and was active in the Western Suffolk Counselors Association.

"A counselor's supposed to be someone who helps kids with choices, and those choices could be in many areas, including difficulties adjusting or with their parents," he said. "I really liked doing it. I'm also lucky that that was a good district to work in."

Patricia Duffield has known Browne for over 30 years, first meeting when her husband Ken worked as a social studies teacher in the district for a number of years, retiring two years after Browne. Ken's family name has long roots in the area according to Patricia, dating back several centuries to among the area's first white settlers. His family had also owned the beach later sold to Islip Town.

"He's my annual date for the Christmas party," she said of Browne with a laugh, referring to the event hosted through the Lake Ronkonkoma Historical Society, where Browne and Duffield both remain active. "Any topic you can bring up, we can find something to talk about."

Upon his brother Thomas' death, who had been a trustee with the Lake Ronkonkoma Historical Society, Browne was invited to join the group.

"He was more into local history than I was," he said, bemused as he'd been before. "He'd be amazed that I'm doing this."