A mecca for families and beachgoers for over one hundred years, Hampton is situated along New Hampshire's short coastline. Composed of two distinct parts--town and beach--the town is a study in contrasts. The quiet, colonial village three miles inland did not see much growth until after World War II. Meanwhile, the beach area progressed rapidly from a nearly deserted stretch of ocean occupied by fishermen and a few scattered hotels to a bustling beach resort that could draw more than 100,000 tourists on a hot Fourth of July weekend. This fascinating volume contains over two hundred old photographs. Vintage images of Hampton Beach show the resort through its many changes; from its lazy beginnings, through the era of the grand hotels, electric trolley cars, and swing bands who played at the Ballroom, up to the 1950s, when the beach became a popular family resort destination.

"Cocaine. It's already cost Dan Marlowe his family and his business. Dan's doing his damndest to stay away from the stuff, but when a boat with two dead bodies is found wrecked on the jetty at Hampton Beach, he's forced into the search for its missing cargo: 200 pounds of cocaine. Will the drug that stole everything short of Dan's life be the one thing that can give it all back? "--Back cover.

Hampton, originally a summer village for Native Americans from the interior of New Hampshire, was founded in 1638 by a small group of Puritan farmers and fishermen. In 1840, the railroad brought the beginnings of the tourist industry to the little village. New businesses sprang up to accommodate the summer visitors arriving on the train from Boston, and the development of Hampton Beach as a resort began. The building of the street railway at the end of the nineteenth century linked the beach to towns all around the region, and Hampton became a major destination for day visitors.

In the Hamptons, the everyday people are as complicated and fascinating as the millionaires... When Katie Doyle moves across the country to the Hamptons, she is hoping for summer employment, new friends for her young son, and a chance to explore a new love affair with a dazzling investor. What she finds is a strange cocktail of classes, where society’s one-percenters vacation alongside local, hard-working people who’ve lived in the Hamptons for generations. Though she’s looking forward to their move, Katie is wary about mingling with her boyfriends’ East Coast elite circles. She soon discovers Southampton isn’t all that it seems to be on the surface—and neither are the people who live there. As George takes Katie on a whirlwind tour of country clubs, haute couture, and lavish events, she is amazed to witness sudden whims become dire needs, extra-marital affairs blossoming right and left, and people purchase friends and loyalties like a pair of shoes. Even the middle-class townspeople maintain a determined façade while maneuvering like sharks among the wealthy summer invaders. The more Katie becomes immersed, the more she learns the secrets of both the upstairs and downstairs, the upper crust and middle of the road. The combustion between the classes becomes explosive as the summer tears on. Betrayals, a sexual predator, and a missing person lost in murky waves drive the reader on a racing Learjet ride through impossible twists and turns until landing at the shocking conclusion. When she meets Luke, a local surfer and middle school teacher, he makes her question what it is she really wants as she understands the life she’s begun for herself is built on shifting Hamptons’ dunes.

“The Hamptons” is synonymous with luxury. Simply mentioning the name conjures images of poolside soirées, grandiose waterfront estates and endless days on the beach socializing with the upper echelon. But before this famed peninsula became the summer haunt of the glitterati, its forty miles of rolling sand dunes provided the perfect landscape for English settlers. Once New York high society caught wind of the charming hamlets and salty air, its members—from the Fords to the Vanderbilts—soon turned The Hamptons into a summer oasis. Next came the creatives seeking solitude, a place to write and sketch, away from the urban cacophony. John Steinbeck in Sag Harbor. Jackson Pollock in the Springs. And Andy Warhol in Montauk. Now, Jay-Z and Beyoncé, Calvin Klein, Madonna, Alec Baldwin and Martha Stewart all enjoy Hamptons homes. They may come from different realms, but what’s one thing all Hamptonites, honorary or official, can agree on? The locale boasts a unique allure—one that morphs to meet the desires of its next seasonal guest or lifelong dweller.

Richly illustrated with archival photos and reproductions of the artists' work, "Hamptons Bohemia" chronicles the evolution of a community and the colorful characters who have inhabited it, from Winslow Homer to George Plimpton. 176 full-color and halftone images.