Nantucket, West Live Cam

A little bit of this…a little bit of that. And some of it isn’t really trivia.

Did you know that there used to be a dwelling on Front and Broadway in Siasconset called the Headache House? According to Early Nantucket and Its Whale Houses, by Henry Chandlee, just to the north of the George Gardner house and on the same lot “once stood a long, narrow dwelling with gable-ends facing Broadway and Front Street. This was called Headache House because of its incurably smoking chimney.”

Did you know that the lean-to type of building, perhaps the first house style used by the white settlers on Nantucket, is “either a large outsheet or addition, with a roof of one slope, at the rear or side of a building or the whole edifice itself, including the long roof.” That information can be found in the Chandlee book, which notes that in England, this type of roof was called a much more colorful name: catslide. Nantucket’s first houses tended to be the lean-to form, according to Dick Mackay’s Nantucket! Nantucket! Nantucket, “not only because it was the style of the day, but because it was rather simple to put up and the early settlers were primarily farmers and herdsmen, not housewrights. High in front and low in back, lean-to houses provided simple human shelter without pretension.”

And on the island, canny house-builders usually placed the catslide/lean-to on the north side – that was because those strong sou’west gales Nantucketers know so well could (and still do) tear off shingles. And that also meant that the front side of the house received more of the sun and light. Who cared if the front door was at the back of the house, away from the road? Sounds like a good idea to me.

Did you know that West Chester Street was once called “West Centre Street”…and “North Center Street” was what the present Cliff Road was called? The original Chester Street of the late 1600s is probably the oldest road on the island; it originally connected Capaum at the first Town, Sherburne, and it ran eastward toward the Great Harbor. Yes, the Chester Highway. There’s still a tiny bit of the olde Chester Street left – it’s a very short block between Centre and North Water – and the present West Chester starts at the very end of Centre and leads, not surprisingly, westward.

By the way, have you noticed what a funny street Centre is? It’s one-way from Main Street and the Pacific National Bank down to India Street, bothway from India to the Jared Coffin House, one-way toward town from Lily Street past the Congregational Church to the JC House, and bothway starting westward from Lily Street until it joins West Chester. No wonder cars and cyclists are confused. What’s that you say? “Bothway” isn’t a real word? Well, neither is “alot,” “thankyou”…not to mention “envyament,” for “environment,” “nucular” for “nuclear,” “relator” for “realtor,” “jewlery” for “jewelry,” and…oh this could go on forever! And that is trivial…isn’t it?

Speaking of roads, do you think the old horses and wagons had as much trouble passing each other on the rough and rutted roads of the past as ever-wider automobiles do today on, say, Gardner Street? It’s said that on the old island roads, once the wagon wheels got into the ruts, you were obliged to keep going because you couldn’t get out of them till you reached your destination. Seeing a hoss and wagon coming from Polpis while you were headed there must have been as alarming as seeing a Hummer coming toward you on Gardner.

Did you know that of the handful of dwellings at Capaum Harbor before it silted in, only one survives – the Elihu Coleman House at the head of Hummock Pond? And that as the first settlers gradually moved nearer the Great Harbor and today’s town, they “cannibalized” their homes and the warehouses, barns, sheep pens, fish sheds, and fences – anything made of wood – to set up their homes and businesses in the new town? The only surviving building at the old Sherburne is Elihu Coleman House built in 1722 at the head of Hummock Pond. Quaker by belief and carpenter by trade, Coleman, interestingly enough, wrote a very early antislavery tract, “A Testemony Against that Anti Christian Practice of Making Slaves of Men…”

Did you know that the first Quaker meetinghouse on the island was built in 1710, 3 years after the Society of Friends was formed? And that the Congregational Society also built a meetinghouse in Sherburne, which was later moved eastward a couple of miles east and still exists as the vestry building of the First Congregational Church on Centre Street? (Nantucketers have always loved to move houses around – they’re still doing it.)

Did you know that perhaps one of the first instances of the intense rivalry between the original 20 proprietors and the 14 half-share men (brought in later because somebody had to tend the sheep, make the shoes, and weave the wool) possibly started when John and Richard Gardner, half-share men, somehow got that first town named Sherburne, which was the name of their family’s village in Dorset? This doubtless set the Coffins et al. to much gnashing of teeth. The Coffins and the Gardners were sworn enemies for years, and it is said that the feud ended only when Jethro Coffin (son of Thomas Coffin) and Mary Gardner (daughter of John Gardner) married and were given the Oldest House by their parents in 1686.

Related to that, did you know that the son of half-share man Richard Gardner, also named Richard, and his wife Mary had 10 children? One, Lydia, was born in 1687 and died less than a year later…so, according to custom, the next baby girl the Gardners had was also named Lydia. Born in 1689 and living for 79 years, Lydia married John Coffin, son of Jethro Coffin and Mary Gardner (the Oldest House couple). (n.b.: Richard fils was the one who built that lovely historic property at 34 West Chester, in 1722.)

And did you know that when Richard Gardner (père) of Salem, Massachusetts, was granted his half-share on Nantucket “in order to exercise his trade as seaman,’ his young son Joseph was also given a half share, provided he “supply the occasions of the Island in way of a shoemaker and not leave the island for 4 years”? So you see, there was a noticeable schism between those who were the wealthy landowners and those who exercised the trades that would keep commerce and live on this little island going. Does this sound at all familiar to 21st-century island readers?

Ever hear of a “squat baluster?” Well, that brings all sorts of images to mind – sounds like something you might call an individual who has just elbowed you out of the way in the line at the movies. It is actually a somewhat thickset post supporting the upper rail on a staircase. You’ll see examples of this in many very old Nantucket houses. Plain and sturdy and simple, as opposed to willowy and slender. A “squat balusters and newels on a closed stringer” – with the stairway “rising around the sides of a square room and having thickly turned newel posts and turned balusters on a closed stringer” (from Early Nantucket and Its Whale Houses,by Henry C. Forman) – in a very old Nantucket house would send many a real estate agent into ecstasy, even though the English of old felt it was a space-waster. Today it gets about the same frisson as running your thumb across a genuine whalebone mortgage button…you DO know that island custom, don’t you?

Did you know that the Lily Pond, which exists no more except as a heavenly little conservation area of squishy soil, marshy plants, and lots of rabbits and birds, was once called Wesco Pond? It held one of Nantucket’s first mills, but alas, the pond disappeared overnight. Your homework assignment: dig out this story. Hint: The discoverer of the calamity said: “Oh, what a wicked piece of work! Some evil-minded person has let the Lily Pond out! It has carried away the sand and made a great gully!” (Where do these quotations come from, anyway? Was there a reporter around then recording people’s remarks when something momentous happened?)

Did you think that dog pounds are a modern invention? Ah, no – while they had no MSPCA, early islanders maintained a number of pounds, usually just smallish bits of land roughly bounded by fences. This was to keep animals from roaming; moreover, many people were forced to build fences around their houses…after all, there were some 500 cows, only slightly outnumbered by citizens, in the early 1700s. And even stray pigs and dogs became a nuisance, especially if you had a small garden in the hard or left your front door open to bring in some air.

Enough of yesterdays. Here’s a bit o’ trivia (pursuits, grumblings, and wonderings) about today’s island. And most of it really IS trivia.

Did you know that there’s a waiter in a very nice Nantucket restaurant who says in such an affected manner to one and all at the table he serves, “Good EVEN-ing!” If that doesn’t generate enough chuckles (or shudders) among the guests, he may later serve what he calls a TANKray gin and tonic and tell guests us how the special “vinegar-ette” was made. Tsk tsk, such snobs, we Nantucket diners! This brings to mind the Sconset waiter of a few summers ago who started off on the wrong foot by asking two of us who are well past our 40s, shall we say, “And what would you young ladies like to drink tonight?” As the meal continued, he kept using this term until finally, my friend said, “If he calls me ‘young lady’ once more, I think I’m going to throw my water over his shoes.” Young men being patronizing toward older women is not trivial. Ugh.

Sitting in the car at a luckily found parking space, awaiting the filling of a prescription, this writer counted the people who were talking on cellphones, or carrying them, as they passed. In 5 minutes, 7 out of about 30 people. And what does it do to the mind to see a person walking by the loveliest gardens – roses, lilies, daisies, hydrangea of many colors, against the wonderful weathered Nantucket shingles – staring off into another world, not ours, while talking on the phone. There oughtta be a law! Or street signs saying DON’T HURRY. LOOK. ENJOY.

Speaking of gardens, was there ever a more spectacular display of multicolored hydrangeas than those hiding modestly behind the fence at the bottom of the incline crowned by the Congregational Church? NOT trivia!

And gardens bring to mind lawns. A tiny lawn is not necessarily trivial, but why is it necessary to hire someone to cut it twice weekly with noisy gas-guzzling mowers? WHY isn’t there some sort of town regulation stipulating that people with lawns smaller than living rooms shall be forbidden to use deafening power mowers? The gentle clackety-clacking sound of a hand-pushed mower is wonderful…and it’s such good and easy exercise.

How come the island’s carpenters, plumbers, etcetera, must smash up anything they take to the Landfill? Used to be you could get a usable sink or storm window or cabinet or whatever there, but now, not so. Seems that the very core of recycling ought to be the chance to re-use something as many times as practical… (BTW, does anyone know where Pimney can find a plain old window for her wall?? Why would anyone need a window –or “winder,” as some old-timers say – for the wall? Because, with mirrors, it can reflect the opposite real window and make the room stretch outside even more. Did you need to know that? Is that too too trivial?

Apologies for repeating a query made in past columns, but why on earth do people continue to ride around with the dayglo parking ticket under their wiper? “Gosh, officer, I just didn’t see it.” Yeah, yeah…

A few years ago islander Gene Mahon said he liked to practice good traffic deeds when he goes out in his car – letting someone go first at a corner, for example, and giving way to cobblestone-crossing visitors. This is commendable, and yrs trly also tries to do this…but still, have you noticed how few people look pleased and raise a hand to wave “thank you” in response? (Is it altogether cricket to say, in these cases, in a rather carrying voice, “You’re welcome!”?)

BUT…one must admit that the number of people who are pleasant and polite walking on the sidewalks and driving their cars around the island is greater than the numbers of the ill-behaved. This is important trivia to remember.

If you ever want a delicious tiny, some might say trivial, adventure, go into the Children’s section of the Atheneum and sit in one of Claire Urbahn’s wonderful animal chairs. Don’t be shy – do it! The child in us needs to be let out now and then. Come to think of it, building at least one major sandcastle on a Nantucket beach a summer is also good for the spirit. And blowing bubbles. And walking barefoot. Tend to the trivial, no matter where you find it. It’s the very stuff of life.