The Other Side of the Hamptons

[jazz music plays] [Peter] Jimmy, you're doing ding repair? -Yes, I've been doing it a long time. -You're fishing too? -Yeah. Lobsterman, seabass trapping, gill netting. -Here's the shop -Every type of fishing. [Peter] All right, so today we're gonna cruise the island. -Cruise all around the Hamptons today. -Cruise everywhere.

[Jimmy] All right, now we're going to the dumps. -To the dumps? The dump is really cool I love the dump. If you ever need anything you just come here.

For instance if the cord on a lawnmower breaks they throw it to the dumps. You know, it's a nice one, and you bring it home, you put a new cord in it and it works great. God knows what could be in here.

-Look at the grills. -Look at that grill. Look at all the grills. [Jimmy] Jesus Christ. Not your typical Hamptons video starting at the dump. [Peter] Look at that, that's almost like a new-looking grill there. Yeah, it's a nice grill. Who knows?

-There's your lawnmower right there. -What's the matter with this thing? Look. Who knows? Interesting, so there's something you never see. -You remember the old-style lawnmower? -Oh yeah, those are great.

Cool, huh? I'm not taking it. I've taken too much crap in my life. I'm trying to lessen my load of junk. [Peter] What are you putting in the dump? Fish? Old fish. [grunts]

[Spanish] [Jimmy] All right, that's it. So with the Hamptons, we're gonna learn what they're all about 'cause this is my first time here. Most people just think multi-millionaires, billionaires. It's true. -But there's a big local population like you, right? Yeah, you probably heard this term, "Montauk's a little drinking town with a fishing problem."

It's always been a fishing community. Real estate was relatively inexpensive back then. -When you say back then, when was that? -In the '50s And Carl Fisher had visions of grandeur of making this place into another Miami Beach. -Montauk? -Montauk.

He started developing the property and it didn't stick, and I think he died broke. But my grandparents fell in love with this place and they bought a couple homes in the early '50s for I think I mighta told ya, for seven grand a piece. -Wow.

Seven grand a piece and they would come out here every summer. And when I was old enough my parents shipped me out here. They would put me on the train in Bay Shore and obviously told the conductors keep an eye on me and when the train stopped, and it was the end of the road, it was the end of the road. Loved it. It was spectacular out here back then. -See that big building? -Yeah, what's that? They call it the White Elephant. That's what Carl Fisher made.

He built that and had all his investors go up to the top and they would pick property out from up there. "I want it from there to there, and here to here, and this and that." -When did you move here full time? How old were you? -Twenty-two, twenty-three. The tribe of surfers back in the day.

We came out for one reason and that was to surf but we had to find a way to live. I became a fisherman, that was my job. That's what I wanted to do. Lot of friends became carpenters, very successful carpenters, and very successful fisherman.

And right next to this dirt lot which I'm gonna show you used to be, we call it the trailer park, and back in the day when it was first open it was all just tents. And back in the day you could buy a trailer. -Like see that little one right there? -Yep. That's an original trailer that went for like 15,000, 17,000 bucks in back in the late '70s. Now they built them up, and refurbished them, and did all this, and a trailer on the water on the first row sold for… -You ready? -Yeah.

3 Million! [laughs] -That's insane. -Yeah, we can actually walk in there. [Peter] So fair to say, the world's most expensive trailer park? -[laughs] Yeah, I guess. -Crazy though, huh? -That's wild. -I know. [Jimmy] So what happened, it's pretty cool. -We can walk down to the ocean here. -Yeah.

I don't know which one it was. So what happened was it was like, no, it couldn't be 3 million. So it was a ripple effect. It was right after COVID or right around COVID. They're paying that much money, we can charge f*cking $5 for a cup of coffee or whatever, you know? Everything went up, it started to gouge, gouge, gouge.

Is it because people came out from the city during COVID? They moved out here, right? -Yeah, yeah. -Okay. [waves crashing] This is a premier surf spot. [Peter] Do you live out here? -I have a trailer. -Okay. -Which one went for 3 million? -Sorry? Which one of these trailers sold for 3 million? -I think it was one of these on the front. -Yeah? -Might have been that one. -Which one?

I rent mine just for August but I think it was that one. The one next to the yellow one. 3 million bucks. -I think it was actually the one that the woman's on. -Really? -Yeah.

-Oh, that's definitely worth 3 million. -That one? [Jimmy laughs] [Jimmy] So this was all tents. It was all tents, surf bums back in the day? -It was all dirt, and surf bums, and everybody was in free love. Once the celebrities or wealthier people came in they had Buffett type people.

Jimmy Buffett, I think he had a trailer here. And it's good, you know what they use 'em for? For after they go surfing, they change out of their wetsuits, and take a shower, and leave their surfboards here. Go back to the regular home. -Does that bum you out as a local? -No, I don't care.

More power to 'em. -So I guess it depends who you talk to but there's not a real big divide between that really wealthy class and the old school locals or is there? There is negativity. Some people are really upset and pissed off at this and that. -Right. -Who cares? These people worked hard, they made their money. If I was in that position I'd probably do the same thing.

Why not? The only difference is that the locals live here all year round. Where these people, they just come out here on the weekends or something like that. It's kind of like, who's luckier? Us or them? We are. [waves crashing] I used to own a house but I got divorced and, you know, pfft, lost that. My wife sold it and she got the lion's share, and I got what was left over. Which I was happy, and I took that money, bought land in Costa Rica, but I'll never be able to afford a home here.

Never. -So you rent a place right now? -Yeah. The rents are like cuckoo. -Okay, what's an example? $5,000 a month. Can't even find a place to live.

But also what's happened, lot of Latinos come out here, hard-working Latinos. They can't afford the rent so they pile a bunch of families living in one house. And they can afford to pay, and they work hard, and they send their money back to wherever they came from, and they work hard. So a lot of the homes… Not a lot, some of the homes are multi-family homes. Which is against the law but what are you gonna do? I couldn't even venture a guess on how much these houses are. Uh-oh.

-You okay? -Yes. -Be careful. -[woman giggles] [man] You look like a guy, might have a a knife. -Never leave home without it. Hey no offense, but now he has no soul. [laughing] [Jimmy] There you go.

You can throw it in the back of my truck. What did you do? -Just cut this. -Oh, you lost a sole. Put it in my truck so you don't have to carry it. -I'm not gonna litter. -You can throw in the back of my truck. -He said you can. -I'll get rid of it.

Your poor dog's freezing to death. -Want that too? -No. -[laughing] -You got your knife? -Thank you. -You're welcome. [Jimmy chuckles] -You know Julian Schnabel? -No. Famous artist, producer, director. He lives down there. He's a good friend of mine.

I fix all his boards too. Real nice guy. Real down to earth guy. And the other thing about Montauk is that there are a lot of celebrities out here but no one cares. The locals, they don't give a sh*t. They don't care. We don't care.

-Okay, so it's not a super flashy drive your Lamborghini out here place? -Some people do. -Okay. No it's very low, low key out here. You know, the people want to blend in.

If celebrities come out here to be recognized, you came to the wrong place. No one really gives a sh*t. You're a nice person, you're a nice person. You're not, you get treated like a bad person, that's all.

And this is Surf Break Hoffman's. Michael Hoffman, whoever that is. Some wealthy dude. -It's all grapes in here. -Yeah. -It's really cool. -It's really a cool canopy.

Oh wow, beautiful. -I'm not driving up here because it's private property and I don't want to intrude but we used to go hunting all back here. Ducks go in this. Right in there. -You would hunt out here as a kid? -Yeah. Puddle jumper, we call it. This is the first cattle ranch in America.

This ranch right here. -Montauk? -Look, it says right there. "Oldest cattle ranch in the USA established 1658." -Before America. -Before America. -That's crazy. Yeah, that's when this place-- Cops, cops… -It's still operating? -There's horses and stuff like that.

And there's all these buildings. It's really cool. -America's freakin' great. -It's awesome. I fully realized after living abroad traveling to 85 countries it's like… -Wow, 85 countries? -Yeah.

Seen a fair amount and this time coming back it really hit me. -You know who commissioned that? -Who? George Washington. This is the end of Long Island. This is really, really, really cool. Do I look older than 60? No. Yes I do. Don't lie to me.

-I don't think so. -'Cause I'm free. Senior citizens, they make me show my ID. -Senior citizen. -Gotta see your driver's license please. 'Cause I'm from New York or just old? It's like that two-bit actor once said, "Trust but verify." [Peter] How old do you think he is? -I stopped guessing a long time ago. -No you didn't!

That's a safe answer. I had someone pull up I swear they were in their 40s, they're like no, I'm 67. I was like, "Pfft, you're kidding." Have a lovely afternoon. Keep up the good work. I'll try. -Lotta ticks out here? -Yes.

Good. [Jimmy] In World War II they used to have all these gun turrets all around here. Big cannons. See the old radar? -Oh, yeah. -That's the old radar tower. I'm not getting too close.

Lot of ship wrecks along this coast. The pirates would… Or the local people… Because the light house has been here for a long, long, long time, and they would put on that cliff over there… They would pretend there was a lighthouse and have fires, and they would think that was the lighthouse and it's called the false point. So they would come in, and run aground, and they'd loot 'em and… -I didn't expect to see this at all here in the Hamptons. Nature like this, I had no clue.

-It's spectacular. -Spectacular, yeah. [wind blowing and waves crashing] [Jimmy] This is called Downtown. -What was all of this? -An Air Force base. [Jimmy] That's a bowling alley I think. [Peter] Look at that one, it's getting taken over by the trees. [Jimmy chuckles] [Peter] So this is just all old Cold War stuff, huh? -Yeah.

-Waiting for the Soviets? -No, waiting for the Germans. -Okay. -So you're thinking World War II. -Yeah, World War II, man.

The Germans, the U-boats were right out here. -Yeah. Beautiful forest.

-Wasn't forest back in the day. There was nothing here. There's the radar tower. -Okay, yeah, there's just a ton of exploration here. [Jimmy] When I was younger we had the little rabbit ears on the TVs and every time that thing went around and it hit our antennae it would go neep. So you'd be watching TV and every, I don't know, ten seconds, neep. You get a little zap from the radar tower.

It was pretty wild. [Peter] I bet a lot of people living out here don't even know about this. Not a clue. They don't know about this. It's an art gallery now but it used to be the train station. You'd get your tickets in there and get on the train. -This is how you'd come in when you were a kid? -Yeah.

-Grandparents would pick you up? -Right here they'd be waiting. Right there. Great place to grow up. Here's the manor. [Peter] Montauk Manor, haunted the say? [Jimmy] You believe in ghosts? -I believe in spirits, sure. -Spirits? [Jimmy] I think I see them every now and then where I live.

See these pfft… These things. I don't know what the f*ck they are. I don't discount anything. You know like Frank Zappa said, "Mind is like a parachute, it only works if it's open."

-Very true. As long as I've been coming out here since the '50s this dock has been here. -So still pulling a lot of fish. -Oh yeah, look at all the draggers.

Hey Gavin, how the hell are ya? -What's going on? It's high tide here. -I see that. How's fishing? All right? Any squid? Just starting to show up. -It's f*ckin' late ain't it? -Yeah. -Been an off year, that's for sure. -Oh, geez. -Always something. -Yep.

-All right, good seeing ya. -You too. This dock has been here for f*ckin' ever. Been rebuilt a bunch of times.

-You know all these guys? -Yeah. They are working their asses off. We have a saying, "What would you do if you won a million bucks?".

You go, "I'd keep fishing till all the money was gone." [Peter chuckles] Okay. So this is a jetty. This used to be all fresh water. Then they blew that up, that was this bit of land a long time ago, late '20s. I think maybe even sooner. And then this became salt water and became a harbor.

-And then you have the yachts over here. -Yeah. These are all party boats, and charter boats. Take people out for hire over there. This guy, guy's named Anthony, and his friend, Johnny, they fish off shore lobsters 30, 40, 50 miles off the beach, and they take watches going out. One guy steers the other guy is asleep.

-And they have, see these coolers? -Uh-huh. Had the coolers all sacked up and he was moving one and the handle broke, and he didn't have this transom here, right? And he went over the stern. Went off the boat. Boat kept on f*cking going. The guy, the other captain was asleep.

He's f*cking floating, watching the boat go away. Gone... Just gone. And he was treading water for I don't know how long.

-See those poly balls, those balls? -Yeah. He found a lobster buoy out there and untied 'em or something, and took his boots off and put 'em under his armpits. You know, with air in 'em, and he was able to float. And they found him. It was a miracle. Finally a good story, somebody lived.

[Jimmy] Now this is my old stomping grounds when I was a kid. None of this was here but this motel when we were kids what we would do… They had the vacancy and no vacancy and we'd [swish] no vacancy. [Peter giggles] I grew up in this house. -This one? -Yeah. -See these trees? -Yeah.

No trees, all beach. -Great place to grow up, yeah? -Yeah, nobody here. We used to spend every day on the beach over here. You can't even see it. And we used to walk down the beach to Culloden Point every day. Beach bums.

-So what's a place like this here? -It'd be a million bucks. There ain't nothing under a million dollars. And they call this liesurama.

Mister whoever did the building, built on every one of these lots, a little home that was affordable. Trying to develop the area, and they were called liesuramas. They were like 8,000 bucks and just move in with your toothbrush. Had the refrigerator, pots, and pans, and dishes. -Cool, right? -That's a liesurama? -That is cool. -Eight grand.

-They had the mattress and everything? -Everything, beds, linens. Everything. There's another one.

See, they had the little… That's a real one. -So from eight grand to a million? -Million… million dollars. This is affordable housing. -What town are we in? Amagansett -Okay, so this is your place? -Yeah. It's affordable housing.

In other words, you have to fit into certain criteria. -Okay. -And the criteria, I think it starts, which is pretty low income, is $32,000 but it goes up to $110,000 income. -Okay. -And I'm right in the middle of it.

-So this is super important for you to live out here? If I didn't have this I don't know where I'd live. It's the only solution. They just built another one. This is 36 units, they just built another one, 50 units, brand new.

-Who's building it? Is it the state? A developer and he's in coordination with the town and the state. I'm sure they get some sort of subsidies. -Yeah. I don't know how they figure it out but somebody's making money. That's for sure. He's not doing that of his good will.

He's working to make money, whoever the developer is. Now we're coming into some expensive homes. Now these are really expensive homes. Not as expensive as we're gonna see. I mean some of these homes don't even hold a candle to what we're gonna see.

-So there's still a lot of open land. -Yeah. I don't know whose house that is. That might be, and don't quote me on this, that could be Alex Baldwin's house. He's got ten acres he's trying to sell.

-That's a nice place, wow. -He was asking 26, I think he's down to 20 or 19 mil. See you used to be able to see all the mansions but you know, I'm talking big money. There's some nice homes around here. I'll tell you.

-This is beautiful. -Busy hot summer day this is packed, huh? -Packed! Packed! Look at that place. Look at these places, geez. -I'm Kevin Buzz. Nice to meet you. -Hi, Kevin Buzz.

Get back to work. What is it, too cold for you guys today? -I'm just chilling. Freezing out, ain't it? Craziness. Way down the street.

Yeah, he's probably like where those chimneys are back there. I think that's his. -Seinfeld's way down there? -Yeah.

Okay, they come out on these walkways, huh? -There's a whole assortment of 'em. You got who knows who these people are really, you know? [Jimmy] Pretty crazy, huh? That guy founded the bar code. [laughs] -He did? -Something like that. -You grew up here too? -Yeah. Played sports at East Hampton High School.

-Saw this place change. -You in college or… -I'm a dropout, I left. -Good man. -You make much more money, smart move. -Absolutely. -Hell with it. -As long as I keep reading my books. -I'll be okay. -Books are good. So you said a lot of change from when you grew up? -Yeah. -And you're pretty young.

Can't imagine what you've seen. Oh, God. You know, it's COVID. COVID was the big change. Everyone came out from New York City.

All those plots you never thought would be built on in Springs, Northwest. Bought up for $500,000, now it's a $3 million house in four years. Easily. Do you remember going to the grocery store during COVID? There was no meat.

-No meat, nothing. -No toilet paper, no chicken. People were coming out here buying from the city, right? They would go to P.C. Richard's, buy all these chest freezers, right? And then go to IGA or whatever grocery store and buy all the chicken.

Everything. -Island population quadrupled, you know? -Yeah. It was crazy. You want to check out the lifeguard area? -Yeah, let's go. Are you cool. -You want this?

-Okay, so that's a true old school… -That's an old school Montauk surfer guy. -You know? -Yeah. The bubs that kinda got a bit of an accent to 'em. -What are the bubs? -The bubs were the clamers. The fisherman, you know? I don't know if he's a fisherman, he seems like one.

-He was. -Yeah. And he surfs or he used to go to Costa Rica in the winters. Yeah, a lot of guys in Montauk do that.

Okay, so this is the lifeguard zone out here? -Yeah, this is the day to day. Not much going on, no one on the beach. That's Glen, that's Harry. So Kev, you grew up here, do you want to take off or do you wanna stay? I wanna stay, you know? It's, one, you look at this, it's beautiful. -Yeah. -Winter's pretty tough here. It's cold.

It's that New England humid cold air coming onto you but the money's here to be made and if you just show up, you go to work, you smile, things are gonna happen, you know? -Okay, what's happening for you? Well one, this is the best job ever. Private life-guarding, swim lessons, surf lessons. -Okay You get in with that, you're making a lot of money and that's just your summer gig. If you pick up another job you're making even more money. In the winter you pick up a trade, you can do whatever you want.

You just gotta be creative and you gotta create things. So it's definitely possible to stay out here. Yeah, this is the man. -So these guys are doing what? Surf lessons? -Yeah, oh yeah. -How are the surf lessons going? -Good. -Absolutely crushing it. -Yeah.

-Okay, how old are you guys? Younger 20s? -22. -21. -Yep. -Sweet, so living your life, just enjoying it? Totally, it's a great place to grow up.

-Okay, so this is gonna sound silly to you guys but a lot of people live online and they see the world through what they see through their computer or phone. So they think a lot of young men, more depressed, don't like to get out in the beautiful nature. On computers all the time. You guys are sort of disproving that myth. Yeah.

If you're on your phone all the time sucking down your algorithm, how are you not gonna be depressed? It's like you're either looking at everyone else live their life tons of things better than whatever you're doing. When you put the phone down, and look around, you're like… There's so much to do. There's just so much to do. Also if that's your reality, you're not actually doing anything. You're just watching other people do stuff. You're not actually getting any fulfillment out of life.

It's really important to do stuff yourself 'cause finishing goals, even if it's just like going surfing with your buddies… -Making shirts, doing your thing. -Even that. -You just feel better. -Yeah. -Do you guys have a good group of friends? -Excellent one. Ryan's hiding somewhere. The sickest crew in reality.

Yeah, honestly. -It's amazing. -It's crazy. And all of our dads grew up and knew each other back in the day so it's like we're like the second gen, you know? -Do you have surfer dads? -Yeah. Surfer, sports, just hard-working, you know? Badass dudes. -So you're continuing the legacy? -Yeah, you can say that.

It's funny, he was the arch nemesis when I was growing up. We grew up wrestling each other. Yeah, our parents wrestled and it was kid wrestling. -Who's winning? -He's winning now. --Back in the day he'd hold me down. -[laughing] Punching me, you know? You're a little more jacked than you think.

I'm just cold, I look all pumped-up, I'm not really that big, you know? -This is Frankie and Bruce. -My dad grew up in Montauk. And my Grandpa Ray opened up the first surf shop in Montauk in the early '70s. -Oh, sweet. -Yeah. What's Big House? Big House is a little… We're in the Hamptons. It's full of big houses and there is a spot in that peak, it was a surf spot. There was a small house.

It was like the big house for the time, now every house is way bigger than it. -So it's a little play on words. -Okay. -We'd say go to the big house. -What's the back here? It's a horseshoe crab. Lots of people know what they are but we've never seen them on a shirt. -People like it, you know? -Is this your posse? This is one of our bosses here, this is Bruce.

-So you're managing this motley crew? The surf team. -I'm the surf team manager. -Oh, cool. So Big House is a lifestyle brand. It's about being in the water and it's about living the life, and basically the freedom of that lifestyle.

-Are you guys selling this? -Absolutely. Okay, I like it. So link down below, guys, in the description. -We'll get some Big House. -Big House New York, you can't beat it. It's clean.

Do you know Jimmy from Montauk? -Of course, Jim Gingrich? -You know Jimmy? -Jimmy and I are making a video together. -Sweet. We want to preserve this lifestyle. Keep it pure and keep it clean. Is there a problem here in the Hamptons with that? Well Georgica Pond is completely trashed. Yeah. All these very wealthy people who live around pump their grass and stuff.

-Fertilizers. -All sorts of fertilizers. Herbicides, pesticides. It's nice to kill ticks and everything to make their lawns look really nice but all that seeps into the pond and they open the cut and it goes into the ocean where we all surf. You can't swim, you can't… It's like toxic algae blooms.

-How many houses are doing this? -Tons. It's every house around the pond. It's the new Hamptons yard. Now what is it? It's a big nice green lawn with evergreens. There is no diversity in what… You look around, you look at all these. There's wildflowers up the sides of these paths.

It is so biodiverse here and since COVID especially all those corners of land, where he lives, where I live… And they clear-cut the whole thing. All these old cedars. All these beautiful birches and stuff. The wildflower meadows, clear cut 'em. -So is there a big divide between those that aren't out here full-time and those that are here full-time? What's your take on that? I feel like a lot of them are on our side.

They came out here 'cause they liked it. -Now even they're seeing the change. -How quiet, how beautiful it is. There's no big hotels.

It's not Atlantic City, you know? There are rules keeping it this way. There's no fast food chains. It's really… -They do respect the locals, it's just they don't know and they need to be educated. It really is just awareness. It is awareness and there are a few hardcore, real, local jabronis, who harvest the pine needle for their testosterone and know you can eat the rosehips at a certain time of year around the beach and actually are true Long Island natives.

And they actually have a relationship with the environment here. And most of the locals don't even have that relationship but it starts with those who care and then it spreads from there. You don't need a golf course in your front yard or your back yard. -Plant some native species. -Do native wildlife.

And use pesticides that aren't toxic. Build In Kind East Hampton is a great Instagram to check out. She learned all the zoning code to start calling out the mass overdevelopment out here. I'm talking you're putting 7,000 square feet houses on a quarter acre and clear-cut the whole thing. Then it's like two people live in the house, you know? -But they drive a Tesla. -For a month out of the year. But they drive a Tesla, so they care.

-[all laughing] -You know? -A $20 million house on the beach, it's three weeks out of the year. It's heated and cooled all year. Then there's kids like us who grew up here our whole life.

and we're not gonna be able to buy property of our own unless we really do something big. -Big House! -That's the whole thing. [Peter] The merch line! We really want to be able to protect the place we grew up in and live here. We help each other, you know? -We take these kids surfing. Charlie, is this your first time surfing today? -Second. -Second time. Again!

[all laughing] He loves it and we're healing the younger generation because all these kids are on screens and we're structuring their unstructured time after school, weekends, summers, getting in the water. Building a love for the ocean, you know? So then they… It's just healthy lifestyle. -Yeah, it is. -That's what we're promoting. They're not anxious. Once they have a love for the ocean then they develop that desire to protect it and develop the responsibility.

That's the next level. Then the next generation knows, and they teach the next. It's like passing on. These kids are in junior lifeguard programs, they look up to these guys. [Peter] The torch is being passed as we speak. We've had it since 2021 now.

At two mile, this is our spot. -There's a lot of responsibility in that. -Yeah, we're outposts. And we have a sick group of people that come down here. Honestly just to hang out with us. It's like Apocalypse Now when you go up the river and you're at the last outpost. There's no beaches.

-Hero's journey every day. We're in control of two mile that way, and two miles that way. There's nothing so if something goes wrong at the Maidstone Club we're the people they call. We follow our dreams.

Dream is to be immersed in the ocean surfing the best waves possible. -That's the initiative for the non-profit. -[surfboard falls] -I know a ding repair guy. -[laughter] We have the best part of it.

-All right, guys. -All right. -Great to meet you. -Later, you too. Really cool guys as you can see. Good tribe.

Is it great to see the next gen like this? -Good kids, huh? -It's the best. Good kids. See, those are real surfers. Those guys are stoked. Stoked, doing good things.

Now we're gonna see some more sh*t. [laughs] More homes… cool. Good stuff, Jimmy. Thanks for being patient there. -What else am I gonna do? -Gave you a little break. -Little break from me. -I did some paperwork.

-So this East Hampton area… -East Hampton. Gets wealthier even? -Wealth. -Wow. There's rich and there's wealth. Now you're talking wealth. -Yeah.

-They have their events, and they want to be seen, and it's their lifestyle I guess. Me, I don't want to be seen. -You like it simple, Jimmy? -I love it basic. But you can remove yourself away.

I mean if I had tons and tons of money would I live here? Nope. No way I'd live here. I'd live in Montauk as secluded as possible. -It's like, what's it called? Rodeo Drive. -Yeah, it is. -Jimmy, you do a lot of shopping here? -Oh, every day.

You know what the rent around here for one of these places is? -No. -Me neither. But it's a really lot. Like 20 grand, 40 grand a month. You gotta sell a lotta socks to do that. [Peter chuckles] [Jimmy] Oh boy, look at the parking here.

-There's this one right here. There ya go. -Oh, good eye. Ooh, hit the curb. Good job, Jim. Perfect. All right. What do I do? Nice. I'm not used to this either.

[chuckles] Look at my car. I'm not used to any of this. -Like going to the big city for ya? -This is... -So living out here-- -Look.

-Look at me… -Yeah. And then… Hold it there, lady. Hold it. Hold it! I notice for me it's really cool because the people, I don't know how they look to you but they all look different to me. Like look.

I never see people like this. What's that? Like they're city people. Their haircuts, what they wear, different. It's pretty cool. I never see that living in Montauk being a fisherman and surfer. You don't see their type. There used to be a toy store I used to go in Christmas shopping.

All right, so 40 years ago what was this street like? -It's always been this nice. -It's always been? Okay. It's just different stores with different things in 'em. -I shoulda got some real estate here. -I don't remember this.

-What do we have? 2,600 square feet, 3.5 mil. -That's a deal. Five bedrooms, 13 mil. This one nine mil, 8,000 square feet. Then you have a small one here, 1,800 square feet.

-Three million. -3.2, yeah. -Where's the location? [shoppers chattering] -Look at that place. -15.7. So this is what we can't see driving down the road.

-Because they're behind the hedges, right? -Yeah. [Jimmy] This is a beautiful area, it's amazing or what? -It is, I mean look at how clean the streets are. -People are nice.

-I was just in Kensington, neighborhood in Philadelphia. -You were? -Yeah. So from going from Kensington… to this. Exactly. Yeah, it's pretty bad.

I was also in the Mon Valley, it's the former, you know, steel country of the country south of Pittsburgh. Right? Rust belt territory. Going from some of those places to this is like a totally different country. -A little different. -You know, it's like… -I feel so bad for those f*cking people.

How the hell? You know, I mean I've been watching a couple… I watch sometimes a couple videos. -It's just heartbreaking. -Yeah. What is this? -This is where you get your underwear monogrammed. But what is this, cup sold in store today, Trump 79, Harris 277. They're doing the cup count.

-Obviously that's how many cups they bought. That's interesting. Oh. Could you see me in this suit? Which one? -Nah, I think it's too tight up around your… -The pants are too tight. [chuckles] -Yeah.

[Jimmy] They are very feminate, they are with the tight pants and the no socks. You wearing socks? Good. [both chuckle] They're two gay dudes. Not that it's bad, I love gays. Let's put it right now. I love gay people.

The more flamboyant they are, the more I like 'em. Great hardware store. Nice people.

I love it here. Everyone's nice. How could anybody… You know, friends are hard-working guys and some guys say, "There's so many people…" They don't like any of these people. I don't know why. Maybe they're jealous or just closed-minded.

I don't get it. I enjoy it all. I love looking at these people. It's the coolest thing in the world. Like I told you I was in the grocery store, packed, and I'm dressed the way I'm dressed. The lady went to me, "You must not like it here with so many people."

I said, "Are you kidding me? I love it." In wintertime it's nothing but a bunch of dirtbag fishermen here. Look at this. It's all beautiful women, nice people. You know, what's there not to like? See these quaint little beautiful old homes? -Cute, right? -Oh, yeah. Cute.

These are very old homes. My friend used to live back there. This is a bubbyville or bonacker area. -Okay, explain bonacker. -What is that? They're fishermen. Baymen.

They're bubbies. They call 'em bubbies. Like hillbillies they call 'em. -Okay, you would never know. It's just right off the road. -Right off the road. -That is interesting. Look, these are all baymen. They're the lessers.

They been down here for a hundred fricken' years. When they buy fish and stuff like that those are the old hullseine boats or actually they still use 'em. They bay boat for scalloping, and they got their chickens and everything. Those are bubbies there.

Maybe I know him. They call this Poseyville. Don't ask me why they named it that but… You notice he got his gold clam rake up there? -Clam rake? -Tong rake they call that. So all the baymen, all the barnackers who were the settlers, the people who came here first, the bennies, the lessers, the balls, they came here and they settled here. And the only way to make money was fishing and farming. Chickens and this and that.

And they've been here for hundreds and hundreds of years. -Mm-hmm. And they got squeezed out. You know, a lot of their fishing rights have been taken away. It's sad. Very sad.

-What do you mean by their fishing rights? -Like I showed you this boat here. -See that boat right there? -Yeah. That's a hullseine boat. They launch them from the beach into the ocean in big surf. They used to set out these nets called hullseines.

They were twine nets. They busted through the surf. They go all the way out, they come around setting the nets, scoop back on the beach, and they winch the boats up. They used to use horses and wagons but now they have pickup trucks with caps on them.

And the government said, "Nope, no more hullseining. You can't hullseine." -So their way of life got removed? -That was the end of that. They'd been doing it for hundreds, and hundreds of years. You see it in the Caribbean islands and all these islands.

They do it. It's the same thing and they pull the nets in by hand. And whatever fish they got, they got. So what they would do it on here, they'd do the same thing, and there would be some fish that would die on the beach or some skates, or some small striped bass. And this and that, and that and this, and people complain, "Oh my god, you're killing the fish." they completely freaked out

and they stopped them from doing it. They made the law no hullseining for striped bass. So they just cut out a big portion of their income. They tried to give 'em town jobs and these guys, for the most part, aren't the most educated people around. Very sad.

They're stopping a way of life. -You can apply it to anyone's industry, right? You sure can. In Appalachia, in coal country, a lot of those jobs have been affected and so those people are-- What do they do? Lot of drugs. There are still coal jobs, they're either working hard or doing drugs. It seems to be like half and half. It's weird, some are doing okay, some are doing really bad.

-It's like town to town almost. -Mm-hmm. [Jimmy] See all those buoys on that house up there? -Yeah. -I think that's Billy Joel's house. Got some of those buoys, huh? That's his boat right there.

-Downeaster Alexa right there. -Nice boat. There's a lot of famous people that live out here. Justin Timberlake got busted here driving drunk.

-Oh yeah? -Yeah. This is Downtown Sag Harbor. -How do you say? You say habba. -Haba, harbor, harbor.

[Peter] This is nice, wow. -It's pretty cool. [Peter] I mean it's equally as nice. It's got a totally different feel though.

-Yeah, it's pretty cool. [Peter] It's a little more cozy. Just everything is taken care of.

There's not one shabby-looking anything. -Not around here. They couldn't stand for it. -There's some old homes on the right. -Oh, yeah. Those are beauties. -It's an old whaling community here.

This is where they whaled. They sued to send whaling ships out from here and go away for X amount of years. -Years? -Years. I was on Saint Lawrence Island, Alaska couple summers ago. -Wow. -They still whale. -Do they? -Yeah, the Natives there.

[Jimmy] Look at that. This is the type of house that a successful whaler would build. -And live in. -Okay.

-Like you see that light there? -Yeah. That was like the whale oil to do that. They used to have, closer to the ocean, widow peaks up top. Where the wives would, a year and a half away, they'd start going up looking for the ships to come in.

Waiting for them to come back and they call 'em widow peaks. A lot of guys never made it home. [water sloshing gently] [Jimmy] Boy, look at these yachts. Wow. Wild, huh? -Could I live on one of these? Sure.

Be nicer than my apartment. God damn. They just get bigger and bigger.

You ring the little bell and, you know, they bring the hors d'oeuvres up -Jimmy. -Yes, sir. -Good times today. Thank you. -All right, Peter. My pleasure. You kidding me? Thanks for bringing me and the audience into a world that most of us have no understanding of.

Oh, good. Because like everything, you can put an easy label on it and then once you start digging, just from what we saw today, different worlds, different identities, different feels, and you're the great storyteller. Thank you. That's very nice of you. Nice to meet you, Pete. Come back another time when you can spend more time here. I'll show you some really neat stuff. Take you on a fishing boat.

-I'm glad I could help out and… -All right. -Goodbye, world. -[chuckling] All right guys, thanks for coming on that journey. Until the next one. -Cool, huh? See ya Peter. -Yeah, really cool. [jazz music plays]

2024-10-05 18:39

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