Head east past the farm fields and you start noticing them. Tall shingled towers with four long sails, standing on village greens, behind old saltbox houses and at the edge of working farmland.
They are not decorations. They are surviving machinery from an agricultural economy that ran on wind power for more than a century.
Eleven historic smock mills survive across eastern Long Island. Most are clustered on the South Fork; one, built in Southold around 1810, now stands at Sylvester Manor on Shelter Island. Some open their doors seasonally. Others are best seen from the road or on a guided tour. Together they make one of the more rewarding slow drives out here.
Did You Know?
A smock mill has a fixed, many-sided shingled tower and a rotating cap, so its sails can be turned toward the wind. The name comes from the tower’s resemblance to a farmer’s smock. The 11 historic survivors are smock mills built to grind grain. Westhampton Beach’s Gov. John Adams Dix Windmill is also a smock mill, but it was designed to pump water.
Choose Your Windmill Stop
Not every mill can be entered, and that is worth knowing before you plan a route.
Step Inside
Several mills let you go inside, either seasonally or on a guided tour. Hook Mill and Pantigo Mill in East Hampton are often the easiest to catch open. Corwith, Beebe and Sylvester Manor usually open for scheduled tours and special events, so it is worth seeing what is on that week.
View From the Road
Gardiner Mill in East Hampton and the windmill at Stony Brook Southampton are best appreciated from outside, and both sit in settings worth the stop on their own.
Make a Photo Stop
The Long Wharf windmill in Sag Harbor is a 1966 replica rather than one of the 11 historic mills, while Westhampton Beach’s restored Gov. John Adams Dix Windmill is a historic water-pumping mill on the Great Lawn. Both make easy public photo stops.
Westhampton Beach and Southampton
Gov. John Adams Dix Windmill, Westhampton Beach – built around 1870 on the estate of John Adams Dix, who would serve as New York’s governor from 1872 to 1874. It is a smock-style mill designed to pump water for household and farm use rather than grind grain, which is why it is not counted among the 11 historic grain mills. Saved from demolition and moved from Seafield Lane to the Great Lawn in 2022, it was dedicated in July 2025 and now stands near the village center, restored as an operational water-pumping windmill.
Shinnecock Hills – built in the early 1700s, the windmill at Stony Brook Southampton has gone by more names than any other on the East End, including Mill Hill, Claflin, College, Shinnecock and Southampton. It originally stood on Windmill Lane in Southampton Village before moving to Shinnecock Hills in 1890. It later served as a guest cottage, and Tennessee Williams stayed there in the summer of 1957 while writing The Day on Which a Man Dies.
Local Tip: The Stony Brook Southampton windmill is undergoing rehabilitation and its sails have been removed for restoration work. Confirm campus access before making a special trip.
Water Mill and Bridgehampton
Corwith Windmill, Water Mill – built around 1800 at Hog Neck in North Haven and purchased by James Corwith, who had it moved to Water Mill in 1813. It stands on the village green directly across from the Water Mill Museum, which means you can see a historic windmill and a water-powered gristmill from the same patch of grass.
Beebe Windmill, Bridgehampton – built in Sag Harbor in 1820 for Lester Beebe, a Revolutionary War patriot and retired whaling captain, and moved five times before reaching Ocean Road and Hildreth Avenue. It is now owned by the Town of Southampton and is recognizable for its rounded cap. The Bridgehampton Museum’s Ocean Road walking tour is a good way to place it among the village’s historic homes and farmland.
Sag Harbor
Long Wharf Windmill, Sag Harbor – residents erected it in 1966 during the Old Whalers Festival as a memorial to the village’s whaling history. It reproduces a windmill built in 1760 that stood about 50 feet west of the present site. Treat it as a village landmark and a photo stop rather than surviving colonial-era machinery.
East Hampton Village
Three historic mills sit within an easy walk of one another, making East Hampton Village the natural place to finish a windmill afternoon.
Hook Mill, North Main Street – the East End windmill most visitors recognize. Nathaniel Dominy V built it in 1806, reusing the main post from a 1736 mill that had stood on the same ground, and it ground grain commercially until 1908. The Village of East Hampton acquired it in 1922, restored it to working order in 1939 and operated it seasonally into the 1950s. It has stood in the same spot for more than two centuries, which almost none of the others can say.
Pantigo Mill, behind Home Sweet Home Museum – Samuel Schellinger began this mill in 1804. It changed hands and locations over its working life before being moved to its current site on James Lane, where it pairs naturally with a visit to the museum and gardens.
Gardiner Mill, 36 James Lane – built by Dominy in 1804 for John Lyon Gardiner and other backers, with timber cut on Gardiners Island and floated across. It stands near Town Pond on the old Gardiner home lot, and the sightline from the road is one of the best in the village.
Local Tip: Museum hours do not necessarily mean the windmill interiors are open. Check with the Home Sweet Home Museum or the Village of East Hampton before you go, including whether you need an appointment.
Two additional mills sit within the Town of East Hampton but are not regularly open to the public: the Wainscott Windmill on private Georgica Association grounds, and the Gardiners Island Windmill on privately held Gardiners Island.
Shelter Island
Sylvester Manor – the mill was built in Southold around 1810 by Nathaniel Dominy, brought by barge to Shelter Island in 1840 and moved to Sylvester Manor in 1926. Though it now stands on Shelter Island, it is the only surviving historic windmill originally built on the North Fork.
Check Sylvester Manor’s calendar for tours and public programs, and to see whether the windmill is open. The farm, farm stand and CSA pickup are all part of a visit, and the Manor’s public interpretation also addresses its early reliance on enslaved and indentured labor.
Mills on the North Fork
The North Fork’s milling history runs on tides and water rather than wind, and its one surviving windmill now stands across the water at Sylvester Manor.
Mattituck – the Old Mill Inn sits on Mattituck Creek in the structure of a former tidal gristmill that opened in the early 1820s. The mill collected incoming tidal water in a basin, then released it through a mill run to power a water wheel and milling machinery. After commercial milling ended, the building was adapted for other uses and later reopened as the current Old Mill Inn. The original drive shaft and millstone are still visible inside.
Make a Day of It or an Overnight
Two routes cover the ground well, and either one fills a day once you allow for lunch and a little lingering.
South Fork Route
- Start in Westhampton Beach at the Gov. John Adams Dix Windmill on the Great Lawn.
- Continue to Stony Brook Southampton for the early 18th-century windmill, viewed from campus grounds when access allows.
- Stop in Water Mill for the Corwith Windmill and the Water Mill Museum.
- Continue to Bridgehampton for the Beebe Windmill and the historic Ocean Road stretch.
- Break in Sag Harbor for the Long Wharf windmill and lunch in the village.
- End in East Hampton Village at Hook Mill, then walk to Pantigo and Gardiner Mills on James Lane.
Shelter Island and North Fork Route
- Begin at Sylvester Manor on Shelter Island, checking its calendar for windmill tours or public programming.
- Take the North Ferry to Greenport, then work west along the Main Road.
- End in Mattituck at the Old Mill Inn, where a former tidal mill gives the route a different angle on local agricultural history.
Make It an Overnight
If you want to combine the South Fork, Shelter Island and the North Fork, plan an overnight. Staying nearby means you can catch the villages early, take the ferry without watching the clock, and give the evening to dinner instead of the drive home.
Explore where to stay across the East End →
Before You Go
- Confirm hours and access with the operator. Schedules are seasonal and change from year to year. Some mills open only for scheduled tours, special events or by appointment.
- Village street parking can fill up early in summer.
- Several mills stand on private property. Respect posted boundaries and view from the road.
- Late afternoon can be especially good for photographs at Hook Mill, the Beebe and the Corwith.
Questions Visitors Ask
Who built the East End windmills?
Nathaniel Dominy V of East Hampton and Samuel Schellinger of Amagansett built or contributed to several of the best-known survivors. Dominy built Hook Mill, Gardiner Mill, the Gardiners Island mill and the 1810 mill now at Sylvester Manor. Schellinger built Pantigo Mill and was associated with other regional mill projects.
Are any East End windmills still able to grind grain?
Hook Mill and Corwith Windmill have each been restored and demonstrated in working condition at points in their history. None operates as a commercial flour mill today.
Is there a historic windmill in Montauk?
There is no surviving historic gristmill in Montauk. The closest are the three in East Hampton Village, a short drive west along Montauk Highway, which makes them an easy addition to a day spent out at the Point.
Follow the Sails
Many of these mills no longer stand where they were built. They were hauled down turnpikes, floated across bays and put back together wherever the grain and the wind were. Stand close enough to one and you are looking at the same timbers that ground the flour for the villages around it.
Find Your East End.
Rather spend the day on the water instead? Read Sail the East End for sunset cruises, day sails and private charters from Greenport to Montauk.