by Edward G. Stanley-Brown

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' Sconset Memories

by Edward G. Stanley-Brown

I FIRST CAME TO NANTUCKET in 1923, the year of my birth. Since that time I have only missed one summer which I spent in Korea, courtesy of the United States Army.

Charles Augustus Oliver, M.D., my grandfather, was an eye surgeon and Chief of Surgery at the Will's Eye Hospital in Philadelphia. There, in 1885, he removed cataracts from a man's eyes. The two operations successfully completed, the patient announced that he had no money with which to pay my grandfather. The patient owned two lots of land on the North Bluff of 'Sconset on the island of Nantucket which he offered as payment for the surgery. My grandfather is reputed to have said that he had "never heard of the damned place but, if that was all he was going to get, he'd take it".

In the spring of 1886 he journeyed to Nantucket, inspected the property and immediately decided it would be a grand location for a summer home. He deposited $1,500.00 in the Pacific National Bank and commissioned a local ship's carpenter to build him a summer cottage. The result, "Sunnycliffe", no longer in our family since 1980, stands today exactly half way between Sankaty Lighthouse and the 'Sconset Post Office. Built from the timbers of a barn from Wauwinet, "Sunnycliffe" boasts four double bedrooms, three single bedrooms, two dining rooms, three chimneys, a wood house, bath house and a garage. Douglas and Barbara Seholm with their six children own the house today and I am grateful that they love the old home as much as I did growing up there.

As a child with my grandmother, 25 pieces of luggage, a dog and always a bird in a cage, we boarded the steamer Commonwealth or the Priscilla of the old Fall River Line at Pier 14 on the North River (the Hudson River). Leaving New York was an exciting occasion with bands playing, flags waving, flowers, bon voyage parties, popping of champagne corks for the grown-ups and unnumbered porters to convey your luggage. My grandmother had a veritable suite with sitting room, bedroom and private bath. One entire wall of the sitting room was taken up with her luggage stacked from floor to ceiling.

My grandmother, who was an unyielding lady, to be polite, had both her dinner and breakfast, the following morning, served in her sitting room. She declined to take a table in the public dining room with its polished brass, burnished wood railings and attentive black waiters

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HISTORIC NANTUCKET

whose snow white hair betrayed their years. Pristine white linen, crystal and hotel silver plate laid an elegant table. For a very few dollars we feasted on an incredible shore dinner with a generous bucket of steamed clams, warm clam juice and melted butter therein to dip, rich white New England Quahog Chowder, live boiled lobster with lemon butter, steamed corn on the cob, green salad, rolls and butter and for dessert, vanilla ice cream with hot fudge sauce.

Dinner over, I was sent to bed as I was considered too young to be exposed to "Horse Racing". This was a throw of the dice game with uniformed bus boys moving wooden "ponies" up and down a felt track. As bets were made and money exchanged it was deemed unfit for the young. All of this was entirely legal as it took place outside the two mile Continental Limit.

Early the following morning the dinner bell summoned us to an incredible breakfast with orange or grapefruit juice, hot and cold cereal, eggs, any style, with bacon, sausage, scrapple; breakfast steaks, broiled tomatoes, mushrooms and every variety of potatoes one could name. Vast pots of coffee, tea and hot chocolate accompanied this repast along with every possible selection of bran, blueberry, cranberry or corn muffins as well as pop-overs, toast and biscuits. An absolutely fantastic meal which satiated every one far into the afternoon.

Docking in New Bedford we traversed the wooden dock. My grandmother stopped at least twice to count her 25 pieces of luggage, the dog and the bird. We boarded the steamer to Nantucket on the other side of the dock. Her course was New Bedford to Woods Hole then to Oak B lu f f s a n d f in al l y t o Na n t u c k et. W e p a sse d t he L i gh t sh ip C r o s s R i p and everyone threw current newspapers and magazines overboard. The men on the Lightship fished these out of the ocean with long wooden poles and set them out to dry on the rails, decks and rigging. In those days Coast Guardsmen were assigned to lightships for months at a time and it was on these lightships the original "Nantucket" lightship baskets were woven. The only item stolen from "Sunnycliffe", our 'Sconset house during my youth, was an original nested set of lightship baskets that went from one that was large enough to hold only a single egg up through 12 baskets to the largest which measured 21% inches in diameter.

As the boat rounded Brant Point she blew her steam whistle three times. It was well to take note of the wind direction and thereby avoid a shower of red-hot droplets of water.

As one came off the gangplank you passed between a row of porters or bell hops who sang out one after another: "Roberts House, Sea Cliff,

'SCONSET MEMORIES 11

Sea Cliff Inn, The Breakers, Gordon Folger, Wauwinet House, Tom Nevers Hotel" and so on, to garner their arriving guests. On the Island at last we walked up Broad Street to Centre to The Roberts House, where we stayed the several days required to open "Sunnycliffe".

The house was put to bed in the fall like a tomb. Mattresses were hung from ceiling hooks. All the furniture was piled in the center of each room and covered with dust sheets. Heavy wooden shutters were screwed in place over every window in the house (there are 57). In the spring all of this had to be dismantled, each room cleaned, everything in the linen closet washed by hand, dried and ironed. Every piece of china, glass and silver washed and polished. The cast iron stove in the kitchen was polished with stove black and started up, the fire to be banked each night. The kerosene engine that powered the pump drawing water from our well, had to be cleaned, oiled and primed and then run to fill the water tank on its tower.

When everything was ready and cleaned, the kitchen stocked with food, ice in the ice box, all beds made, we took a horse and carriage to 'Sconset and settled in. The trunks and luggage followed on a separate wagon.

Mr. Coffin delivered fresh milk every day and his vegetable wagon came by three times a week. Mr. Glidden's fish wagon came on Friday with all his wares on a huge tray of ice. Lobster was 25 cents a pound and required one day's advance notice. In August the blueberry pickers came by with their oversized pails and you simply took a kitchen colander to the back road and bought what you needed. Ice came in large blocks on a wagon with an awning. There was a cardboard dial in the back kitchen window which you adjusted with a black arrow to show how much ice you wanted, 10, 20, 50 pounds, the ice man sawed up your needs and brought it in with his tongs.

Meat and staple products came from Ashley's Market which stood on Main Street at the corner of Centre, where Congdon and Coleman's Insurance office is today. My grandmother took the horse and buggy to town once a week to do her marketing.

Sunday dinners in the middle of the day featured roast beef one Sunday, alternating with roasted chicken the next. Dessert was homemade ginger or fresh peach ice cream. Just before the dinner bell I cycled down to Mrs. Coffin's kitchen and dashed back with the silvery-tinged metal box in a great hurry so the ice cream wouldn't melt. My grandmother invariably invited the minister who had preached the Sunday Sermon at the 'Sconset Union Chapel. Each week I was asked about the sermon. I was only rarely able to describe it satisfactorily.

'SCONSET MEMORIES

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We walked to the lighthouse, played on the beach, made sand castles and learned to swim in the surf. At Wauwinet we paddled about on the harbor side and learned how to sail from Captain Whelden on the catboat Lillian, which sailed down harbor to town. We took all our meals at home, save for that glorious occasion: a clam bake!

A long deep trench was dug on the beach and a roaring wood fire started on the bottom. When this was hot enough it was covered with large rocks, and when they were hot enough they were covered with bushels of seaweed. The baking potatoes, corn, fish, chicken, clams and, of course, the lobsters, were arranged on the rocks, and covered with more seaweed, and then a heavy tarpaulin which in turn was covered with sand. When the "bake" was ready bowls of melted butter were handed out and the tarpaulin removed, resulting in an unbelievably tantalizing aroma. The trick at this point was not to fill up too much on clams, chicken, fish and potatoes. There were always guests who made this mistake and were then too full to eat their lobster. I almost always managed to get two lobsters in this fashion.

We took tennis lessons and played at the 'Sconset Casino just as children do today. When the subject was deemed suitable, we sat through a play or a movie at the Casino on those same miserable uncomfortable wooden chairs that must have been there time out of mind.

My grandmother had a locked leather bag marked U.S. Mail. I rode my bicycle down to the Post Office where the Post Master, who also had a key, filled the bag and relocked it. I was not to be trusted with a "parcel too large for Box". This had to be collected by a grownup.

I fished for pickerel in Gibbs Pond and when I was older George Rogers taught me salt water fishing. He instructed innumerable youngsters to surf cast as well as training us in sportsmanlike behavior and he cared not a whit whether we were summer people or islanders.

My grandmother was an energetic hostess and there were endless house guests until the time came to close the house for going home. The guest book, started in 1889, is filled with thank you notes, letters, signatures, poetry, hymns, sketches and even water colors contributed by the never ceasing succession of house guests. In her later years, blind, my grandmother took to sitting on the front porch and inviting tourists walking the Bluff Path to Sankaty Light to come up on the porch for a chat or a cup of tea.

There weren't too many houses on the North Bluff in those early years. Miss Wilmerding lived in the "Flagship" now owned by Marjorie and the late Nat Benchley. The Vaughans lived in what is now the

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HISTORIC NANTUCKET

Turrentine House and they had three stunningly beautiful daughters in the Dana Gibson style. At age 12 years I was secretly in love with all three of them.

The Morris sisters owned what is now the Cashman House and they were among the first in 'Sconset to have a motor car and a liveried chauffeur.

Next door lived the Mesdemoiselles Heubener and Reusch who tutored us in French, and had seemingly endless supplies of candy. They are buried side-by-side in the Huguenot Cemetery.

Next came Stanley Swift who was an avid golfer. He had a small black and white Boston Terrier who had learned to find and retrieve golf balls. Mr. Swift carried a large empty pail to the Sankaty Head Golf Club and while he played the dog dashed hither and yon collecting balls and soon filled the pail.

Further north lived the Watrous family. Raymond Watrous designed the yachts that raced for the America Cup. They served dried kelp to be sprinkled over your dinner. They assured me this was extremely healthful, but it tasted simply dreadful.

Nearer the Light came Professor Karl Landsteiner who greatly objected to people taking the Bluff Path across his property to the Lighthouse. Hoping to discourage this practice he positioned two water sprinklers in such a fashion that it was impossible to cross in front of his house without getting drenched. As children we called him Professor Water Snozzle. It was quite a shock in medical school to learn that he had been awarded the Nobel Prize in 1930 for having discovered the four blood types and the Rh factor in human blood.

In those days Sankaty Light ran on kerosene vapor. If you appeared at the appropriate moment the keeper would let you climb up with him and when the exact moment of dusk arrived you could ignite the flame. The original light with its prisms may be seen today in the Whaling Museum. The light flashed every 7.5 seconds even as it does today but there is no human being in attendance.

Just south of "Sunnycliffe" in my childhood stood the "Haunted House" built by Miss Bertha Galland, a star of the Broadway stage at the turn of the century. After she died the house was unoccupied for many years and stood shuttered and dark; truely a "Haunted House". Finally it was to be auctioned off for back taxes and a crew of cleaning people came over from Boston and worked for a week. The dust on the floors was so thick that your footprints showed clearly while curtains had rotted off their rods. The scene was right out of Charles Dickens'

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HISTORIC NANTUCKET

"Great Expectations." Selden Dickinson made his winning bid standing in the privet hedge which surrounds "Sunnycliffe". Since then the original house burned to the ground and has been replaced by a smaller version.

In the mid-thirties my grandmother died and the house passed on to my mother and her brother, Norris Oliver. This explains the sign "Oliver-Stanley-Brown" which was at the back of the house for many years. At that point servants vanished from the scene and we took our meals on a weekly basis at the Chanticleer. Today, this is surely one of the finest restaurants on the Island but then, run by the senior Wileys, it was a true family affair.

You had an assigned table and your own napkin ring, the napkin being changed every third day. You could foretell the menu by the day of the week, steak on Monday, lobsters on Friday and roast beef on Sunday. If you missed a meal you got a credit and could invite a guest. The only competition was Folger's Guest House on Broadway, next to "Auld Lang Syne". Both offered plain, wholesome American style cooking. Servings were gigantic and eminently satisfying.

'Sconset memories: Terns' eggs on the beach in June (careful where you step), roses in July, blueberries in August, beachplum jelly in September. Summertime ends, and back to the Roberts House for the 4 or 5 days it took to put the house to bed and finally the 6:00 a.m. boat for home.

Last summer, as the Nantucket rounded Brant Point, I watched a gentleman throw a penny into the harbor. I remarked that I wasn't sure that that was the best place as I had always thrown my penny at the last jetty. He said "Well, it's worked splendidly for me for the past 68 years." He said it gets harder to leave each year. Our eyes both filled up simultaneously and we looked away from each other in mutual embarrassment.

Not too many folks are left who know about throwing a penny - be it Brant Point or the jetties. Do it, it means you'll come back next year.

Edward G. Stanley-Brown, known to all on Nantucket as "Ted", is now a doctor. He lives in Ridgewood, New Jersey, and spends his summers in Tom Nevers Head.