FROM THE ARCHIVES

Next Tuesday is Election Day. The Town of Babylon itself began with a vote, and its very first election was close enough to make any candidate nervous.

Before 1872, this was “Huntington South,” the southern part of the Town of Huntington. Residents found it a burden to travel to the north side for Town Board meetings and services, and a road project in the Village of Huntington, whose costs were charged to every property in the town, made it worse. The South Side Signal, a Babylon Village paper edited by Henry Livingston, first printed the idea of splitting the town on February 12, 1870, according to the Town’s history.

On January 27, 1872, the voters of Huntington decided. By more than 2 to 1, they chose to divide the town in two. Within a week a commission drew the new line “one mile north of the Long Island Rail Road,” and the State Legislature approved the Town of Babylon on March 13, 1872.

The first election came on April 2, 1872, the Town says. Two coalition tickets ran, one nominated at a meeting in Amityville and headed by John Robbins, the other nominated in Babylon and led by Elbert Carll. Carll won, 364 to 349. Fifteen votes made him the first Supervisor of the Town of Babylon.

The new board met that same day at the American House hotel, on the northwest corner of Deer Park Avenue and West Main Street in Babylon Village. It passed five resolutions. The first set aside $1,500 to support the Town’s poor; another gave $200 to roads and bridges.

For 46 years, the Town had no Town Hall. The board met in hotels and sometimes in members’ homes. In 1917 the taxpayers voted 667 to 462 on Proposition 18 to build one, on land at West Main Street and Cottage Place donated by the family of David S.S. Sammis. The cornerstone went in on March 13, 1918, the Town’s 46th birthday. That fall, the Babylon Leader of November 1, 1918, ran the headline “Town in New Headquarters—First Meeting Held Wednesday,” according to the Town Historian.

The building served for 40 years, until the current Town Hall on Sunrise Highway opened in 1958. After that it was a district court, then a photography studio. The Town regained ownership in 2004.

Today Old Town Hall, at 47 W. Main St., is the Town of Babylon History Museum, with the old police jail cells and the old courtroom. Tours run Tuesday through Thursday, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.; call (631) 587-3750.

Need to know where to vote? Start with our early voting guide. Small numbers matter: in 1872, fifteen votes picked a supervisor.

Sources: Town of Babylon, “Town History” · Town of Babylon, “Town 150th Anniversary, 2022” · Thomas B. Smith, “A Brief History of Old Town Hall,” 2013 · Town of Babylon, “Old Town Hall”

Photo: Town of Babylon.