8 ash comprehensive by Nantucket Preservation Trust

8 Ash Street NANTUCKET

A House History Written by Betsy Tyler Designed by Kathleen Hay

nantucket preservation trust Two Union Street â&#x20AC;˘ Nantucket, Massachusetts www.nantucketpreservation.org

Copyright ÂŠ 2008 Nantucket Preservation Trust All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the Nantucket Preservation Trust. The text of this book was set in Perpetua, Bickham Script, and Dear Sarah. Researched and written by Betsy Tyler, Nantucket, Massachusetts Designed by Kathleen Hay Designs Nantucket â&#x20AC;˘ New York Printed in the USA

Ash Lane, c. 1915

Clay Lancasterâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s map of early town divisions

8 Ash Street Benjamin Barney Jr. 1765

ASH STREET AND ASH LANE NEIGHBORHOOD

oth Ash Street and Ash Lane existed in 1799, when Isaac Coffin recorded the streets in the town of Nantucket. Although some early dwellings in the neighborhood were removed and others destroyed by fire, the house built by David Joy on Centre Street still stands between Ash Lane and Ash Street, as do the colonial-era houses at 10 and 8 Ash Street, as well as 5 Ash, situated between Ash Street and Step Lane. The area of town north of Broad Street was generally known as the North Shore, although the streets that connect with, or cross, North Water Street comprise a neighborhood that has more in common with other early town residential areas, like the Wesco Acre Lots and the Fish Lots, than with the later nineteenth-century neighborhoods that developed on Brant Point and along the cliff. A map drawn by architectural historian Clay Lancaster for his book Nantucket in the Nineteenth Century shows the area north of Broad, between Centre and North Water Streets, as the property of Thomas Macy, William Worth, John Gardner, and Richard Gardner in the early eighteenth century.

Looking up Ash Street, c. 1890s

Why Ash Street and Lane were so named is unknown, but there were ash trees introduced on Nantucket sometime before 1908, when Eugene Bicknell wrote about the flora of the island; whether they were introduced in the eighteenth century is not known. It is possible that there may have been some sort of ash pit in the area, or it may have been the location of a seventeenth- or eighteenth-century fire that left memorable debris.

Botanical illustration of a green ash leaf, by Charles Sprague Sargent

Detail of William Coffinâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s 1833 Map of the Town of Nantucket 5

Sketch of Benjamin Barney Jr. house by Catherine Garland 6

Benjamin Barney Jr. & Jemima Jenkins Barney

1765 – 1832

he Barney family was not one of Nantucket’s first families— this branch of the Barneys lived in Newport, Rhode Island—but the first member of that family to settle on Nantucket married into the family of one of the proprietors, or original landholders, of the island. By the mid-eighteenth century, he and his descendants had become financially successful and were leading citizens of the town. Two sons of the Quaker family of Jonathan Barney and Sarah Griffin of Newport wed Nantucket women in the first quarter of the eighteenth century: Benjamin married Lydia Starbuck in 1722 and Jacob married Dorcas Barnard in 1726. Although Jacob and his wife moved back to Newport, he is listed with his brother Benjamin in the Barney Genealogical Record as one of the first Barneys on Nantucket. Details in the comprehensive Genealogy of the Barney Family in America reveal that Jacob and his family did not live on the island; he was a member of the Society of Friends in Newport, owned a large house on Truro Street in that town, and he and his Nantucket wife had eleven children born in Newport. It was Benjamin Barney (1699–1783), a tailor from Newport— described by historian Robert J. Leach as a “wealthy Quaker”—who settled on Nantucket. He and his first wife, Lydia Starbuck, had eleven children, seven of whom survived to adulthood. Only two Barney males were to carry on the family name: Benjamin Junior and Jonathan, son of Benjamin and his second wife, Huldah Hussey. 7

Benjamin Barney built the house at 1 Liberty Street in the first quarter of the eighteenth century; it is one of the oldest dwellings in town, verified in a deed dated 1726 as the house built by him. It has two ridge chimneys rather than the usual massive central chimney seen in Nantucket houses of the period, suggesting that Barney may have brought ideas of residential architecture with him from the mainland. Lydia Barney died in 1751; two years later, fifty-three-year-old Benjamin married Huldah Hussey, with whom he had two more children, born in 1754 and 1756. Benjamin’s will, written in 1778, five years before he died, grants a barn and ten sheep commons to youngest son Jonathan; eight sheep commons to his youngest daughter Phebe; and the remainder of his property equally to his wife Huldah and all of his children. An educated man who had an extensive library for his time and place, his probate inventory shows that in addition to the Bible, which most families owned, his bookshelf boasted, among other titles, Newhouse on navigation, Barkley’s Apology, two volumes of Milton, a dictionary, and Penn’s Reflections and Maxims. The house at 1 Liberty stayed in the Barney family until the mid-nineteenth century. Benjamin Barney Jr. (1732–1803), the only son of Benjamin and Lydia, grew up in the house on Liberty Street. Nothing is known about his education, but he was part of a literate family and probably attended one of the local Quaker schools. After acquiring as much formal education as his family provided, he apprenticed with a cooper. In 1753, the same year his father remarried, he wed Jemima Jenkins. Twelve years later, in 1765, he and his siblings divided among themselves lands that were jointly owned; such partitions usually took place after the death of a parent, but the elder Benjamin Barney was still very much alive—he did not die until 1783. The deed does not indicate how the lands were acquired, but since Benjamin Barney’s two children by his second wife are not among those owning the property, it would appear that it must have come from the family of his first wife, Lydia Starbuck, who died in 1751; her father, Jethro Starbuck, lived to be ninety-eight, and was still living in 1765, so it is not clear exactly how the real estate descended.

Replica of a cooper’s shop in the Nantucket Historical Association’s Whaling Museum, c. 1960

1 Liberty Street

The property that Benjamin Barney Jr. acquired in the partition recorded in 1765 was located between Ash Lane and Ash Street, although the deed of division does not name either throughway:

A piece of land containing sixteen square rods and two thirds near the dwelling house of SilvanusWorth measuring four rods and nine feet in length and bounded on the east by the said Worth’s land

Silvanus Worth had been given land between Ash Street and Ash Lane in 1758, by his father-in-law Silvanus Allen; it is described as situated “near the dwelling house of George Folger,” who lived at 10 Ash Street. Worth built his house before 1765, but it was destroyed by the Great Fire of July 13, 1846; George Folger’s house, which may have been built by his father, Abishai, dates from the first half of the eighteenth century and still stands. Benjamin’s sister, Hepzibah Coffin, wife of William, acquired a nineteen-square-rod plot of land west of Benjamin’s in the division of 1765; in 1795 Benjamin bought a small portion of that parcel from her heirs. The mid-eighteenth-century neighborhood where Barney built his house included David Joy’s house, at 43 Centre Street; George Folger’s house, at 10 Ash Street; and Sylvanus Worth’s house, at 4 Ash Street. The earliest image of the neighborhood, William Coffin’s 1833 Map of the Town of Nantucket, clearly depicts the four houses between Ash Street and Ash Lane, as well as a very large structure at the southeast corner of Ash and North Water Streets that was the home of William R. Easton.

10 Ash Street

Benjamin probably built his house soon after acquiring the land. He and Jemima had four children when the deed was signed in January 1765, and their fifth child, Eunice, would be born that April. Oldest child Lydia was ten, and the three boys—Peter, Matthew, and Daniel—–were eight, six, and four. Benjamin’s trade may have taken him to sea when he was a young man, and Jemima and the children may have lived with her family. She was

Detail of William Coffin’s 1833 Map of the Town of Nantucket

43 Centre Street, at the corner of Ash Street, c. 1890 11

the oldest of the ten children of Peter and Abigail Jenkins; her first child, Lydia, born in 1755, was only a year younger than her youngest brother, David Jenkins. Her sister Abigail, seven years her junior, married Jonathan Barney Jr. of Newport, first cousin of Benjamin Barney Jr.That family of Barneys lived on Nantucket, too, and helped to increase the Barney name locally through their sons and grandsons.

They had endured a different sort of tragedy, however, when Jemima died in 1768 at the age of thirty-six; their children were three, seven, nine, eleven, and thirteen. Oldest daughter Lydia probably helped care for the younger children, but Benjamin surely employed other household help to assist with their care and the household duties. Historian Edouard Stackpole’s examination of the papers of the Council of the Massachusetts House of Representatives brought to light a number of petitions from Nantucket in 1777 and 1778 requesting permits to sail on whaling and trading voyages. In his book Nantucket in the American Revolution, Stackpole states that Benjamin Barney was given a permit for the schooner Olive Branch, under the command of Captain David Paddack, to proceed to Hispaniola for salt and other provisions. There is no local record of either Benjamin Barney or Benjamin Barney Jr. owning the schooner; it could have been either man, although in the Genealogy of the Barney Family in America, author Eugene Preston records that it was Benjamin Barney Jr. who served as a “patriot” in the Revolutionary War, dispatching his schooner on the trading voyage.

The Barney family was probably well established at 8 Ash Street before the Revolutionary War. Nantucketers suffered during the war and for several years afterwards due to maritime restrictions that affected not only the burgeoning whaling industry but also the importation of goods of all kinds from the mainland; the construction of houses, along with most other business enterprises, was at a standstill from 1775 to about 1783. As food and fuel prices rose due to the shortages, people were forced to dig peat in the swamps to burn in their fireplaces for heat, and to subsist on meager local produce, and fish; the village of Siasconset, a seasonal fishing station, expanded at this time, probably because of the increased need for the catch from the “stew-pond” of the island. As a cooper, Benjamin must have seen the demand for his product decline. According to statistics compiled by Charles H. and Mary Grace Carpenter from documents in the Nantucket Registry of Deeds, there were at least 146 coopers working on the island in the period 1751–76; it was the second most common trade in that period, next to mariners. Coopers, who worked in shops on island and aboard whaleships to assemble the casks that held whale oil, would not have been employed during the Revolutionary period because the whaling industry was essentially shut down.

Benjamin Barney Jr. married Lois Bunker in 1777, but they had no children. In his will, written in 1783, he made the following bequests:

I give unto my wife Lois all my personal estate movable goods and chattels and household furniture of all kinds and the use of all my real estate except the great chamber in my dwelling house, during her widowhood, and if she should marry then she shall have the use of one third thereof during her life. I give unto my daughter Eunice the use of my great chamber above mentioned as long as she shall remain unmarried, at the expiration whereof or at her decease, if she should die before my wife, to return to her as above mentioned, and if any part of my said estate of any kind remain at the decease of my said wife, my will is that it be equally divided between my five children, namely Lydia, Peter, Matthew, Daniel, and Eunice, part and part alike, that is inasmuch as Lydia has had to the value of ten pounds lawfull money in household furniture, that shall be reckoned as a part of her portion, and her brothers and sister shall be made equal with her before she shall come in for a share of the remainder.

Benjamin was a man of means despite the hard times. In 1775 he bought his brother Jonathan’s dwelling house—inherited by Jonathan’s wife Abigail Coffin in 1771— for £30, and in 1779 he bought land in Shimmo for £12. The fact that he had available funds to purchase real estate during the war years indicates that Benjamin and his family did not endure the financial hardships that many other island families faced. 12

Benjamin Barney Jr.â&#x20AC;&#x2122;s will

Benjamin Barney Jr. did not die until 1803, twenty years after he penned his bequests. His oldest daughter, Lydia, had married Matthew Starbuck in 1776 and moved to New Garden, North Carolina, a Quaker community where a number of Nantucket families settled during the Revolutionary War. She took some family furniture with her when she set up her own household, and that accounted for her father’s stipulation in the will concerning her share in his estate. Eunice Bunker married Uriah Macy in 1787, so she never had need of the great chamber that her father had promised her if she was unmarried when he died. Peter, Matthew, and Daniel were all married before 1803 as well. Benjamin had thirty-one grandchildren (three more were born after he died), and it is interesting to note that each of his five children had a daughter named Lydia, after their grandmother, Lydia Starbuck Barney. According to architectural historian Clay Lancaster, there were only three types of houses built on Nantucket in the 1760s: the lean-to, which was prevalent from 1700 to around 1760; the gambrel style, built in the period 1748 to 1798; and the typical house, a form that dominated local building from the 1760s to the 1830s. Benjamin Barney Jr. built his house during a time of transition in style, and like most colonial houses on the island, changes have been made to the original structure. The earliest image of the house— its footprint on William Coffin’s 1833 Map of the Island of Nantucket—doesn’t reveal much about its construction, showing only a rectangular outline for the dwelling, with a small wart on the southwest corner. Chimneys and rooflines are not delineated, and even if they were, would reveal the house as it existed more than fifty years after it was built, a year after it was sold to George M. Jones by Benjamin Barney’s heirs.

According to architectural historian Clay Lancaster, there were only three types of houses built on Nantucket in the 1760s: the lean-to, which was prevalent from 1700 to around 1760; the gambrel style, built in the period 1748 to 1798; and the typical house, a form that dominated local building from the 1760s to the 1830s.

Lean-to style house located at 105 Main Street

Gambrel house located at 18 India Street

Typical house located at 12 Liberty Street 15

A structural analysis of the house was prepared by Ann Huppert in 1990 and tells us something about the evolution of the dwelling: The house at 8 Ash Street is a five-bay, two-and-a-half-story structure with a centered doorway. The original building was a rectangular mass fronting on Ash Street with a small wart or shed extension on the southwest corner. It appears to have been constructed with full height front and rear walls, rather than having had a lean-to or saltbox shape. Changes in the roof sheathing and attic floorboards indicate that the house had a central chimney that has since been replaced by four end-wall chimneys. These four chimneys were also constructed in front of plastered walls, further evidence that they were added after the house was built. A large, central chimney would have been typical of a late-eighteenth-century house, since while this was a transitional period, it predates the turn toward classicism in which end-wall chimneys often superseded the earlier type. The central chimney would also have dictated the floor plan of the house. There were most likely narrow winder stairs directly in front of the chimney mass and just inside the front doorway. Rooms would have been arranged around the chimney with fireplaces in most. Also of note is the roof construction. Vertical board sheathing is nailed to horizontal purlins placed between the principal rafters. The “purlin roof ” system is rarely found in post-Revolutionary construction, as it was replaced by a “rafter roof ” system in which common (secondary) rafters support horizontal sheathing boards between the principal rafters, which are less massive than in the earlier system. The two-story rear ell was added after 1834, the date of theWilliam Coffin map, but structural evidence, including cut nails, indicated that it was probably constructed in the mid-nineteenth century. Sanborn Fire Insurance maps show that a twostory rectangular barn stood to the west of the house by 1887 and was removed by 1904. Between 1909 and 1923 a single-story garage was added on the southeast corner of the property. 16

According to Huppertâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s analysis, the house built by Benjamin Barney Jr. was a typical houseâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;twoand-a-half stories high, with a central chimney providing hearths in the rooms built around it. It is not known when the central chimney was removed and the four end-wall chimneys added, but it was probably in the 1830s, when a number of houses on the island were built with that arrangement, allowing for a central hallway, a larger staircase, and a more symmetrical interior. Lois Barney lived at 8 Ash Street until she died in 1828, and Peter, Matthew, and Daniel Barney sold the house to George M. Jones in 1832.

The front staircase now features a mural 3

Map by S. H. Jenks Jr. depicting the section of town which was destroyed by the Great Fire of 1846 18

George M. Jones & Jane Ann Palmer Jones 1832 – 1847

hirty-three-year-old blacksmith George M. Jones and his twenty-nine-year-old wife, Jane Ann, bought the house at 8 Ash Street from the heirs of Benjamin Barney Jr. in 1832. They had a daughter, Emily, who was three, and they would have three more children during their time on Ash Street —Adaline, born 1836; Isabella, born 1839; and Daniel, born in 1844. Jones was a blacksmith, with a shop on Old North Wharf that burned down along with everything else on the wharf on July 13, 1846, the night of the Great Fire that destroyed, with few exceptions, the entire commercial district of the town as well as numerous homes. Luckily, the house at 8 Ash Lane was spared, although it must have been a terrible night, with destruction all around, including the house of neighbors to the east on Ash Street. Clay Lancaster states that the house at 8 Ash Lane was destroyed by the fire as well, but that is not true. The house is not depicted on S. H. Jenks’s map of the burned district, which shows other houses on Ash Street lost to the conflagration.

George M. Jones sold the house to master mariner Alexander H. Coffin in 1847; in that deed he is no longer referred to as a blacksmith, but a trader. A plot plan dated 1847 shows a parcel of land near the new cross wharf that abuts his store, so he must have replaced the blacksmith shop with that structure. It appears that the Jones family left Nantucket in the aftermath of the Great Fire. Several parcels of real estate they owned, in addition to the house on Ash Street, were sold in 1847, and there are no local death records for George or his wife, Jane Ann, nor are there any marriages recorded here for their four children. A death notice in the Inquirer and Mirror, December 11, 1896, states that George M. Jones, age 70, died in San Francisco. It was either Jones or the next owner,Alexander H. Coffin, who removed the central chimney and replaced it with the four end-wall chimneys, creating the two elegant parlors on the first floor and the corresponding chambers above. The loss of the original cooking hearth and ovens in the massive eighteenth-century chimney would have necessitated the construction of the new kitchen wing, with an additional fireplace.

Early examples of iron work still exist in the house today 20

Alexander H. Coffin & Eliza Worth Coffin

1847 – 1857

n 1867, the Reverend Phebe Ann Coffin Hanaford, a famous daughter of Nantucket, wrote a little book titled The Captive Boy in Terra Del Fuego: Being an Authentic Narrative of the Loss of the Ship Manchester, and the Adventures of the Sole White Survivor. She told the story of the wreck of the Nantucket ship Manchester, which set sail April 7, 1854, from New York for Valparaiso, Chile. The captain of the ship was master mariner Alexander H. Coffin, whose passengers included his wife, Eliza, and their sixteen-year-old son, Thomas, a former student of Rev. Hanaford’s, who was to become the “captive boy” of the horrifying sea tale. The book recounted a story well known to local residents, who learned of the shipwreck in June 1855, when Thomas wrote from Valparaiso to his cousin, Seth B. Coffin, telling of the wreck and his survival. The true account—embellished with moral lessons in the didactic style of religious books for young readers in the nineteenth century—was written by Hanaford thirteen years after the wreck to help raise funds for Thomas, who was then an injured veteran of the Civil War.

Illustrations from The Captive Boy

Alexander H. Coffin (1808–1854) and his wife Eliza Worth (1812– 1854) purchased the house at 8 Ash Street just after the Great Fire, when their children Thaddeus, Thomas, and Louisa were ages thirteen, nine, and four, respectively. Like most mariners, Alexander spent years at a time at sea; during the final productive years of the whaling industry on Nantucket he was captain of the whaleship American, from 1841 to 1845, returning with 1,890 barrels of sperm oil, a successful voyage that enabled him to buy the house on Ash Street for $1,300. He bought other property from George Jones in 1848, including a parcel of land east of the house on Ash Street; part of the homestead of James Brown on Main Street; a store on the south side of Straight Wharf; and a bowling alley next to the store on the wharf, all for $1,500. As the whaling industry faltered, many former whaling captains found other maritime work—as captains of trading vessels, cargo ships, and steamships. In 1854, Capt. Coffin accepted the command of the ship Manchester with a consignment of coal and lumber for the firm of Cartwright & Harrison, for delivery to Valparaiso. His wife, Eliza, and son, Thomas, accompanied him. When rounding Cape Horn on August 28, the ship struck a submerged reef about thirty miles from shore, rapidly took on water, split in two, and sank. Captain Coffin tried to save his wife, but, like her father, Thaddeus Worth, who was lost at sea in 1815, Eliza drowned. Coffin was able to rescue his son Thomas, and they clung to part of the wreckage, which eventually drifted to the shore of a small island. Four days later, the second mate and a seaman named Robert Wells arrived at the island on a raft they had constructed from wreckage on a nearby island where they had washed ashore. These four, the only survivors of the nineteen on board, immediately set about constructing a boat, but the second mate soon died of trauma and exhaustion. On November 22, natives of Tierra del Fuego arrived in a canoe and approached the survivors; after taking clothes and supplies the men could spare, they demanded more. When the survivors refused to part with anything else, the natives turned violent, bludgeoning Captain Coffin to death in front of his son. Thomas and seaman Robert Wells, who, according to Rev. Hanaford’s title, was a man of color, escaped in the newly built boat. 24

Illustration from The Captive Boy

On the fifteenth of February, 1855, a native canoe approached them; being weak and exhausted, they gave themselves up to Indians, who fortunately treated them kindly, although they lived naked and destitute.

After six weeks sailing along the coast,Thomas and Robert had exhausted all the supplies they had managed to salvage from the wreck, and for another month subsisted on raw shellfish, berries, and roots. On the fifteenth of February, 1855, a native canoe approached them; being weak and exhausted, they gave themselves up to Indians, who fortunately treated them kindly, although they lived naked and destitute. Thomas and Robert remained with the Indians for three months, until they spotted the Chilean brigantine Meteoro, Capt. Martinez, cruising along the coastline. The natives paddled out to the ship with their American sailors and demanded a ransom for the release of the two survivors, which Capt. Martinez paid. He then delivered Thomas and Robert to the American Consul in Valparaiso, who arranged their passage home. Thomas E. Coffin was seventeen years old when he arrived back on the island in 1855. His brotherThaddeus was twenty-one, not living at home, and younger sister Louisa was twelve. While her parents were at sea she had been cared for by her Aunt Lydia, who may have been the sister of her father or her mother, for they both had siblings named Lydia. The house on Ash Street had been rented, as Capt. Coffin explained in a letter written from New York to his brother and sister on March 23, 1854: We have put all our furniture and other fixings in the east parlour and locked them up, the other parts of the house together with all the out buildings and all the other fixings, horse, cow, and all the farming tooles I have let to Robert P. Pitman for one year, he paying one hundred dollars for the same. The optimism of Coffinâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s letter is painful to read in light of the outcome of the voyage: . . . here was a good offer and a good ship, one that I have thourily [sic] tried, and going one of the pleasantest voyages that there is. . . . I thought it would be very beneficial to Eliza Anneâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s head to go the cruise and see some of the manners and customs of the people on the other side of the continent. 25

From other comments in the letter, it appears that Eliza may have suffered from migraines; Alexander says that his mother was willing for Eliza to accompany him â&#x20AC;&#x153;for she thought it mite entirely cure her of that poor head of hers.â&#x20AC;? The Coffin children were forced to sell the family home in order to settle the estates of their parents. Thaddeus sold his share for $100, and Job Coleman, guardian of minors Thomas and Louisa, sold their twothirds share for $200. The island was sinking into an economic depression from which it would not recover for several decades; it was not a good time to sell a house. Thaddeus Coffin moved to California, where he died single in 1866. Louisa Coffin married James Beebe in 1862 and moved to Oregon, where their two daughters died young. The resilient Thomas E. Coffin, survivor of the catastrophe that claimed both of his parents, made a voyage to China after his return from South America, then moved to New Bedford for a couple of years to learn a trade, but what that trade was has yet to be determined. He headed west in 1861, moving to Illinois, where he enlisted as a soldier in the 21st Regiment of the Illinois Volunteer Infantry. Once again, Thomas witnessed firsthand manâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s inhumanity to man; severely wounded at the battle of Murfreesboro, Tennessee, on December 30, 1862, he lay on the battlefield for four days before being transported to a hospital, where he remained for five months. Thomas was honorably discharged from the army in May of 1863, when he was twenty-eight years old, and the next year married Laura Aldrich of Adrian, Michigan, with whom he had six children.

Thomas Edward Coffin and sons

Thomas Edward Coffin

The tragic and poignant story of the wreck of the Manchester, as related by Rev. Hanaford in her tale, was about the captain, wife, and son who lived at 8 Ash Street, and would not return there as a united family. The house that successful whaling captain Alexander H. Coffin purchased for $1,300 in 1847 sold at auction in 1857 for $300.

Guardianâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s sale of real estate, January 14, 1857

sa Meiggs (1812–1885), a shipwright, was born in Sandwich, Massachusetts in 1812. In 1835, when he was twenty-three, he married Abby Kelley of Nantucket. They lived on the west side of Union Street in a house he purchased in 1840 for $1,400. Abby died in 1841, predeceased by their three-year-old child, Charlotte; seven weeks after Abby’s death their unnamed infant also died. Asa married Caroline Morey (1825–1885) in 1843. As a shipwright, he was more than likely employed at the Brant Point Shipyard, since that was the only location of ship building and repair on the island. The demand for whaling ships built locally came to an end in the late 1840s, when the entrance to the harbor became too shallow for the large ships needed for voyages that lasted four or five years. Nantucket was no longer the center of the whaling industry, a fact made perfectly clear by the fire that had destroyed the island’s wharves and the maritime industries located nearby. Asa Meiggs went bankrupt. In 1849, he was declared an insolvent debtor by the Commissioner of Insolvency for the County of Nantucket, and his Union Street property was seized. By 1857, however, his financial situation had improved enough for him to buy the house at 8 Ash Street for $300. He and Caroline and their two daughters, Hannah and Caroline, lived on Ash Street for five years, but by 1862, when Asa mortgaged the property to Freeman Adams for $139.80, he was a resident of Barnstable. Unable to pay his mortgage, Meiggs lost the property to Adams, who sold it to real estate agent Robert F. Gardner for $167 in 1863. The economic depression on Nantucket was so severe that many houses stood empty; the population of the island had fallen dramatically, from 9,712 in 1840 to 6,094 in 1860, and would hit the nadir of 2,930 inhabitants in 1905. Paul Paddack bought the house from Gardner for $225 in 1863.

Asa Meiggs & Caroline Morey Meiggs 1857 – 1862 Freeman E. Adams 1862 – 1863 Robert F. Gardner 1863

Looking down Ash Lane, c. 1880s

A view down Ash Street, c. 1900s

P Paul Paddack & Emily Fuller Paddack 1863 – 1912 Edgar Francis Paddack 1912 – 1920 Alvin E. Paddack 1920 – 1922

aul Paddack (1828–1892), a carpenter, married Emily Fuller (1833–191?) in 1853. Ten years later they bought the dwelling on Ash Street that would be their family home for more than fifty years and the childhood home of their five sons: Edgar, Arthur, Charles, Paul Jr., and Alvin. Paul and Emily, both born during the golden age of Nantucket whaling, lived through an era of depression and decline on the island, when the days of maritime industry and international recognition, which brought prosperity and opportunity to so many families, were a glorious past, offering no present employment. The year-round inhabitants scrambled to make a living, reluctantly embracing the seasonal tourist industry as a way to profit from the history and natural beauty of the island. There is scant documentary record of Paul Paddack and his family. As a carpenter, Paul probably did more small jobs and repairs than new construction, as little was being built in the period from 1850 to about 1880. Sanborn Insurance Company maps show that there was a long, narrow, two-story barn on the east side of the house in 1887 that was removed before 1904; it may have been Paddack’s carpentry shop. It can be assumed that Paul Paddack was an accomplished craftsman because his son, Alvin, who was praised for his skill, learned the trade from his father. Alvin had spent a year at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as secretary to a professor of mathematics, but, according to an obituary notice in the Inquirer and Mirror in 1953, he came back to the island to care for his elderly parents: Then, feeling responsible for the care of his parents, he returned to Nantucket to learn carpentry from his father. He became an all round good mechanic, recognized for his skill and careful workmanship. Even to the present time, whenever an unusual problem of construction came up, it was to Mr. Paddack that many another carpenter went for advice.

8 Ash Street, c. 1890s

Sanborn Insurance Company Maps 1887

1892

1898 32

1909

1904

1923

1949 33

There is no probate record for Paul Paddack, and no obituary in the local newspaper. The first resident and business directory of Nantucket, published in 1897, shows Emily M. and Alvin E. Paddack residing on Ash Street. Subsequent directories, in 1909 and 1914, list the mother and son, but Emily died before the next directory was published in 1919, although Alvin E., carpenter, still lived on Ash Street. In 1927, the last directory published before the era of phone books, Alvin E. was living at 12 Darling Street. Although oldest son Edgar F. Paddack held title to the house from 1912 to 1920, he lived in Blanchester, Ohio. The â&#x20AC;&#x153;Valuation and Tax Listâ&#x20AC;? published by the town of Nantucket in 1896 assessed the Paddack house at $350, the quarter-acre of land on Ash Street at $150, and the barn at $50. Emily Paddack was also the owner of two acres of mowing land, ten acres of pasture, eight sheep commons, and a quarter-acre garden at Poverty Point. Farms had sprouted up all over the island in the last half of the nineteenth century when the dwindling population began to rely more heavily on local agriculture. The fact that the Paddacks had mowing land suggests they needed feed for cattle or horses, which their large pasture could have accommodated.The small garden at Poverty Point was probably their kitchen garden.

Alvin E. Paddack

Ash Street

Joseph Wood Rutter & Mildred Hopkins Rutter

1922 – 1989

rom 1900 to the eve of World War I, Nantucket was a summer resort featuring big hotels, like the Sea Cliff Inn and the Point Breeze Hotel in town and the Ocean View House and Beach House in ’Sconset. The railroad provided transportation to Surfside, Tom Nevers, and ’Sconset, and the Nantucket Yacht Club and the Siasconset Casino were founded. The Inquirer and Mirror ran a seasonal column announcing the arrival of guests from the cities of the eastern seaboard, and the local yearround populace catered to the needs of those who came to enjoy the cool breezes, the sea, and the social life. Mildred Hopkins (known as Mimi) was on island with her mother and brother when their travel plans were interrupted by a hurricane; Joseph Wood Rutter (known as Wow) was in the same predicament, and the two met. They married in 1910, and bought the house on Ash Street in 1922. It was their home until Mimi died in 1988, at the age of ninety-eight-and-a-half; her husband predeceased her in 1957. Their four children—Joseph, Alison, Caroline, and Ruth—spent summers on Nantucket, and many of their grandchildren now own homes on the island.

The house that the Rutters purchased in 1922 had been owned by the Paddack family for almost sixty years, and was probably typical of many old houses on the island—repaired, patched, and cared for, but with no major changes made. The Rutters followed the same trend. According to the grandchildren, Mimi, who ruled the roost in the summer, never changed anything, although they do remember her painting the uneven floors herself. Mimi was an artist who participated in the annual sidewalk art shows, and she was an avid sportswoman and game player: Scrabble, bridge, golf, and swimming were her other passions. She picked beach plums and made the requisite jelly, foraged for wild mushrooms and cooked them, and is remembered fondly for putting wet lettuce leaves under her hat to keep her head cool when she played golf. The children enjoyed the usual summer pursuits, and also delved into “table tipping,” a Victorian parlor game that was believed to open up communication with the spirit world. In Blue Balliett’s book, Nantucket Hauntings, one of the Rutter children recounts the story of the resident ghost in the house, a Paddack, who communicated with them on numerous occasions. Joseph Wood Rutter, founder and partner in Rutter & Co., an investment-counseling firm in New York, suffered through the stock market crash of 1929, but recovered and reimbursed all his clients who lost money in that debacle. He furnished the Nantucket house with antique and primitive furniture that he collected; his grandchildren have many of the items he purchased: copper and pewter wall sconces, tavern tables, cannonball beds, a ship model, and a sailmaker’s table. 38

According to the grandchildren, Mimi, who ruled the roost in the summer, never changed anything, although they do remember her painting the uneven floors herself.

Mimi Rutter enjoys a day at the beach.

Mimi Rutter (left) 39

he Inquirer and Mirror ran a seasonal column announcing the arrival of guests from the cities of the eastern seaboard, and the local yearround populace catered to the needs of those who came to enjoy the cool breezes, the sea, and the social life.

A watercolor by Nantucket artist J. B. (Jane) Reid

8 Ash Street, 1922

Rear of house, 1922 23

The house that the Rutters purchased in 1922 had been owned by the Paddack family for almost sixty years, and was probably typical of many old houses on the islandâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; repaired, patched, and cared for, but with no major changes made.

8 Ash Street, 1990

Rear view of 8 Ash Street taken from Ash Lane, 1990 43

The floor plan of the house during the Rutters’ occupancy was slightly different from its present configuration. The double parlor on the left was used as a dining room, with a small sitting area at the north end. On the other side of the central hall was the living room. The two-story addition to the original eighteenth-century house was L-shaped with a small studio on the northwest section of the ell. A kitchen, with a maid’s room and bath in the northeast corner, and another small bath in the southwest corner, completed the layout of the addition A clothes-drying yard was on the west side of the kitchen wing, and a small porch at the southeast corner of the kitchen led to the side yard, where large round-backed wicker chairs sat on the lawn. Mimi’s bedroom, with two fireplaces, was on the southeast side of the original house, and there were two bedrooms across the hall. On the second floor of the two-story addition a tiny bedroom was situated over the little firstfloor studio. There were two baths, and a bedroom with a fireplace where Mimi’s mother stayed when she visited.

Detail of Sanborn Insurance Company Map, 1949

The house built by Benjamin Barney Jr. played a central role in the lives of several generations of the Rutter family. Built in 1765—and probably reconfigured with four new chimneys, a revised floor plan, and a kitchen wing by the mid-nineteenth century—it was preserved, like many other houses, by economic hard times and a thriftiness instilled by the Great Depression. The Paddacks owned the house for fifty-nine years and the Rutters owned it for the next sixty-seven years. When Bill and Susan Boardman bought the house in 1989, they were only the seventh family to make it their home. View of 8 Ash Street, c. 1950s 44

Rooftop view of east faรงade of 8 Ash Street, 1987

Bill and Susan Boardman

William J. Boardman II & Susan Ruckstuhl Boardman 1989 â&#x20AC;&#x201C;

ccomplished needlework artist Susan Boardman first came to Nantucket in the summer of 1974 to take a needlework course with Erica Wilson, whose husband, Vladimir Kagan, invited the husbands of the students to visit as well. Both Susan and Bill fell in love with the island that summer. They returned about ten years later with their two sons, Michael and Stephen. Reacquainted and re-enamored with Nantucket, they began looking for a house that would become their year-round home. Earlier in their lives they had restored a historic dwelling in Exeter, New Hampshire, so when they discovered the house at 8 Ash Street for sale in 1989, they were not daunted by the huge amount of work that needed to be done to make it a year-round dwelling. 47

Architect Christopher F. Holland of ’Sconset designed a new two-story wing to replace the one added in the nineteenth century, and supervised all the work on the project, which began in 1990 and was completed by the summer of 1992, when the Boardmans were able to first enjoy the newly restored house. Susan moved up to Nantucket from the family home in Washington, D. C., when Stephen graduated from high school in 1993, and became a year-round resident; Bill, who has a consulting firm in D. C., spends as much time on the island as he can. Older son Michael now runs a program for teaching autistic children in New York City and Stephen is an attorney in San Francisco. The historic Benjamin Barney Jr. house retains its doubleparlor interior on the first floor, with working fireplaces now supplemented with a heating and air-conditioning system. The central hallway, with stairs to the attic, is decorated with murals painted by Kevin Paulsen, who was the Boardmans’ housepainter. A talented artist who had painted the murals at American Seasons restaurant and other commercial establishments, Kevin was commissioned to create murals in the style of nineteenthcentury itinerant New Hampshire muralist Rufus Porter. The Boardmans’ house was Kevin’s first residential project. In the living room he created a nineteenthcentury whaling scene in three panels, including a depiction of the port of Hong Kong, the ship Susan pursuing sperm whales, and a harbor in the Sandwich Islands. Murals on the walls of the the first and second floor halls and the stairway up to the attic display both exotic and island scenes and feature stylized trees in the Rufus Porter tradition. Personal icons—including family pet Roti, birds, and a monkey—are on the walls of the attic landing.

Northwest parlor

Two views of the northeast parlor 49

Mural in the northeast parlor depicts a 19th-century whaling scene. Opposite: A mural in the second-floor hall features an island scene in the Rufus Porter tradition. 50

Detail of monkey (attic mural)

Detail of family pet, Roti (attic mural)

Attic mural 52

The east room on the second floor of the Barney house became the master bedroom; keeping the layout of the house the same as it was under Rutter ownership, there are two bedrooms across the hall. On the first floor of the new L-shaped south wing of the house is the kitchen, a dining area with a fireplace on the south wall, and a small sitting area. Bill Boardmanâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s interest in oenology is represented by the well-stocked wine cellar located beneath the entrance to the kitchen wing, with access through a door in the dining room. Upstairs, the main room is Susanâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s needlework studio, with a long worktable, bookshelves, and a fireplace. Bathrooms and utility space fill the remainder of the second floor. A second stairway leads from the studio to the Ash Lane entry.

East bedroom

Northwest bedroom

Southwest bedroom 53

The dining room (opposite) leads to a well-stocked wine cellar.

Sitting room just off the kitchen and dining room Opposite: Susanâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s studio space on the second floor

After more than a hundred years of benign neglect, which helped to preserve the integrity of the eighteenth-century house, 8 Ash Street has been carefully and beautifully restored, stabilized, and revitalized as a year-round home. Susan spends much of her time in her studio creating elaborately detailed embroidered narratives principally featuring Nantucket women, and has had exhibitions of her work at the Nantucket Historical Association and other venues. Blending extraordinary craftsmanship with an appreciation for the lives of island women past and present, her work commemorates and continues a tradition of independent women on Nantucket. Reflecting the tastes and interests of its various owners for almost two hundred and fifty years, the Benjamin Barney Jr. house retains its integrity inside and out. Like so many of the islandâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s substantial, dignified, and unadorned dwellings from the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, the house on Ash Street, like an old woman of stern countenance, does not reveal the warmth and beauty of her interior life.

Bill, Susan, and Sukey Boardman, 2007

Side entrance off driveway on Ash Lane

Terrace entrance off Ash Lane 60

Left: Back terrace Opposite: View from roofwalk 62

Timeline

1602 1620 1630–48 1641 1659 1660 1663

Bartholomew Gosnold sights Nantucket from the bark Concord Plimoth Plantation Taj Mahal, Agra, India Nantucket deeded to Mayhew and Son by Lord Sterling Nantucket deeded by Mayhew for thirty pounds and two beaver hats to the original purchasers First group of settlers arrive West end of island bought from the Indians Peter Foulger and other tradesmen move to the island; fishing and farming are main occupations 1673 Whaling commenced in boats from the shore 1675 Auld Lang Syne, 6 Broadway, Siasconset 1686 Jethro Coffin House (lean-to house) 1 Sunset Hill 1690 Christopher Starbuck House (lean-to house) 105 Main Street 1693 Nantucket transferred from New York to Massachusetts 1696–1708 St. Paul’s Cathedral, London, Sir Christopher Wren 1704 Society of Friends is formally organized on Nantucket 1719 White population, 721 1722 Rotch Counting House (Georgian style) Foot of Main Street 1722–24 Captain Richard Gardner 111 House (lean-to style) 34 West Chester Street 1723 Straight Wharf built Old North Church, Boston, William Price 1725 North Shore Meeting House, later moved to 62 Centre Street 1726 Thomas Starbuck House (typical Nantucket house) 11 Milk Street White population, 917 1730 Quanaty Bank dug away to make land from Union Street to the present shore 1746 Windmill, built by Nathan Wilbur, South Mill Street 1763–64 White population, 3,220 Indian population, 358 (Indian plague results in 222 deaths, leaving only 136 Indians) 1765 Shore whaling ceased North Shore Meeting House moved from site near No Bottom Pond to present site at 62 Centre Street (Old North Vestry of First Congregational Church) 1767 Silas Paddock House (gambrel-roof house) 18 India Street 1770–1800 Monticello, Charlottesville, Virginia, Thomas Jefferson 65

1774 1775–81 1784 1790

Population, 4,545 including one clergyman, two doctors, and one lawyer Approximately 1,600 Nantucketers lost their lives during the American Revolution Population, 4,269 Lighthouse erected at Great Point Hezekiah Swain House (typical Nantucket house) also known as Maria Mitchell House, 1 Vestal Street 1791 First whaling ship sails from Nantucket to the Pacific Ocean 1792 Capital of United States, Washington, D.C., Thornton, Bulfinch, Latrobe, Mills, and Walter 1800 Population, 5,617 1809 Joseph Starbuck House (federal style) 4 New Dollar Lane Second Congregational Meeting House, 11 Orange Street 1815–23 Royal Pavilion, Brighton, England, John Nash 1818 Pacific National Bank (federal style) 61 Main Street c.1820s The African Meeting House (Greek Revival style) 29 York Street 1821 Nantucket Inquirer begins publication 1822–23 Methodist Church (Greek Revival style) 2 Centre Street, modified in 1840 1829–34 Moors End, built for Jared Coffin (Federal style) 19 Pleasant Street 1830 State House, Boston, Bulfinch and Upjohn 1834 First Congregational Church (Gothic Revival style) 62 Centre Street Atheneum incorporated 1837 Capt. Levi Starbuck House (Greek Revival style) 14 Orange Street 1836–38 The Three Bricks (Federal-Greek Revival style) 93, 95, and 97 Main Street 1837 William H. Crosby House (Greek Revival style) 1 Pleasant Street 1838 Quaker Meeting House, 7 Fair Street Atheneum acquires Universalist Church building (1825) Lower India Street 1840 Population, 9,712 Baptist Church (Greek Revival style) 1 Summer Street 1841 Frederick Douglass speaks at the Atheneum 1844 William Hadwen Houses (Greek Revival style) 94 and 96 Main Street 1846 Great Fire, July 13 and 14

1847 E. F. Easton House (Easton-Joy House) (Gothic style) 4 North Water Street Maria Mitchell discovers the first telescopic comet, named after her Atheneum (Greek Revival style) rebuilt after Great Fire, Lower India Street 1849–61 Population declines due to California Gold Rush and the Civil War 1851 Crystal Palace, Great Exhibition, Hyde Park, London, J. Paxton 1852–54 Admiral Sir Isaac Coffin Lancasterian School (Greek Revival style) 4 Winter Street 1855 Abram Quary, reputed last Indian, dies 1865 Population, 4,748 Nantucket Inquirer and Nantucket Weekly Mirror merge to form Inquirer and Mirror 1872 Nantucket economy begins to revive with tourist trade Eliza Starbuck Barney House (Victorian style) 73 Main Street 1875 Population, 3,201 Innishail (Shingle style) 11 Cliff Road 1881 Nantucket Railroad constructed to Surfside 1882 Union Chapel, 18 New Street, Siasconset 1884 Nantucket Railroad extended to Siasconset 1888 Eiffel Tower, Paris, Gustav Eiffel 1889 Electric lighting introduced to Nantucket 1894 Nantucket Historical Association established The Mayflower (American Shingle style) Baxter Road, Siasconset 1897 St. Mary’s Church (Queen Anne style) Federal Street 1900 Siasconset Casino (Shingle style) New Street, Siasconset 1901 St. Paul’s Church (Richardsonian Romanesque) 16 Fair Street 1909 Robie House, Chicago, Frank Lloyd Wright 1916 First telephone transmission from Nantucket to mainland 1931 Empire State Building, New York City, Shreve, Lamb, and Harmon 1955 Historic District Commission created 1957 Sydney Opera House, Sydney, Australia, Jorn Utzon 1964 Sherburne Associates formed 1966 Island of Nantucket designated a National Historic Landmark 1984 Nantucket Island Land Bank established 1997 Nantucket Preservation Trust established 67

Glossary of Terms

ANTHEMION: pattern of honeysuckle or palm leaves in a radiating cluster, used as a motif in Greek art APPURTENANCE: a minor property, right, or privilege belonging to another more important property, and passing in possession with it BAY: a segment of a structure BAY WINDOW: a window structure projecting beyond a wall’s outside surface BEAM: a horizontal structural support CAPITAL: the top piece of a column or pilaster CASEMENT: a window that swings open CHIMNEY WITHES: masonry projecting from main chimney mass above the roof CORNICE: projecting top element of an interior or exterior wall DOOR SURROUND: structural and decorative elements associated with an entry DORMER: a roofed, vertically framed element with a window, located on a slanting roof ENTABLATURE: the full horizontal crowning of an architectural order (architrave, frieze, and cornice) FAÇADE: the front, or face, of a structure FIREBOX: combustion chamber of a heating unit HALF-HOUSE: early house with rooms on only one side of the chimney HALL: the main, or great room, in an early house; in a later house, the main passageway, with stairs HOMESTEAD: the Massachusetts General Laws in 1851 defined homestead as property occupied as a residence by a family. Homesteads were exempt from certain taxes and from seizure by creditors. Previous to 1851 the general meaning of the term was that of family residence KEEP: round brick storage area usually located under the kitchen LATCH: device for fastening a door consisting of a moveable bar attached to the door that falls into a hook or catch on the frame of the door LUNETTE: a half-moon window, or fan MESSUAGE: the portion of land intended to be occupied, or actually occupied, as a site for a dwelling house and its appurtenances MUNTIN: thin lead or wood piece that frames each pane of glass MORTGAGE BUTTON: customary on Nantucket — a round ivory disk placed prominently on the newel post after the final mortgage payment NEWEL POST: the upright support at the base or head of a stair railing PANE: a piece of glass, also called a light 69

Detail of wine cellar mural

PANELING: a flat surface surrounded by a border or frame of wood PILASTER: rectangular columns projecting slightly from a wall, with base, shaft, and capital PLASTER: pasty material used for covering walls and ceilings, historically composed of a mixture of lime, sand, hair, or shells, and water PLINTH: square block at the base of a column PORCH: early term for front hall and stair, later referred to as rear kitchen area PORTICO: a classic porch POST: an upright support PROPRIETOR: one of the original purchasers of the island of Nantucket. The term later came to mean an owner of shares in the common lands ROD: a measure of length (16.5 feet) and a measure of area. In most local deeds of the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries the total land area of a property is given in rods ROOF HATCH: opening in the roof providing access to the chimney, for cleaning or in case of fire ROOF WALK: A platform with a railing on the roof ridge SALTBOX: A lean-to house; tall in front with long roof sloping down to low eaves SASH: window element that may be raised and lowered SHEEP COMMON: pasturage for one sheep on the common and undivided land. One sheep common equaled 1/19,440 of the common land, or one acre. Eight sheep commons equaled one cow common SIDELIGHTS: windows on either side of a door or window SILL: the bottom element of a house, door, or window frame SPLASHBOARD: area at the base of a wall stained a dark tone to mitigate discoloration from dirt and use STOOP: Uncovered entry steps and platform TENEMENT: a portion of a house tenanted as a separate dwelling, or a large house constructed or adapted to be let in portions to a number of tenants TIMBER FRAME: First settlersâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; construction method, using principal post-and-beam Âmembers built around a massive chimney with walls formed by filling spaces between members with plaster TRANSOM LIGHTS: small windows over a door or another window TRANSVERSE HALL: passage that extends from front to back VOLUTE: a spiral or scroll form, as seen on an Ionic capital YEOMAN: a man of respectable standing holding a small landed estate, especially one who cultivates his own land 71

Illustrations

p. 1 courtesy of the Nantucket Historical Association, P15827: Ash Lane, c. 1915. p. 2 Map Showing Early Nantucket Town Lot Layouts and Share Sites, 1673–1744. Clay Lancaster, Nantucket in the Nineteenth Century (New York: Dover, 1979) p. xvii. p. 4 courtesy of the Nantucket Historical Association, GPN1813: Ash Street, c. 1890s p. 5 Botanical illustration of green ash leaf by Charles Sprague Sargent, from website http://forestry.about.com/od/treeidentification/ig/Common-Trees-United-States. p. 5 courtesy of the Nantucket Historical Association, MS1000.3.4.5: William Coffin’s Map of the Town of Nantucket, 1833. p. 6 Sketch of Benjamin Barney Jr. house by Catherine Garland, collection of Susan and Bill Boardman. p. 8 courtesy of the Nantucket Historical Association,P4442: Replica of a cooper’s shop in the NHA’s Whaling Museum, c. 1960, by Bill Haddon. p. 9 courtesy of the Nantucket Historical Association, P18645: 1 Liberty Street, 1986, by Flint Ranney. p. 10 courtesy of the Nantucket Historical Association, p. 11 courtesy of the Nantucket Historical Association, PH14-59: 43 Centre Street, c. 1890s. p. 13 Benjamin Barney Jr.’s will, 1783: NP Book 4, p. 408. p. 15 Drawings of 105 Main Street, 12 Liberty Street, and 18 India Street, from Historic American Buildings Survey. p. 17 Front staircase, Betsy Tyler, 2008. p. 18 courtesy of the Nantucket Historical Association, MS1000.4.3.11: Map of That Section of the Town of Nantucket, Which Was Destroyed by Fire on the Night of the 13th July, 1846, by S. H. Jenks Jr. p. 20 Door hardware, Betsy Tyler, 2008. pp. 22–4 Illustrations from The Captive Boy in Terra Del Fuego (New York: Carlton & Lanahan, 1867). p. 26 courtesy of the Nantucket Historical Association, MS332.2.11: Thomas Edward Coffin and Sons. p. 26 courtesy of the Nantucket Historical Association, MS332.2.12: Thomas Edward Coffin. p. 27 Advertisement from the I&M, January 14, 1857. p. 29 courtesy of the Nantucket Historical Association, GPN1810: Ash Lane, c. 1880s. p. 29 courtesy of the Nantucket Historical Association, F986: Ash Street, c. 1900s. p. 31 courtesy of the Nantucket Historical Association, GPN1814: Ash Street, c. 1890s pp. 32–3 Sanborn Insurance Company Maps. p. 34 courtesy of the Nantucket Historical Association, P1957: Alvin E. Paddack. p. 35 courtesy of the Nantucket Historical Association, P2048: looking west on Ash Street. p. 37 courtesy of the Nantucket Historical Association, PC-Ash-6: color postcard of Ash Street by H. S. Wyer, c. 1910s. p. 37 courtesy of the Nantucket Historical Association, PC-Ash-7: color postcard of Ash Lane, c. 1920s. p. 38 courtesy of the Nantucket Historical Association, PC-Ash-4: Color Postcard of 8 Ash Street, c. 1920s. 73

Detail of hall mural 74

p. 39 pp.40–41 p. 42 p. 42 p. 43 p. 43 p. 44 p. 44 p. 45 p. 45 p. 46 p. 47 p. 48 p. 49 p. 50 p. 51 p. 52 p. 53 p. 54 p. 55 p. 56 p. 57 p. 58 p. 59 p. 60 p. 61 p. 62 p. 63 p. 70 p. 74 p. 86

Photos of Mimi Rutter, courtesy of Lynn Petrash. Painting of Ash Street houses by J. B. Reid, courtesy of Bill and Susan Boardman. courtesy of the Nantucket Historical Association, P15288: 8 Ash Street, 1922. courtesy of the Nantucket Historical Association, P2810: rear of 8 Ash Street, 1922. courtesy of the Nantucket Historical Association, P13270: 8 Ash Street, 1990. courtesy of the Nantucket Historical Association, P13271: rear view of 8 Ash Street, 1990. Detail of Sanborn Insurance Company Map, 1949. courtesy of the Nantucket Historical Association, P13318: 8 Ash Street, c. 1950s. Bill and Susan Boardman on front steps of 8 Ash, courtesy of Bill and Susan Boardman. 8 Ash Street, courtesy of Bill and Susan Boardman. courtesy of the Nantucket Historical Association, P12607: Rooftop view, 1987. Hooked rug, courtesy of Bill and Susan Boardman. Northwest parlor, Betsy Tyler, 2008. Northeast parlor, Betsy Tyler, 2008. Mural in northeast parlor, Betsy Tyler, 2008. Mural in second floor hall, Betsy Tyler, 2008. Attic mural details, Betsy Tyler, 2008. Bedroom views, Betsy Tyler, 2008. Dining room, Betsy Tyler, 2008. Wine cellar, Betsy Tyler, 2008 Sitting room, Betsy Tyler, 2008. Studio, Betsy Tyler, 2008. Front façade, Betsy Tyler, 2008. Bill, Susan, and Sukey Boardman, 2007, courtesy of Bill and Susan Boardman Views from Ash Lane, Betsy Tyler, 2008. Garden retreat, Betsy Tyler, 2008. Back terrace, Betsy Tyler, 2008. View from roof walk, Betsy Tyler, 2008. Detail of wine cellar mural, Betsy Tyler, 2008. Detail of hall mural, Betsy Tyler, 2008 Hong Kong panel; northeast parlor mural, Betsy Tyler, 2008

Notes and Sources

I&M : Inquirer and Mirror

MS: Manuscript

Abbreviations

NHARL: Nantucket Historical Association Research Library NRD: Nantucket Registry of Deeds

NP: Nantucket Probate

Ash Street and Ash Lane Neighborhood

Isaac Coffin’s 1799 street list is reprinted and annotated by Henry Barnard Worth in Nantucket Lands and Land Owners (Bowie, MD: Heritage Books Inc., 1992, facsimile reprint, previously published: NHA Bulletin, vol. 2, nos. 1–7, 1901–13), pp. 240–82. Clay Lancaster, Nantucket in the Nineteenth Century (New York: Dover, 1979), p. xvii. Mabel Agnes Rice mentions Bicknell’s list of ash trees in Trees and Shrubs of Nantucket (Nantucket: Maria Mitchell Association., 1946), p. 27.

Barney

Genealogical data for the Barney family and all other eighteenth- and nineteenth-century families associated with 8 Ash Street can be found in the following sources: the Eliza Starbuck Barney Genealogical Record, in a computer database available at the NHA and on its Web site, www.nha.org; Vital Records of Nantucket, Massachusetts, to theYear 1850 (Boston: NEHGS, 1925); and MassachusettsVital Records, 1841–1910, from Original Records held by the Massachusetts Archives. Online database: NewEnglandAncestors.org, New England Historic Genealogical Society, 2004. For Barney family details, see Genealogy of the Barney Family in America by Eugene Dimon Preston (Springfield, VA: Barney Family Historical Association, 1990). Leach, Robert J., Quaker Nantucket (Nantucket: Mill Hill Press, 1997). NRD Book 4, p. 71: Jethro Starbuck to Benjamin and Lydia Barney, 1726/27. Historic American Buildings Survey, 1 Liberty Street, in NHARL. NP Book 3, pp. 378–79: Benjamin Barney’s will, 1778. NP Book 3, pp. 405–06: Benjamin Barney’s estate inventory, 1785. NRD Book 7, p. 21: division of property among Sarah Barney, Mary Macy, Samuel and Abigail Starbuck, Benjamin Barney Jr., William and Hepzibah Coffin, William and Elizabeth Rotch, and Dorcas Barney, 1765. NRD Book 6, p. 64: Silvanus Allen to Silvanus and Rachel Worth, 1758. NRD Book 14, p. 155: Hepzibah Coffin to Benjamin Barney Jr., 1795. NRD Book 37, p. 480: William R. Easton to Reuben Baxter, 1838. “Occupation and Social Categories” are listed in Charles H. and Mary Grace Carpenter’s The Decorative Arts and Crafts of Nantucket (New York: Dodd, Mead & Company, 1987), pp. 225–26. 77

NRD Book 7, p. 416: Jonathan Barney to Benjamin Barney Jr., 1775. NRD Book 9, p. 506: William Mitchell to Benjamin Barney Jr., 1779. Edouard Stackpole. Nantucket in the American Revolution (NHA, 1976), p. 45. NP Book 4, p. 408: Benjamin Barney Jr.’s will, 1783. Clay Lancaster. The Architecture of Historic Nantucket (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1972). Ann Huppert’s report, dated April 1, 1990, is in the NHARL subject file “Ash Street.”

Jones

See Title Trail for all deeds relating to the property at 8 Ash Street. See “Business People of Nantucket Prior to the Fire of 1846” in One HundredYears on Nantucket (Inquirer and Mirror, 1921).

Coffin

Phebe Ann Hanaford’s book about Thomas Coffin’s misadventure was published in New York by Carlton & Lanahan, 1867. For statistics of the whaling industry, see Judith Navas Lund’s Whaling Masters andWhalingVoyages Sailing from American Ports (New Bedford Whaling Museum, et al., 2001) and Alexander Starbuck’s History of the AmericanWhale Fishery (Secaucus, NJ: Castle Books, 1989; originally published 1878). Alexander H. Coffin’s letter dated March 23, 1854, is in NHARL MS 15/ folder 115. See also NHARL MS 332, the Thomas Edward Coffin Papers, which include an obituary of Thomas that provides biographical details, and newspaper clippings from 1855. Edouard Stackpole wrote about the wreck of the Manchester in HN, October 1982 “The Loss of the Ship ‘Manchester,’ of Nantucket, off Cape Horn.”

Meiggs

NRD Book 40, p. 425: James Alley to Asa Meiggs, house on Union Street, 1840. NRD Book 48, p. 224: Asa Meiggs, insolvent debtor, 1849. Population statistics are from the Town Clerk’s Office, in NHARL subject file “Population.”

Paddack

Alternate spelling of the surname Paddock/Paddack occurs frequently in town records and elsewhere; it is the same family. The obituary notice of Alvin E. Paddack is in the I&M April 4, 1953. 78

Following are the Nantucket directories: The First Resident and Business Directory of Nantucket, Edgartown, Cottage City, andVineyard Haven. (Boston: T.W. Ripley, 1897). The Resident and Business Directory of Nantucket 1909. (Boston: Boston Suburban Book Co., 1909). The Resident & Business Directory of Nantucket 1914. (Boston: Union Publishing Co., 1914). The Nantucket Directory 1919. (Boston: Union Publishing Co., 1919). Lothrop’s Nantucket Massachusetts Blue Book and Directory 1927. Boston: Union Publishing Co., 1927. The NHARL has U. S. Census records for Nantucket, 1790–1930. The town of Nantucket published “Valuation and Tax Lists” in 1896, 1902, 1911, 1916, and 1922.

Rutter

Thanks to grandchildren of Mildred H. Rutter and John Wood Rutter—Lynn Rutter Petrash (with contribution from her husband, John Petrash); Jonathan Wood (Woody) Rutter; Gail Nickerson Johnson; Judy Warriner Walker; and Tucker Warriner Smith for a conversation about their family and the house at 8 Ash Street. See “A Birdcage Table” in Blue Balliett’s Nantucket Hauntings:Twenty-One Firsthand Accounts with the Supernatural (Camden, ME: Downeast Books, 1990) for tales of the resident ghost.

Boardman

Thanks to Susan Boardman for initiating the House History Program of the Nantucket Preservation Trust, and to Bill Boardman for helping to keep the present project a secret.

Deed Trail

8 Ash Street

: Benjamin Barney Jr., c. 1765

BOOK 7/PAGE 21 1765 Division among Sarah Barney, Mary Macy, Samuel and Abigail Starbuck, Benjamin Barney Jr., William and Hepzibah Coffin, William and Elizabeth Rotch, and Dorcas Barney Benjamin Barney junior shall have to him his heirs and assigns forever in severalty a piece of land containing sixteen square rods and two thirds near the dwelling house of Silvanus Worth measuring four rods and nine feet in length and bounded on the east by the said Worth’s land BOOK 14/PAGE 155 1795 Elisha Folger and Hepzibah his wife; Jacob Coffin; Albert Coffin; James Barker and Sarah his wife; Griffin Coffin, to Benjamin Barney A certain tract of land in Nantucket aforesaid which derived to us from our mother Hepzibah Coffin deceased adjoining the land whereon the dwelling house of said Barney now stands BOOK 32/PAGES 185–86 1832 Peter Barney, Mathew Barney, and Daniel Barney to George M. Jones, blacksmith A certain tract of land situated in said Nantucket and bounded as follows: on the North by Ash Street, on the East by land of the heir of Gideon Worth deceased, on the South by Ash Lane, and on the West by land of the heirs of George Folger deceased, containing twenty rods of land, more or less, together with the dwelling house, out houses and fences thereon standing. . . . and is the same premises which ascended to us from our late father Benjamin Barney deceased BOOK 47/PAGE 92 1847 George M. Jones, trader, to Alexander H. Coffin, yeoman A certain tract of land with a dwelling house and other buildings thereon standing bounded as follows, viz on the South by Ash Lane, on the West by land formerly owned by George Folger, on the North by Ash Street, and on the East by a line through the center of the well and running parallel with the west line of land formerly owned by Gideon Worth. BOOK 48/PAGES 73–4 1848 George M. Jones, trader, to Alexander H. Coffin, master mariner Parcel 2: A certain parcel of land situate on Ash Street in said Nantucket, bounded north by said Street; East by land of Joseph Worth, South by Ash Lane and West by land heretofore conveyed by me to said Alexander H. Coffin Note: this deed conveys several other parcels to Coffin, and repeats and reconfirms the transaction recorded in Book 47, page 92. 81

BOOK 53/PAGES 298–300 1857 Job Coleman, guardian of Thomas E. Coffin and Louisa W. Coffin, minor children of Alexander H. Coffin, to Asa Meiggs, ship carpenter Two undivided thirds of a certain tract of land and of the dwelling house and other buildings standing thereon, situated on Ash Street, in said Nantucket, and bounded on the whole as follows: on the North by Ash Street, on the East by homestead of Joseph T. Worth, on the South by Ash Lane, and on the West by land formerly of Geo. Folger BOOK 53/PAGES 300–01 1857 Thaddeus W. Coffin, by my attorney Joseph B. Swain, to Asa Meiggs, ship carpenter One undivided third of a certain tract of land and of the dwelling house and other buildings standing thereon, situated on Ash Streeet, in said Nantucket, and bounded on the whole as follows: on the north by Ash Street, on the East by homestead of Joseph T. Worth, on the South by Ash Lane, and on the West by land formerly of George Folger. My title came to me by inheritance from my said father Alexander H. Coffin BOOK 56/PAGES 548–49 1862 Asa Meiggs to Freeman E. Adams A certain tract of land situated in said Nantucket together with the dwelling house and other buildings standing thereon, and abounded as follows: on the North by Ash Street, on the East by land of Joseph T. Worth, on the South by Ash Lane and on the West by land now occupied by Nabby Drew. The same is the estate which I purchased of Alexander H. Coffin BOOK 57/PAGE 285 1863 Freeman E. Adams to Robert F. Gardner A certain tract of land situated in said Nantucket, with the dwelling house and other buildings thereon standing, and bounded as follows: on the North by Ash Street, on the East by land of the estate of Joseph T. Worth, on the South by Ash Lane, and on the West by land occupied by Nabby Drew. Said premises were advertised for three successive weeks, in the Nantucket Inquirer, to be sold at public auction, and at said auction sale the said Robert F. Gardner was the highest bidder BOOK 57/PAGES 301–02 1863 Robert F. Gardner to Paul Paddack A certain tract of land situated in said Nantucket, with the dwelling house and other buildings thereon standing and bounded as follows: on the North by Ash Street, on the East by land of the estate of Joseph T. Worth, on the South by Ash Lane and on the West by land occupied by Nabby Drew

BOOK 76/PAGES 388â&#x20AC;&#x201C;89 1892 Edgar F. Paddack, Charles W. Paddock, Paul Paddock Jr., Arthur C. Paddock, and Alvin E. Paddock to Emily M. Paddock, our mother All our right, title, and interest in and to all the land together with all the buildings and structures of every name and nature, situated in said Nantucket, owned by us by inheritance from our father Paul Paddock late of said Nantucket, deceased intestate BOOK 98/PAGE 378 1912 Emily M. Paddock, widow of Paul Paddock, to my son Edgar F. Paddock A certain tract of land with the dwelling house and all other buildings thereon situated in said Nantucket, bounded North by Ash Street, East by land of Hannah DeMott, formerly of Amelia R. Winslow, South by Ash Lane, and West by land of Margaret L. B. Chatfield, formerly of Elinore Cabot. Containing 5760 sq. ft. more or less BOOK 98/PAGES 397â&#x20AC;&#x201C;98 1920 Clara E. Paddock, widow of Edgar F. Paddock, of Blanchester, Ohio, to Alvin E. Paddock The land in said Nantucket with the dwelling house and all other buildings thereon, bounded North by Ash Street, West by land of John R. Killen, formerly of Amelia R. Winslow; South by Ash Lane, and West by land of Margaret L. B. Chatfield, formerly of Elinore Cabot BOOK 100/PAGE 307 1922 Alvin E. Paddock to Joseph Wood Rutter of Irvington, New York The land in said Nantucket with the dwelling house and all other buildings thereon, bounded North by Ash Street, West by land of John R. Killen, formerly of Amelia R. Winslow; South by Ash Lane, and West by land of Margaret L. B. Chatfield, formerly of Elinore Cabot. Containing 5760 sq. ft. more or less BOOK 334/PAGE 27 1989 Ruth Rutter Warriner, executrix of the estate of Mildred H. Rutter, late of Easton in Talbot County, Maryland, deceased to William J. Boardman II and Susan R. Boardman That certain parcel of land, together with the buildings thereon, located in Nantucket, Nantucket County, Massachusetts, now known and numbered as 8 Ash Street

Hong Kong panel; northeast parlor mural

Acknowledgments With special thanks to

Susan Boardman, Director Emerita of the Nantucket Preservation Trust, for her inspiration in intiating the House History Program and her dedication to its ongoing success. Elizabeth Oldham, Nantucket Historical Association Library Research Associate, for her keen eye in the editing of this book. Marie Henke, Nantucket Historical Association Photo Archivist, for her assistance with historic images and maps. and Bill Boardman for keeping a secret.

Nantucket Preservation Trust Advocates, Educates, and Celebrates the Preservation of Nantucket’s Historic Architecture

his comprehensive history is an important contribution to the island’s architectural record. Documentation is one of the ways the Nantucket Preservation Trust celebrates the more than 2,400 historic homes, farms, and workplaces that contributed to the island’s designation as a National Historic Landmark in 1966. By providing owners of historic houses, island residents, schoolchildren, and visitors a broad spectrum of programs and projects, we encourage the preservation of irreplaceable structures, architectural features, and cultural landscapes. Lectures, walking tours, house markers, special events, and publications—including the house histories and neighborhood histories— define our unique work on Nantucket. We hope you enjoy the history of this house, its past owners, and its place in Nantucket’s remarkable architectural heritage.