Mattituck American Legion Post 861 Set To Close: 'A Heavy Heart'

MATTITUCK, NY — It was the saddest of news on the North Fork this week as members of the Mattituck American Legion post 861 announced that the Legion will be closing.

"It is with a heavy heart that I announce that at tonight’s meeting it was voted on approved to close Mattituck American Legion Post 861," a Facebook post by the organization said. The closure, the post said, is "due to declining membership, members to fill posts, and the ability to carry out its necessary community functions. The paperwork will be filled to return the charter. Members are encouraged to transfer to other posts or to Post 1."

The Legion will one or two more meetings to finalize the closure, officials said.

The Legion has been struggling with declining membership for years: In 2017, three years shy of its 100th anniversary, members announced that the Raymond J. Cleaves American Legion Post 861 in Mattituck could soon be closing its doors forever.

The problem, then-Legion member Art Tillman told Patch — Tillman passed away in 2019 — was one that's cast its shadow on many similar organizations, a membership that's fading due to the passage of years, and few new recruits.

But those who love the Legion, located on Wickham Avenue, have long been trying desperately to give the post one last chance.

"Raymond J. Cleaves was a casualty of World War I," Tillman said at the time. "Mattituck area veterans of that war, whose 100th Anniversary we now honor, formed an American Legion Post in 1920, one year after the American Legion was established — and honored Raymond J. Cleaves, a casualty of the war, in naming the new post after him."

Sadly, he said in 2017, "Three years short of our 100th anniversary there is likelihood the Raymond J. Cleaves Post of the American Legion will shortly have to close. At the last three Post meetings we did not have a quorum to conduct regular business."

It was the Legion, Tillman said then, who fought the government to include Agent Orange as a disability from war. "It is the Legion that advocates for VA hospitals and patients. It is the Legion who remembers all those who have given lives for their country. It is the Legion that does so much more for the community. Please join us in honoring those who have given so much so we can live free."