Massachusetts : a guide to its places and people, Part 63

Author:
Publication date: 1937
Publisher: Boston : Houghton Mifflin Company
Number of Pages: 802

USA > Massachusetts > Massachusetts : a guide to its places and people > Part 63

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There are no public roads, with the exception of a quarter-of-a-mile

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stretch of State road on the island of Cuttyhunk. To see the primitive loveliness of this archipelago and the beauty of its isolated summer estates, it is necessary to follow lanes and bypaths afoot.

Transportation to Cuttyhunk can be secured by a small launch which leaves New Bedford daily, weather permitting (75¢ round trip). One and a half miles left of the motor-boat landing is the U.S. Coast Guard Station, and about a half-mile in the opposite direction are the magnifi- cent buildings and grounds of the William M. Wood Estate which covers more than a third of the entire area of the isle.

Tarpaulin Cove, on the east shore of Naushon Island, has been a haven for pilots and pirates, and was the last port of call for Captain Kidd. The French Watering Place, a little southeast of Tarpaulin Cove, was so named because of the French privateers who swarmed in Vineyard Sound. During the Revolution, British foraging expeditions cleared the island of livestock, and during the War of 1812, Naushon was used by them as a naval base. The geologist finds Naushon one of the best places to study the features of the great terminal moraine.

PENIKESE ISLAND was given in 1873, to Professor Louis Agassiz with an endowment fund of $50,000 to establish a game sanctuary and a school of natural history. In 1907, the State acquired the island and established a leper colony, which was later abandoned.

The first port of call is WOODS HOLE (see Tour 19A), home port of the famed ketch 'Atlantis.' (Transportation of motor cars from this point should be arranged for in advance.)

Continuing through the channel, the vessel enters Vineyard Sound, where the water is usually slightly rougher, and approaches the island of Martha's Vineyard, rounding the high brilliantly colored bluffs sur- rounding Oak Bluffs, which give the small island a deceptive appearance of bulk.

MARTHA'S VINEYARD, a triangular isle off the elbow of Cape Cod, measures less than 20 miles from east to west and 10 from north to south, with its highest point 311 feet above the sea. Leif Ericson may have been an early visitor, but Bartholomew Gosnold, in 1602, was the first known white man to visit it. The island was permanently settled in 1642, and in the 18th century became a whaling center. It was part of the original New York Grant until 1692, when it was ceded to Massa- chusetts, forming, with the Elizabeth Islands, Dukes County.

Martha's Vineyard has been summarized by Walter Prichard Eaton as 'a land of old towns, new cottages, high cliffs, white sails, green fairway, salt water, wild fowl and the steady pull of an ocean breeze.' Few islands are 'so many things to many men' as this. From the bare ridge of Indian Hill (260 ft.) to south and east stretches a level plain of dwarf forest-top without a sign of civilization; to the west the land rolls away hilly and broken by rocky outcrops and tree-filled ravines. Northward lies the blue of the Sound with the faint tracery of the Elizabeth Islands on the far horizon. Yet down in the heart of Oak Bluffs the little cottages

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are set so close and at such extraordinary angles that a motor car can hardly make its way safely at more than ten miles an hour. Again in Edgartown there is gracious spacing in the comfortable small eastward- looking houses with their silvered shingles and picket fences and lilac hedges. Then out beyond on the Island are the isolated small farms, the salt ponds and lonely beaches, the pines and yellow sandbars, the high bluffs and heavy surf on the south and placid small harbors on the north, with the extraordinary colored clay cliffs of Gay Head at the southwestern tip.

Sec. b. OAK BLUFFS - EDGARTOWN -GAY HEAD - VINE- YARD HAVEN, 48 m.

OAK BLUFFS (town, alt. Io, pop. 1657, sett. 1642, incorp. 1880), a village on the northeast shore, doubles its population in the summer. The Algonquin name for this tract of land was Ogkeshkuppe ('Damp Thicket'), but the earliest English name, given in 1646 by Thomas Mayhew, the first proprietor, was Easternmost Chop of Howe's Hole. Mayhew granted it to John Dagget. There is a story, not vouched for, however, that Dagget's son Joseph married the daughter of a local Indian sachem and as a dowry received practically all the land comprising the present town.

At the Center is the Methodist Tabernacle (R) surrounded by tiny, ornate cottages. Summer campmeetings have been held in the village since 1835.

The East Chop Lighthouse (1869), on the north tip of Oak Bluffs, stands on a cliff 75 feet above the sea.

A short walk south across Farm Pond (L) leads to the Norton House (1752), held together by stout wooden pegs except where modern restora- tion has required the use of nails and metal fastenings.

Broad, tarred Edgartown Rd. runs south from Oak Bluffs through HARTSVILLE, a hamlet named for a family that has for generations maintained summer homes here.

The road continues between white sand dunes, covered with coarse grass in summer, on a narrow strip of land bounded for many miles (R) by Sengekontacket Pond (Indian, 'Salty Waters'), and (L) by the Nan- tucket Sound, with the open Atlantic beyond it, shining blue and calm, or green-gray and turbulent, according to the weather. To the southeast is the narrow brook ending in Cape Pogue. The pond has several inlets permitting the tidal ebb and flow that keeps it stocked with shellfish.

EDGARTOWN, 5 m. (town, alt. Io, pop. 1399, sett. 1642, incorp. 1671), was first called Nunnepog (Indian, 'Fresh Pond'), and, when incorporated, was named for Edgar, son of James II.

At early island elections corn and beans were used as ballots. 'The freeman shall use Indian corn and Beans, the corn to manifest Election, the Beanes Contrary' - which explains the phrase 'to corn a man.'

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In the 18th century Edgartown was the prosperous home port of Arctic whaling vessels, and in a typical year of the 19th century men were busy refining whale oil and making candles, while the women turned out 15,000 pairs of socks, 3000 pairs of mittens, and 600 wigs.

West at the upper end of the village into Cooke St., the oldest street on this island, is the Edgartown Cemetery (R), with headstones dating from 1670, inscribed with curious epitaphs. Also on this street are some of the oldest houses in Martha's Vineyard, including (R) the Thomas Cooke House (open), built in 1766, now the headquarters of the Dukes County Historical Society.

At the east end of Cooke St., left into Water St., is the Public Library, which houses a collection of paintings and etchings done by famous artists, and an exhibit of bronze statuary.

Water St. continues to Edgartown Harbor Light, where the route turns into Pease's Point Way, which crosses Edgartown Rd. and becomes the Takemmy Trail, passing through Edgartown Plains.

The Martha's Vineyard State Forest, along the Takemmy Trail, covers a wooded area of 4473 acres. A short distance west of the State Forest, at a cut-off (L), stands a pile of rocks enclosed by an iron railing, a Memorial to the Rev. Thomas Mayhew, son of Governor Mayhew, whose labors won many converts among the Indians. Departing for England in 1668, Mr. Mayhew here bade farewell to his Indian friends. He was lost at sea, and the Indians henceforward placed a rock on the spot when they passed.

WEST TISBURY, 13 m. (town, alt. Io, pop. 282, sett. 1669, incorp. 1861), named for the English birthplace of Governor Thomas Mayhew, was first known as Tackhum-Min-Eyi or Takemmy (Indian, 'The Place Where One Goes to Grind Corn').

In its youth the town had saltworks on the shore, smokehouses on the hills where fat herring were cured and prepared for market, brickworks, and a lumber trade. But it has now placidly settled down to farming, fishing, and the cultivation of the summer tourist trade.

It is said that every wild flower known to eastern Massachusetts has been found in the town, the Tea Lane section alone yielding over 700 varieties. Glacial boulders and hills of unconsolidated drift appear in the midst of fresh-water springs and ponds, one of which is one and a half miles long. Many Algonquin names still survive; among these is Manitouwattootan ('Christiantown'), applied in 1659 to a reservation for the Praying Indians that is now an almost deserted village.

In the village is Music Street, so named because, after one family ac- quired a piano, all the others on the street followed suit.

The route swings past the Congregational Church and shortly reaches the junction with an unimproved road.

Left at this intersection, then right at the first fork is the Experience Mayhew House (private), a typical frame dwelling of the Cape Cod type, the oldest house

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in the town. To the south, white-capped combers of the Atlantic pound the hard- packed white sands of South Beach, rarely patronized by swimmers because of the heavy undertow.

Abel's Hill Cemetery (R.) on the main highway contains lichen-covered tombstones bearing many odd epitaphs.

From Stone Wall Beach, 15 m., NO MAN'S LAND, a tiny island lying eight miles offshore, is visible on clear days.

This island is reached only by small boat or airplane. The one family on the island is completely isolated when bad weather and raging surf make these means of com- munication impossible. On the island are huge rocks of unusual formation, one of which is known as Devil's Bed and Pillow. Many Indian remains have been found, including a kind of workshop for the manufacture of arrowheads and other stone implements. A boulder on the shore bears the figure 1004 in eroded marks that have caused some authorities to think that Leif Ericson may have visited this spot almost 600 years before the arrival of Bartholomew Gosnold.

A short distance west of Stone Wall Beach is Beetle Bung Corner.

Left here on a road that crosses Nashaquitsa Pond.

GAY HEAD (town, alt. 185, pop. 158, sett. 1669, incorp. 1870) is one of the two towns in Massachusetts which are still mainly occupied by people of Indian descent. A paradoxical situation occurred in 1711, when the Society for Propagating the Gospel purchased the lands at Gay Head for the sole use of the Indians, their original proprietors. In the early days fishing, whaling, and agriculture furnished the chief source of revenue which, at its best, was scanty. Labor in the cranberry bogs and the sale of bowls and jars fashioned from the colored clays of the cliffs now are the chief present source of livelihood.

The road passes the tip of Black Brook, where at certain seasons the headless ghost of a man supposedly murdered here is said to appear as a warning to the spectator that his own end is approaching. The omen always comes true, old-timers say.

A road continues to Gay Head Light, built in 1799, rebuilt in 1859. It contains 1003 prisms of cut and polished crystal glass, and flashes every ten seconds, three white beams and one red.

Below the lighthouse a Cliff (60 ft.) drops straight down to the waters of Vineyard Sound. Composed of variegated vertical strata of clay ranging from white, blue, orange, and red, to tan, the precipice, in the rays of the late afternoon sun, pre- sents a gorgeous reflection, best appreciated from offshore. (Small boats will make special trips for the sunset hours.)

Beetle Bung Rd., running straight ahead from Beetle Bung Corner, with clipped wooded sides as in English rural lanes, shortly joins North Rd.

Left turn here 0.5 m. to the old-fashioned fishing village of MENEMSHA (Town of Chilmark, alt. 140, pop. 253, sett. 1671, incorp. 1714), where the air is per- meated by the smell of lobster bait being ripened in the sun. The regions now known as Chilmark, Tisbury, and Elizabeth Island were granted in 1671 by patent, under the name of Tisbury Manor, to Thomas Mayhew, Sr., with the privileges of feudal lordship, as in the medieval manorial system. The settlers were con- sidered tenants, and required, in spite of their protests, to pay quit-rents. May- hew, Jr., sold his privileges to Governor Dungan in 1685, and was appointed stew- ard, a position in which he continued for 25 years.

At the end of the road is Menemsha Pond, which was connected with Menemsha Bight by the Government several decades ago to provide a harbor for the fisher- men. Along the shores of this artificial salt-water pond are numerous shacks of fishermen.

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North of Beetle Bung Rd., North Rd. runs by Peaked Hill (alt. 31I) (R), a high point on the island. Left, almost opposite Peaked Hill, is an early home now gray with age, formerly the Home of Captain George Claghorne, designer and builder of the U.S. Frigate 'Constitution.' Adjacent, Roaring Brook runs through an abandoned brickyard. Here is an ancient Aqueduct, of rude construction, that once carried water from the brook.

North Rd. passes between Indian Hill (alt. 261) (L), picnicking, and (R) Brandy Brown Place (private), which takes its name from a former salt-box house on the site in which the island's supply of brandy was hidden during a British raid of the Revolutionary War.

Along the North Rd. are many large trees, bent almost to the ground. Tradition has it that when the Indians inhabited this section, they bent small oaks over and pinned them down to mark a trail.

On the outskirts of Vineyard Haven, North Rd. passes beautiful Tashmoo Lake (L), the largest fresh-water body on the island. » Legend relates that an Indian, on a journey through the deep forest, had been told by his mother, a seeress, that the end of his trip would be marked by beau- tiful springs of pure water. When he came to the lake, he knelt down, drank out of a snow-white shell his mother had given him, and gave the water his name.

VINEYARD HAVEN, Town of Tisbury, 43 m. (alt. 20, pop. 1822, sett. 1660, incorp. 1671), is a rapidly developing summer resort. Agriculture, whaling, fishing, and salt-making were the early industries of the town- ship, which extends to the south shore of the island and has a bay. During the Revolution this harbor was a refuge for many of the British men-of- war. In 1775 the people erected a Liberty Pole on Manter's Hill. A cap- tain of the British ship 'Unicorn' desired this pole, and one of the select- men, not daring to refuse, set a price on it; but his daughter, Polly Dag- gett, and her two friends, Parnel Manter and Maria Allen, decided to. destroy the pole rather than let it be made a spar on a British ship. To his fury the captain was obliged to sail away without his prize.

In 1778 Tisbury was ravaged by Major-General Grey in a raid described by a contemporary: 'They caryed off and Destroyed all the corn and Roots two miles around Homses Hole Harbour; Dug up the Ground everywhere to search for goods the people hid, even so Curious were they in searching as to Disturb the ashes of the Dead. Many houses were all Riffled and their Windows were all broke.' Grey departed September 14, having been in the harbor only four days; he had destroyed one brig and cargo, one schooner and cargo, four vessels with several boats, 23 whaleboats, and two saltworks, and he took with him 388 stands of guns, 1000 pounds sterling, 300 oxen, and 10,000 sheep. This left the people greatly impoverished, and, during the severe cold of the following winter, they would have suffered for food had not a northeast blizzard driven a school of sea bass into Lagoon Pond. People from every part of the island cut tons of frozen fish out of the ice, which saved many of them from starvation.

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'Bum-boating' was early established in Tisbury. A bum-boat was to the coasting vessel what the pack-peddler was to the country housewife. To the sailor, the boat might be called a 'floating dittybox,' where he could find every blessed thing he wanted.

A fire in 1883 ravaged an area of 40 acres, destroying many historic houses filled with family treasures.

The HISTORICAL BUILDING (L), on Main St., owned by the Sea Coast Defense Chapter of the D.A.R., contains many interesting relics of the early settlers.

Left from Vineyard Haven on Huzzelton's Head, a bold bluff, stands (L) the Haunted House (boarded up). Here during the Revolution lived Daggett, a Tory, who was often visited by British officers. Two of them came one day to bid him good-bye after having seized a Falmouth pilot to take them over the shoals to Nantucket. Friends of the captured pilot, learning of the visit, crossed to the island in whaleboats, surrounded the house, and took the officers prisoner; on their return to Falmouth, they were in an excellent position to dicker for the return of their friend, the pilot.

Branching right from Main St., Harbor Rd. passes the Marine Hospital (L) and leads back to OAK BLUFFS, 48 m.

Sec. c. MARTHA'S VINEYARD to NANTUCKET, 15 m.

Leaving Martha's Vineyard, the vessel follows a southeast course through Nantucket Sound and enters the great bay made by the north shore of Nantucket Island and its small sister islands.

NANTUCKET (Island) is named from the Indian Nanticut, meaning 'The Far Away Land.' The island is approximately 14 miles long and has an average width of three and a half miles. Nantucket is an ex- perience. The steamer rounds Brant Point Light and comes suddenly on 'the little gray town in the sea,' a town today full of visitors all summer long; its cobbled lanes and bypaths are bright with summer frocks, polo shirts and white ducks, striped shorts and gay 'bras'; its beaches are covered with brown throngs and dots of color; yet the little gray town has not lost its sense of the past, the days when it was the great whaling port of the world and only simple folk in homespun or oilskins trod its crooked paths from house and warehouse, cooper shops and rigger shops to the quays and back again. The old cobblestoned streets, the comfortable homes and well-kept estates, the open moors swept by the salt breezes of the ocean, the stately trees still entitle the island to its Indian name Canopache ('The Place of Peace').

Nantucket was included in the royal grant to the Plymouth Company in 1621. In 1641 the island was purchased by Thomas Mayhew, who in 1659 sold nine tenths of it to nine other people. Because of the Puri- tan severity in Amesbury and Salisbury, people from those towns, accompanied by Peter Folger of Martha's Vineyard, emigrated to Nan- tucket in June, 1661. From 1660 to 1692, when it was ceded to Mas- sachusetts, the island belonged to the Province of New York.

Farming, fishing, and sheep-raising provided the settlers with a liveli-

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hood, but the farms were soon exhausted and the people turned to whaling. In 1768 the town possessed 125 whaling ships, and the whale oil was exported directly to England in Nantucket vessels. The town, the pioneer in whaling, was eventually displaced by New Bedford with which it shares honors in Herman Melville's 'Moby Dick.'

During the Revolution, caught between the British warships and Con- tinental privateers, the people suffered severely. Over 1600 men were lost, and very few ships survived the blockade. The fleet was gradually rebuilt, and Nantucket again became a thriving port; in 1779 the town was raided by eight British vessels, with staggering property damage.

Between 1797 and 1812 shipbuilding and nail and wool manufacturing developed. In the War of 1812, II Nantucket vessels were captured by the British. By 1830 Nantucket rated third among the commercial towns of Massachusetts in spite of the fact that the whaling fleet had by 1812 dwindled to 40 ships.

Sec. d. NANTUCKET - SIASCONSET - NANTUCKET, 17 m.

NANTUCKET, 0.1 m. (town, alt. 12, pop. 3495, sett. 1641, incorp. 1687), also takes its name from the Indian Nanticut.

At the head of Steamboat Wharf, the docking point, stands (L) the Art Gallery (open), where the works of the many famous summer colonists are exhibited.

Straight ahead on Broad St.

The Whaling Museum (open weekdays, 9.30-5.30, Sun. 2-6; adm. 25¢) is an old brick structure built in 1847, for use as a sperm-candle factory. It now contains many relics of the whaling era.

R. from Broad St. on Center St .; L. from Center St. on West Chester St. On Sunset Hill (R) is the Oldest House (open 9.30-5.30; adm. 25¢), also known as the Jethro Coffin House. Built in 1686, it is a two-story frame structure of compact proportions with shingled walls. On the face of its massive central chimney is a raised brickwork ornament, horseshoe in shape, to discourage witches from entering.

L. from West Chester St. on New Lane; R. from New Lane on Madaket Rd. A Drinking Fountain here bears a tablet honoring Abiah Folger Franklin, Benjamin Franklin's mother, born in a house near-by.

Retrace Madaket Rd .; R. from Madaket Rd. on Saratoga St .; L. from Saratoga St. on Vestal St.

The Maria Mitchell House (1790) (open weekdays, 10-12 and 2-5; adm. 25g), I Vestal St., is the birthplace (1818) of the famous astronomer and discoverer of the comet named in her honor. The long wooden latch on the front door is made from a bit of mahogany from a wrecked ship. In the rear is a small Observatory, and across the street is a scientific library with Mitchell relics.

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R. from Vestal St. on New Dollar Lane; L. from New Dollar Lane on Prospect St.

The Old Mill (open 11.30-5.30; adm. 25g), built in 1746, stands con- spicuously on a hill. The great spar and wheel stretch out behind, and are so fixed that the arms of the mill can revolve only when the wind is due west. The corn meal ground here is in great demand. In the days of the whalers, homecoming vessels were first sighted from this hill, and the families of men at sea spent many anxious hours scanning the horizon for approaching sails.

L. from Prospect St. on South Mill St .; R. from South Mill St. on Lyons St .; L. from Lyons St. on Fair St.

The Friends' Meeting House (open), corner of Moore's Lane (L), built 1838, has the Quaker simplicity of hard benches, bare floors, and can- dles on the walls. Adjoining is the Nantucket Historical Society Building (open in summer 9-5; adm. 25¢).

R. from Fair St. on Main St.

At the head of Straight Wharf (1723) is the Rotch Market (1772), two red-brick buildings that were originally the warehouses of William Rotch, but later the Pacific Club, a rendezvous of the old whaling cap- tains.

Retrace Fair St. to Main St .; L. from Main St. on Orange St.

SIASCONSET ('Sconset), 8 m. (alt. 18), is the Newport of Nantucket. Its greatest charm lies in its grassy lanes and low, picturesque cottages hemmed in with little white fences and gay with bright-hued flower gardens. Many of them have the blue shutters that, tradition says, were reserved by unwritten law in the past for the houses of captains and first mates.

Just left of the bus-stand, near the bluffs, is a sign pointing out over the ocean: 'To Spain and Portugal, 3000 miles.' The nearer waters below are dotted with fishing smacks bobbing up and down in quest of shimmering cargo; in the distance the great black hulls of merchantmen and the sharp prows of ocean liners plow through the furrows of the open sea.

Left from 'Sconset a walk of about 1.5 m. along the cliffs leads to Sankaty Head Light, built 1850. A climb of 75 steps to the walk of the light is rewarded by a view of the neighboring moors and the ocean.

East of 'Sconset, a road runs through POLPIS. It leads through un- dulating moors with enchanting vistas of the harbor and of small ponds. Altar Rock (alt. 102), one of Saul's Hills, is the highest point of land on the island, and provides a grand panorama of moor and blinding- white beaches, framed by the blue-gray rim of the ocean.

TOUR 15 : From VERMONT LINE (Guilford) to CON- NECTICUT LINE (Thompsonville), 55 m., US 5.

Via Bernardston, Greenfield, Deerfield, Whately, Hatfield, Northampton, Holyoke, West Springfield, Springfield, and Longmeadow.

B. & M. R.R. services area from Springfield north; N.Y., N.H. & H. and B. & M. R.R.'s service southern area.

Road is hard-surfaced throughout.

US 5 passes through the Connecticut Valley connecting important cities along the river. North of Deerfield is rolling country, with mountain ranges visible in the distance; south of Deerfield, US 5, closely paralleling the Connecticut River, travels through flat country rimmed by the foot- hills of the Berkshires (R) and the central highlands (L).

US 5 crosses the Vermont State Line 10 m. south of Brattleboro, Vt.

At 0.6 m. is the junction with an unnumbered road.

Right 4.5 m. on this road, which parallels Shattuck Brook, is LEYDEN (town, alt. 940, pop, 253, sett. 1738, incorp. 1784), named for Leyden, Holland, where the Pilgrims sought refuge for a time.

Although exceedingly hilly, this area contains much excellent farmland and is especially suited to dairying. Stone quarried in the town was used for the bridge across the Connecticut River, but lack of transportation facilities limits quarrying as a source of income.

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Massachusetts : a guide to its places and people, Part 63

Author: Publication date: 1937 Publisher: Boston : Houghton Mifflin Company Number of Pages: 802

Author:
Publication date: 1937
Publisher: Boston : Houghton Mifflin Company
Number of Pages: 802