USA > Massachusetts > Suffolk County > Winthrop > The history of Winthrop, Massachusetts ; 1630-1952 > Part 2
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Just as the settlers exterminated the turkeys, so they were profligate with other game. Deer very soon became scarce; bear were nearly exterminated, save in the depths of the Maine woods. Probably the greatest waste of all was in wild birds.
The passenger pigeons are a classic example. Today, not one is known to be alive anywhere. When the settlers came, reports Wood, there were "millions and millions." Indeed many later writers in other parts of the country where hunter's guns were just beginning to roar, reported that the earth was literally shadowed as by a cloud when a flock of pigeons passed overhead. Other writers speak of vast areas of the forest which were
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swarming with the birds to such an extent that the ground was soiled inches deep for hundreds of acres while the noise of the birds was that "of a rushing river tumbling over a rapids". It is even reported that the birds, who were certainly gregarious, nestled so closely together and in such numbers, that their com- bined weight stripped giant oaks and maples of their larger boughs. These pigeons were shot, netted and trapped and so squandered that within a few years, as civilization moved west- ward, they were literally wiped out of existence.
The importance of wild fowl as a source of food was made evident in 1632, just two years after settlement, when the Gen- eral Court ordered, "That noe person whosoever shall shoote att fowle upon Pullin Point (Winthrop) or Noddles Island (East Boston), but said places shall be preserved for Jobe Perkins to take fowle with netts."
No one in New England at least, now practices the ancient art of fowling but it is one of the oldest of arts, being described in the Middle Ages as an "ancient and honorable mystery." Boys were apprenticed to master fowlers and thus learned the pro- fession. Primarily it consists of taking birds alive by means of nets, snares and various devices such as bird-lime-which last consisted of smearing the branches where birds roosted in num- bers at night with a sticky paste which held them fast until morning when the fowler picked them off like fruit from a laden apple bough.
Certainly few fowlers ever had a more luxuriant oppor- tunity than Jobe Perkins at Pullin Pointe and Noddles Island. The section then was heavily wooded, the beaches were numerous and there were the great unspoiled salt marshes-ideal attrac- tions for many kinds of birds. What is now Belle Isle Inlet- what is left of it-was then a much deeper tidal estuary winding between the salt marsh grasses. Although no description of Per- kins' work remains, it is to be imagined that he built a frame work of light saplings for several hundred yards along and over the creek. This frame work was wide at the open end and nar- rowed down to a very small diameter at the farther end. Perkins and his aides would wait until there was a considerable flock of birds, say at about where the present Winthrop-East Boston bridge is now and then, in row-boats, drive the birds into the net and force them deeper and deeper into its constrictive diameter until, at the end, they could pick up the birds by hand-taking them alive to Boston market.
What happened to Perkins' concession, how much he paid for it and similar questions cannot be answered, but certainly Winthrop's first fowler had unlimited stock.
Back in those days, before the wasteful habits of the settlers
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could make any serious depletion of wild life noticeable, the marsh and forests teemed with birds. Winthrop, its woods, fields and beaches, was a nursery for multitudes of birds. Indeed, on the ledges and sands of the outer beach, the great auk, now extinct, and such other birds as the gannet, shag, cormorant, puffin and many kinds of gulls and terns, not to mention many more lesser birds were at home. The wildness of the Winthrop beaches and rocks can be attested by the fact that they were also home to such animals as walrus and various types of seals. It was a hunter's paradise indeed.
Here too were seen in considerable numbers the white swan, the sand hill crane, the heron, the brant, snow geese, Canada geese and such ducks as mallards, canvas backs, eider, teals, widgeons, sheldrakes and many others. Most of these commonly bred in Winthrop then, although of course the great breeding grounds then as now, were to the north. Yet each Spring and Fall, during the migrations, the sky was filled with clouds of these birds and Winthrop's marshes often sheltered countless thousands of them at night.
It must have been a magnificent sight then, to go out in the early morning, or late in the twilight, to see and hear the geese and duck in their hosts. How they must have deafened the ear with their clamorous calling and the beating of their wings must have sounded like constantly rolling thunder. Morton reported in 1642, "I have often had a thousand (geese) at the end of my gun."
Plover and the smaller birds, such as sandpipers and the like, were so numerous and so small as to be hardly fair game. Yet they, with the passenger pigeons previously mentioned, were often taken and used in making pies-which was a sort of mas- sive dish consisting of several pounds of bird flesh baked be- tween thick layers of biscuit-like crust in a lordly dish. This was a hearty meal and may be relished today, in a dwarfed and pale copy, in our modern chicken pie.
These smaller birds were very easy to kill, although many hunters regretted wasting "their shotte upon such small fowles." Morton reports ". .. sanderlings are easier to come by ; because I must go but a step or two for them. I have killed between foure and five dozen at a shoote, which would load me downe." There were larger plover, known then, and the names are still heard amongst old timers, as "humilities" and "simplicities." Says Wood again, "Such is the simplicitie of these smaller birds that one may drive them on a heape, like so mannie sheep, and seeing a fitte time, shoote them. The living, seeing the dead, settle themselves in the same place againe. I myself, have killed twelve score (240) att two shotts."
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Of course birds were far from being the most important source of wild food. Deer was probably the great food staple. When the Puritans came the woods of Winthrop were teeming with the gentle animals as the name Deer Island attests, but the animals were very soon exterminated and from then on, the only deer that came into Winthrop were refugees from the still un- spoiled forests of what are now Saugus, North Revere and Mal- den. Soon these forests were emptied also and that was the end of deer in our section.
The moose was commonly seen in Winthrop too, in the early days, but this huge creature, larger than a horse, very soon van- ished at the end of the settler's guns. There were elk and caribou also, in very limited numbers probably, and they did not long satisfy the settlers' hunger for meat because they are creatures of the wilderness-even more so than the moose. Of the four animals the deer alone has managed to survive in numbers in New England. Indeed, it is said that there are more deer in New England today than there were when the settlers came. The reason is, of course, that the deer is comparatively small, very agile, and has managed to adapt himself to feeding on the fringes of the farm. Any hunter will tell you that deer in open, that is farming country, are much larger than the forest deer, as for instance in the depths of the Maine woods.
There were many small animals in Winthrop at the begin- ning and these managed to survive longer than did the bigger creatures. Such were rabbits, squirrels and racoons. The first was used for meat after the deer vanished, the racoon was ex- terminated for its fur but the squirrel remained and still remains because he is of no value for either fur or food. Of course in Winthrop today, with practically every inch occupied by houses, there is no possibility of any wild animal, save mice and rats and squirrels existing. What is left of the marshes, and the outer beach still provides resting places for migrating water fowl but the glory of wild life that once made Winthrop noted has vanished.
Fish took the place of game as a source of food as the larger wild animals were destroyed. And for many years, Winthrop was a splendid place for fish and for sea-food; it was not until contemporary times that the pollution of the harbor ended this.
A mere catalog of the fish that have been and still are caught off Winthrop shores, though seldom now in the harbor, exemplifies this sea-given wealth of the town: bluefish, bream, catfish, cod, dogfish, eels, hake, flounders, haddock, herring, mackerel, mackerel shark (one typical of several small species), perch, pollock, porgy, sculpin, shrimp, skate, smelt, tuna, tautog and many more. As for shellfish, oysters once abounded; they
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soon vanished. For many years, these have remained: clams, crabs, lobsters, quahogs, scallops, sea clams and many more less edible species. Of small interest now but formerly valuable for oil, were such as whales, porpoises and blackfish.
A catalog of wild animals of Winthrop, made by the late George McNeil, includes such as: bats, chipmunks, field mice, fox, gray squirrel, red squirrel, mink, moles, muskrat, rabbit, rat, skunk, weasel, woodchuck-plus of course the old deer, moose, elk and caribou. As for snakes Winthrop now has a very few harmless ones, such as blacksnakes, green snakes, garter snakes and possibly a few more but in the beginning, Winthrop had various slightly poisonous adders, such as the striped adder and the house adder while, sad to say, the virulent rattlesnake was once a nuisance, although scarcely a peril. The poisonous snakes were quickly killed and none have been reliably reported for the past century.
Geologically, Winthrop is part of the general New England region which is one of the oldest, that is unchanged, portions of the earth's crust. Geologically, the basis of Winthrop runs back many millions of years, being part of the Appalachians, the mountains which are the mere stumps of what were once lordly peaks five miles high or more. Specifically, the New England Acadian Section, is Pre-cambrian and elder Paleozoic in charac- ter. Many ages ago, the rocks were crushed and folded like paper in a mountain building process. Up through the shattered rock then poured rivers of igneous rock which, however, seldom broke through the then existing surface. These "domes" or intrusions cooled in place and, when subsequently uncovered by erosion and glacial action, comprise the present day granite so characteristic of much of New England.
Since the mountain building, there have followed uncounted years and ages of erosion of various types. At least a mile-thick layer of surface has been removed in the process, much more of course from the higher elevations. Thus the original snow- capped mountains were ground off and washed away to mere hills, or even obliterated. Much of New England became a flat- tish peneplain-known as the Cretaceous peneplain for its being formed in that period. Much of New England during the time was sunk beneath the ocean.
Next followed another period of stress and strain and New England was crumpled upward again. Volcanoes erupted, lava flowed and, when the motion ceased, most of New England was lifted bodily perhaps 2,000 feet with the worn away mountains once more respectably high. Oddly enough this uplift was not equal but was highest in what is now Vermont and lowest in
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what is now the Cape Cod area. Thus all New England was tilted from northwest to southeast.
Once again followed another long period of erosion. Rivers carved themselves new valleys and, along shore, the ocean pounded rock to sand and built great beaches. This period was that of the Tertiary and the resulting peneplain is known by that name. It came to an end with a very slight upheaval which served to elevate the north west and broaden the lower reaches near the Ocean. Perhaps, as a very general statement, the shore line then was an average of 100 miles farther to the east. It was a remarkable shore line, especially along the southeastern Massachusetts coast. Several now placid rivers, like the Charles, tore great canyons in the rock near the ocean, making gorges as great as those of the present Grand Canyon of the Colorado. These gorges still remain-under the ocean.
It was during this period that the sea alternately invaded the shore and then retreated, over swings of thousands of years. The present period is one in which the ocean is sweeping in and this has given us the characteristic drowned valley type of coast. Rivers have been shortened and the salt water has entered into their valleys making tidal estuaries. As the land subsided, high- spots on ridges would remain above water, making numerous islands, often connected one with another and with the mainland by a higher ridge, thus forming peninsulas.
Of course much of this outlined geological history is neces- sarily obscure since nearly all of its features have been ob- literated by glaciation. It is to glaciers that Winthrop owes its form and character.
This planet of ours has experienced several "ice ages," per- haps seven, so far. When the world went into one of these cold periods, sheets of ice, sometimes a mile in thickness, would creep down out of the north and in their coming-as well as in their de- parture, when the climate warmed again-they profoundly changed the face of things.
The last glacier, which created Winthrop and its vicinity, came during the Pleistocene age and receded from here some- thing like 25,000 years ago. This great ice sheet, which appar- ently originated in the Laurentian region to the north and north- west, moved slowly, very slowly, in a northwest-southeast direction.
It overwhelmed everything in its path. Tops of mountains were sheared off, loose rock, soil and sand picked up and carried along-as snow from the edge of a plow. The mass of rock at its forefront acted like the cutting blade of a titanic bulldozer and cut off the topsoil and the hills and pushed the mass ahead of itself.
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Even more, the ice changed the shape of the mountain masses it could not level. As it climbed up the northwest side of the hills, the cutting edge created a long smooth slope. At the top, the final several hundred or thousand feet was sheared away. Then, as the ice sheet tumbled down the southeast side of the mountains, it fell so easily that the side remained steep. Indeed, if the southeast angle is projected upwards, and a similar angle projected from the base on the northwest side, it is demonstrated that the point where the lines intersect indicate the original height of the mountains. What are now a thousand or two feet high, were once mountains four and five thousand feet high. New England was once as lordly mountainous as Switzerland- long ago. The Alps are very young as mountains go. Eventually they too will be worn to stumps but by then New England may grow a new crop of snow-covered peaks.
Finally when, after many years, the ice edge reached about as far as present New York City, the climate turned warmer. The ice halted and then began to retreat; which is to say, the ice melted away.
No living being can image the terrific confusion the ice left behind as inch by inch it retreated back into Canada. Streams of water gushed across and out from under the ice in massive torrents. This was the tool, these vast masses of swiftly rushing water, which carved New England into what is, more or less, its present face. You see, as the ice halted, it left at a standstill the masses of rock and sand, clay and loam, which it had carried along as it moved south. This it promptly deposited, forming what is known as the terminal moraine at its southeasterly edge and its lateral moraine at its easterly edge. According to some geologists, this terminal moraine formed Cape Cod and Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket-for example.
The melted ice rushing through and over these moraines shaped them into outwash plains, kames and eskers. In places the ice water washed the moraine completely away; in others it shaped the mass into domes and hills with valleys between. Just as the wind after a snow storm drifts the soft snow into weird shapes in an hour, so through many years the water shaped the moraines into various forms. Of course, the process thus begun has continued ever since for wind, rain, frost and sun constantly erode the face of the earth-tearing it down and preparing for another age of mountain building, perhaps a million years from now, perhaps tonight. New England is staid and quiet geo- logically now; but it may erupt into fire and flame at any mo- ment as the rock beneath our feet awakens once again. The hills may seem eternal but to the geologist, a thousand years is but the tick of the second hand on a clock.
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So far as Winthrop is concerned, when the ice sheet re- treated from here, it created all our hills. These are a very peculiar type of formation-for, while most hills are at least in part masses of rock, our hills are made up of sand, pebbles, small boulders and clay-"unconsolidated till" is the technical name, meaning loose soil.
These hills are known as drumlins. They were not forgotten by the retreat of the glacier at the end of the ice age but were made during the ice age itself when, as the climate fluctuated, the glacier's edge alternately advanced and retreated over short distances-perhaps a few hundred feet rather than several hun- dred miles as in the general advance and final retreat.
Take a piece of bread, a small piece, and roll it lightly back and forth on the table. The bread will form a sort of thick and pointed cigar. That is how drumlins were made. The glacier rolled back and forth beneath its edge great heaps of debris and thus what now resembles half footballs resulted.
Winthrop's hills are all drumlins, so are the hills of Revere, East Boston and Chelsea. So are many of the Islands in the har- bor-what is left of them. Specifically, Deer Island, Great Brewster, Long Island and the now vanished Apple and Gover- nor's Island were all drumlins. So is Point Shirley, Great Head and the four hills at the Highlands with a smaller group or pair of the drumlins making up the Center and Court Park sections.
Of course, time and the ocean have not dealt kindly with the drumlins. Being soft as compared with rock, they have been greatly eroded. An example of erosion has been the cut of High- way C 1 through the western end of the drumlin which is Orient Heights. This cut was originally wide enough only to keep the sides in permanent shape but rain washed away the soil until the road below was badly mudded over on the east side. Not until the bare soil was sodded over was this erosion stopped.
As the ice went away, the bare drumlins, until grass covered them and checked wind and rain erosion, washed down filling the space between the hills. Thus the salt marsh between Winthrop and Beachmont and between Winthrop and East Boston and Re- vere was brought into being. Drainage of tidal waters formed Belle Isle Inlet and its "tributaries." Indeed, until the marshes were recently choked with debris from the airport and the pumping of mud to form the oil farm and Suffolk Downs, the marshes were in miniature a complete river basin, save that the current alternately flowed in and out. Then the marshes open to the sea were closed away by the formation of what is known as barrier beaches and the placid marsh was allowed to build itself up to high water level, by means of silting with humus formed by the annual decay of the marsh grasses and weeds. A cross sec-
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tion of these marshes gives a complete description of the geology of the past 25,000 years or so for the different layers of silt, sand, blue clay down to the bed rock far below to a geologist are as complete a history as if it had been written and published by man.
Probably the greatest agent which affected the drumlins was the ocean. The waves, especially during storms, battered them and ate mercilessly away at their substance. Orient Heights, protected by its marshes, is a good illustration of a drumlin which has not been much damaged by erosion. Only man has corroded its majesty. Great Head is a good example of a drumlin of which the ocean has destroyed about half of its length. Cherry Island bar, off Beachmont, is an example of a drumlin which has been completely leveled by the waves. Of course, Apple Island and Governors Island are examples of drum- lins leveled by man-the Airport consumed their substance.
As the ocean chewed away at exposed drumlins, the water carried away the sand and clay and the smaller pebbles while the larger boulders dropped down and were actually built into a sort of breakwater which gave some measure of protection against the waves. Of course, it was not adequate protection and hence in modern times we have been compelled to build sea walls along the shore front from Revere Beach, past Beachmont, around the Highlands and right down to Point Shirley. The damage winter northeasters sometimes do to even these modern sea walls, shows that we have reined back, not entirely halted the ocean. How- ever, if the walls had not been built, it is altogether likely that Beachmont Hill, the Highlands and Point Shirley would all have been washed away-as indeed they may be yet, unless we keep the sea walls in constant repair.
These rocks formed reefs which alter tidal and storm cur- rents so that the sand and small pebbles washed out are deposited along between the drumlins. Thus our beaches came into being, composed of the ruins of the drumlins between the reefs-as be- tween the end of Beachmont and the Highlands, between the Highlands and Great Head and between Great Head and Point Shirley. As breakwaters and sea walls are built, the currents are altered still further. Thus in some places the beaches are being lowered and in others built higher. For example, the beach along the Crest, between the Highlands and Cottage Hill, has been notably elevated in the past few years since the breakwater was built off shore. Probably, within a few more years, what was the area of water between the shore and the breakwater will be filled in and Winthrop Beach will be that much wider. This for-
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mation of reefs and beaches is a continued process. Every storm makes changes; and every change has its consequences. Un- doubtedly we can keep the present area of Winthrop, and per- haps even persuade the ocean to enlarge it rather than wear the shore line away. However, it must be remembered that this will only be so if constant vigilance is maintained and the walls and breakwaters kept in repair.
These drumlins, when the Puritans arrived must have been very attractive, especially to sea-weary eyes. The hills stood up out of the levels of the salt marsh, not bare and shabby as we know them now, but clothed in heavy forests, probably of white pine, oak, birch and maple. This forest cover gave the soil protection against erosion and thus the hills had accumulated through the many centuries a rich and fertile humus. The sub- soil, being of unconsolidated till, was "tight" and thus the food elements put into the soil by the forest did not leach away-as it does in sandy and loose soils. The Indians, of course, had cleared little areas here and there by fire for their corn but they were not farmers. They much preferred to live by hunting and fishing and hence while they did plant corn, beans and pumpkins, they did not "farm" in the sense that large, cleared areas were utilized.
The scene is so different now, with buildings, many of them not designed to be attractive, covering all the drumlins, with roads cutting through the hills, with ugly skeletons of electric wire poles strung everywhere-and with every forest tree cut down long since, that we descendants of the Puritans cannot realize how the town and its neighborhood did look 330 years ago. Mellen Chamberlain in his History of Chelsea visualized the aspect of his town by writing: "While the bold bluffs of Win- nisimmet were untouched by the leveling hand of man, and the great hills of the main, toward the north, and the lesser heights to the east, south and west, stood at their original elevations, and covered with primitive forests, the situation must have been one of scarcely paralleled beauty and interest."
Channing Howard, Winthrop engineer for many years, has written the following description of our town: "Here was bold bluff and sandy beach along the outer shore against which lapped the never still waters of the open sea, and the broad expanse of salt meadows and placid winding creeks in the distance, and the hills of varying height in our own territory, and the higher hills to the north . . . Bordering us by the south and west lay splendid waterways for future commerce ... all kinds of landscape which the heart could wish, either for the eye of beauty or for the most
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