Historic Nantucket
Looking U p Straight Wharf in 1962
January 1987 Published Quarterly by Nantucket Historical Association Nantucket, Massachusetts
NANTUCKET HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION OFFICERS President: H. Flint Ranney Vice President: Robert D. Congdon Vice President: Mrs. Bracebridge Young Secretary: Mrs. Walker Groetzinger Treasurer: Donald E. Terry Honorary Vice Presidents Walter Beinecke, Jr. Albert Brock Albert F. Egan, Jr Alcon Chadwick Mrs. Bernard Grossman Mrs. R. Arthur Orleans Presidents Emeritus George W. Jones Edouard A. Stackpole Leroy H. True
Edward B. Anderson Mrs. Kenneth Baird Mrs. John A. Baldwin Mrs. Dwight Beman Mrs. James Chase Mrs. H. Crowell Freeman
Max N. Berry Patricia A. Butler Charles Carpenter
COUNCIL MEMBERS John Gilbert Mrs. Hamilton Heard, Jr. Mrs. John G. W. Husted Reginald Levine Robert F. Mooney Mrs. Carl M. Mueller Philip C. Murray
Mrs. Alan Newhouse Francis W. Pease Mrs. Judith Powers Charles F. Sayle, Sr. Mrs. Jane D. Woodruff Robert A. Young
ADVISORY BOARD Mrs. Charles Carpenter Stuart P. Feld William A. Hance Andrew J. Leddy, Jr.
Mrs. Thonas Loring William B. Macomber Nancy A. Martin
STAFF John N. Welch, Administrator Victoria Taylor Hawkins Bruce A. Courson Curator of Collections Curator of Museums & Interpretation Jacqueline Kolle Haring Edouard A. Stackpole Historian Curator of Research Materials Louise R. Hussey Leroy H. True Librarian Manager, Whaling Museum Elizabeth Tyrer Wilson B. Fantom Executive Secretary Plant Manager Peter S. MacGlashan Elizabeth Little Registrar Curator of Prehistoric Artifacts Kathrine L. Walker Gayl Michael Asst. Curator of Research Materials Ass t. Curator of Collections Thomas W. Dickson Merchandise Manager Miller: Richard P. Swain Docents: Kay Allen, Kathleen Barcus, Suzanne Beaupre, Marjorie Burgess, Alcon Chadwick, Tamar Chizewer, Marjorie Corey, Roscoe Corey, Margaret Crowell, Anita Dougan, Everett Finlay, Barbara Johnston, Maureen Murdock, Elsie Niles, Alfred Orpin, Gerald Ryder, Dorothy Strong, Mary Witt Historic Nantucket Edouard A. Stackpole, Editor Merle T. Orleans, Assistant Editor
Historic Nantucket Published Quarterly and devoted to the preservation of Nantucket's antiquity, its famed heritage and its illustrious past as a whaling port.
Volume 34
January, 1987
No. 3
CONTENTS Nantucket Historical Association Officers and Staff
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Editorial: A World-Wide Anniversary Wireless at Nantucket in 1901 and 1909
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Austin Strong By Helen Wilson Sherman
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Bequests/Address Changes
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Nantucket Whale Oil and Street Lighting by Edouard A. Stackpole
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A Reminiscence of Maria Mitchell Edired by Emilia P. Belserene
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Thoughts of Nantucket from 58,000 Feet by J.E. Lacouture
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Historic Nantucket (USPS 246-160) is published quarterly at Nantucket, Massachusetts by the Nantucket Historical Association. It is sent to Association members and extra copies may be purchased for $3.00 each. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to: Nantucket Historical Association, P.O. Box 1016, Nantucket, MA 02554. c. N.H.A. 1986 (USSN 0439-2248). Membership dues are: Individual $15., Family $25., Supporting $50., Contributing $100., Sponsor $250., Patron $500., Life Benefactor $2,500. Second-class postage paid at Nantucket, Massachusetts. Communications pertaining to the Publication should be addressed to the Editor, Historic Nantucket, Nantucket Historical Association, Nantucket, Massachusetts 02554.
First Commercial Wireless Station established in August, 1901 at the east end of Nantucket in the village of 'Sconset.
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A World-Wide Anniversary - Wireless At Nantucket in 1901 and 1909 ON JANUARY 16,1901, there flashed through the air from the ocean liner Lucania a message picked up by the South Shoals Lightship No. 66 and relayed to the station at 'Sconset. It was a miraculous event, and the wireless transmission was sent by telegraph from the U.S. Weather Bureau station in the Pacific Club to the New York Herald in New York - a simple statement from the captain of the vessel bound from Europe to this country. But the incident aroused the world. It was news brought over the air waves to a nationally known newspaper, which had scooped its rivals by thirty-six hours. The New York Herald had received permission from the Government to install a wireless station at 'Sconset, as well as one on the South Shoals lightship, some 40 miles at sea. Communication between these two sta tions had begun on August 12, and on the 16th Captain McKay of the Lucania had sent his famous message: "All well on board. We are 237 miles from Sandy Hook - expect to reach New York harbor Saturday." The significance of this message-made possible by Signor Marconi, who had established the 'Sconset station-revolutionized the history of com munications throughout the world. The second event which startled the world had to do with the second wireless station at 'Sconset, only a mile away from the original site. It was a different kind of message-a call for help from the White Star liner Republic—struck amidships by the liner Florida, only a few miles from the South Shoals Lightship. The distress call was picked up by the 'Sconset station and immediately relayed to the mainland stations and help was soon enroute to the scene. It was on January 23,1909, and the wireless operator on the Republic, named Jack Binns, became famous, while the 'Sconset operators, principally Jack Irwin, received little recognition. It was a bitter-cold night and Irwin, dozing in his chair by the stove was alerted by the distress call "C. Q. D." He immediately got in touch with ships nearest the scene, then contacted the mainland revenue cut ter stations on the mainland. The result was the ultimate rescue of the Republic's passengers, and marked the first use of wireless to save lives at sea. The United States Congress during the following year passed the law which made the use of wireless on liners crossing the Atlantic mandatory. But even before this event, the first wireless distress call came from the lightship No. 58, which on December 10,1905, sent out the call HELP, and her crew were rescued by the cutter Azalea, on South Shoals.
AUSTIN STRONG Playwright, Author, Actor, Friend
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Austin Strong by Helen Wilson Sherman
AUSTIN STRONG WAS AN extraordinary man who brought Nantucket into the twentieth century. When new people flow into the scene without knowing its history, from the 1920's, and ask, "Who is Austin Strong?" it is time to set down what he did for this island. He came from a glamorous and illustrious life which began as Robert Louis Stevenson's step-grandson, and evolved into a playwright, author, raconteur, as a man of letters with fame at his back, when he made Nan tucket his stage set and created a new elegance here which celebrated (and still does) Nantucket greatness as a whaling port, before the stockmarket crash. This dapper blue-eyed man, with smooth and shiny black hair and pink and white complexion, clean shaven, with heavy black eyebrows in his round face, had great style and charm. All of his delight in life was in spired by Stevenson. He loved pirates and Spanish galleons (influenc ed by Treasure Island). The old deviltry on the high seas, and buried treasure became artistic imaginings in which he dreamed of himself as THE CAPTAIN OF THE SHIP. In fact he acted it out on Nantucket, which became his buried treasure. He first knew Nantucket when he married my father's sister, Mary Holbrook Wilson, and the couple visited the great house on the Cliff Road, south of the Sea Cliff Inn that my grandfather Ellery H. Wilson rented for the summer. It was around 1910. The island bespoke so strongly of the sea, in the romance of his dreams he knew that he had found with joy the place to create them and bring enchantment to the visiting population who had already bought houses here and came for the sum mer. He wanted to elevate the Nantucketer with a sense of its heritage for what was heavily asleep to their inheritance of silent heroism. He bought the 1731 house at 5 Quince Street after spying it from a horse and carriage, in a delapitated state of run down decrepitude. While my aunt sat in the carriage, Austin knocked on the door and asked the bushywhiskered unwashed, lanky man if the house could be bought. The man scratched his head and said he allowed it could. Uncle asked to see the attic and bounded up the stairs, took a look at the full-length empty room under the eaves and fell in love. The deal was made. (I remember the former owner whose last name escapes me. I used to see him in hip boots wading the shallows at the corner of Easy St. and Old North Wharf, spearing garbage into a hemp bag. His first name was Frank, a Nan tucket neer-do-well, symptom of island loss of purpose.) The attic became Austin Strong's study and studio where he wrote plays and stories, designed tiny stage sets and plotted the two great Nan-
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tucket Hospital Fetes in which I partook as a girl. I was privileged to be in my uncle's tow (he had no children of his own) and was taught the REAL things and the REAL people among the natives, who taught me many lessons in my childhood. I may not be a native Nantucketer but surely am a spiritual daughter who can thank such great local souls as Capt. B. Whitford Joy, Ralph Dunham, Herb Coffin, Nelson Ewer and Johnny Cross (both of them whaling men), Albert Chase (who let us play in his great barn on the edge of town. His wife fed us milk and cookies.) Albert Johnsen Sr., and Chester Barrett (when my brothers and I got up at 4 a.m. and went out on the "Petrel" to watch them bring in dory-loads of fish at the weirs off Great Point) and many more carpenters, painters, boat-captains and gardeners with whom we came in childhood contact. Austin Strong loved these people, whom he celebrated in the memorable "Nantucket Follies" of 1929 at the Yacht Club. He put Roger Dunham and his newstand on stage and had well known summer peo ple and natives come to buy the Sunday paper. He had short, jolly redfaced and fat "Babe" the American Express delivery man come in car rying a trunk. It brought down the house. He also honored Walter Chase, whitehaired and whiskered, who won the Congressional Medal of Honor for saving the crew of a stranded sail ing ship in a gale off Great Point, by launchng a lifeboat in wild seas with his crew, and rowing out to the wreck. Capt. Chase was dressed in hip boots as he was at the time of the incident, and posed like a noble statue, carrying a coiled rope, the medal on his breast. As the audience silently took in the nobility of this giant of a man, a pin could have been heard if dropped, then one and all stood up and cheered and clapped with tears running down their faces for a Nantucket hero. Another memorable scene was the deck of a whaling ship with Cap tain B. Whitford Joy, last ship's master to round the Horn from Nan tucket, standing near the steering wheel as captain of the ship while old time whaling men and boatmen from Old North Wharf, dressed as sailors, sang wonderful sea chanties that I have remembered all my life; one being "0 the stormy winds they may blow-ow-ow". Austin Strong commandeered the Yacht Club children and young men to handle changes of the stage sets, and young girls to dance, so it was a truly ecumenical production between Nantucketers and summer peo ple. Programs of the Follies are a collectible, today. This was during those days when doors were never locked, the nuclear age did not exist and no hint of war or disaster loomed to make people fearful. A wonderful trust and innocence made Nantucket marvelous
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as a playground for children, and my uncle became a Pied Piper to us. Large batches of children came down with parents who bought caver nous lean-to houses and stayed from June to whenever schools opened on the mainland. They turned down family memberships at the Yacht Club when the Gilbreths with eleven, the Ellery Wilsons with seven and the Albert Reads with five, came of age to sail in small boats. Austin Strong took this avalanche of eager little ones in tow when he became the Yacht Club Commodore. But prior to this, Austin Strong felt that the Yacht Club and the Steam boat Wharf needed redesigning, to fit the new wealth of the twenties. So he revamped the Yacht Club and its floats and designed a new steam boat wharf, which has recently been replaced. The Commodore was a member of the New York Yacht Club, the most prestigious in the country and as he made friends with the very rich yacht owners, he lured them to Nantucket. Some yachts were so big, like Julius Fleishman's giant "Camargo", clipper-bowed and black, and the three master square-sailed ship "Sea Cloud" belonging to Marjorie Post, had to anchor outside in the Chord of the Bay. J.P. Morgan's super giant yacht also came here, Henry Ford's yacht and the "Nourmahal" of Vincent Astor. It was great fun as a child sailor to go out and in vestigate these plutocrats of the sea, and stare at the uniformed crew and officers, and admire the elegant varnished launches they had, which ladies in long skirts could board from macramed, canvassed and var nished gangways. They never brought these ships to the wharf. Uncle invented the "Officer of the Day" at the Yacht Club of volunteer male members, who wore yachting hats, navy blazers with gold but tons, white flannels, shoes and shirts and black ties, who went out on the bright blue open launch driven by Byron Coffin in uniform, to visit incoming yachts, giving them an engraved card inviting them to use the Yacht Club facilities. Once when my father went out with Byron to a snaky fast and dirty yacht in the rum-running era, the owner thought he was being raided, and laughed in relief when he recognized Dad. He showed him dozens of crates of booze hidden in the hold. A polished brass cannon was mounted under the flagpole on the Yacht Club lawn, the gun is still shot off at 8 a.m. and at sunset. Style had come to Nantucket Harbor while the commercial wharves still unloaded coal, oil and wood from schooners like the Alice Wentworth and the Coral, and yachts had to get fuel, ice and water from the Island Service Co. along with the fishing fleet. Gradually the commercial harbor has given way to a massive yachting center, on this side of the Nuclear Bomb, World War II and Vietnam. The Commodore improved the yacht racing fleet by introducing the
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Indians, Vineyard Sound Interclubs and the Baby Rainbows for the children. He began a small class of youngsters aged two to twelve at the float in front of his Boathouse on Old North Wharf, of which I was the girl member. He'd put us each (alone) in a ten foot dinghy with a leg-o-mutton sail, named the YUYU, and pushed us off into what seem ed to be the Pacific Ocean between his megaphone directions and the Skipper (then the retired schooner Allen Gurney) across the basin. The story is told that Mrs. Harold Chatfield was eating lunch on the Skipper when friends pointed to "the darling curly-haired child in the sailboat" headed toward them. Mrs. Chatfield screamed. It was her son Henry, later to become an ocean sailor and boat designer. He was a genius around boats, even at the age of ten. All of us who were taught by the Commodore (who washed our faces with a huge spongeful of salt water if we made a booboo) became sailors, if not as a business, as an avocation in our older years. Gifford Warner, Leeds Mitchell Jr., my brother Pete Wilson, and John Walling (who cap tained a U.S. submarine in WW II and was lost with his ship when it was sunk by a Japanese submarine in the Pacific). I married a cruis ing man and spent many summers at the tiller of our Concordia Yawl "Marinette" sailing to the far reaches of Maine. We all can thank "Un cle Austin" for teaching us sailing and the rules of the sea. Giffie Warner has run a sightseeing ferry out of Essex, Conn, for years. Uncle used to say that Giffie would never win races because he spent more timp looking over the stern at his wake that he did observing the art of sail ing fast against errant winds and tides. The Commodore's sympathy for young children goes back to his own boyhood when Robert Louis Stevenson decided he needed an education which was not available in Samoa, and so sent him to California. I think it wasSan Franscisco. The little boy who had been a prince to the native Samoan children at Vailimi did not know how to play with children like himself and grew very lonely. One day a Catholic priest found him sit ting dejectedly on a curbstone and asked him why he looked so sad. Austin looked into the sympathetic face, burst into tears and told his story of where he had come from and that he had no friends. The father invited him to join a Catholic boys' group that he ran and there, Austin Strong found friendship and comfort. When he returned to Vailimi dur ing vacation, sailing across the Pacific on a square-rigged passenger vessel, he told Stevenson that he wanted to be a Catholic. Stevenson ar ranged for the boy to be confirmed by the Bishop of the Pacific Islands. As he grew up he developed his own profound spiritual life and the church faded out of the picture. At the end of his life he and my aunt became communicants at St. Bartholomew's Episcopalian church in New York City. But my story is to show how impressions of love and kindness to a lonely child made him sensitive to all childhood loneliness and his in ner drive was to put light into our worlds with his love. He used to call
AUSTIN STRONG me "The Lone Eagle": the lone one who is not lonely and as the eagle does, surveys the universe. I cried tears when the voice from the Moon matter-of-factly said "The Eagle has Landed". The lone space ship ac complished the impossible. Thus did this godfather of mine give me iden tity for my own lonely flights into self-discovery. During World War II Austin Strong organized a series of patrols to see that orders for "brownouts" and "blackouts" were carried out, when even cigarettes had to be snubbed out, when German subs were in the vicinity. The island became pitch black in the night. He organized Vic tory Gardens on public land where townspeople could raise their own vegetables. (Before Bartlett's!) Nationally he lectured for the govern ment from New York to Texas on the seeing eye dogs for soldiers blind ed in battle. In World War I, he published a set of pocketsized books of plays for soldiers in France to put on behind the lines for amusement and relaxation. He was ever concerned for the souls needing feeding with fun and laughter. In Nantucket during World War II he organized the "Winter Club" when radio was the only contact with the world. This brought writers, artists, dramatists and philosophers for evenings of talk discussing new books. Dr. Will Gardner, Edgar Jenney and Edouard Stackpole were in the group whom I remember. The Strongs were influential with Everett U. Crosby and others to divert the town away from paving Main Street with tarmac, so preser ving the cobblestones. Quaint but painful to walk on with soft shoes. You need skiis. The most historic Nantucket Fetes were produced by Austin Strong's vivid imagination who saw Upper Main St. from the Pacific Bank to the Monument as a stage in which to involve as many summer people and natives as possible; boatmen from the waterfront, retired whaling men, Yacht Club members and business men to don costumes of the Quaker days, taking part in a procession celebrating the return of a ship after years at sea. Uncle was the captain dressed in top hat and dove grey elegance with a Chinese "wife" on his arm, followed by a group of ship's officers, then sailors towing a long cart carrying a Surfside Life Boat filled with ship's sailors carrying the oars aloft, with a few hoop-skirted maidens riding with them (Mary Sarg was one) and my young brothers Lewis and Peter Wilson rode as cabin boys. They marched up to the Hadwen-Satler House where the Captain's Nantucket "wife" awaited him around a tea table with ladies in silks and satins. (The Chinese wife was a gift to the Nantucket wife for a servant.) In every doorway along the route sat or stood ladies in bonnets and hoop skirts, girls in pantalettes, watching the pass. I danced a Virginia
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Reel with a group on Phebe Beadle's lawn. Meanwhile, a two-wheeled cart drove at the end of the marchers carrying several severely dress ed Quaker ladies, driven by a man in black with a top hat, going to sheepshearing as if nothing else was going on. The second memorable Fete was held on Easy Street and Old North Wharf, also organized by my uncle. Governer Allen came over on the original "Naushon". The basin was filled with sailboats, their sails haul ed at moorings, and flags and banners flew from every available pole and mast. George Grant, another "last" whaling man, climbed to the crosstrees of Uncle's flagpole beside his boathouse, and posed as a sailor pointing to whalespouts as he once did at sea, dressed in jeans, blue shirt and red and white neckerchiefs, barefoot, crying out "Ah-Blows!" as he pointed to the east. It was put on a postcard. That flagpole later had to come down. It was fifty feet high, and was Uncle's pride and joy, but proved unsafe in heavy winds. He used to fly giant American flags from it. The Inquirer & Mirror printed a "Souvenir issue" of the "Hospital Fete, 1929 for Saturday, August 17" which is filled with photographs of Easy Street and Old North Wharf, where every shanty and boathouse had things for sale, food for sale (the best little neck clams I ever ate were opened by Red Haddon and Herb Coffin) and Tony Sarg did peo ple's caricatures in the doorway of "The Annex". It shows pictures of Governor Allen and Miss Winslow, a delightful elderly lady, and a wideangle view of the whole basin with the sailboats, the original Skipper, and a windmill replica that was raffled off and ended up in Dionis. I am lucky to have a copy of this "Souvenir Number" supplement of the I & M. It was as if with all of this great celebration of Nantucket both in her whaling past and her twenties present, set in motion future imagina tions for island development in promoting her as a glamorous summer place where history added cultural background in a real way. Unfor tunately for today, having suffered the depression and WW II and Viet nam and the H bomb, those wondrous times are not lived here any more and Nantucket's heydeys have become something we try to preserve - and does not add anything of today's culture and history, because there doesn't seem to be any. But Austin Strong had much to do in building up a faded island for it to continue to trade on as the twentieth century approaches. He created the Wharf Rat Club on Old North Wharf when waterfront men and town merchants used to gather around Herb Coffin's pot-bellied stove and spit bucket to chew the fat and settle town problems - at least in theory. Perry & Coffin's was a marine clothing store for fishermen and all the waterfront and Nantucket Sound fishing news circulated there
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in the old days. When the Commodore of the Yacht Club bowed to the Commodore of the Wharf Rats (Herb Coffin) due to the motto NO RESERVED SEATS FOR THE MIGHTY, which my uncle created himself, a new era of blending summer people, politicians and VIPs in to a wonderfully warm combination of give and take, was instigated in 1926, and nationally famous persons have Wharf Rat Flags designed by Tony Sarg flying from every sort of yacht, battleship and Arctic ex plorer. Franklin Delano Roosevelt came down in his schooner Amberjack and became a member. The Wharf Rat Club has been pictured and described in the National Geographic Magazine. Meanwhile, with the rise of his three-storied Boathouse on this wharf in 1923, a new elegance appeared there which has evolved over the years until all the fishing shanties but one is now a summer rental and the commercial era of Old North Wharf has died. Robert Gambee's photographic essays on Nantucket have called the regal line of its Boathouses, "Nantucket's Venice", and the view from Easy Street of the water side of the buildings on pilings have been photographed and painted a hundred times over. So one can readily see that a "Seeing Eye" from a creative and dramatic imagination by a man of letters with no idea of making money, out of his love for Nantucket, staged the dawn of its new era, in the twen ties as a time of beauty, trust and honesty and style, which evolved into too many people wanting it. Its history from Austin Strong's initiative is being spoiled by too much money which has disturbed the island's economy. It is not the fault of my uncle's joy and sensitivity of the REAL Nantucket. The evolution of what he and many others started (I think of Everett U. Crosby and his study of 99% Perfect early American ar chitecture of old Nantucket dwellings) is sliding out of their focus, and no Nantucketer today can make any local new history or culture, unhampered. It is survival of the unselfish real, unselfconscious art that is in jeopardy. As the theme of this essay has been on one man's great influence in awakening Nantucket to itself from his gifts of imagination and ap preciation, this does not cover Austin Strong's success as a playwright in New York and London. His stage play "Seventh Heaven" became the first motion picture to receive an award, 1927 (the Photoplay Medal) before the advent of the Oscars and became famous through Charles Farrell and Janet Gaynor. He wrote wonderful plays like "Little Father of the Wilderness" and "Drums of Oude" and "Three Wise Fools". He was a great Mime, besides. But he made Nantucket his greatest stage set, leaving the results for others to develop.
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HISTORIC NANTUCKET For further reading: "This Life I've Loved" by Isobelle Field (his mother) 1937, Longmans & Green, New York "The Violent Friend" by Margaret Mackay, 1968, Doubleday & Co., NYC Austin Strong's personal album donated to the Nan tucket Historical Society by Helen Wilson Sherman "A Photographic Journey to Nantucket in 1911" by Helen Wilson Sherman, Poet's Corner Press, Nan tucket, 1973.
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Nantucket Whale Oil and Street Lighting by Edouard A. Stackpole
THE NAME OF NANTUCKET is synonymous with American Whaling. From the 17th century, when this tiny Island in the Atlantic Ocean, off the southeastern coast of Massachusetts, inaugurated a brand new Col onial industry called whaling in "the deep", until the end of its busy enterprise in 1870, Nantucket whaling men became the pioneers in ex ploring and finding new areas for whales in the great oceans of the world. Because of the influence of the Society of Friends in its life on land and at sea, these whalemen were called by Melville "Quakers with a vengeance." During the 18th century the whaleships lighted the lamps of the world of both the new and the old. The true impact of the whaling industry on the habits and customs of the town and city life of its time has not ever been fully evaluated. It must be remembered that before the introduction of the whale oil lamp, the means of lighting homes and buildings was governed by the meagre illumination allowed by fish oil, torches and tallow dip candles. With the coming of a better light through the whale oil lamp, the lengthening period of study and recreation created greater opportunities for the advancement of learning and social gatherings. As an example of cultural advancement, the dim medieval theatre was succeeded by the first theatres with stage lights, footlights and other advancements in the art of stage craft, using whale oil and candles. The eighteenth century saw a new era in lighting history. In contrast with the crude fish and vegetable oil lamps, the rush lights, link tor ches and tallow dips, and the first (right) whale lamps, came spermaceti oil from that aristocrat of whales, the sperm. The improvement in lamps and the introduction of sperm candle brought a great demand for sperm oil, and Nantucketers were the great specialists in marketing this superior oil. Quite aside from home consumption there soon came a de mand of Nantucket whale oil for street lighting. For years the great cities of Europe remained unlighted. London was a prime example. Save for the watchman's lanthorn as he made the rounds, and the link-boys bear ing their torches for the individual traveller or sedan-chair, the streets were as tombs, dark and rambling, with refuse and garbage underfoot and robbers at pitch-black corners in wait for travellers of hours unattended. When, in 1709, the first lights made their appearance in London, they were few and placed at points too far apart to be effective. Then, in 1745, came the reforms in civic government, when the elder Pitt secured passage of a bill which would give more street lights for the metropolis heart of the British Empire. As an immediate result, the demand for whale-oil increased one hun dred fold. The addition of more street lights resulted in the decrease in crime. It has always been an axiom that crime does not thrive in the
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light, whether in illumination from lamps or from an enlightened society. Great cities like London and Paris recognized there important facts ear ly, and made provisions for better lighting. Most of the great cities of Europe soon adopted a system of street lighting which increased the demand for whale oil. The cities of Ham burg, Copenhagen, Kronstadt, Berlin, Vienna, Budapest, Rome, Ant werp, Amsterdam, Paris, Madrid, Lisbon, Marseilles, Bordeaux on the Continent, and London, Liverpool, Portsmouth, Hull, Dublin and Edin burgh in the British Isles constituted a tremendous market for the industry. By far the aristocrat of lighting in the home was the sperm candle which came from that aristocrat of whales, the spermaceti. From the head-oil- or the almost pure spermaceti oil taken from a great reser voir in the whale's head called the "case" came the "head matter", a wax-like substance which, when processed, was made the sperm can dle. This candle burned with a pure white flame, giving forth no smoke and no odor. Here, indeed, was the very essence of candle-making, a peerless taper which graced the rooms and tables of the rich, the cultured and the governing classes of its time. Even today this candle is considered without rival in its performance. Street Lighting In Nantucket It is interesting to note that Nantucket, as a community, was not call ed a village, as were most New England habitations in Colonial days. It was always a town from the beginnings, when the first house-lots were laid out along the shores of the Great Harbor. These were called the Wesco Acre Lots, and as the town grew the Fish Lots and the Monomoy Acre Lots were added. The dwellings, shops, lofts and warehouses were built close to each other, with the waterfront and the wharves the more closely congested. Houses from the old settlement to the west were mov ed into the new town of Sherborn as the town grew in size. During the night, people walking the streets and byways carried either a candle lanthorn or an oil-lighted one. Early in the history of the old town, a watchman made the rounds, with the number augmented as the population increased, and the houses gradually spread throughout the confines of the house-lot divisions. With the development of the whal ing industry the closely-knit town also grew. However, the introduction of street lights was comparatively slower. Whale oil was too valuable a commodity to be "wasted" by burning it at night for lighting the streets for the citizens. However, in 1826, the town began the practice of furnishing oil for street lamps which certain individual citizens erected along the streets. Apparently this custom was not universally agreed upon by the voters who, at a town meeting in November, 1826, decided to postpone the con tinuance of such action. A number of years later (1848) tne firewards requested citizens place lighted lamps within front windows at night time
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HISTORIC NANTUCKET
when a fire occurred in the neighborhood. It must be remembered that London in 1730, as the chief market place for Nantucket whale oil, had no more than 700 street lights in the entire limits of this city - the greatest in Europe. In 1736 a system of street lighting was introduced in London known as "parish lamps," and paid for by a tax collected. The practice grew; it was a great way to curb the crimes that were taking place in that city's streets. By 1780 some 15,000 street lamps were being tended by the lamp-lighters. It was London's boast that there were more street lamps along Oxford Row than in the entire city of Paris! The street lamps were placed at regular intervals, and were now enclosed by glass. Whale oil was the illuminant, and a cotton twist was the wick. Sperm oil was used in private homes. With the demand for oil by the London market, it was natural for the thrifty Nantucketers to curtail any extravagance in bringing regular street lights to the town. Private enterprise, on the other hand, led to the first "out-door" lamps, which were placed by the door posts of the dwellings of certain wealthy citizens. It is probable that Liberty, India, Orange and Union Streets were the first to boast these lamps by door ways of the ship-owners and whaling merchants. The style of light was similar to those found in London. It will be remembered that Boston and Philadelphia were the first American cities to adopt the London methods. John Hancock, in 1772, was the promoter of street lighting in Boston, proposing a globe of glass. Three hundred were imported from London. It was Benjamin Franklin, who earlier had proposed a triangular glass cover for the street lamps in Philadelphia, demonstrating that the lanthorn, if completely closed, would cause smoke and soot and obscure the light. The tallow candle was undoubtedly first used by the Nantucket families, with mutton and hog fat for the ingredients. When visiting at night the lantern guided the way along the footpaths, and then, in the town, along the streets. When whale oil came into use, the lanterns were improved, and the tinsmith was employed for lamp-making as well as for lanterns. Some of the early lantern types had horn instead of glass, which served the owners well through the years. In September, 1748, the town voted to establish the night watch from 8 o'clock in the evening until the "break of day". As the watchmen car ried lanterns, we are now aware of the official night use of whale oil for lighting. It is highly probable that individuals hung lights in front of their homes when expecting visitors at night, but just what type used must have been a personal choice. Hogarth, in London, drew sketches of street lights, showing tin sections as well as glass. It is probable that no regular street lighting in Nantucket was ever adopted until the advent of the first decade of the 19th century. The records of the town are singularly free of any references to such a use, but it is logical to recognize that some means of providing lights along the thoroughfares must have been in existence. It is also likely that the commercial connections with other sea ports brought about the adop tion of posts of a standard size for this use. Individual house owners pro-
NANTUCKET WHALE OIL
19
vided street lamps at their dwellings well into the 19th century. In voyages to London the Nantucketers reported the advances made in street lighting in that great metropolis. The first use of manufactured gas for lighting was introduced in London, with American cities follow ing this example. In Nantucket gas was manufactured for the first time in 1854, and the stores on Main Street began installing gas fixtures soon after. The iron standards for street lights were next to be introduced. This cast iron post had a cross-arm under the lamp holder, so that the attendant took care of the glass-enclosed burner. On the 22nd of November, 1854, the Main Street Square was lighted with gas for the first time. The average iron standard was 20 ft. high, and the design was usual ly a fluted column, tapered with acanthus leaves and a cross arm under the lantern. In 1967, the late Errol Coffin, a well known architect who retired to live in Nantucket, made an interesting study of street lighting posts and bracketed gas lanterns, and included a number of drawings for his important essay. His article was published in Historic Nantucket. Ben Franklin's Experiment EXTRACT FROM A LETTER TO JOHN PRINGLE FROM BENJAMIN FRANKLIN John Pringle, Philadelphia, Dec. 1,1762 Sir, - During our passage to Madeira, the weather being warm, and the cabin windows constantly open for the benefit of the air, the candles at night flared and run very much, which was an inconvenience. At Madeira we got oil to burn, and with a common glass tumbler or beaker, slung in wire, and suspended to the ceiling of the cabin, and a little wire hoop for the wick, furnish'd with corks to float on the oil, I made an Italian lamp, that gave us very good light all over the table.. The glass at bottom contained water to about one-third of its height; another third was taken up with oil; the rest was left empty that the sides of the glass might protect the flame from the wind. There is nothing remarkable in all this; but what follows is particular. At supper, looking on the lamp, I remarked that tho' the surface of the oil was perfectly tranquil, and duly preserved its position and distance with regard to the brim of the glass, the water under the oil was in great commotion, rising and fall ing in irregular waves, which continued during the whole evening. The lamp was kept burning as a watch-light all night, till the oil was spent, and the water only remain'd. In the morning I observed, that though the motion of the ship continued the same, the water was now quiet, and its surface was tranquil as that of the oil had been the evening before. At night again, when oil was put upon it, the water resum'd its irregular motions, rising in high waves almost to the surface of the oil, but without disturbing the smooth level of the surface. And this was repeated every day during the voyage. I am, etc. B. Franklin. (H.G. Hubbard)
20
A Reminiscence of Maria Mitchell edited by Emilia Pisani Belserene, Director Maria Mitchell Observatory ONE OF THE scrapbooks in the Maria Mitchell Library contains a long letter about Maria Mitchell, written shortly after her death1. The writer was Graceanna Lewis, best known today for her extensive ac tivities on behalf of abolition. In her own time she was perhaps better known as a scientist and lecturer on natural history. Miss Mitchell has been called America's second woman scientist2. Miss Lewis deserves the place of third. What she had to say about her distinguished friend deserves attention because she was in a unique position to appreciate the special qualities and influence of this famous daughter of Nantucket. Media, Delaware Co. Penn, Aug. 18, 1889 Joseph Swain, Dear Cousin: In reply to thy note of the 15 inst. my first thought was that my memory was too full of material for a paper intended for one reading. Were I to be brief, I should have to omit details; and every thing, however slight, connected with the distinguished woman, thee queries after, is of interest. I first saw Maria Mitchell about the year 1874, at Vassar College, whither I had gone to deliver a course of three lectures, by the invitation of President Ray mond. I was there about a week I think, and saw her every day at the table. In addition to this, President Raymond gave a special dinner to which she was of course invited, and she gave a tea in her own apart ments at the Observatory. Maria Mitchell was Professor of Astronomy at Vassar and Director of the Observatory from 1865 to 1888. She came to this post at the age of 47 after having first won fame by her discovery of a comet with a small telescope on the roof of the Pacific Bank on Nantucket. She was not college-trained herself but had been introduced to astronomy by her self-taught father, William Mitchell, and had continued her education on her own while she was librarian at the Nantucket Atheneum. The letter continues: After my return, I wrote an article entitled "A Day with Maria Mitchell." I am sorry I have no copy of that ar ticle, or that if I have it is packed away in some place now inaccessible to me. As you must have seen photographs of her, I will not describe her personal ap-
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22
HISTORIC NANTUCKET pearance, but no photograph which I have met with, gives the cordial good will which seemed to emanate from her face, and beam on those around her. She was bright, winning, and full of conversation. At that period "Spelling Bees" had just been revived and I remember how she told with merriment of the mistakes she had made, and her willingness to give the young folks something to laugh at, in seeing her go down, and I also remember thinking that she could well afford any laugh at her expense. President Raymond also owned to not being able to spell every word in the Dictionary, and thought that he, or almost any one else, might be caught on some unusual word, when taken unawares. They both seemed to enjoy the fun of such mistakes, in themselves, and other highly educated persons. Prof. Mitchell invited me to visit in her own apart ments, and as I wished very much to have her opinions on some questions of study which had claimed my at tention, I was glad to go. She met me with the most cor dial simplicity - asked me to pardon her resting on the sofa, while she talked, as she had been up the night before making observations until two o'clock. When she had settled herself comfortably she said, "Now I want to know about your parents and brothers and sisters and your family and the circumstances which led you to be a naturalist." - thus seeking for a common bond of family affection in which we could meet at my own level, instead of hers. After I had given the desired in formation she told me that her love of astronomy was not derived from her father but was encouraged by her uncle.
This last sentence is partially crossed off but not so that it becomes hard to read. In the margin of the scrapbook, in which the letter is pasted, there appear the words "Mrs. Kendall thinks this a mistake as well as considerable which followed here about her work in the home for the family." Mrs. Kendall was Maria Mitchell's sister Phebe, first female member of the School Committee in Cambridge, Mass. She was extremely pro ud of her professor sister and we are indebted to her for preserving the journals and correspondence. She edited them, also, for publication.3 Unfortunately, however, she preserved only those parts she considered proper for the public to share.4 We can learn who wrote the marginal note with the help of a scrapbook of Phebe Kendall's own papers at the Maria Mitchell library. In it we recognize the handwiriting, Mrs. Ken-
A REMINISCENCE OF MARIA MITCHELL
23
dall's own. As to the uncle we must agree. Graceanna Lewis was simply mistaken. William Mitchell's children were all very close to his brother, Peleg, but nowhere is there indication that Peleg had any interest or expertise in science. Her mistake gets one to wondering, however. Just what was it that had she misunderstood? The Mitchells were related to the Folgers, and the famous Walter Folger, whose many interests included scien tific matters, was cousin to Maria and a member of her parents' genera tion. It is very tempting to assume that Maria had spoken of his influence on her development as a scientist.5 The next half-page of Graceanna Lewis' letter is crossed off much more thoroughly than the sentence about the uncle; it is almost obliterated, and it is clear that Mrs. Kendall's intention was that it not be read at all. Under high magnification, however, it is possible to make out these words: She was one of a large family of children and she and her sisters ed to do the washing for the family she remembered one morning when they finished a wash for 15 persons before nine o'clock in the morning that they might go to a lecture in the afternoon. I ask ed the priviledge of publishing this fact for the benefit of American girls rather ashamed of the knowledge of house cleaning, or indifferent to the want of knowledge. She freely gave me the liberty, and I like to make it known. I make no apology for going against Mrs. Kendall's wishes. Having decifered all but one word, I remain puzzled as to her purpose. There seems to be nothing too personal to share. Before reading the crossedoff section, I had expected it to contain complaints about having to do housework, complaints that would have been unacceptable in Mrs. Ken dall's time. Did she instead think that her sister would not have en couraged the knowledge of housecleaning? Among Maria's writings we find conflicting attitudes about housework. There is a journal entry dated Feb. 15,1853, quoted by Mrs. Kendall, which complains bitterly that girls must learn "all kinds of any woman's work, and the consequence is that life is passed in learning these only, while the universe of truth beyond remains unentered."6 In journal en tries for Oct. 21-23,1854, however, also quoted by her sister, she wrote with pride about the efficiency with which she had performed household chores in addition to her work at the Atheneum and some laborious astronomical computations that were occupying her attention. She ex pressed the opinion that servant girls had an easy time.7
24
HISTORIC NANTUCKET
I conclude that the story about the big wash was, like the sentence about the uncle, simply a mistake, at least in its implication that it was a usual occurrence for the Mitchell girls to do the washing. The daughters may have done more than just lend an occasional hand - Julia Ward Howe quotes Maria Mitchell as having described her childhood as "an endless washing of dishes"8 - but the family usually had the help of a servant. Another puzzle connected with this page of the letter is a notation, "see page 13," in the top margin, in what seems to be Graceanna Lewis' hand writing. But the letter ends in the middle of page 12. No page 13 is to be found in the scrapbook. Fortunately the rest of the letter is intact: This reminds me of an occasion when my dear friend, Prof. Rachael L. Bodley and myself met at the Academy of Nat. Sci. Philadelphia to attend a meeting together. I remembered afterward that our conversa tion before the meeting was not upon any scientific sub ject, but that we were both congratulating ourselves that we had excellent mothers who taught us to be good housekeepers. Maria Mitchell, like all the distinguish ed women I have known, was eminently practical, as well as profound, and truly womanly in every fibre of her being. Prof. Mitchell took me into the observatory and spoke of the necessity of making her observations without ar tificial warmth from the danger of the expansion of the instruments which might cause inaccuracy. If I remember rightly her telescope was uncovered,- open to the sky and she wished very much for improvements which would lessen her exposure to the cold. She remarked that she was sometimes afraid of paralysis from exposure alone. Whether she ever succeeded in getting the improvements she desired I do not know, but I presume that from her remarkable influence at the college, and the wealth of the institution that she did. At that period it seemed to require great physical courage to endure both the cold of winter, and the loss of sleep which her profession demanded, but she look ed like a remarkably vigorous, cheerful and healthful woman bodily and spiritually. Her furniture was plain and simple and there was a frank sincerity corresponding therewith which make
26
HISTORIC NANTUCKET me believe she chose to have it so. It looked natural for her. I think I should have been disappointed had I found her rooms fitted up with undue elegance. She was strong and looked as though made to wear herself, yet I was drawn irresistibly to her as one of the most motherly of women. I truly and deeply loved her. At another time she took me into the rooms her father used to occupy. It seemed to be a great comfort to her that she could have had him with her, and to have ministered to him before his departure. She was feel ing the loneliness of this loss, and from what she said, I could not help feeling that she had been equally good as a daughter and as an astronomer. The plain rooms, I could well understand, were hallowed to her because of his former presence.
William ended his days living with his daughter in the Observatory apartments at Vassar, where he enjoyed his role as a sort of honorary grandfather to the young women students. The daughter had also cared for her ill mother, giving up her work at the Atheneum when the mother required her constant presence. At the tea which I mentioned previously she was assisted by two of her young lady pupils, and there seemed to be a delightful spirit of comradeship between them. One of the young ladies had dressed a salad with small green cucumber pickles, and red cherries in a tasteful pattern. A plate of oranges served for dessert, and she herself toasted brown bread over the coals of the stove which warmed the room. It was one of the most informal and delightful teas which I can remember, and you can understand how much I ap preciated it from the fact that she usually took her meals at the college, but this was a special occasion. Prof. Raymond came in after tea and we had a very pleasant evening. It was easy to perceive the deference paid to Prof. Mitchell by Prof. Raymond and the other officers of the college. When I left Vassar for Boston she sent a most kind and encouraging letter of introduction to ladies whom she thought I ought to know, including Julia Ward Howe, Mrs. Livermore9 and their associates. I already knew and loved Lucy Stone and this letter from Maria Mit chell placed me at once in communication with the very best of Boston women.
REMINISCENCE OF MARIA MITCHELL
27
I next met Maria Mitchell as President of the "Association for the Advancement of Women" at the fourth meeting of that association in Philadelphia in 1876. She had previously asked me to prepare a paper on Science, and I took for my subject "The Development of the Animal Kingdom." She had this paper published in pamphlet form, and circulated widely amongst naturalists. She wrote me she was thankful to have anything so solid to mark the Congress of which she was president. Many years of advance make a wide dif ference in opinion and I would not write as I did then, but I do not know that I could improve on the under lying principles of development as set forth in that paper. At a later date, Prof. Mitchell wrote asking whether or not I would be willing to present myself as a candidate to the vacant chair of Natural History, knowing that I would not be elected. She said there was not the shadow of a chance for election, since no woman would be chosen for the most remunerative position in the college, to know how well one woman was prepared for it. I did make the application backed by any amount of first class testimonials. President Raymond wrote me a very handsome letter, saying the choice had nar rowed down to three of which I was one. It ended, of course, as Prof. Mitchell knew it would, but it showed her constant watchfulness to aid the cause of woman, (although it was a sacrifice to me). Graceanna Lewis' biographer, Deborah Warner, believes that the Vassar decision was not entirely sexist. The authorities may have been looking for strength in geology rather than in zoology and botany.10 Later she wrote to ask my age, saying that she believ ed that she and I were the two oldest educators amongst the women of the U.S. I sent her my age (born in 1821). She was a few years older - some two or three I think.11 Since then I do not recall any further correspondence with her. I have always felt a warm interest in her as a woman of commanding breadth and nobility of character, independent of her great reputation as an astronomer. There has been no special call for com munication between us, and I would not intrude on her studies unless there were, and unless she herself sought it. The good sense of ordinary persons ought to prevent them from using up the time and strength of the extraor dinary, but I was always deeply gratified for her kind interest in me, and my work, and I think I must have
28
HISTORIC NANTUCKET made her feel this as fully as I intended. At least I hope so. May she know it now! I suppose I need not inform thee that she was a relative of Lucretia Mott, and that many of her characteristics reminded me of that sweet, beautiful, brave and noble example of womankind. I should rather judge that Maria Mitchell was less harmoniously balanced, just as she was less beautiful in feature than her cousin, but for all that, she was strong grand and impressive as a woman, and she would have wielded an immense in fluence in any station in life. As an astronomer, and an educator at Vassar, it is simply impossible to estimate the power she possessed of building up character; or the difference she had made in the elevation of the lives of the women educated at the college*. I always felt that she was the center around which the rest revolved. What Vassar would be without her I can scarcely imagine. Very truly thy cousin, Graceanna Lewis * Maria Mitchell remarked that the earnestness of the Vassar girls almost frightened her.
We do not know why Joseph Swain had inquired about Maria Mitchell. His letter of inquiry to his cousin12 is not included among the extensive Graceanna Lewis papers at the Friends' Historical Library at Swarthmore College. Neither do we know how the answer that he received came to the Maria Mitchell Library. The Joseph Swain papers themselves are also housed at Swarthmore, the college of which Joseph was to become president in 1902. There was at one time the possibility of a connection between that college and Maria Mitchell. In 1872-1874 there was an exchange of letters among Mitchell and the presidents of Vassar and Swarthmore concerning the possibility that Mitchell might become a Visiting Professor at Swarthmore while retaining her posi tion at Vassar.13 The president of Vassar vetoed the idea, pointing out that his college had acquired "with a great sum" not only her "valuable services" but also "the prestige of her name." Whatever the reason for Joseph Swain's interest, we owe him our gratitude. It is because of his interest that we have this informative view of Maria Mitchell through the eyes of a contemporary woman scientist. It is a pleasure to thank Dr. Jane Stroup at the Maria Mitchell Library for access to the Memorabilia. To Barbara Welther I am indebted for her identification of Phebe Kendall's handwriting in the marginal note, and for showing me the possibilities of high magnification. I am grateful
29
HISTORIC NANTUCKET
also to the Friends Historical Library at Swarthmore College for genealogies of Graceanna Lewis and Joseph Swain, and for the search, albeit negative, for the request from Joseph Swain which prompted this informative letter. NOTES 1. Maria Mitchell Memorabilia Item 2, p. 323. A very few obvious slips of the pen have been corrected. 2. Margaret W. Rossiter, Women Scientists in America: Struggles and Strategies to 1940 (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1982), p. 27. 3. Phebe Mitchell Kendall, compiler. Maria Mitchell: Life, Letters, and Journals (Boston: Lee and Shepard, 1896). Now published by Ayer Publishing Co., Salem, N.H. 4. Helen Wright. Sweeper in the Sky (New York: Macmillan, 1950), p. 241. The present publisher is the Nantucket Maria Mitchell Association. 5. ibid. p. 27. 6. Kendall, op. cit. p. 25. 7. ibid. p. 16. 8. Julia Ward Howe, "Maria Mitchell" in Our Famous Women. (Hart ford: A.D. Worthington, 1884), p. 441. 9. Mary A. Livermore preceded Maria Mitchell as president of the American Association for the Advancement of Women. 10. Deborah Warner, Graceanna Lewis: Scientist and Humanitarian (Ci ty of Washington: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1979), p. 59. 11. Maria Mitchell's dates are Aug. 1, 1818 - June 28, 1889. 12. The relationship of Graceanna Lewis, 1821-1921, to Joseph Swain, 1857-1927, is that her father and his maternal grandmother were brother and sister. 13. Dorothy J. Keller, "Maria Mitchell, An Early Woman Academician," Doctoral dissertation, University of Rochester, 1974. Also, letter from Edw. H. Magill to Maria Mitchell, 12 Mo. 4,1872, Item 68, Maria Mit chell Memorabilia".
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Thoughts of Nantucket from 58,000 Feet by J. E. Lacouture
RECENTLY WE FLEW BACK from London to Washington on the Con corde - on reflection, a rather spectacular 3 3/4 hour trip. Since I had been a pilot for years it was only natural that during the trip I would wander up into the pilot's compartment. The entire nose of the Concorde which includes the pilot's compartment is made of a very durable plex iglass and affords a magnificent view in all directions. It just so happened that I arrived there as the Concorde at 58,000 feet, Mach 1.85 was passing just south of Nantucket. It was a crystal clear day and there lay Nantucket about the size of a twisted hankerchief with Cape Cod just to the north about the size of a person's arm bent at the elbow. The great point of Nantucket looked like a miniature copy of the lower Cape from Chatham to Provincetown. It was a breath taking and meaningful sight to me who had roots in both places. I returned to my seat to take my wife up to see the spectacular view and then spent the short time remaining on our flight thinking about Nantucket. Memories in later life take on a cherished patina as one reflects on things past. I can remember Nantucket when there were only comparatively few cars and even fewer airplanes, when the beaches were uncrowded and clean as was the water, when one could lay on the beaches without worrying about being run over by a jeep, when the moors were pristine and undotted by houses, where there were no hous ing developments such as Tristram's Landing, Tom Nevers, Dionis and Surfside to spoil the priceless open lands of old. All the changes mentioned above have brought Nantucket into the modern world so alien to the Nantucket of old. The pressures of popula tion growth and demand are irreversible changing one of the few rem nants of rural environmental splendor left along the East Coast of the United States. Again I paused to think of the unbridled growth of Nan tucket today with its traffic problems, the worries of adequate water supplies, power supplies, sewage disposal, etc. I thought of men like Beinecke and Larsen and institutions like the Nantucket Historical Trust and the Nantucket Conservation Foundation who have tried so hard to stem unbridled growth especially of the Coney Island kind and who have attempted to preserve the historic homes of Nantucket and some of Nan tucket's priceless open lands for generations of the future. I then mused abit on the future of Nantucket. At this time I could only feel sorry for my grandchildren and great grandchildren. I feel certain that man's scientific drive, economic cupidity and unwillingness to cor rect and counteract destructive environmental acts will bring un precedented changes to Nantucket fifty years from now.
THOUGHTS OF NANTUCKET
31
To begin with, recent studies of the alarming destruction of the ozone layers over the Antarctic continent caused mostly by chloroflurocarbons from spray cans and refrigeration and airconditioning units could mean that in the not too distant future humans could not venture forth on the world's beaches unless completely covered, including face masks, unless they were willing to risk almost certain skin cancer. To attempt to obtain a worldwide ban against systems using chloroflurocarbons in timely fashion to avert this gloomy prediction seems most unlikely. Secondly as automobiles, factories, home heating and the ever ac celerated burning of the world's tropical rain forests continue to pour carbon dioxide into our atmosphere, it is bound to increase the carbon dioxide content of our atmosphere significantly which in turn will significantly raise global temperatures. (The Greenhouse Effect). There is no way to stop the adverse effect or even slow it down, so possibly Nantucket should start planning now for the effects it will have on the Island. With the present state of knowledge most scientists who have studied the problem predict a sea level rise from melting polar ice caps by the year 2050 of from one to 25 feet. Assuming a middle figure Great Point, Brant Point, Coatue, most of Madaket and the low lying areas on the South Shore of the Island, Cod Fish Park and Low Beach in Sconset and much of the lower town of Nantucket would be under water. In my mus ing I could only wonder if possibly for the lower town of Nantucket and Brant Point areas dikes could be built to protect them from this in evitable rise of the ocean's water levels. I even worried a bit about my waterfront home at Sconset even though it is well back from the Southbank. On that unhappy note we were getting ready to land at Dulles, so I ceased my musing and reflected that I was glad I had belonged to the generation which had seen Nantucket before the developers and popula tion growth had so drastically changed it, and that my children had had the opportunity to grow up in the innocent, unhurried and happy times of the Nantucket of thirty years ago.
At the Bend of New Mill Street One Hundred Years Ago
