Riverhead Rotary Club makes pitch for peace pole downtown
The Riverhead Rotary Club is moving forward with plans to install a multilingual peace pole in Riverhead Town, following positive response from the Town Board at a work session Thursday, Jan. 8.
The Rev. George Dupree, immediate past president of the Riverhead Rotary Club, presented the proposal to town officials, explaining that the concept is part of the Peace Pole Project that began in Japan in the 1970s. Today, more than 200,000 multilingual peace poles have been planted globally, becoming a highly recognized symbol — and worldwide movement — of spreading the message of peace on Earth.
The Rev. Dupree said the Rotary is eyeing town locations that have high visibility for the pole installation, such as along the downtown River Walk. Town officials also discussed the possibility of placing more than one peace pole at other appropriate locations in the future.
“We’re such a unique community; if we place multiples of these and we find a language that’s not represented in the first one, we can definitely take care of that,” said Riverhead Town Supervisor Jerry Halpin.
The seven-foot pole would highlight languages spoken throughout Riverhead, such as Spanish, Polish and Ukrainian. Once finalized, the Riverhead Rotary would order the pole, which would take about eight weeks to receive.
The Town Board thanked the Riverhead Rotary for their continuous service to the community.
Southold Town installed a peace pole on the front lawn of its Town Hall in 2024. That pole reads “May peace prevail on Earth” in eight languages spoken on the North Fork: English, Hebrew, Greek, Polish, Spanish, Ukrainian, Arabic and the Mohawk language indigenous to New York State.
