Cape Cod: Exploring a Sense of Place
The Ever-Present Sea
No aspect of the physical setting of Cape Cod is more important to the Cape's sense of place than the sea. The surrounding water literally shapes the Cape, carving and building its beaches, channels, and islands, and watering its marshes with each tide. The sea effects the climate, moderating the temperatures late into the fall, delaying spring, and cooling the hottest of summer days with ocean breezes. Temperature differences between water and land cause frequent morning or evening fog.
The sea has provided food for the Cape's inhabitants since humans first arrived here. The Wampanoag supplemented their diet of beans, corn, and squash by fishing and gathering shellfish. They stripped blubber and meat from whales that were stranded on the beach, learn to hunt them in the shallow waters, and taught these skills to the first English settlers. In the mid-18th century, Cape Codders joined other maritime New Englanders in hunting the sperm whales, primarily from the ports at Wellfleet, Truro, and Provincetown. Eventually these ports were eclipsed by Nantucket and New Bedford, but the ports continued to do an active trade with packet ships from Boston. For nearly a hundred years, Cape Cod enjoyed prosperity, thanks to the whaling industry. Many a Cape sea captain made his fortune by whaling.
In late fall and winter, “nor’easters” caused frequent shipwrecks along Cape Cod’s coast, as ships navigated around the treacherous shoals. Between Wellfleet and Truro alone there have been over a thousand wrecks. In 1872, the U.S. Life Saving Service was established to provide rescue efforts for ships in trouble. Nine rescue stations were built on the coast of Cape Cod from the tip at Race Point to Monomoy Point. By the early nineteen-teens, better navigational equipment and finally, the opening of the Cape Cod Canal had greatly reduced the number of shipwrecks. In 1915 the Life Saving Service was incorporated into the U.S. Coast Guard.
Winslow Homer's The Life Line captures the drama and heroism of the sea rescue by the U.S. Life Saving Service
Cape Cod National Seashore, NPS Photo
Captain Edward Penniman, built this house in 1868 at Fort Hill in Eastham. The jawbones from baleen whales form an arch over the property entrance.
(below) The Old Harbor Life Saving Station at Provincetown NPS Photo
By the end of the 19th century, whaling was in decline. The economy of Cape Cod was hit hard, but but once again the sea proved its importance as people began to make a living from from tourism. Vacationers first arrived by stage or packet boat, but in 1848 the first trains from Boston came to Sandwich, and by 1873 the railroad had reached Provincetown. President Grover Cleveland (1885-89, 1893-97) made his home at Bourne the “summer White House,” popularizing the Cape as a vacation spot. (John F. Kennedy would do the same in the early 1960s.) Grand seaside resorts soon grew up. The automobile brought more tourists who came to enjoy the Cape’s beautiful beaches. The creation of the Cape Cod National Seashore in 1961 ensured that the forty-mile coast from Eastham to Provincetown, along with its marshes, ponds, and uplands would be preserved free from development and set aside for the enjoyment of all. While today many still make a living by fishing, lobstering, or aquaculture, tourism is the Cape’s number one industry, and the sea, the beaches, and the charm of the beach towns the main reason people visit.
The sea continues to dominate the Cape's sense of place throughout the year. Even after the summer visitors have gone, Cape Codders enjoy the sea. Visit a beach on any day, at any time of the year, and you will find someone walking, bird watching, fishing, watching the sunset, or simply sitting and gazing at the waves.
[1] Henry David Thoreau. Cape Cod (Cambridge: Thomas Y. Crowell & Co., 1908), Kindle edition.
The first lighthouse on Cape Cod was Highland Light, built on the cliffs of North Truro in 1797. It has been rebuilt and moved several times, most recently in 1996, to keep it from toppling into the sea as the cliffs eroded. There are eighteen lighthouses on the Cape, eleven along the treacherous coast of the Upper Cape from Chatham to Provincetown.
Although GPS and improved navigational aides make lighthouses no longer a necessity, they continue to stand as popular and iconic symbols of Cape Cod. NPS Photo
" A man may stand there and put all America behind him." [1]
—Henry David Thoreau