Peconic Schoolhouse to Open as Community Center Monday Night

That vacant little red schoolhouse made mostly of concrete on Peconic Lane will come alive again as a community center on Monday night.

After about three years of planning and restructuring, officials and workers will see the old Peconic School, originally built in 1938, reopen as a community center at 7 p.m.

“We’ve been down there really working on painting and refurbishing ever day for probably the last month,” said head of Southold Town Public Works Jim McMahon. “Three rooms and the bathrooms are done and ready to open.”

The fourth room of the four-room schoolhouse features a concrete stage, which, according to McMahon, will be great for small concerts and PowerPoint presentations. Workers are holding off on that room for further deliberation on the best use of it from Southold Town Board members.

“The town board did not want to use this building exclusively for one kind of event such as concerts,” McMahon said. “And with the four rooms, there is a lot more privacy for certain things like card games or a quilting group, whereas before one group might be interrupted by a pack of Cub Scouts in the open room of the recreation center.”

The building closed as a school in 1997, when the children who attended were transferred to . The town purchased the building in 2008. Southold Town Historian Antonia Booth will have pictures and information of the historic school at Monday night’s grand opening, which is open to the public.