Nat Ward Photographs Ditch Plains Beach in Montauk

Summary

Podcast Summary: All Of It – "Nat Ward Photographs Ditch Plains Beach in Montauk"

Release Date: July 25, 2025

Introduction

In this episode of All Of It, hosted by Tiffany Hansen in place of Alison Stewart, WNYC delves into the vibrant culture of Montauk through the lens of Queens-based photographer Nat Ward. The discussion centers around Nat's newly released photography book, Ditch, Montauk, New York, 11954, which captures the essence of Ditch Plains Beach—a communal hub where diverse individuals converge to enjoy the sun, sand, and surf.

Discovering Ditch Plains Beach

Nat Ward shares his serendipitous discovery of Ditch Plains Beach in 2018. Unlike other beaches he frequented growing up, Ditch Plains offered a unique blend of community and spontaneity that resonated deeply with him.

“Ditch is the place where I bring my kids to learn how to talk to strangers, because inevitably, the people you're next to, you're becoming friends with for a day.”
— Nat Ward [03:49]

Nat contrasts Ditch Plains with Island Beach State Park from his childhood, highlighting the sense of familiarity and repeated encounters that foster a deeper community connection.

The Essence of Public Human Pleasure

The conversation delves into the idea of the beach as a rare space where physical human pleasure is openly sought and observed. Nat elaborates on this concept, emphasizing the beach's role as a counterbalance to the isolating and divisive elements prevalent in online interactions and societal politics.

“A place like the beach and in particular Ditch Plains, where all sorts of people crush in together, felt like the opposite of what I was experiencing online or even in my classrooms to a certain extent.”
— Nat Ward [02:15]

Listener Memories and Community Engagement

Throughout the episode, listeners call in to share their personal memories of Montauk, enriching the conversation with diverse perspectives:

• Thomas from Montclair, NJ reflects on his great aunt's windmill house in Montauk, underscoring the beach's generational impact.

• Kelly reminisces about her summer job at the Montauk Yacht Club in 1981, highlighting the adventurous spirit of the era post-Jaws.

• Carol shares her honeymoon memories at Khandira's Cottages in Ditch Plains, juxtaposing the serene past with the present's increased traffic and commercialization.

• Lisa from Oradel recounts her family's fishing excursions in the late 1950s, drawing connections to iconic figures like Quint from Jaws.

• Mary Ellen from Clearwater, FL discusses the evolving vibe of Montauk, balancing nostalgia with observations of its "Hamptonized" transformation.

Photographic Techniques and Artistic Vision

Nat Ward delves into his creative process, discussing his choice of black-and-white photography and panoramic formats to evoke nostalgia and highlight human interactions without the distraction of color.

“It's a tricky and maybe sneaky way to get people to look at body language, to look at interactions, to look at facial expression...”
— Nat Ward [19:39]

He shares anecdotes about capturing candid moments, such as the evocative image of a bare-chested man embodying the quintessential beach archetype. Nat emphasizes the importance of being present and integrated into the community to authentically document its essence.

Evolving Vibes and Community Layers

Addressing concerns about Montauk's changing atmosphere, Nat appreciates the layering of old and new cultures, noting that the core community remains intact despite the influx of new visitors.

“The vibe has changed, but what's interesting about Montauk is that it layers so the people who are still there are still there.”
— Nat Ward [28:33]

Exhibition and Accessibility

Nat Ward informs listeners about the exhibition of his photographs at the Montauk Historical Society, encouraging the community to engage with the visual narratives of their cherished beach.

Conclusion

The episode wraps up with heartfelt thanks to Nat Ward and gratitude for the shared memories that highlight the enduring allure of Ditch Plains Beach. Nat's work serves as both a personal memoir and a communal archive, celebrating the timeless beauty and human connections fostered at Montauk's beloved shoreline.

Notable Quotes:

1. “Culture encompasses religion, food, what we wear, how we wear it, our language, marriage, music, what we believe is right or wrong, how we sit at the table, how we greet visitors, how we behave with loved ones, and a million other things.”
   — Cristina De Rossi [Podcast Description]

2. “A place like the beach and in particular Ditch Plains, where all sorts of people crush in together, felt like the opposite of what I was experiencing online or even in my classrooms to a certain extent.”
   — Nat Ward [02:15]

3. “It's a tricky and maybe sneaky way to get people to look at body language, to look at interactions, to look at facial expression...”
   — Nat Ward [19:39]

4. “The vibe has changed, but what's interesting about Montauk is that it layers so the people who are still there are still there.”
   — Nat Ward [28:33]

Engage with the Conversation

Listeners are encouraged to share their own Montauk stories by calling or texting 212-433-9692, contributing to the rich tapestry of experiences that define Ditch Plains Beach.

Availability

Nat Ward's photography book, Ditch, Montauk, New York, 11954, is available now, with select photographs on display at the Montauk Historical Society through Labor Day.

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All Of It continues to serve as a companion and curator of New York City's diverse cultural landscape, fostering a sense of community through shared stories and artistic expression.

Transcript

[Unknown]

Foreign.

[Tiffany Hansen]

This is all of it on WNYC. I'm Tiffany Hansen in for Alison Stewart. In 2018, Queens based photographer Nat Ward walked onto Ditch Plains beach in Montauk and liked what he found. He started taking pictures of beachgoers soaking in the sun, playing in the sand, swimming in the ocean floor. For years after, Nat kept returning to the ditch. The result of that is a new photography book called Ditch, Montauk, New York, 11954. In the book, Nat writes about Ditch. Quote, it was the human world that I desperately needed. The beach and those people were a reminder, a revitalization, a restoration of faith, and most strikingly, a demonstration of the importance of physical human pleasure sought out in public view. Nat Ward's book is available now. Some photographs in the book are also on view at the Montauk Historical Society through Labor Day. Nat's with us in studio. Welcome.

[Nat Ward]

Thank you. Thank you for having me.

[Tiffany Hansen]

And Nat and I would love you in this conversation as well. What's your favorite beach in Montauk? What makes it so special? We're sure you have some Montauk stories. 212-433-9692. You can text us, you can call us at that number 212, 433-9692. All right, so let's talk about that quote that I just read here, Nat. I. I suppose that the beach really is one of the few places where we can see, as you write, physical human pleasure sought out in public view. I was trying to think, like, where, where else would that be? I suppose the pool.

[Nat Ward]

Sure.

[Tiffany Hansen]

Right. Or like, I don't know, we're. Any place where we're sort of communally gathered, doing a thing that is physical, that is also not together.

[Nat Ward]

Nightclubs, concerts, that kind of thing. Sure.

[Tiffany Hansen]

It's an interesting thing to think about that, the notion of humans being all physical together in a single space. What makes the beach so special among those places that we just list it off?

[Nat Ward]

I think it's also the time, right. In 2018, isolation in our, in our culture and, and kind of like divisive politics felt fresh in a way that maybe it doesn't today, although it's not gotten much better. But a place like the beach and in particular Ditch Plains, where all sorts of people crush in together, felt like the opposite of what I was experiencing online or even in my classrooms to a certain extent. And it shocked me. It was surprising. And I think that there's something that is the opposite of frictionless about the beach and about Ditch.

[Tiffany Hansen]

Yeah. So describe Ditch for people who. I mean, because if you haven't been out to Montauk, you don't know what makes it different from the other beaches in Montauk. And, you know, we all sort of have this kind of image, I think, of what we mean when we say Montauk beach, but. So describe it for us.

[Nat Ward]

So Ditch is a surfers beach. It's also a beach where people set up impromptu barbecues all day long. It's a place where families come from all over the tri state area and end up out at Ditch. It's a place where families have had bungalows in their. In their families for generations on Ditch. And so it is. The best way to sum it up is it's the place where I bring my kids to learn how to talk to strangers, because inevitably, the people you're next to, you're becoming friends with for a day.

[Tiffany Hansen]

I love that. Beaches are an interesting place for that. Right. You're sort of all kind of like commenting on the world and what you're doing and your ball flies onto their beach towel and your Frisbee hits their kid or whatever. Right. You grew up on the Jersey shore, though, however, right?

[Nat Ward]

Totally.

[Tiffany Hansen]

Okay. So I'm just curious, as a photographer, how you would differentiate between beaches down the shore which have their own vibe. Right. And specifically, I guess, Ditch.

[Nat Ward]

Yeah. I mean, I think one of the things that happened was I grew up going down to Island Beach State park, which does have a different vibe than the rest of the shore. Right. There's no boardwalk. You have to walk through a rather uncomfortable path and get bit by flies and stuff like that.

[Tiffany Hansen]

You have to.

[Nat Ward]

Yeah, you have. You absolutely have to. Yeah. So coming. Coming through Shadmoor State park into Ditch, it was like flashback time for me. And also the idea that. And it is crowded in the summer, Island Beach State park is there's this kind of place you can't take in in one look. It's. It's very different from the rest of the Jersey Shore. Right. Like, it's less of the. The kind of boardwalk culture, less of the house rental culture. E. But Montauk in particular, Ditch, is a place where regulars show up day in and day out. And I think that's what really separated it from some of the places I grew up going to, was that I would go every single day because I was making this work. And I run into the same people four summers in a row and talk to them for like three hours at a stretch, you know, and so that felt really special.

[Tiffany Hansen]

Yeah. We're talking about the book ditch, Montauk, New York, 11954. It's a new photograph book by Nat Ward, and we want you to join the conversation with your memories of Ditch beach, why not? Or any other beach on Montauk. What, what can you recall about it? What's your favorite? What is a special memory for you? 212-433-9692. You can call us, you can text us at that number. Have you spent much time in the Rockways, just out of curiosity?

[Nat Ward]

Oh, yeah, yeah.

[Tiffany Hansen]

Okay. I like this. Sort of like getting the different vibe setting, you know, from Ditch versus, you.

[Nat Ward]

Know, like Reese Beach. Yeah, right.

[Tiffany Hansen]

Take re speech. Sure.

[Nat Ward]

I mean, Reese beach is my beach that I would go to every summer for 15 years.

[Tiffany Hansen]

So you probably see some commonalities now though, too, right?

[Nat Ward]

Absolutely.

[Tiffany Hansen]

Yeah. What would you describe those as?

[Nat Ward]

It is the level of interaction. Right. You know, I think there are, there are other beaches where you can go and be a few hundred feet away from people, 50ft away from people, whatever. But re Speech and Ditch, you really are on top of each other and you're close. And the kind of looking that happens in these speeches I think was something I reflected along. Reflected on a lot. Yeah. I mean, you're constantly, you know, looking at people and being looked at. And I think that the performances that happen when people are aware that they're being looked at are really interesting.

[Tiffany Hansen]

Yeah. All right, now we got a. We got a caller here. We have Thomas in Montclair, New Jersey. Hi, Thomas.

[Thomas]

Hi, how are you? You know, long time, longtime listener of WNYC and a member. And I was, I'm just calling in, you know, about our Montauk stories. My fiance and I are literally just driving back now from the, from the grave site of my great aunt who had this wonderful house out in Montauk for years. It was this windmill and it was such a special place for my family growing up. We were a middle class family that wouldn't have had access to Montauk otherwise. And my great aunt, she, you know, she was a grandparent to us because both of my parents, sets of parents died before my sister and I were born. And she, she didn't marry or had kids of her own, so we were, we were her, you know, her grandchildren, basically. She died last month, Unfortunately. She was 93 years old. She loved a wonderful full life, but she had this house in Montauk and it was so beautiful. It was a windmill house. People are familiar with Montauk. They probably have driven past this house and she, you know, had us out there every summer, my parents, my sister and I, and our dog. And it was just such a wonderful, magical place for us as children. And, yeah, like I said, we're just driving back from the grave site now, so it felt very much like, you know, kismet that the, you know, I put on WNYC just pulling out of the grave site, and the very first thing I hear is calling and tell us your stories about Montauk. So I really just, you know, I really felt like I had to call and say. But it was, you know, just missing her a lot today.

[Tiffany Hansen]

Thank you. Thank you, Thomas, for calling in and sharing that with us. And, you know, so much, you know, you mentioned your. Nat, you mentioned your memories of the beach, and so much of what we get at the beach is really, like, burned into us as core memories. I mean, I have memories of the beach with my grandmother in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.

[Nat Ward]

Oh, yeah. You know, yeah, for sure. And.

[Tiffany Hansen]

And South Carolina and, you know, so there is. How did you think that you could tap into that with these photographs? I guess I'll get. I'll bring it back around to the book. How did you tap into that sort of nostalgia and that kind of like. Oh, that.

[Nat Ward]

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think that the beach can be a really magical place, and it can be really surprising what you can see at the beach. And, you know, maybe not while making the pictures, but upon looking at them later on, I'm like, oh, this is the kind of place that people have been going to for millennia and doing the exact same things. And so I would look for, you know, people revealing themselves, either looking judgmentally at another person or having their body splayed in a slightly awkward position, but in public. And it's so beautiful to see that freedom that happens at the beach. And so I think a lot of the nostalgia around your experiences in Florida or mine on the Jersey shore or down in the Chesapeake Bay have to do with the sensory feeling of the place. And so I was trying to tap into what it feels like for a body to be in that place, the.

[Tiffany Hansen]

Warmth and the sandiness. We'd love to hear your Montauk stories as well. Nat Ward is a photographer. His new book is ditch Montauk, New York, 11954. We know you have Montauk memories, and we'd love to hear them. 212-433-9692. You can call us eight and you can text us at that number. So I'm just curious about the timing here. You arrived in 2018, we'll get to the whole, like, pre pandemic, post pandemic, for sure. Right. But how much did you know about Montauk at that point?

[Nat Ward]

I mean, almost nothing outside of eternal sunshine and spotless mind. Right. That was my entire context. I mean, I had driven out there to see the lighthouse at one point, but I was lucky enough to go on this resident the Edward F. Albee foundation residency at the Barn. And I finished up writing for another book project, and I wanted to go to the beach, and I had this very strange camera, right. Enormous panoramic camera. And I thought, let me see if I can do something strange with it and photograph people instead of the landscape. So more the social landscape. And, you know, I went down, discovered the beach, and. And then upon developing the photographs in my darkroom in Queens and seeing the contact sheets, I realized, oh, these pictures encourage a slower way of looking at pictures, just like being at the beach encourages a much slower way of encountering the stuff of your lived experience. And I thought that was really interesting. And so I. I went back, and over those years, Montauk became a part of my life. You know, the people, the community, that's what really kept me coming back were the people I met on the beach and then would see at the restaurant and then would see at the bar. You know, that was an interesting thing to me in a place that seems so transient.

[Tiffany Hansen]

Did you have some sort of preconceived notion about what you thought you were going to experience and how is it different?

[Nat Ward]

My. My. My notions were colored by my experiences of other places on the east end of Long Island. And Montauk couldn't. Couldn't have been more different. And that was another thing that. That drew me in. It was a place where all kinds of different people show up and stick around for a while. Kind of similar to the neighborhood that I live in. Right. I like the fact that all of my neighbors know each other. Right. And. And Montauk felt like a place where that happens out there.

[Tiffany Hansen]

Got it. We have. We're going to take a text and a call here when we get back from the break, but I want to get this text in before we break because it's very critical that you hear this. Nat, Judah, and Ellie, your children are very excited to hear their daddy on the radio today.

[Nat Ward]

Oh, my God, I love you guys.

[Tiffany Hansen]

We're talking with Nat Ward about his new book of photography called ditch Montauk, New York, 11954. And we'll get back to it in and and we'll get back to your calls too, here in just a minute. Stay with us. This is all of it. This is all of it on wnyc. I'm Tiffany Hansen in for Alison Stewart. We're talking with Nat Ward, the Queens based photographer who has a new book out about Ditch Plains beach in Mon. By the way, Nat, we have unleashed a furor of people who are telling us that it is not Ditch Plains beach, that it is Beach Ditch or Ditch Beach? I'm not sure. I think I'm just going to shorten it to Ditch and then it will just cover our bases.

[Nat Ward]

Absolutely.

[Tiffany Hansen]

That's the name of the book and we're talking about it and we're taking your calls as well. 212-433-9692. Your memories of Montauk. Let's hear from Kelly. Kelly, good afternoon.

[Kelly]

Good afternoon.

[Tiffany Hansen]

You worked on Montauk.

[Kelly]

I have great memories, yes. I spent a summer, I think it was the summer of 1981, so it was a long, long time ago. I spent a summer working at the Montauk Yacht Club. It was a, you know, it was a great summer job. It was pretty wild. They had employee housing. So I literally was in a room, I think with like five other girls. There were like three sets of bunk beds and we worked, you know, as various jobs, mostly in the restaurants, I think at the yacht club. And on days off, I remember I didn't have a car. I had a bicycle out there. So I had to, you know, I bicycled to the beach or I bicycle to whatever you know, party was going on and sometimes bicycling at 2:00 in the morning. So I had got a lot of great exercise that summer and the beaches were great. I think that it was short shortly after Jaws came out, too. So I remember swimming in the ocean and just sometimes being a little freaked out because I was like, really? There's nothing, you know, like you're on the furthest point east here. There's nothing between me and the Atlantic Ocean.

[Tiffany Hansen]

Kelly, you need to listen to our conversation with the Radiolab folks about their jaw, about the jaws, 50 years of jaws. You'll love it. Thanks so much for the memories. And let's talk with Carol here who is en route to the Berkshires. Hi, Carol.

[Carol]

Oh, hi.

[Thomas]

Thanks for taking my call. Yeah.

[Carol]

I just wanted to say that my.

[Thomas]

Husband Gary and I honeymooned in Montauk in Ditch Plains at a group of little cottages called Khandira's Cottages. They were two story almost shacks. There were Little cottages right on the beach. It was just gorgeous. And we went to the Shagawam and the bird on the roof. I think the bird on the roof is still there, from what I've heard. A little coffee breakfast place.

[Nat Ward]

And yeah, just.

[Carol]

It was a magical.

[Thomas]

Just a magical place.

[Carol]

And then maybe 10 years later, we went. We tried to go.

[Thomas]

We went back out, but there was so much traffic, we were discouraged from ever going again.

[Tiffany Hansen]

Carol, that's a bummer. That's a bummer. But still a good memory. Still a good memory. Thank you, Carol. So, Nat, I'm curious. I can imagine for people who look at your book, flip through the pages, it is going to be a little bit of, like, memory lane for some folks.

[Nat Ward]

Oh, for sure.

[Tiffany Hansen]

Did you anticipate that?

[Nat Ward]

Well, I knew that the people who are in the book, they were going to see themselves in the book. But also, I mean, I'm making black and white pictures. I'm making panoramic pictures. And I understand at this point what that triggers in someone when they're looking at photographs, but I think that's really special. It's a reminder of what life feels like. Not necessarily like a reduction of that either, because the pictures are complicated and messy with all sorts of seaweed and junk on the ground. Like, it's. It's not the idealized version. It's the beach, the way it looks, you know, And I think that, you know, if a picture can do that, if it can remind you of what your life felt like and do it a little bit more often, then it's a successful photograph.

[Tiffany Hansen]

We have a text here that says, my second cousin on my mother's side is the owner of Sam's Son, Star Island Marina in Montauk. And so I spent many summers there with my family, both eating at the local restaurants and fishing off his docks. Well, that sounds heavenly.

[Nat Ward]

Yeah.

[Tiffany Hansen]

Another text says, the bakery, the baker has been there for about 25 years. She's lovely and makes really unique baked goods. You cannot not stop in. We're becoming a travel log here for.

[Nat Ward]

Montauk, but you gotta stop by Balsam Farms, you know, like.

[Tiffany Hansen]

But I think what that gets at, right, is are these core memories for people.

[Nat Ward]

Totally.

[Tiffany Hansen]

And it's funny you mentioned the black and white. I wanted to ask you about that because it does. It instantly evokes a. Like, here's a time from another era. Right. For people that are not schooled in the ways of all of the use of light with photography and all of these sort of artistic ins and outs that we could talk about ad nauseam. It's just a feeling that you get when you see a photo in black and white. What was your decision making around that?

[Nat Ward]

On a practical level, I'm interested in a process that has zero digital intervention. Right. And so everything is physical. The light hitting the film is physical. The film going into the developer is physical. All of that produces real objects. But, you know, from an aesthetic level, like, you're talking about the way people receive it, I think it's a tricky and maybe sneaky way to get people to look at body language, to look at interactions, to look at facial expression without imagining that it's mimicking life as it is right now in front of them. So there's a little bit of a remove, and sometimes you can read into that a bit more and read the expressions and the meaning behind the expressions a bit more easily. Mm.

[Tiffany Hansen]

We have a text. I was at a hotel at the tip of Montauk one morning eating breakfast. The hostess directed me to look out the window, and there I saw dolphins jumping in and out of the water. You know, that sort of visceral response that you get when you see dolphins jumping in and out of the water? Or you, you know, you get a little too warm at the beach and you gotta run into the waves. And how do you capture that kind of movement?

[Nat Ward]

Oh, my goodness. Well, one, you have to make the place a part of your life. Like, I'm currently a little sunburned.

[Tiffany Hansen]

I wasn't gonna say it.

[Nat Ward]

Yeah, I know. But seriously, you know, I was there day in and day out, and people knew that I was the photographer guy, and so it wasn't a surprise to people. And I would have conversation, what are you doing here? And we talk about it, and then maybe they'd want to be photographed. But there's. There's actually a picture in the book that I think it's. It's one of the signal photographs. It comes at, like, a peak of drama in the sequence of the book of a girl getting chased by young men who are throwing water on her. And it's the only photograph where I employed the pan. So, like, everything but the girl is blurry. But there are all sorts of ways like that, right, in photography to generate, you know, the mimicked feeling of that moment in life.

[Tiffany Hansen]

Yeah. Let's get back to our calls. Here we have Lisa from Oradel. Hi, Lisa.

[Nat Ward]

Hi. How are you?

[Tiffany Hansen]

Good, thank you.

[Unknown]

Are you well?

[Carol]

My memory.

[Unknown]

Thank you for this program because you really gave me such wonderful memories. My parents were going out to Montauk in the late 50s. And back then, the only thing that was there was fishing. And my dad was very into fishing. And we would miss the first week of school. Every year we would go for two weeks, we would miss the first week, and we just had the most glorious time. One of my most fond memories is driving my father. And we would get there and we would be driving on the Montauk highway, and we would go towards the dock area, and we would go every single afternoon when the boats were coming in, and we would watch all the. All the fish being unloaded off the boats. We would see sharks, which was really incredible. And there was a fisherman, Frank Mundus, and that's loosely what Quint from Jaws is based on. Quinn Quint. Excuse me. Everyone's getting involved here. Anyway, wonderful, wonderful, wonderful memories.

[Tiffany Hansen]

Well, we love the memories, Lisa, even if they come from the peanut gallery. Appreciate that. You know, one of the photographs that I really love in the book is there's a bare chested man with. He looks like he's been out in the sun for a very, very, very, very long time. And it got me thinking about, in other words, it's clear that he's very darkened from the effects of the sun. And it got me thinking about that use of light and dark in black and white film and in black and white photographs.

[Nat Ward]

Sure.

[Tiffany Hansen]

And was that. I'm sure, obviously it was a conscious decision to take that photo, but was it based on that kind of like light and dark, or was it that you just really liked this guy or what? I just wanted to know the story and get a little bit of the insight into how you decide to snap that picture.

[Nat Ward]

I mean, Paul and I did talk every single day that I was out there, but also I was really interested in these beach archetypes. And he functions in that photograph as an amazing character.

[Tiffany Hansen]

He looks like he's like the mayor of the beach.

[Nat Ward]

Exactly right. And you would imagine that every beach of that density has that kind of character on it. And so I was thinking, I mean, the stuff about light and shadow and composition that exists in my kind of like, you know, subconscious movement with the camera. Like, you know. But when I'm looking out at the beach and seeing people, oftentimes I'm thinking archetypes from my experience of the beach, from art history, you name it. And that's kind of the fun revelation. The beach, the surprises that happen. It's like, oh, you fit perfectly into this idea that I have of someone who exists on the beach. And so. And with him and with other people, he was game to play the role. Right. I could say, oh, okay, can you sit back and close your eyes and pretend. And pretend, you know, puff your chest out a little bit? And we could have fun with playing those characters.

[Tiffany Hansen]

We're talking with Nat Ward about his new book of photography called ditch Montauk, New York, 11954. And we're taking your memories as well. And we have Mary Ellen, who is in Clearwater, Florida. Hi, Mary Ellen.

[Carol]

Hey, there. Hi. Thanks for taking my call, Nat. Congratulations on the book. So my husband and I moved here to Florida. You're welcome. For a variety of reasons that make sense on paper, but we are longtime New Yorkers and we. I grew up. Not grew up, but in college, which I was in the Bronx. Started going out to Montauk in the 1980s. And then my husband and I were lucky enough to buy a small place up at Montauk Manor in 2002. And we've owned places since then. We kind of owned a little beach cottage off Tuthill Road, which was just the most magical place. And then we ended up owning at the Beach Comber, which is a co op on old Montauk highway, and we still own there. And we. Even though we knew we were leaving New York, we could not leave Montauk, and so we held onto that place. And we are up there every year. And the thing I wanted to bring to the conversation is just there have obviously been so many changes to the whole vibe of Montauk over the years. Now you're. You're a relative newcomer of 2018. The vibe had already changed a whole lot by the time you discovered Montauk. But what I wanted to just bring to the conversation is, you know, from God. Now, it's crazy to think it, you know, that I've been going out there since the 80s. What is that, like, 40 years? No, can't be. Anyway, that it is still, you know, as much as people like. Like to kind of hate on it in some ways now, because the vibe has become much more Hamptonized and it's really pricey and people are wearing high heels and, you know, they're. They're heels are falling into the sand and into the grass and they look silly and they basically are trying to replicate the city and Montauk, all those complaints, it still is one of the most magical places.

[Tiffany Hansen]

Mary Ellen. In the world. Thank you. Mary Ellen, sorry to cut you off, but we're running out of time here, and I just wanted to get your reaction here. Nat, because the vibe has changed. But, you know, we've just essentially spent the last 35 minutes as a, as a travel log for people who would like to go out to Montauk for sure. And there are, you know, we've also spent this time talking about photographs which as I understand on the radio is a little hard sometimes for people to understand there are photos. If now we've convinced everyone to drive out to Montauk, there are some photos on display out there and those are on display through, through the 1st of.

[Nat Ward]

September at the Second House Museum, which is right off 27 as you come into Montauk. And I just wanted to say in terms of the vibe, the vibe changing, right, what's interesting about Montauk is that it layers so the people who are still there are still there. And then, yeah, there are people losing their heels in the sand. Okay. But it layers on top. And I think that's a really special sedimentary thing that happens there.

[Tiffany Hansen]

That is Nat Ward. He's the photographer who has this new book out called DITCH. Montauk, New York, 11954. Nat, thanks for your time.

[Nat Ward]

Thanks so much.

[Carol]

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[Tiffany Hansen]

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[Carol]

By sponsoring our programming, you'll reach a.

[Tiffany Hansen]

Community of passionate listeners in an uncluttered audio experience.

[Carol]

Visit sponsorship wnyc. Org to learn more.