Wrecked on the Feejees and Other Stories

THE NANTUCKET HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION Dorothy Slover President David H. Wood First Vice President

Peter W. Nash Second Vice President

Alan F. Atwood Treasurer

Virginia S. Heard Clerk David H. Wood Acting Executive Director BOARD OF TRUSTEES William A. Hance Julius Jensen III Arie L. Kopelman L. Dennis Kozlowski Jane Lamb Carolyn MacKenzie Albert L. Manning, Jr.

Sarah J. Baker Patricia M. Bridier Laurie Champion Prudence S. Crozier John H. Davis Alice F. Emerson Thomas C. Gosnell Barbara Hajim

Bruce D. Miller Aileen M. Newquist Steven M. Rales Arthur I. Reade, Jr. Alfred Sanford Richard F. Tucker Marcia Welch Robert A. Young

ADVISORY BOARD Nina Hellman Elizabeth Husted Elizabeth Jacobsen Francis D. Lethbridge Reginald Levine Katherine S. Lodge Sharon Lorenzo Patricia Loring

Walter Beinecke, Jr. Joan Brecker Patricia Butler Helen Winslow Chase Michael deLeo Lyndon Dupuis Martha Groetzinger Dorrit D.P. Gutterson

William B. Macomber Paul Madden Robert F. Mooney Jane C. Richmond Nancy J. Sevrens Scott M. Stearns, Jr. John S. Winter Mary-Elizabeth Young

RESEARCH FELLOWS Dr. Elizabeth Little

Nathaniel Philbrick

Dr. Patty Jo S. Rice

Renny A. Stackpole

EDITORIAL COMMITTEE Mary H. Beman Susan F. Beegel Richard L. Brecker

Nathaniel Philbrick Sally Seidman David H. Wood

Thomas B. Congdon, Jr. Charlotte Louisa Maison Robert F. Mooney Elizabeth Oldham PROPERTIES OF THE NHA

Oldest House Hadwen House Macy-Christian House Robert Wyer House Tbomas Macy House 1800 House Greater Light Old Mill Old Gaol

Old Town Building Thomas Macy Warehouse Fire Hose Cart House Quaker Meeting House Nantucket Whaling Museum Fair Street Museum Peter Foulger Museum Museum Shop

Cecil Barron Jensen

Bartholomew Gosnold Center Folger-Franklin Memorial Fountain, Boulder, and Bench Settlers Burial Ground Tristram Coffin Homestead Monument Little Gallery Eleanor Ham Pony Field Mill Hill Elizabeth Oldham

EDITOR

COPY EDITOR

Helen Winslow Chase

Claire O'Keeffe

HISTORIAN

ART DIRECTOR

Historic Nantucket welcomes articles on any aspect of Nantucket history. Original research, first-hand accounts, reminiscences of island experiences, historic logs, letters, and photographs are examples of materials of interest to our readers. © 1999 by Nantucket Historical Association Historic Nantucket (ISSN 0439-2248) is published quarterly by the Nantucket Historical Association, 2 Whaler's Lane, Nantucket, MA 02554.

Second-class postage paid at South Yarmouth, MA and additional entry offices.

Postmaster: Send address changes to Historic Nantucket Box 1016 • Nantucket, MA 02554-1016 • (508) 228-1894; fax:(508) 228-5618 • infonha@capecod.net For a map of our walking tour and historic sites: http://www.pointinfinity.com/mapandlegend

NANTUCKB VOLUME48, N0.4

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Nantucket Jetties

17

President's Letter

by Matt Byrne

by Dorothy Slover

5 William Cary (1804-1883)

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Collecting for the Future: A Call/or Twentieth-Century Materials

The Loss of the Oeno

by Joseph Theroux

by Betsy Lowenstein and Aimee E. Newell

10

The Book of Books: Bible~-

in the Collection of the Nantucket Historical Association

21

by Betsy Lowenstein

14

I

Book Section The Admiral's Academy: Nantucket Island's Historic Coffin School

by Margaret Moore Booker Review by Elizabeth Oldham

Sally Takes the Smallpox

22

by Leslie W. Ottinger

NHANews

On the cover:

On the Upper Rewa River, a one-time home o/Wzlliam Cary. Etching/rom At Home in Fiji, by C. F. Gordon Cumming, published

by Wzlliam Blackwood and Sons, Edinburgh and London, 1881.

F R 0

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M

ALL HAS COME TO NANTUCKET.

I love this time of year. I love the rhythm of nature as it slows down in preparation for winter. I love the rhythm of Nantucket as it slows down.

But I find I also miss the pace of the summer - when Nantucket is bursting with energy and filled \vith people who treasure Nantucket for its history, its open spaces, and its intrinsic beauty. I feel fortunate to have Nantucket in my life. I frequently reflect on the fact that we are caretakers of the island for our moment in time.

We don't own Nantucket. Nantucket is owned by its history.

I have the same concerns that we all share - overcrowding, overbuilding, too many cars. But when the peace of fall comes we have a chance to put these concerns into a bigger picture. We do have growth. It is a fact of our booming economy, I HISTORI C

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PRESIDENT

just as it was at the height of whaling. We I cannot stop growth, but we can try to guide it. I think Nantucket does a fantastic job of guiding growth; if you compare our island to other places that are experiencing the same stresses, Nantucket does a brilliant job. We have growth, but we have very little real change. We have more, but it is more of the same. We have more houses, but they look very much like what was already here -and soon blend in. We follow, to a great degree, the historical models that date back to the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.

Some houses are larger, but I often imagine what the houses on Main Street, the houses we so respect and admire, must have seemed like to the community of that period. More and more land is in conservation - an amazing achievement in a climate of rapid growth. Houses on the island, for the most part, are clustered - a time-honored

concept - and open spaces are vast. Some areas, such as town, are densely settled and an interesting contrast to the moors, wetlands, and beaches.

Nantucket is unique, unlike any place I have ever been. It has its own rhythm, its own colors, its own nature, and a historic ambience we are all privileged to inhabit.

Our job, the job of the Nantucket Historical Association, is to preserve and protect this history in the built environment, in docwnents, in artifacts. We join with other organizations on Nantucket that protect the open land, the written history, the oral history, and provide for our physical well-being to work together to make the island the very best it can be. We could look at the cup as half empty, but I see it as half

full.

- Dorothy Slover FALL

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Wtlliam Cary ( 1804-1883) The Loss of the Oeno by Joseph Theroux

An early-nineteenth-century boarding house sign from the NHA collections.

Gift ofMary E. Long.

Photograph by Jeffreys Allen.

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Cary was born on Nantucket on April25, 1804, the son of Edward and Abigail Russell Cary. He grew up on the island as the whale fish ery grew, and watched ships fitted out at the little harbor for the long voyages to the Pacific. He was also familiar with the inhabitants of the Pacific islands, even with some words. On one house near Pleasant Street that catered to Pacific islanders, in a section of town called "New Guinea," a sign was lettered "KANAKAS ONLY." He also knew the fishing village at Siasconset where there were many shacks used by men who hauled in their catches of fluke and flounder. Nantucket boys played there, pretending to fight Indians, later experimented with smoking pipes of tobacco and drinking rum . One of his friends was David Whippey (also spelled Whippy), who left Nantucket in 1821 on the whaleship Francis.

He was only sixteen, and his brother was senior mate.

Three years later David had not returned.

When Cary was nineteen years old, he signed aboard one of Aaron Mitchell's whalers , the Oeno, Captain Samuel Riddell of Nantucket. ("Oeno" is the Greek word for wine; it is also an islet off the coast of Pitcairn Island.) He was one of three boatsteerers, also called harpooners. A Kanaka from "New Guinea" also signed on, Henry Attooi (probably Akui) of Hawaii. Because of the sandbar that had built up at the entrance to the harbor, the ship had to be loaded at nearby Martha's Vineyard. They departed the Vineyard on November 4, 1824, and by the tin1e they had reached New Zealand's Bay oflslands, on March 20, 1825, they had killed eight I had prompted him to write down his story. Then he left whales and stowed 150 barrels of oil. the island again, perhaps afraid that there was too much But their luck seemed to tum there. Two of the crew detail in the written account. It was published in the deserted and were replaced with two white men and a Nantucket Journal in 1887 , and was the first time Maori boy, whose name is unknown. They departed islanders had read exactly what had transpired in Fiji so New Zealand on April 7 and passed Pylstaat Island many years before. But Cary was dead by the time the (Ata Island, south of the Tonga group) on the 13th. manuscript was found.

The following day they struck a reef on what turned out 1885, IN THE 'SCONSET SECTION OF Nantucket, off the coast of Massachusetts, a manuscript was discovered in an abandoned fish-house. It was a South Sea tale of shipwreck, massacre, cannibalism ... and it was not written by Stevenson or Louis Becke. It was written by a Nantucketer and it was true. His name was William Cary, boatsteerer of the whaleship Oeno. Many Nantucketers had been suspicious of him and his first sketchy accounts of the disaster. Perhaps it was this that

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to be Turtle Island (now Vatoa, in the southern Lau group of Fiji). The Oeno was soon swamped and the crew of twenty-one escaped in the whaleboats. They rowed across the lagoon and spied a figure waving at them "in a friendly manner." As they neared the beach, a crowd gathered and appeared to be armed. But what the crew imagined to be spears were actually stalks of sugar cane, with which the Fijians sought to trade.

Cary described the natives as tall, handsome, and well built - some brown, others darker. They wore only a bark cloth wraparound, men as well as women. To Nantucketers, whose wives rep01tedly wore their bonnets to bed, this nakedness must have been a revelation. Indeed, the people were friendly, shared their food and song for nearly two weeks.

The tastiest dish Cary calls "tarrow packarlolo," which must be taro and vakalolo, a coconut-milk pudding.

The whalers were given mats and a "bore " (bure, house) to sleep in.

Captain Riddell decided to jury-rig masts and sails on the whaleboats and make for Tonga, but on the day that they planned to outfit the boats, a fleet of twenty native canoes arrived on the beach with eighty men from the isle of Ono, to the south. TI1ey were painted red and black, armed with clubs and spears. They approached and there was some atten1pt at communication, but the warriors gave up and returned to their vessels. For two days the Ono warriors treated the whalers rudely, rifling their possessions and even lifting caps off their heads, apparently trying to provoke them.

Riddle advised against violence and the men endured the treatment. Cary predicted an attack, and one night ran off to the nearby bush and slept in a cave.

Cary returned to the village in the morning to find that a local had left a collection of spears in their bure to assist them. Anotl1er arrived witl1 a woebegone face, as though to warn them of impending attack. When noises were heard, Cary took off across the island. H e was followed by the Hawaiian, Henry Attooi, who evenrually gave up and rerurned to the village.

Upon reaching the other side of the island - about half a mile distant - Cary found another cave and hid there throughout the night. In the morning he returned to the now-deserted beach and found two crewmen buried in the sand. In one of the whaleboats he found li! STOR I C

NANTUCKET

some raisins and then ate a coconut.

He lived in the cave for two days.

Eventually hunger forced him to try his luck with the locals, who seemed friendly. He found some women fishing in the shallows. They eyed him for a moment and then ran off to the village. Cary panicked and retreated to the safety of hi s

Fijian weapons, from left to n?,ht: Throwing club, or "Ula." Gift of Edward F. Sanderson.

Pandanus war club; head of club resembles the fruit of the pandanus tree. Anonymous gift.

Gunstock or lipped club.

Gift ofthe Trustees of the Atheneum.

Photographs by JeffreyS Allen.

cave.

When he heard a group of men outside th e mouth of the cave, he went out to meet them, expecting to be killed. They were armed with knives and hatchets. H e sat on the ground submissively and awaited the blows . An old chief made Cary understand that he was "now his son." Cary also reali ze d th at the whole crew of the Oeno had been massacred.

And consumed.

The men of Ono returned and spoke with the old chief. Cary feared they would take him away, though they soon departed. But a week later two large canoes arrived from "Lahcameber." (The island of Lakeba , pronounced "lakemba "; but any New Englander would recognize the Kennedy-esque inflection , as in "It would not be a good idear to invade Cuber ... ") The chief assured Cary that the Lakeba men liked white men . One of the visitors included a Friend ly Islands or "Tongataboo" chief who FALL

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spoke English.

He chatted happily with Cary.

They assured the boy they would protect him.

The new warriors proceeded to ransack the village. Two days later they returned tn their canoes, taking Cary with them to Ono island.

Upon arrival they feasted on fish, pork, and fowl while being entertained by Samoan and Tongan dancers.

A boxing match was staged, with the fighters' hands bound in "tappa" cloth. The king, who had taken a liking to Cary, invited him to bathe in his private freshwater pool, and witness the shaking trances of his priest, the "umbaty" (bete; the Fijian b is pronounced mb).

They were soon visited by people from Ambow (Bau), a tiny island off the coast of the main island of Fiji, Viti Levu. The group included half a dozen mutineers from Manila and a man from the Ladrone Islands. Cary and his hosts decided to visit Ambow.

They sailed northwest toward Engow (Gau) then to Motosick (Moturiki) where they arrived in the afternoon. While there, a canoe arrived from Ambow. A white man stepped out and walked up to Cary, smiling.

"Don't you know David Whippey?" he asked.

Cary nodded. "Yes. I formerly knew him. He was a townsman of mine and an old playmate. " "Well," said the man, "I am that David Whippey."

Cary wrote that his "joy was unbounded" at discovering his old friend. It had been a year now since Cary had seen a white man. They soon returned to their host's home, where Whippey told of how he had served on various ships over the last few years, and how he had left the last ship some thirteen months before. He had "gone native," dressed like the Fijians, and was happy to stay, happy with the climate and customs. Whippey was soon off to Ovalau

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in search of turtle shell for his chief.

Cary, though he longed to reach home, also was becoming accustomed to life in the island group. As a favored one of the chiefs, and thus of their class, he had his pick of any woman he fancied.

They also valued him for his ability to shoot a musket, as well as disassemble, clean, oil, and reassemble it. He was a good shot in taking down wildfowl and also in battle with neighboring islands and villages.

Cary stayed at Ambow for six or seven months, and never refused to follow customs, whether it was in cuisine or helping to hunt or farm. To plant yan1s or "tarrow," the men would break up the soil and the women would plant. He also assisted his hosts in battle and - reading between the lines - the after-battle feasts. "The prisoners," he noted, "they eat." After one battle, they captured "five or six female prisoners and some of the dead bodies for a cannibal feast after we go home." On one occasion he fought alongside David Whippey, just as they had fought imaginary Indians back on Nantucket.

Later they were visited b y people from Raver (Rewa). Cary thought them "the finest looking and most intelligent I had ever seen." He asked for permission to visit tl1em. He canoed half a dozen miles up the Rewa River and mere was welcomed by the local chief. "He seemed much pleased and told me to take the choices of I his houses of which he had three. I took one which was occupied by one of his wives (he had five) and lived there very comfortably, the chiefs wife treating me wim great kindness."

He observed many of their religious practices, styles of warfare, and fort-building. He noted that warfare was one of their most popular pastimes. And when they I were not fighting they were preparing for war, making clubs, spears, bows, and arrows, etc. But he also enjoyed chiefly pastimes, bathing in a thermal pool, hunting ducks, dancing.

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At this time he got word of a foreign ship in the vicinity. He was eager to communicate with it, but was dissuaded by his hosts, who, he was reminded, were also his captors. They went so far as to have the priest perform sorcery showing that there was no ship. Yet Cary did not try to escape, though he had been gone nearly three years.

In October 1827, the Clay, a ship out of Salem, Massachusetts, arrived at Ambow seeking a cargo of beche-de-mer, a sea cucumber much sought after by the Chinese. Its captain was Benjamin Vandaford. Cary signed on for a voyage to Manila. Cary wrote to Aaron Mitchell, owner of the Oeno, briefly describing the fate of his ship and crew. The letter was published in the New Bedford Mercury on September 26, the next day in the Nantucket Inquirer. There was considerable disbelief of the story, which did not mention cannibalism, or sexual practices. "This account," proclaimed the Inquirer, "is certainly indefinite .... " Back in Fiji, William Cary crewed on many ships between Manila and Ambow. Though he says in his journal that he was always seeking a ship to return home on, he never signed on board one. In October 1830 he was in a good position to return home. He was at

Mowee (Maui) in the Sandwich Islands and noted that "there were several Nantucket ships and men and it seemed almost like home to me for a while." He even met up with one of his cousins there. But a week later he returned, without comment, to Fiji. On the way they touched at Penhhyns (Penrhyn) where they were attacked by the natives, but they survived without injury.

Over the next three years he continued to trade in beebe-de-mer and make voyages to Manila, to Rotumah, the Kingsmill Group (the Southern Gilberts, now Kiribati) and Sydney. There he met up with the Tybee of Salem, Captain Meller, which was on its way to Salem. Meller agreed to take Cary on and they departed June 9, 1833.

They passed the Bay of Islands on the 16th, saw ice floes south of the horn, and arrived at Pernambuco to restock in September. They made Cape Cod Light at midnight, Cary noted with some nostalgia, on October 26. By 9 A.M. they had reached Salem and by the end of the month he was back on Nantucket.

"I was received with much joy by my friends and relatives and I believe heartily welcomed by all the inhabitants. " In 1834 news reached Nantucket that one of the

Opposite page: Bottom, Davzd \Vhippey, bom on Nantucket in 1801, died in the Fiji Islands on January 25, 1875, nearly fifty years after he had "gone native."

Top, "Fijian girls sporting in the sea," from Kidnapping in the Pacific,

by W. H. G. Kzizgston, London, n. d.

This page: Illustration ofa chief's kitchen in Fij~ from At Home in Fij~ by

C. F. Gordon Cumming, Edinburgh and London, 1881.

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WRECKED ON THE FEEJEES •

Above: First Fish House Below

Deck, Sconset by James Walter Folger, 1917.

Gift of Howard Hagenbuch in honor of Margaret Cody.

Photograph by

JeffreyS Allen.

At right: William Cary's Fijian saga, published posthumously in 1928, by the Inquirer and Mirror.

8

HISTORIC

crew of the Oeno, "a young boy," was seen alive at Tongataboo by a Russian captain, but that he was so closely watched that it was impossible to effect his escape. The Nantucket Inquirer speculated that it was "very probably" one Barzillai Swain. Cary insisted that young Swain had not survived and that he had never seen him alive after the massacre. But general distrust of the original story, and resentment by the families whose sons did not survive the massacre coupled with the Swain rumor soured his return to Nantucket.

One of Cary's last acts before leaving his island home was to write out an account of his years away.

He called it Wrecked on the Feejees. He was, however, unable to interest anyone in its publication. He left the island around 1840 to live across Nantucket Sound in New Bedford. There Cary married a local woman, Ann Fish, a widow, who lived only until1855. They had no children. Ann Fish Cary was buried at New Bedford.

Reports from Fiji had David Whippey making good.

He became a prosperous merchant, boatbuilder, and United States Vice Consul. After fathering several children by various women, he married a woman from Koro and helped found the town of Levuka. He was the official translator for the United States Exploring Expedition in 1840 and much impressed Commodore Charles Wilkes.

Cary died at New Bedford on February 28, 1883, two months short of his seventy-ninth birthday. His obituaries dwelled on the Fiji years and the mystery of Barzillai Swain. Four years later his manuscript was found and the Nantucket Journal published it. In 1928, the Inquirer and Mirror issued it as a pamphlet. Its subtitle gave him more credit than the newspaper or the community had ever done: NANTUCKET

Experience of a Nantucket Man, the Sole Survivor of Crew of Whale. hip uoeno", Who Lived for Nine Years

Among Cannibals of the South Pacific.

'J

&WWMB

;;w:s.;;a

"Experience of a Nantucket Man a Century Ago Who Was Sole Survivor of Whaleship "Oeno" and Lived for Nine Years Among Cannibals of South Sea Islands."

Joseph Theroux is a writer and school administrator.

Formerly a/Massachusetts, he and his wife, Diane, and daughter, Anina, live in Hila, Hawaii.

Sources: Cary, William, Wrecked on the Feejees (Nantucket: The Inquirer and Mirror Press, 1928 and 1949). Originally published in parts in the Nantucket Journal, 1887.

Gravelle, Kim. 1979. Fi;i's Times: A History o/Fi;i (The Fiji Times Press, Suva, Fiji; reprinted 1980, 1988).

Ward, Gerard R., ed. 1966. American Activities in the Central Pacific: 1790-1870, vol. 7 (The Gregg Press, Ridgewood, NJ).

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The Book of Books: Bibles in the Collection of the Nan tucket Historical Association

T

HE LIBRARY AT THE NANTUCKET HISTORICAL

Association possesses forty-five Bibles dating from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. It may be difficult for many of us today to fathom the centrality of religion in the lives of past Nantucket men and women and the significance of the Bible as a moral and spiritual compass. Bibles, however, are more than the "word of God," a source of guidance and solace. They are objects, artifacts, historical records. On a documentary level, the Bibles in the NHA's collection reveal fanuly and individual histories, as well as the "lives" of the book itself. All of the Bibles in the collection contain inscriptions and signatures; many contain family records and genealogical notes; a few even hold loose documents, tucked between pages and undisturbed for many years.

In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries the Bible was a book that was thoroughly read and studied, often daily .

Indeed, people were taught to read primarily to read the Bible, according to John M. Forbes, curator of the Quayle Rare Bible Collection at Baker University in Baldwin City, Kansas. A Bible owned by Catharine Starbuck in the 1860s contains the notes: "Read psalms 1, 34. Read 3 chapters every week day and 5 every Sunday." Her Bible also contained meditations, news-clippings, and notes of a religious nature. Pasted to the inside of the back cover is the following handwritten poem: "The Bible? That's the book, the book indeed. I The book of books; I On which who looks, I As he should do aught, shall never need I Wish for a better light I To guide him."

HISTORIC

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by

Catharine Starbuck was a Unitarian (the book includes the printed insert "Scriptural Belief of Unitarian Christians").

Sinlliarly, the mother of John Norris hoped that her son would every day "read a portion of God's word."

We cannot be sure if John Norris regularly read the Bible his mother gave him , but there is certainly evidence that the Bible was used. The leather that encloses the small book is worn and scratched, and a few faint

Betsy Lowenstein

The rare and valuable Attken Bzble.

Gift of Mr. and Mrs. John Wtlson.

Photograph by JeffreyS Allen.

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penciled notations mark several pages. Most significant- originally owned by Captain Zenas Coffin contains sevly, the right-hand comer of page 812 is turned down , eral inscriptions, indicating that the book was carefully suggesting that the page, which displays chapter 9 of conveyed from one generation to the next: "Given to the Book of Luke, contained a message that resonated Mary C. Coffin By her Grandmother Abial Coffin, for the reader. "And it came to pass, that, as he was 1848." "Given to Ann C. Macy, By her sister, Mary C. praying in a certain place, when he ceased, one of his Coffin, Aug. 1878." "To be given to Marianna Worth disciples said unto him, Lord, teach us to pray, as John after my decease, Ann C. Macy, Sept. 1896."

Bibles were not only "bequeathed" but also given as also taught his disciples," the chapter begins. gifts and tokens of regard, or to commemorate an Bibles were cherished, as evidenced in the way the event.

A tiny Bible printed in France in 1847 was prevolwnes accompanied their owners on travels and were passed on to family members sented to Cyrus Peirce at Versailles by a British delegaafter death . Lydia G . Brock, tion "for the purpose of expressing their respect for the wife of Peter C. Brock, mas- zeal manifested by their brethren in crossing the ter, brought her Bible with Atlantic to attend the great Peace Congress at Paris." In her when she joined her hus- August of 1873 Phebe Ann Hanaford gave a Bible to C. band on a trading voyage. Starbuck, with the inscription "In memory of the time Beneath her signature is the when we walked to the house of God as friends. God note: "Ship Lexington Coast Bless you in your work for the Sabbath School!" The of New Zealand November American Bible Society presented a Bible to the African [20th] 1853 Cruising after Methodist Episcopal Zion Church of Nantucket on Sperm Whales . headed June 18, 18-14.

Towards the Curtiss Nearly all of the Bibles in the library's collection Islands. " The book was also contain vital information - that is, the births, deaths, taken aboard the ship Eagle and marriages of family members over several generaby Oliver G. Brock, her son. tions. Tracing one's roots is not a late-twentieth-century "Ship Eagle bound to San interest. It was important to people in the eighteenth Francisco then to Canton and nineteenth centuries to note births, deaths, and and then to New York ," marriages and to identify their lineage. Bibles, thus , reads an inscription at constitute a genealogical databank. Vital information the back of the book. Phebe was recorded on the flyleaves and in other blank spaces Fish's Bible accompanied her in the Bibles printed in the eighteentl1 century. In the on several moves: "Brought 1820s Bibles began to be printed with special pages, from Nantucket by Mrs. located between the Old and ew Testaments, to be Phebe Fish to Cotuit May used for the recording of births, deaths, and marriages.

1840. Brought back to Publishers had accommodated one of the traditional Nantucket by Mrs . Fish in functions of tl1e Bible, as a repository of family history, September 1854." Many of the Bibles show the wear of in the process encouraging the recording of the signifitravel and use, bearing smudges, loose pages, and cant events that chart an individual's life. fragile bindings.

A Bible owned by George Starbuck (of West Brick, A Bible printed in Oxford in 1766 contains the sig- Main Street) , who married Elizabeth Swain in 1833 , nature of Judith Macy and the inscription: "Judith contains a wealth of genealogical material. A family Macy Her Book. Given by her Father, in the year of our record lists the births of their eight children. The Bible, Lord MDCCLXX [1770]." Later, the book was passed which is particularly battered looking, bearing scorch on to her nephew, Thomas Macy. Beneath Judith 's marks and a split spine, also records the names and vital signature are the words "Thomas Macy His Book 15th dates of the children of George Starbuck Jr. A note in 3rd mo. 1794. Given him by his Grand Parents in the family record states: "Ara bella Wife of Geo .

Rememberance [sic] of his beloved Aunt Judith who Starbuck, Jr. Born April 13th 1840 at Richmond Port departed this Life the 14th 3rd mo. 1789. " A Bible Phillip, Australia, being the first white child born at that

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Judith Macy's Bible was printed in Oxford in 1776.

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place. " Alice Starbuck, their eldest child, was born on Nantucket, but her nine brothers and sisters were born in England, in London and Birkenhead (a town outside of Liverpool). The latest entry in the Bible reads "George Starbuck, Jr. Died in Birkenhead England May 14th 1914." It is uncertain whose hand recorded this note - perhaps it was George's wife, Arabella, as she was still living, or so it can be presumed as her name is not listed in the column of deaths for the fanlliy.

On the verso of a title page of a Bible printed in England in 1706 by the Company of Stationers is a genealogical record that begins "An Account, or Record , of the births of the Children, of Jonatl1an and Rachel Swain" (who married in 1791). Interestingly, the names of eleven children are entered in the Bible, while the Eliza Starbuck Barney Genealogical Record, the library's most reliable genealogical resource, lists only nine children. Susan Swain (1806-1828) and Paul (1802-180-i) are missing from Eliza Barney's account and not listed in the published vital records for Nantucket. Bibles can hold vital information not found in other sources. Particularly intriguing is the mention of the death, or disappearance, of Gideon Swain, who was lost at sea in 1825: "Gideon Swain Sailed from Baltimore for St. Thomas and was not heard from after they sialed [sic] he left a son named Henry M. Swain he lives in Illinois."

A Bible owned by the Beebe family is especially detailed regarding the deaths of its family members.

Henry W. Beebe was "killed at the storming of the heights of Fredricksburg May 2nd, 1863. Aged 29-812. " John Murray Beebe died of paralysis; John Allen Beebe Jr. died of diphtheria, September 6, 1878; and Ezra Styles Beebe "died at sea by a whale 1861 18 years." Deaths are recorded factually, unemotionally.

As entered by Samuel Stubbs: "Christina Stubbs my Wife Dide [sic] 16th of 6 mo 1798. " Beneath were these words: "Samuel Stubbs and Drusilla was Married the 8th day of2 mo. 1801." Drusilla Worth was the sister of Christina, Stubbs's first wife.

As mentioned earlier, many of tl1e Bibles contained inserted material, papers placed between pages or beneath a cover, which were removed during tl1e cataloguing process and properly housed in the manuscript collection (materials were cross-referenced in the library's databases). The Bible was a kind of notebook, or safebox, in which information documenting fanlliy events and relations was kept. Opening the cover of one HI STOR I C

NANTUCKET

Bible revealed a creased and faded letter written on blue-lined paper. The letter is dated February 11, 1861, and was penned in Covington (Indiana? Ohio?). It opens "Dear Cousin Carrie" and is signed "From your affectionate cousin Franky Ladd. " The author complains of a toothache, describes her Christmas presents, including furs and a fan, and longs for a visit from her cousin: "we will have a nice time playing paper dolls and conquer if we can find any nice place to climb or jump." The Bible also contains the signatures of Alpheus Stewart, Anna Tucker, Joseph McCleary, and Fred Willetts Folger, who all appeared to have owned the Bible at one time or another. A genealogical search revealed that "Carrie" is Caroline L. Stuart (as spelled in the Eliza Starbuck Barney Genealogical Record) (1846-1905), daughter of Alpheus Stewart. Caroline, who married Frederick Willett Folger (1845-1917) in 1869, was fifteen when she received the letter from her cousin.

A Bible owned by Phebe Fish, the Phebe Fish who moved to Cotuit and back, contained genealogical notes , sketches - one sketch, depicting a dozing matron, is entitled "Twenty Minutes" - a fan chart, and a letter addressed to Judith]. Fish of Broad Street.

Two extract telegrams were found in a Bible in the possession of the Sheffield family. A Bible donated by Phebe W. Tracy contained handwritten family records for various members of the Tracy fanlliy, which included Paddacks and Bakers.

Publishing Bibles was a booming business in the nineteenth century. Out of the library's collection of forty-five Bibles some thirty different publishers are represented. The most prolific publisher of Bibles appears to have been the American Bible Society (ABS), which began as a missionary moral-reform agency. The library possesses six Bibles printed by the organization. The ABS was established in 1816 and over the nineteenth centuty created a worldwide netI work of Bible agents who sold inexpensive Bibles and Testaments. Other prominent publishers of Bibles represented in the collection are the New York Bible and Common Prayer Book Society and the British and Foreign Bible Society.

The first whole English Bible to be printed in America was the Aitken Bible, which was published in two volumes by Robert Aitken in Philadelphia in 1782.

(Between 1777 and 1782 Aitken printed the New I Testament only.) The library possesses a copy of this FALL

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11

â&#x20AC;˘ $30.00 cents [sic]." Prince Coleman inscribed a particularly large and bulky Bible with the words: "Prince Coleman His Bible Bought in Dunkirk August 10, 1789." (Nantucketers established a whaling community at the French port of Dunkirk in the late eighteenth century.)

It is tantalizing to ponder the previous lives of these books, carried from place to place, and from home to home, often to be retrieved from attics and closets long after the individuals who had treasured them had died. A Bible published in Philadelphia in 1817 and owned by the Coombs fan1ily is accompanied by a card that reads "Come from Straight Wharf Theatre, September 6, 1947." Sewn onto the first page of a Bible printed in New York in 1825 is a small sheet, on which is written these words: "This Bible belonged to Joseph and Mary Whippey grandparents of Phebe W. Tracy, by whom it is loaned to the Nantucket Historical Society to be held by them until called for by some descendant of said Joseph Whippey." Phebe Tracy also placed several documents within the Bible for safekeeping.

On the back of a letter of recommendation for Miss Mary P. Tracy, "first assistant in the Nantucket High School for the last two terms," dated October 28, 1868, she had written: "I do not think the Historical Society will care for this paper but I am putting it in the package."

We do care, and are grateful that Phebe Tracy and other Nantucketers recorded their fanilly histories between the pages of a Bible.

A genealogical chart found in Phebe Fish's Bzble.

Bequest of Anna Gardner Fish.

12

H I ST 0 R I C

rare and valuable book, which, unfortunately, does not contain the signature of a Coffin, Starbuck, or Macy.

The only clue to the Bible's provenance is a rather illegible signature in pencil that appears to read E. M. Boyle.

Each volume measures six inches by four inches and is embossed with a pattern of gold foliage on cover and spine. Another Bible of particular note is that published in 1808 by Mathew Cary of Philadelphia. Cary, an Irish political refugee, was loaned the money to start his press

by General Lafayette. According to John M. Forbes, the Bible, an early one of Cary's, is a "real prize."

As Bibles were published abroad, so were they purchased in foreign places. A Bible printed in 1783 in Oxford contains the inscription "Bought by Gideon Gardner in the City of London in 1792 at the price of N A N T U C K E T

Betsy Lowenstein is the NHA's library director and a frequent contributor to Historic Nantucket.

Sources: Bible collection, NHA rare book collection.

Dr. John M. Forbes, Curator, Quayle Rare Bible Collection, Baker University.

Hills, Margaret T., ed. 1962. The English Bible in America: A Bibliography of Editions of the Bible and the New Testament Published in Amenca 1777-1957.

Wosh, Peter}. 1994. Spreading the Word: The Bzble Business in Nineteenth-Century America.

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Sally Takes the Smallpox

L

AST YEAR AN ANTIQUES DEALER IN EASTPORT,

Long Island, approached the NHA about a Nantucket manuscript. It had been found in the drawer of a chest acquired from an "antiques picker," and the actual origin of the chest was unknown. The price seemed reasonable and the association purchased the manuscript.

The acquisition proved to be a loosely bound journal with several missing pages. It is thought to have been the workbook of a Sarah Folger and includes a number of miscellaneous items copied from various sources and the drafts of several of her letters, dated between 1799 and 1802. It has not been possible to identify Sarah, who sometimes signed herself as Sally, with certainty, as there wa s more than one Sarah Folger on Nantucket~ at that time. Most likely (\ she was the one who ~ '2. married Borden Chase in 1802. If so, they had one c::::J

o"'----

child, also Sarah, and Sally appears to have

0 () , ~ 0

~~~fd~~;~~~ ~j:~~;!t:;

~

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would h ave been the George Folger who had married Rebecca Slocum, and the Sally of the manuscript does refer to Slocum relatives.

One of the letter drafts is of special interest since it concerns the hospitalization of Sally and her sister for inoculation against smallpox. The letter was to be for her friend Mary Rodman, and the conclusion is missing.

Sally wrote:[Original spelling has been retained but punctuation added, for clarity. -Ed.] Nantucket 1800 With pleasure I retire and take my pen to acknowledge the reception of thy favor that can1e safe to hand when I needed all the consolation that could flow from the streams of friendship, f HISTORLC

NANTUCKET

or at that time I was confined within the gloomy walls of a hospital. Altho tedious yet never had cause to complain and trusting it will not be tiresome to the ear of my dear Mary, I will give the short account how time past with thy favored friend- as my sister inform'd you we for some time past had it in consideration to take the small pox. At length we thought the right time had come for us to go - accordingly we pursu'd it and if I recollect right my sister gave an account until jallop day [See explanation below. Ed.] which my dear was a tedious day. Our next was spent more pleasant as our new acquaintance began to be more famillier and we found a number that was affii ~ ble, convert) . sant , and 0 agreeable. <-_,.......---.路路路.路 Some were -~ employ'd in telling their storys whilst others walk' d and immersid then1selves in different recreations. I was very still in observing the different inmmsements which I thought was necessary in present situation often retired to that lock't room which my sister mentions. In the afternoon our worthy Doctr visited us and talk'd very comfortable which cheer' d our drooping spirits until the unwery' d sun had reclined his beams below the western horizon. We then retired to our strawy couch and I laid me down. I enjoyed none there downy pillow but the next rising sun alter' d the scene for my mouth began to be very sore which proved tedious for 10 days therefore will pass them silently by as nothing can flow from my pen that will be entertaining in that time for I willing it

by Leslie W. Ottinger

0

'

A floraL detaiL /rom

I SaLLy FoLger'sjournaL. FALL

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13

I •: . :-y t·· r1 P. :· i·· ;·· : I·· 1 ... y. . ............ 1.-,.J . 1.... 1 !:, ~

I

.

;·~ •'\' : •.-

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The back page of Sally Folger's workbook illustrates the doodlings and practice lettering found throughout the book.

Bottom right: afloral detail from Sally's workbook.

Opposite: One ofSally's eyelet and floral details.

14

HISTORIC

•

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.

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'

..........,.. ·-.;: 1.•••'

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shoud be arrais' d from my own memory, although at the period I had 20 pocks cleverly tum'd and by degrees each gloomy scene vanish'd and the day once more shown in its wanted brilliancy and my bowl of milk porrage had the comfortable addition of a little fine biscuit which my craving appitite gladly receiv'd. The 13th was a memoriable day. I propos' d a walk to my nurses daughter; she readily join' d me _ .. much could I say on every day whilst there but long and tirsome would be my letter, therefore for Brevity's sake must leave till in a week was ready to come out but not being willing to leave my sister_ Staid another week but finally wash day came and after sheding tears with my dear nurse and daughter for indeed my dear they seemed very near to me prepared to ...

NANTUCKET

Although by the end of the eighteenth century many residents of New England had survived smallpox and became immune to a second infection, there was still a large segment of susceptible people, especially children. Smallpox is caused by a virus and humans are the only hosL Highly infectious, it is spread by breathing in particles from an infected person. It was endemic in the population and burst into epidemics in populous areas about every fifteen years. After an incubation period of perhaps ten days, a case began with fever and chills, and then produced characteristic lesions in the mouth and throat and finally on the skin. These skin "pocks" were the sign that established the diagnosis.

Most patients recovered, though some had severe and disfiguring scars, and the mortality rate was still ten to twenty percent at the end of the century.

Inoculation was a means for bringing about a mild form of the disease with the consequent immunity, Practiced in the Middle East for centuries, it was introduced in New England by Dr. Zabdiel Boylston of Boston in 1721. Inoculation consisted of conveying the disease by scarifying the skin and implanting material obtained from the pock of a patient with naturally acquired smallpox. The resultant infection was relatively mild, although there were still occasional fatal cases, and the resultant pocks usually were followed by only imperceptible scars. Inoculation was not universally supported, in part because a person with this mild form of smallpox was nevertheless highly infectious, and the resulting cases were of the virulent form_ For this reason, persons undergoing inoculation were isolated for three to five weeks. Failure to carefully observe this precaution put the general population at risk, and inoculation hospitals were at times the subject of intense regulation and also a degree of public opposition. These small hospitals, along ~ ' £ with others established .' for ~1e isola.tion ~f cases "t ~-, ~ dunng eptdemtcs, ,,···..--rv-.1""" sporadically appeared during the ~~-ft:~d/1 last half of the centu- ' ~ · ry, and we do know of an inoculation hospital on Gravelly Island, west of Madaket, that was run by ?

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1999

Dr. Samuel Gelston of Nantucket during the 1770s.

Perhaps there were other, later hospital sites on the island or Sally and her sister may have gone to the mainland for their inoculations. The decision to do so could not have been an easy one, since it involved immediate risk, expense, and inconvenience with only the possibility of future benefit. They did proceed though, and the letter provides details of her experiences and how she was able to cope with the hospitalization.

The medical routine of the time included, before inoculation, a short period of dieting with avoidance of foods from animal sources, and the use of a program of purging. "Jallop day" would have been part of the second, utilizing a common purgative in the medical practices of the eighteenth century O"alap is a resin prepared from the root of a Mexican plant). These measures and a limited diet, which for Sally consisted of milk porridge, were thought to avoid the more serious complications of the disease. Bedding, which was provided by the hospital, appears to have consisted of a straw mattress and no pillow. The lesions began with a sore mouth and she developed twenty pocks, with an active infection that lasted for about ten days. She then began to feel better. Her diet was supplemented with biscuits, and she was allowed to walk about outside, although still no doubt isolated from anyone other than the other patients and the staff of the hospital. Then wash day came. The practice was to burn the bedding and clothing of each patient, supervise a careful bath, and then provide dean clothing, followed by their discharge from the hospital. By now Sally had dearly become quite attached to her nurse and the nurse's daughter, who had helped her through what must have been a tedious and sometimes frightening month-long experience.

A final point relates to the date of the letter, 1800.

Two years before, in 1798, Edward Jenner, an English physician, had provided convincing evidence that an infection with cowpox, which is caused by a different but similar virus, could convey at least a degree of immunity to smallpox. Vaccination, using material from cowpox cases, was, compared to inoculation, quite safe and did not require isolation. It had been introduced in Boston by Dr. Benjamin Warehouse when he vaccinated his own four children in 1800. Inoculation fell into disrepute and the practice gradually disappeared over the next decade. Coincidentally, also in the NHA's

HISTORIC

NANTUCKET

manuscript collection, is an interesting related document. An item in the Charles Congdon Collection, dated December 16, 1802, is a broadside issued by the Board of Health of Boston. In it are described experiments, conducted by several Boston physicians, showing that children previously infected with cowpox by vaccination were not subsequently vulnerable to infection by inoculation or exposure to active cases of smallpox.

The conclusion was that the board was "confident in affirming that cowpox is a complete preventive against all the effects of the smallpox upon the human system. " Hence, Sally and her sister were likely among the last Nantucket citizens to undergo inoculation. And we know that over the next century with vaccination and the more rigid isolation of active cases, smallpox became an infrequent cause of death in New England.

Leslie W. Ottinger, a physician, retired to Nantucket in 1996.

He has been a volunteer in the Edouard A. Stackpole Lzbrary and Research Center since February 1999.

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15

Nantucket Jetties By

L

Matt Byrne

Lighting the eastern jetty

I

ONG , DARK ARMS OF STONE, THE JETILES OF

Nantucket reach out to the sea, offering safety and a welcome to island visitors. For over a century, the jetties, huge slabs of New England granite , have guarded the channel into Nantucket Harbor. And neither time nor abrasive tide nor the crunch of ice has diminished them.

The need for the jetties arose out of the whaling industry and because of the existence of a sandbar. The sandbar, a massive shoal, stretched across the northwest coast of Nantucket blocking passage into the harbor of any vessel drawing more than nine feet of water.

Because of the many sailing vessels that struck upon it and were lost, the shoal acquired a mean reputation.

Maritime people called it the "Nantucket Bar"; more often just "the Bar." And it was a place of disaster.

By the early 1800s, vessels sailing out of Nantucket in search of whales began voyaging into the far reaches of the Pacific Ocean. The larger ships needed for such trips drew more than nine feet of water. Now the Nantucket Bar became more than an annoyance, it

became a threat to the future of the whaling industry on Nantucket. To solve the problem of shoal water, the island's sea captains designed a method of loading and wuoading the whaling vessels. An outward-bound vessel, empty and riding high in the water, would be taken from its dock, moved out of the harbor across the Bar into deeper water. Then, using a number of smaller boats called "lighters," the islanders would shuttle back and forth between wharf and sailing vessel, ferrying out the supplies and provisions needed for the long voyage to the Pacific. When the ship returned, now heavy with barrels of whale oil, the process had to be reversed.

Lighters ferried the cargo to dockside, and once the sailing vessel lay empty and riding high in the water, it could be brought across the Bar to the docks. Loss of time and the extra manpower needed for the lighters made this practice expensive. And the risk of a sudden storm always threatened a returning vessel waiting with cargo just outside the Bar. To overcome the hazards of the Bar, the citizens of Nantucket in Town Meeting in 1803 petitioned the Congress of the United States. Their request: dredge a channel through the barrier of the N antucket Bar. Mariners , whalemen, and nautical engineers were unable to agree upon the best method of conquering the Bar. Many thought dredging would do it. O thers suggested the construction of long, stone piers - one on each side of the harbor entrance. In theory, the rush of the strong Nantucket tides between tl1e stone piers would furrow a channel to a usable depth.

Over the next decades , federal engineers visited the island conducting surveys , holding meetings, discussing the matter and writing their reports. And the islanders waited.

In 1828, impatient island ship owners put up a swn of money to clear a channel through the Bar at their own expense. They bought a dredge, towed it over from the mainland, and put it to work. Tough, impenetrable, the Bar resisted the dredge. And with their funds exhausted, the men abandoned the effort.

Nevertheless, the island whaling fleet continued to grow, and by the early decades of the nineteenth FA LL

1999

century Nantucket had become the whaling center of the world. Lighters continued in use, and sailing vessels continued to wreck themselves upon the treacherous shoals of the Nantucket Bar. To remain competitive in the rush for whale oil, the islanders tried other methods to conquer that barrier of hardpacked sand and stone and clay that lay across their harbor entrance. They tried using a floating drydock.

Called "camels," floating drydocks had been used for years in several European countries. Two hollow, wooden hulls formed the sides of the flat-bottomed camel. With the hulls filled with water and the camels thus settled deep below the surface, the whaling vessel was slipped between the hulls and securely J fastened. Then, by pumping out the hulls, the can1el and the sailing vessel that was nestled inside floated high in the water to be easily towed across the Bar. By the year 1845, use of the lighter method had declined to be replaced by the safer and less expensive camels. The islanders had conquered the Nantucket Bar without the aid of Congress. Or so they thought.

The glory days of the Nantucket whaling fleet were over. In 1846, a fire destroyed the wharves and most of the business area of Nantucket. Oil discovered in Pennsylvania crowded out the need for sperm oil.

Hundreds of islanders went west for California gold.

And then can1e the Civil War. When the war was over, transportation along the East Coast increased, and Nantucket Sound with its sandbars, shoals, and tidal rips became a main artery of commerce. As always, in bad weather, passage through Nantucket Sound became a dangerous ordeal for most vessels under sail. Mariners needed a safe harbor: Nantucket, the politicians declared, could be made that.

Again, federal engineers studied the harbor and the Bar. They advised Congress that a riprap jetty of stone should be built at the harbor entrance; possibly a second. The jetties would be designed to concentrate the powerful tides; the forces of nature would be turned against the obstinate bar. So, in 1880, some eighty years after the islanders first sought help from Congress, HISTORIC

NANTUCKET

.

s

Congress acted. Federal funds were granted to construct the western jetty.

Private contractors in the spring of 1881 shipped the granite stone, the riprap, over from Connecticut. By 1884 they had completed the western jetty, extending it some 4,000 feet from land out into deep water. With that done, the need for a parallel jetty became obvious.

Yet no one was in a hurry to complete it. Ten years passed. In the spring of 1894, the politicians finally approved work to start an eastern jetty.

Historian Edouard A. Stackpole, in writing the history of the Nantucket Bar, estimates that the U.S. government spent in excess of $500,000 to construct the granite jetties. They have proven remarkably sturdy free of the need for repairs. In addition to providing a safe, useful harbor, they have protected the land, and have held back the forces of sea storms and the crush of ice.

The Bar remains. Today, passenger boats coming from Cape Cod are eased across the Bar. Sea captains know it awaits below, forever a peril.

Detail of map showing the Bar, from Wrecks Around Nantucket,

compLied by Arthur H. Gardner and published by the Inquirer and Mirror Press, 1915.

Matt Byrne is a retired lawyer living with his wife, Vera, in the town a/Manlius in upstate New York.

For thirty years they have been summer residents of the Madaket area.

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17

Collecting for the Future: A Call /or Twentieth-Century Materials

by I Betsy Lowenstein

and Aimee E. Newell

...

.. ...

A

Nantucket public schools for many years. the NHA is eager to add twentieth-century Tom Macy: Books, postcards, souvenirs from 1959 materials to its collections. Contemporary Macy family reunion; Steamship Authority schedules material, in the not too distant future, for 1956 and 1964; dance cards and programs for will constitute the archives and artifacts that allow the Nantucket High School graduation festivities 1933-35. historical association to recreate Nantucket life from 1900 to 1999. We are looking for business and personal Barbara Medaugh: French and Latin texts owned by papers, posters and programs, books, photographs, her aunt, Helen B. Shaw, a teacher at the high school in souvenirs, equipment pertaining to the scalloping the 1930s, '40s, and '50s. Many are inscribed with the industry, island-related clothing, and decorative arts. names of Nantucket students.

If you possess materials you feel may be of interest to Aimee E. Newell: Programs and tickets for various us, or if uncertain of an item's significance, please get in theater performances, concerts, and lectures in 1997 touch. Call either library director Betsy Lowenstein and 1998. at the library (508-228-1894) or curator of collections Aimee Newell at the NHA's Gosnold Center (508-325- J Northland Cranberries, Inc.: Hayden Separator 7885). Following is a list of recent donors and their gifts Machine used to sort cranberries at the Hollywood of twentieth-century items that will inspire you to think farm in Polpis in the first quarter of the century. of your "clutter" as source material for future exhibitions and scholarly research.

Helen Seager: Map of Nantucket published by Young's Bicycle Shop; 1974 Nantucket Magazine; Mary Lee's Albert H. Arnold: Promotional booklet about Coloring Book (of Nantucket), 1983 .

The Sea Cliff Inn, ca. 1910-1920.

Helen Wilson Sherman: Hunting dagger ,vith ivory Josephine Deacon: Collection of family photographs handle, given to donor by Captain Peder H. Pedersen and a Campfire Girls Indian costume. in the late 1920s.

s THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY APPROACHES,

Maia Gaillard: Five posters advertising events organized by the Nantucket Arts Council, ca. 1980-1982 .

Kansas State Historical Society: Two envelopes addressed to Mrs. Charles Robinson depicting Nantucket scenes, postmarked 1901 and 1902.

Frances Karttunen: Wooden conductor's baton, photograph album kept by Ellen Ramsdell dating from 1918 and 1919, and a scrapbook of newspaper clippings and photographs chronicling Nantucket musical and theatrical performances from 1930 to 1950.

Ellen Ramsdell was supervisor of music in the

18

HISTORI C

NA

TUCKET

Eugene Stone: A small collection of photographs showing Nantucket beaches, houses, and individuals from the first half of the century .

Paula K. Williams: Portrait of Captain Arthur McCleave by Gladys K. Milligan , ca. 1940.

Mark Yelle: Three ledgers from William Holland's grocery store at 39 Main Street. The ledgers, which span the years 1911 to 1919, were found in the attic of 35 Main Street.

Robert L. Young: World War II papers, including letters, books, medals, currency, and film footage.

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Performance Center Methodist Church Admission

$4.00 Students

$2.50

Historic Nantucket Book Section by Elizabeth Oldham

The Admiral's Academy: Nantucket Island's Historic Coffin School

By Margaret Moore Booker

Mill Hill Press, Nantucket; paper, $14.95.

N SEPTEMBER 1826, A ILLUSTRIOUS VISITOR stepped onto Nantucket's shores. A fifth generation descendant of Tristram, Admiral Sir Isaac Coffin, born in Boston in 1759, had completed a distinguished career in the British Navy and was living in comfortable retirement in England. He had always been proud of his Nantucket heritage and had visited his relatives some twenty years previously.

This time he stayed with Willian1 Coffin, an influential merchant, in his home at 18 Union Street.

Sir Isaac had managed to accumulate a respectable fortune and, being childless, wished to establish a memorial of some kind on Nantucket that would benefit his island kin . Would it be a church? a monument? would he make a gift of a great ship?

Fortunately for Coffin kinand now for all of usSir Isaac fell in with William Coffin's son-in-law Samuel Haynes Jenks, first editor of the Inquirer and a long-time agitator for a public school system on Nantucket.

"No," said Jenks to the admiral (during the course of a carriage ride to Sconset), "the best thing you can dothe deed that will make you forever remembered-is to establish and endow a free school. You will thus benefit your numerous kinsfolk and their grateful posterity, while you effectually perpetuate your nan1e."

I

20

H I S T 0 R I C

N A N T U C K E T

Jenks was thus immensely gratified by the establishment in 1827 of Admiral Sir Isaac Coffin's Lancasterian School "for the purpose of promoting decency, good order and morality, and for giving a good English education to youth who are descendants of the late Tristram Coffin." Since a good many of the island's 8000 inhabitants qualified , there was no dearth of prospective pupils. [The Lancasterian method involved using the brightest students as monitors and tutors, with one class teaching what it had learned to the class below-a method that cut down on the cost of teachers' salaries.]

The first Coffin School was at the corner of Fair and Lyon streets, with 230 students-both boys and girls but separated by gender in two rooms-and their course of study was identical, including reading, writing, spelling, arithmetic, geometry, algebra, declamation, rhetoric, chemistry, gran1mar, history, and natural philosophy. Whew! And all that for only $2.50 per quarter. The first male teacher ("preceptor") was paid $500 per atmw11 , the "preceptress" $300; some things never change.

The school flourished during its early years, but was forced to close its doors after the Great Fire of 1846 consumed its entire library of 3000 volumes, which was housed in a building at Centre and Main streets.

Over the years 1846 to 1854, the school's trustees wisely left endowment funds to grow, until they were to purchase the land on Winter Street at1d build I able the handsome Greek Revival structure standing there today. Its function has changed over the years as well, for many years having been involved with Nantucket's public school system. Lots of old-timers (and some not all that old) will tell you about their days at the Coffin School.

Margaret Moore Booker has traced the history of the Coffin School with verve and affection and has made good use of the NHA's collectio~ of photographs. It's a little book but it's packed with fact and anecdote, making the sturdy little temple of learning on Winter Street come alive.

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N H A

Annual Meeting The Nantucket Historical Association held its one hundred and fifth Annual Meeting under a tent at the Old Mill on Friday, July 9. The speaker for the meeting was Lonn Taylor of the Smithsonian Institution's ational Museum of American History. Patty Jo S. Rice, Ph.D., was nan1ed Research Fellow.

Elected to the board of trustees as the class of 2003 were Sarah J. Baker, Patricia M. Bridier, Thomas C. Gosnell, Julius Jensen III, L. Dennis Kozlowski, Arthur Reade Jr., and Alfred Sanford. Elected for a one-year term with the Friends of the NHA were Prudence S. Crozier and Carolyn B. MacKenzie.

Early in the meeting NHA president Dorothy Slover spoke to members about executive director Jean Weber's decision to retire as of July 1999.

She expressed her sadness at Jean's departure but also her pleasure in having had the opportunity to work with her and to witness the enormous contributions she had made in her four years at the NHA. Jean Weber, in her short speech, reflected on the past year and departure before she introduced the day's speaker, a long-time personal friend, Lonn Taylor. Mr. Taylor gave a fascinating lecture entitled Time Past - Time Present. He spoke about preservation projects around the country to illustrate the importance of preserving the country's history by maintaining and "reading" its houses, flags, and even Lowriders.

Dorothy Slover also introduced Patty Jo S. Rice as the NHA's newest Research Fellow. Dr. Rice was recognized for signilicant research and commitment to the values of historic preservation on Nantucket, for volunteer services as an architectural historian and as a researcher in the history of whale-oil manufacturing processes and the economy of the whaling industry, and for contributions as a gifted and creative educator. Dr. Rice spoke briefly about her research on the Whaling Museum and the history of whale-oil manufacturing. Her knowledge of the subject and her enthusiasm made for an intriguing presentation.

The meeting under the tent was a great success, everyone agreeing that it was a pleasantly cool spot. Docents started the mill before the meeting and members were invited inside the building for a look at the turn-

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ing gears and corn being ground. Thanks to trustee Ginger Heard and former president Kim Corkran for their planning and decorating skills.

Antiques Show The twenty-second annual Antiques Show held August

5-8 was once again an enormous success, thanks to an outpouring of support from our underwriters;. 629 founders, benefactors, sponsors, and patrons; and ucket holders. The show is the NHA's primary fund-raising event. In addition, the show is tremendously helpful in increasing awareness of the association and its mission of historic preservation and education.

This year's net proceeds are expected to exceed $300,000. Revenues increased over last year in all areas including the raffle - thanks to the volunteers who sold a record number of tickets. The ew Collectors Booth tripled sales and general admission increased by twelve percent. All of the events surrounding the show were beautifully orchestrated by Polly Espy and her committee.

The theme for the Antiques Show was "Nantucket Foundino- Fanlliies." Pottraits of founding families and their children and life-size silhouettes greeted visitors from the moment they arrived at the show. Still more silhouettes adorned the walls of the foyer and lunch room. The silhouettes have become sought-after props,

Clockwise /rom far le/t: Jean Weber wzlh guest speaker Lonn Taylor at this year's Annual Meeting. held at the Old Millt/7 july.

Polly Espy with Antiques Show honorary chairmen Mimi and Dwight Beman.

Polly Espy and Peggy Silverstein

Annual Meetzl1g coordinators Ginger Heard and Kim Corkran in /rant a/the Old Mill.

Patty ]a Rice, the NHA 's newest Research Fellow.

(Antiques Show photos

by JeffreyS Allen.)

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The education programs had another successful summer thanks to the talented teaching staff Docents Patti Clinton and Dave Prugh are seen with Living His tory partidpants Claire and Carly Jensen outside the Oldest House.

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making encore appearances at the NHA's capital campaign kickoff party in Septem b er (see below) an d Nantucket's March of Dimes Telethon.

An important even t d uring th e Antiques Show week was the lecture sponsored by the Friends of the NHA on Monday, August 2. Some 200 guests gathered to bear art historian Theodore E. Stebbins Jr. of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, give his lecture "Real Life in the Art World."

The NHA thanks all of the volunteers for their hard work -stuffing envelopes and bags, decorating the high school gym, arranging the founders and benefactors dinner hosted by Trianon-Seaman Schepps, and greeting guests as they arrived at the show. Special th anks go to the show's title sponsor, the Chase Manhattan Private Bank, and to Aetna International; an anonymous donor; Christie's Fireman Fund Insurance; Leonard's Antiques; Lucille Jordan Associates, Inc.; Matth ews Ventures; Seldom Scene In teriors; Westchester Air, Inc.; Executive Air Charter; and Woodmeister Corp., Custom Building and Design, for their corporate support.

In addition, thanks go to the thirteen generous donors who contributed items fo r this year's raffle.

Last, but far from least, we are grateful to all our members and friends whose support of the show made it the most successful on record.

New Staff The NHA is pleased to announce that Niles Parker has been hired to assume the responsibilities of chief curator and director of museums. Niles is a graduate of Colby College and has an M.A. in musewn studies from the Cooperstown Graduate Program/State University of New York. Most recently he was curator of exhibitions

at the New York State Historical Association in Cooperstown and editor of the association's Heritage Magazine, a quarterly publication. He has also worked at th e North Carolina Museum of History, the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of American History, and the National Archives. Niles, his wife Sonja, and young son Noah are looking forward to joining the Nantucket community.

Peter Schmid has been hired as the NHA's photoarchivist. Peter has twelve years' experience in the field, most recently as photo-archivist at Utah State University. His specialty is the arrangement, description, and preservation of photographic images. Peter's expertise will be invaluable to researchers in the library.

Amy Jenness has been the NHA's information systems manager since July. Her organizational, writing, and computer skills have already been of great value to the NHA. Amy had been the features editor of the Inquirer and Mirror for the past two years and previously was managing editor of Vermont Business Magazine.

She has lived on Nantucket, on and off, since 1981.

Georgina Winton joined the NHA as Museum Shop manager in September. For the past eleven years, Georgina had been the manager and buyer for the Seven Seas Gift Shop on Centre Street, which closed its doors this year after forty-one years. After graduating from Sy racuse University, Georgia worked in Nantucket for two years before moving to the New York and New Jersey area to work in department stores and specialty shops. She returned to Nantucket in 1988.

She, her husband, and one bossy cat live here year row1d.

H istoric Nantucket Wins Award For the second year in a row, Historic Nantucket has won an awar d in the New England Museum Association's Publication Competition. Last summer's issue on whales and whaling took honorable mention in the competition's "Newsletters - Full Color" category.

Editor Cecil Barron Jen sen and art direc tor Oaire O'Keeffe are especially pleased, considering the only "full color" in the issue was on the cover.

1999 FESTIVAL OF TREES EXHIBITION SCHEDULE NEW/17115 YEAR . .. Festival of Wreaths Exhibition and Sale Sherburne Hall (upstairs) on Centre Street Friday, November 26-10 A.M. to 4 P.M. Saturday, November 27 - 10 A.M. to 4 P.M. Sunday, November 28- 10 A.M . to 1 P.M.

Festival of Trees Hours: Friday, December 3 -10 A.M. to 7 P.M. Saturday, December 4-10 A.M. to 7 P.M. Sunday, December 5 - 10 A.M. to 7 P.M. Monday, December 6 - 10 A.M . to 4 P.M.

For more information, call the NHA offices at (508) 228-1894

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Campaign Kickoff On Thursday, September 2, almost 300 guests literally walked through the jawbone of the forty-five-foot sperm whale that washed ashore on December 31, 1998, to join trustees and staff in the exquisitely decorated Siasconset Casino to hear the NHA's plans for the future. Peter Nash, vice president of the board and campaign chair, announced that $9.8 million has been committed in the "quiet" or "leadership" phase toward a goal of $15.4 million for A Campaign for the Island of Nantucket: Starting with History, Starting Now. Seventyone percent of the initial funding has come from one hundred percent of the trustees. Among the donations is a generous pledge of $2 million from the Teresa and H . John Heinz Foundation. One million will be given outright while the second million must be "earned" by raising an additional million.

Dorothy Slover, president of the board of trustees, announced the extraordinary gift of $3.5 million dedicated to the new museum center and its orientation gallery from Thomas and Georgia Gosnell and their family. Georgia Gosnell told the crowd that the gift is given with much affection for Nantucket and the Historical Association.

Slover explained that the campaign will focus on five important objectives. First, to renovate the Fair Street Museum into a comprehensive research library.

Thomas mzd Georgia Gosnell wzth capztal campaign chair Peter Nash.

Top right: Teresa Heinz, Senator john Kerry, and Georgia Gosnell.

At left: The entrance to the Campaign Kickoff at the Siasconset Casino.

Photos by Terry Pommett.

Second, to repair and renovate the Nantucket Whaling Museun1. T hird, to construct an exhibit and orientation theatre that will link the Whaling M usewn and the Peter Foulger Musewn and showcase our two whales; the center will be a vital and living presence in the commw1ity. Fourth, to expand the Peter Foulger Museum to include an education wing for yow1g people. Finally, to double the NHA's endowment to provide stability for a vigorous future.

Regular updates on the campaign's progress will be published in a newsletter titled The Gam. The first issue is expected to be in mailboxes by mid-October.

1999 FESTIVAL OF TREES NANTUCKET BANK WAD U\DLR\\'RIIER

Thursday, December 2, 1999 BENEFIT PREVIEW PARTY: 6 P.M. WHALING MUSEUM FESTIVAL OF TREES DINNER: 8 P.M. PETER FOULGER MUSEUM HISTORIC

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THE MUSEUM SHOP Eleven Broad Street • Nantucket, MA 02554 (508) 228-5785 • FAX: (508) 325-7046