The Bessie C. Beach was a three-masted coastal schooner built in 1880. It's home port was New Haven, Connecticut. The schooner measured 128 ft. and 30 in. in length, with a depth of 12 ft., and a tonnage of 341. On December 6th, 1912, the Bessie C. Beach, loaded with spruce lath, and traveling from St. John, New Brunswick to Philadelphia, came hard ashore, east of Devon, on Napeague Beach, Long Island, New York, ending its sea faring days. Logbook contains 55 pgs. covering itemized bills and expenses (including weight and cost of cargo, demurrage costs, etc.) for approximately 50 trips between 1896 and 1900. Included are trips to Port Royal and Charleston, S.C.; Savannah, GA; Newport News and Norfolk, VA; Fernandina and Jacksonville, FL; Fall River and Boston, MA; Philadelphia, PA; Providence, RI; New York, N.Y.; Kennebec and Bath, ME; Perth Amboy, N.J.; Bridgeport and New London, CT; and San Juan, Puerto Rico. Ship cargo included ice, railroad ties, lumber, and coal. The Bessie C. Beach lives on in Amagansett Village, East Hampton, New York. On Memorial Day in 1913, Amagansett Village raised its first flagpole. Donated by Capt. Herbert N. Edwards, a 45-ft. section of the 120-ft. pole came from the top mast of the Bessie C. Beach. World War I was just a year away and accounts of the day referred to it as “the liberty pole.”