Vol. 37 July 1989 No

Published quarterly and devoted to the preservation of Nantucket's antiquity, its famed heritage, and its illustrious past as a whaling port.

Vol. 37 July 1989

CONTENTS

Camp Sankaty Head by John C. Lathrop

How To Trace Your Genealogy by Helen Winslow Chase

The First Gubernational Visit to Nantucket by Edouard A. Stackpole

Summer of '41 by Edgar A. Anderson

No. 3

12

25

32

A Basic Nantucket Reading List by Helen Winslow Chase 35

Historic Nantucket (USPS 246-460) is published quarterly at Nantucket, Massachusetts by the Nantucket Historical Association, 2 Union Street, P.O. Box 1016, Nantucket, MA 02554, to which address changes should be sent. Historic Nantucket is sent to Association members and extra copies may be purchased for $3.00 each. © N.H.A. 1988 (ISSN 0439-2248).

Member dues are: Individual $25, Family $40, 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 Editorial Board, Historic Nantucket, Nantucket Historical Association, P.O. Box 1016, Nantucket, Massachusetts 02554.

CONTRIBUTORS

EDGAR A. ANDERSON, a year-round resident of Nantucket, has served as both board member and business manager of Theatre Workshop.

HELEN WINSLOW CHASE, a professional historian and native Nantucketer, is a former member of the Nantucket Historical Association's Council and now serves on the Advisory Board. She taught history in the high schools of Nantucket and Elgin, Illinois.

JOHN C. LATHROP, also a retired teacher, is Siasconset's unofficial historian and an occasional contributor to Historic Nantucket.

EDOUARD A. STACKPOLE, Historian of the Nantucket Historical Association, is the author of numerous books and articles on whaling and all aspects of the island's heritage.

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Camp Sankaty Head by

John C. Lathrop

The Caddy Camp, Camp Sankaty Head, is a unique and special feature of the Sankaty Head Golf and Beach Club, Inc. The Club's property, all 275 acres of it, was donated by Mr. David Gray of Detroit and Santa Barbara in 1921. By the fall of 1922, a group of seven trustees had been organized, 100 charter members had paid in $47,000, and most important, they were playing golf. Dues for the new club were $60.00 per year. By 1924, at a total cost to date of $96,000, two well-known golf architects had created eighteen imaginative holes, and an attractive Club House on Mayflower Hill supported the course. The necessary outbuildings, wells and a Delco electrical generating system were also in place.

One major problem remained to be solved. Two other courses on Nantucket were about thirty years older than Sankaty, and they had cornered the caddy market. At this point a somewhat mysterious Mrs. Gardner entered the picture. A member of the Hyannisport Club on the Upper Cape, she apparently came to Nantucket a number of times between 1925 and the early thirties to play the Sankaty Head golf course. She noticed that the caddy situation was not ideal and suggested that someone at Sankaty talk to Donald M. Smith.

Smith, a member of the YMCA staff in Worcester, MA, had organized summer camps there and on the Cape, including a caddy camp at Hyannisport which he had run for nine years. President George Kirwin of Sankaty, aided by Alden Buttrick, Bob Hardy and Bill Newman, interviewed Mr. Smith at this camp in 1930 and secured his services as the Director of Camp Sankaty with a "word

Illustration for Nantucket promotional brochure, c. 1925, by John G. Held, Jr. From the collection of the Nantucket Historical Association.

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of mouth-handshake" agreement. Smith was not in 'Sconset continuously, however, and chose a very good man, Cameron Sanford, as camp manager.

The Camp still occupies the site Mr. Smith favored for it. Bounded by fairways eleven, twelve and thirteen of the present course, this plot was, in 1930, a maintenance area; and a storage building there housed fertilizer. "Smiddy," as he quickly became known, created the camp's first administrative space by having the fertilizer moved out of half of the building and flooring the rather small liberated territory. The resourceful Smiddy had the whole building by the time the second camping season began. One-half became the kitchen; the other was used for mess and recreational purposes.

Wooden flooring for a main building came from the frames the groundskeeper/greenskeeper had used to protect sand traps during the windy winter. The Camp rescued a woodburning stove from the dump and gratefully accepted donated lanterns and candles. Pyramidal tents each slept eight boys. These early framed shelters and outbuildings were, to put it mildly, lacking in sophistication, and Mr. Charles Goetz, a Governor of Sankaty and a keen champion of the caddies, eventually asked the Club for improved sanitary facilities and at least $5,000 for special repairs and replacements.

The camp day started in 1930 with a trumpet call and flag raising before breakfast. Chores and a march to the "bench" for service as caddies followed quickly. A single round paid $.75, a double $1.25, and there was no tipping. Today, each boy has work experience, caddying at least every other day, and "housekeeping" duties. Most of his recreation involves sports - golf, naturally, but also swimming, tennis, basketball, softball, track and field, volleyball and touch football. Table tennis, chess, checkers, horseshoes and fitness activities are available. A camper may aspire to work on the Camp publication. With convenient transportation in the Camp's small busses, each caddy may enjoy the resort features of the whole island. For the two-month 1930 camp season, boys paid a $5.00 registration fee and $5.00 a week for board. After 31 years, board had only increased to $18.00. It is now $35.00.

We learn of the Camp's history and its remarkable development during and after this early period from a number of interesting sources. We have a small number of snapshots and glossy formal group pictures, but oral history is a far richer source. There are, for example, two recorded tapes of interviews between Donald

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Cluh House on Mayflower Hill at Sankaty Head Course, c. 1925. From the collection of the Nantucket Historical Association.

Smith, the original organizer of the camp, and Norman Claxton, the director during the Camp's greatest expansion, 1960 into the 1980's. There are, of course, men still alive who attended the camp in the 1930's, 40's and 50's.

Memories vary dramatically with their sources. Smiddy recalls, for instance, the baa-ing of Levi and Henry Coffin's sheep which grazed near the course. He also recalls baseball games against 'Sconset boys and the evening "camp fires" on Wednesdays and Sundays. Old "boys" remember the adult supervisors: Arthur Cameron, "Cammy;" the cooks, Albert Lemelin and Arthur Flaherty; and such special friends from the club as Alex and Elizabeth Carter, Sam Swazy, the groundskeeper, Bob Hardy, and those- wonderful wives of members, among them Mrs. Harr Ranney. In the early groups of about fifty boys, some were as young as twelve years old, and they needed and appreciated a bit of "mothering attention.

Another unusual figure many recollect is Mr. Walter Hoff, an inspirational person who helped Cammy. He held vespers and solved personal problems because he could listen long and well, but he is most often remembered for his great powers as a storyteller at the evening campfrres he conducted. He could even cook!

8 Historic Nantucket

An unexpected source of caddying history is in the melodious and boisterous song often heard at these campfires. In 1935, the officers of the Sankaty Head Golf Club published two song books, one of which is about the caddies in the five-year-old tented encampment, nestled between the fairways of holes two, three and four of the original nine holes:

To the tune of Eddie Cantor's song "When I'm the President"

You cannot get a caddy; they're standing in a bunch,

You ask, 'Where are your players?' 'In the clubhouse eating lunch!'

The caddies are reserved,

The caddies are reserved

For those who spend their dough up here.

WE WANT CADDIES! WE WANT CADDIES!

Another song ran:

Tramp, tramp, tramp, along the fairway, -- from tee to tee, hunting balls in every byway -

We never smile at all, when players whiff a ball

We've learned what caddies should be;

We never are talking; we're all deaf and dumb as can be.

There're players who praise us and players who haze us.

San-ka-tee Golf Club caddies are we.

And like Gilbert and Sullivan's policemen,

There are many things about our own employment (repeat)

Which induce us to come back here ev'ry year (repeat)

But, alas, some players give us no enjoyment (repeat)

Oh, take one's consideration with another - A Caddy's lot is not a happy one!

Or, finally, to the tune of "Jingle Bells":

Ev ry time they dub a shot we are all to blame. (repeat)

Every morning now, we rise at half past six,

And after we have chow, we carry bags of sticks.

Camp Sankaty Head 9

We hike o'er hill and dale until our feet are sore, And then we hunt for little balls and then we hike some more.

During World War II, Camp Sankaty Head continued to operate despite the fact that the Club was able to maintain only the original nine-hole course. The greens which headed north across the Polpis Road were closed for the duration. The Camp continued to prosper through the 1950's and registered two historic milestones in the first years of its third decade. In 1961, Mr. Chuck Beaverson was in his last year as Caddy Camp Director and the "Smith era," which started in 1930, was drawing to a close. Norman Claxton served that year as Assistant Director, but began, in the following one, his many years as Director. Since his retirement eight years ago, he has been the advisor to current Director Doug Ellsworth. The Camp, the Foundation and the Club have been very fortunate to enjoy such successful continuity.

Another event had an equally important effect on the character of the Camp and on its future. In September 1960, at the Annual Meeting of the Sankaty Head Golf and Beach Club, Inc., Governor Charles Goetz proposed the formation of a Boys Development Fund to support the Caddy Camp. He suggested that all male members of Sankaty contribute to the fund and expressed the hope that these gifts could eventually become tax deductible. By midwinter his idea had evolved into a proposal that the Camp for caddies become a charitable foundation.

Under this arrangement the Camp was to be legally separate from the Sankaty Head Golf Club. Furthermore, the governors agreed to lease the camp to the Foundation for one dollar per year and to make a yearly contribution of not more than $1,500.00 to its operation. Mr. Goetz continued valiant and persistent efforts to secure federal non-profit status for the Foundation and was finally able to inform his fellow governors, at the June 1964 meeting, that the Sankaty Head Foundation had been granted a tax exemption, effective January 1, 1964.

To qualify as a charitable foundation with the Internal Revenue Service, the Camp needed to admit without charge a minimum of four boys from families who could not otherwise finance their attendance. In 1964, the Camp supported six participants from Boys Clubs in the area of Passaic, Garfield and Clifton, NJ. As many as ten or twelve boys - 25 % of the Camp - have been on complete

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scholarships in any single year, and the boys earn more than four hundred dollars in a season. It is expected that this money will be used for educational purposes.

Recruiting has always been an important part of the success of Camp Sankaty. It is the responsibility of the Director to plan during the winter interim for the new season to open during the last week in June. Based on past history, he can expect that 40-50% of last season's caddies will apply to return. He can complete his roster from a pool of relatives of campers or close friends of campers because many people who know the program wish to propose candidates. Each applicant and a parent or guardian enter into an agreement with the Camp. The boy states in writing his educational and occupational goals. He also writes a short essay on why he wishes to attend the Camp. He must be recommended. For some years the directors accepted hoys, usually at least sixteen years old, from industrial sections of Massachusetts and New Jersey. Now they come from all the states as well as a number of foreign countries.

The positive influence of the Camp continues in many campers' lives well after their summer in 'Sconset. By 1977, the Foundation had firmly established a program of scholarship awards, based upon loyalty, responsibility and industry "with a smile ~ both in the Camp and on the course." Twenty-five percent of the Camp participants are now helped financially in secondary schools, colleges and postuniversity studies from a "bank" which exceeds $20,000 each year. The ranks of these scholarship recipients have produced successes, as you might guess, in law, medicine, teaching, architecture, the automobile business, the armed forces, all forms of engineering, and computer science. There are a number of former "boys" with golf-related occupations as well - greenskeepers, golf coaches, Professional Golfers Association officials, and PGA professionals.

These encouraging records reenforce the feelings of pride in family achievement that grow from the Caddy Camp experience. For many alumni, "family" implies Camp as well as blood relations. As a case in point, toward the end of the 1988 season, Bill Binney played in a nine-hole tournament with Bob Hardy. Forty or more years before, he had been Bob's caddy for a member-guest weekend. Bill was the oldest of eight brothers to go through the Camp, and their father had preceded them as a caddy. Curt Brown of Mansfield, Ohio, followed not only his father, but his grandfather.

Well before the official formation of an Alumni Association in

Camp Sankaty Head 1 1

1986, former caddies manifested their love and respect for the Camp and its leaders through voluntary services. Many "hands" and "strong backs" appeared for "opening and closing" free services and served as supplemental helpers and caddies on member-guest weekends.

There were some who felt that this loyalty to the Camp could be organized to the greater benefit of the institution. Jim Krzywicki, who was a camper in 1967 and 1968 and worked as a cook in 1976, helped spread the word of a possible Alumni Association. He prepared a data bank and sent off a letter of information and an invitation to join a continuity group which would add to the promotion and welfare of Camp Sankaty Head.

More than 700 former caddies received his letter. Many have replied and are now abreast of the hard work performed by President Robert Montesano of Robbinsdale, Minnesota, and his able staff. Among promising organizational developments, the alumni caddies have created a constitution and by-laws, including a system of paid membership, have formulated a camp history and are distributing a regular newsletter. There is even a line of Alumni wear!

The Association has already benefited the Camp by contributing a television and videorecorder for the "rec hall." Because the Camp has arrived at senior citizen status, it needs some physical rehabilitation; and with the generous support of the Sankaty Club and the Alumni, it has a new plumbing system and a new kitchen for the 1989 season. The future seems bright for both the Association and, as it approaches its sixtieth birthday, for Camp Sankaty Head as well.