Thiele Nominates Steinbeck Writer’s Center For $500,000 State Grant
State Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr. announced this week that he had nominated the former home of the Nobel Prize-winning author John Steinbeck on Bluff Point Lane in Sag Harbor for $500,000 in state funding to help turn it into the John Steinbeck Writer’s Center.
Although the grant has yet to be awarded, Thiele said on Monday he was “very optimistic” that it would be, and said earlier grants from the same fund had been used to help restore Long Wharf, renovate the John Jermain Memorial Library, and undertake similar projects in his district.
Steinbeck lived in the modest cottage, set on 1.8 acres of wooded property overlooking Morris Cove, from 1955 until his death in 1968. He wrote “Travels with Charley in Search of America,” and his last novel, “Winter of Our Discontent,” and was notified he had won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1962 while living in the house.
When the heirs of Steinbeck’s wife, Elaine Steinbeck, put the property on the market in early 2021, an effort, led by Kathryn Szoka, an owner of Canio’s Books, began to preserve the property, despite its hefty asking price of $17.9 million.
Szoka said she was thrilled by Thiele’s offer. “The amount is significant,” she said of the proposed grant, “and beyond that is the fact that he has stepped forward to recognize the importance of the homestead. It speaks volumes as to what Steinbeck means to the state.”
“It’s fabulous; it’s a great help,” added Susan Mead, the co-president of the Sag Harbor Partnership, which is leading the preservation effort.
Earlier this year, the partnership announced that it was working with the University of Texas, which has a collection of the writer’s papers through Elaine Steinbeck, to transform the property, which includes Steinbeck’s writing gazebo, into a writer’s retreat operated by the university.
Although the asking price has been reduced to $16.75 million, and Southampton Town has signaled its willingness to help buy the development rights to the property with money from its Community Preservation Fund, a deal has yet to be made.
In the meantime, Sag Harbor Mayor Jim Larocca has suggested that the village itself become part of the deal, arguing that the underlying property could be turned over to the village, so it can be preserved as parkland. He said the village as a municipality would be better equipped to handle maintenance of the property as well as that of Bluff Point Lane.
The street is only one lane wide and resembles more a driveway than a public thoroughfare. Larocca said it was offered to the village in 1972, but that the necessary steps to take it into the village road system had never been completed, so that it is still treated as a private road.
“I think the village is in a much better position to solve these practical problems if we are at least partners in the process,” he said on Monday.
The property remains on the market, but Szoka said she hoped Thiele’s announcement would prime the pump and encourage private donors, both large and small, to commit to the preservation effort.
“Once a significant donor steps forward, others will look at that and realize donating is the right decision,” she said.
Thiele, who was born and raised in Sag Harbor, said it was important to recognize Steinbeck’s legacy.
“I remember him, particularly in connection with the Old Whalers’ Festival,” Thiele said, “but I’m not sure at 12 years old I had a full appreciation for ‘The Grapes of Wrath’ or his position in the pantheon of American literature.”
He said it was also important to remember that when Steinbeck lived in the village, it was not today’s Sag Harbor.
“The fact that Steinbeck lived in Sag Harbor when it was basically a factory town says a lot,” Thiele said. “Sag Harbor of the 1960s was not what it is today, when we are basically awash in celebrity culture. He wasn’t one of those guys who hid on his property. He took part in village life.”