Name/Title
William S. Gosman Oral HistoryEntry/Object ID
ARC.2744Scope and Content
William Shannon Gosman, who was born in Amagansett in 1940, is a member of the family who opened a small food stand catering to commercial fishermen at a dock his father ran on Montauk Harbor beginning in 1943. Over time, Gosman’s Dock grew into a sprawling complex of restaurants, shops, a commercial dock, wholesale fish processing facilities, and a retail market, all set on the waterfront.
Bill Gosman grew up in Amagansett and in a residence at Gosman’s Dock called the Round House during a time when Montauk boasted any number of colorful characters, especially at the fishing docks, as well as a relatively unsupervised environment for young people. He was a witness to the aftermath of the Pelican disaster as well as the growth and heyday of sportfishing on Montauk Harbor, not to mention cultural and socioeconomic changes in general. The Montauk of his youth, including his own labor at the commercial dock, presents a hardscrabble contrast to what seems to be a more white-collar Montauk in his retirement years.Oral History Details
Interviewee
William S. GosmanInterviewer
Virginia GarrisonInterview Date
Dec 12, 2024Interview Place
* Untyped Interview Place
Montauk, New YorkLength of Interview
1 hour, 54 minutes.Primary Language
EnglishRecording Media
Digital RecordingTranscriber
Virginia GarrisonAcquisition
Acquisition Method
GiftAcquired From
William S. GosmanCopyright
Type of License
In copyright: http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/Copyright Holder
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