Tom Wickham explores centuries-long connection to North Fork in annual lecture series

The heavy rainstorm didn’t stop North Fork farmer Tom Wickham from telling family stories at the third annual Tom Wickham Lecture Series.

As the owner of Wickham Fruit Farm in Cutchogue who served in town government in the ’90s, he shared his family’s story starting from the Revolutionary War to a crowded room at Minnow At the Galley Ho in New Suffolk. The lecture was in celebration of America’s 250th birthday.

“This is a talk about land and people,” Mr. Wickham said. “The people are mostly in my family, and the land is here, from the South Fork to the North Fork. Land and family go together from biblical times, and we see it repeating throughout history.”

The lecture brought together local history, family legacy and the changing realities of life on the North Fork, as Mr. Wickham traced his family’s connection to the land through the late 1700s, generations of farming and the challenges facing agriculture today.

His connection to the land stretches back more than three centuries. In 1699, his ancestor Joseph Wickham purchased property on the North Fork and built what is now known as the Old House. But the family’s hold on the land was later fractored by the war, when Parker Wickham, a prominent Loyalist, had his property confiscated by the state.

For Mr. Wickham, that history illustrates just how deeply land and family have been intertwined through generations.

The talk also served as a reflection on what it takes to preserve that connection — and what the future has in store.

“Every family faces a question of who will be the next generation,” he said. “And it’s a question that I think many of you may be thinking about as I’m talking: What will be the next generation?”

The next Lecture Series will be in the spring of 2027.