Community Corner

Historic Family Home Was First Mt. Sinai Post Office

Did you guess where this old photo was taken?

On Monday, we asked you to guess where in Mount Sinai the picture of this old home was taken. Did you get it right?

According to the Mt. Sinai-Miller Place Historical Society this is the Phillips-Randall House built around 1740. The owner of the home also made it the first post office and changed the name of the town from Old Mans to Mt. Sinai using his bible as a guide.

Below is a description of the home given by the historical society:

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"This was part of the Phillips homestead until 1884 when the farm was sold to John S Randall, who moved his family to the farm and continues to live there although the farm was sold out of the family in the early 1980s. This was also the first Post Office with Charles Phillips, the Post master, and remained there until 1907. Tradition gives Charles the credit of changing the name of the village from Old Mans to Mt Sinai. Why the name was changed has never been made clear. According to tradition, Charles Phillips took his family Bible and a knitting needle. He closed his eyes and opened the Bible saying that the proper name would be closest to the needle and would be the name of the village. He had opened the Bible to the book of Exodus and the needle was closest to Mt Sinai."

Did you get it right?

Find out what's happening in Miller Place-Rocky Pointwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Photo is courtesy of the Miller Place - Mount Sinai Historical Society. The Miller Place-Mount Sinai Historical Society offers house tours of the historic William Miller house on Saturdays throughout the late spring and summer. Stop by to take a step into history and see the house and what it was like to live at different times throughout the past 300 years.


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