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How the bottle, pictured here, arrived in the collection of the East Hampton Historical Society is very murky. It’s made of glass embossed with the name “Albert R. Bridger, Bridgehampton, L.I.” We have no provenance in our catalog records, but research suggests the bottle was used for beer during the first decade of the 20th century.
Born in 1869 or 1870 and raised in Central Islip, Albert R. Bridger ran a hotel in Babylon before enlisting in the military and serving as a Captain during the Spanish American War. After the War, he settled in Bridgehampton with his sister, Helen, who had purchased property for $2,000 with her friend, Sarah Bookman to construct a “Raines Hotel,” according to the Sag Harbor Corrector. Raines Law Hotels were typically hotels that operated above a saloon located on the ground floor. They were named for Senator John Raines who authored a N.Y. State liquor law in 1896 that wound up encouraging these establishments. Critics accused the proprietors of using the hotel rooms for prostitution.
Located on the east side of Bridgehampton/Sag Harbor Turnpike at the corner of Suwassett Avenue, the Bridger hotel featured a billiard and pool parlor. According to the 1900 U.S. Census, Albert oversaw the hotel while Helen worked as a cook and their boarder, William Godby, tended bar and may even have served the bottle of beer that is in our collection.
Bottles were usually embossed with the name of the brewery and not a hotel proprietor’s name. It’s possible – because Sarah Bookman’s husband, Maurice, was an agent for the Ibert Brewing Company based in Brooklyn – that Ibert made the beer that was bottled under Bridger’s name.
Albert Bridger ran the hotel, which became known at the Suwassett House, for less than ten years. Not long after arriving in Bridgehampton, he married a woman named Annie and they had two children. Tragically, Albert died of pneumonia in December 1909 and his wife died just one month later after falling down a flight of stairs. After Bridger’s death, Daniel Parsons acquired the hotel and he and his son, Frank, operated it for decades.
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