Keith Snedecor, founder of Friends of Connetquot River State Park Preserve, dies at 62

More than two centuries ago, Eliphalet Snedecor built a tavern that would become a jewel of Long Island history, nestled within what is now Islip Town’s nearly 3,500-acre Connetquot River State Park Preserve.

The business became a getaway hub for the state’s rich and powerful, who later bought the site and turned it into the South Side Sportsmen’s Club of Long Island, which boasted members ranging from Theodore Roosevelt to Andrew Carnegie.

But that history was nearly uprooted in 1996. The tavern had fallen into disrepair decades earlier and was to be converted into a bed-and-breakfast — until the great-great-great-great-grandson of the tavern’s founder got involved.

Keith Snedecor, of East Islip, formed a nonprofit that saved the tavern and pumped life back into the blighted property over the next three decades. Newsday has reported that his group went on to refurbish the site’s main house, reintroduce turkeys to the preserve and transform the old tavern into a museum, along with a slew of other initiatives designed to share and protect the area’s unique history.

Snedecor, 62, who dedicated nearly half his life to that cause, died at his home of a heart attack on May 11, his family said. His colleagues said his mission and the history of the preserve will live on because of what he built.

“That’s his legacy. It’s Connetquot,” said Janet Soley, president of Friends of Connetquot River State Park Preserve, the nonprofit Snedecor founded. “Had Keith not had this passion for the place, I don’t know what would have happened. It could have been turned into another Long Island neighborhood with a failing strip mall. Who knows?”

Snedecor worked as an accountant for Northrop Grumman when he wasn’t tending to the preserve, according to his brother Rick, of Patchogue.

Soley described Snedecor as a “gentle giant” who “really loved history and the history of the park because it meant so much to him. It was his family.”

Former Friends of Connetquot president Richard Remmer said Snedecor’s passion for history and the preserve were “contagious,” and he largely credited the group’s successes to Snedecor’s ability to unite board members who had competing interests.

“He engaged a lot of other people,” Remmer said. “Keith was always able to somehow pull everybody together and remind them that we all share in [this mission]. With his wonderful sense of humor he could be a little bit disarming, he’d bring the temperature down in the room, and then suddenly board members were all … pulling [together] again to make things happen.”

In addition to his brother Rick, Snedecor is survived by another brother, Robert, of West Islip, and a sister, Joanne Gunther, of Cary, North Carolina.

A memorial service for Snedecor will be held at St. John’s Church in Oakdale on July 20 at 2 p.m., according to Solely, who said some of Snedecor’s ashes will be spread outside the historic tavern he helped save.

“Keith has given us the knowledge to keep that history alive,” she said. “And for that, I think everyone must be grateful to him.”

By Sam Kmack

sam.kmack@newsday.com

Sam Kmack covers the Town of Islip for Newsday. He is a graduate of the University of Southern California and previously worked as a city watchdog reporter in the Phoenix metro area, as well as an investigative journalist at the Arizona Center for Investigative Reporting.