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SPOTLIGHT:
Guidebook Cape Cod ~ Eastham
Swift-Daley House and Tool Museum, Route 6. Nathaniel Swift (of Swift
Meat Packing Company) lived in this circa 1741 residence. The bow-roofed
building, furnished with antiques, is a restoration of a full Cape with
a central chimney, pumpkin pine floors and borning and mourning rooms.
Its second floor contains an exhibit of wedding gowns and trousseaus
from the 1800s and 1900s. The parlor has a rosewood melodeon, a unique
double oil lamp and old photographs of the Eastham of 100 years ago. Be
certain not to miss the adjacent Tool Museum which exhibits tools and
implements collected in the area including remnants of salt work and
cranberry-growing operations. Built in 1741 by Joshua Knowles, this
bow-roofed home has wide floorboards, a minister's cupboard, original
wainscoting, and an eight-foot-wide fireplace. Its eight rooms are
filled with period furnishings, including artifacts and clothing from
the Colonial through the Victorian eras. It is open weekdays from 1 to 4
PM in July and August. The Tool Museum, behind the Swift-Daley House,
has a display that includes numerous tools and implements collected in
the area, including remnants of saltworks and cranberry-growing
operations. The hours are the same as those of the Swift-Daley House.
Admission to both is free. (508) 240-1247
Captain Edward Penniman House, Fort Hill Road. This whimsical yellow and
red Victorian French Second Empire house, set on a knoll overlooking the
Atlantic, was built circa 1868 by a rather eccentric whaling captain.
Visitors enter through an enormous archway of whale jawbones at its
gate. Located within the boundaries of the Cape Cod National Seashore,
the Penniman House in the Fort Hill area of Eastham showcases the
fortunes made by the Cape's whaling captains. Retiring from the sea in
1876, Captain Edward Penniman built this impressive Victorian mansion on
a knoll with a cupola overlooking the Atlantic Ocean. In front of the
house there is a gateway made of two huge whale jawbones marking the
entrance to the property. A few rods beyond this edifice one finds the
Indian sharpening rock and a timeless ocean view and visitors can also
see the spot where the Fo’c’sle once stood before it was swept out to
sea in the hurricane blizzard of 1978. Henry Beston in The Outermost
House made the Fo’c’sle famous. You can tour the house during the summer
season; admission is free. The Penniman House is open from May through
September, Monday through Friday from 1 PM to 4 PM. Guided tours are
available in May and June on Monday and Saturday starting at 10 AM; in
July and August guided tours are offered Monday, Wednesday and Saturday
at 10 AM. Admission is free. Reservations are required if you plan to
take a guided tour by calling the Cape Cod National Seashore at the
number above. Fort Hill Road (508) 255-3421 www.nps.gov/caco
Eastham Grist Mill, Route 6 and Samoset Road. This smock mill, with its
original hand-hewn machinery still operative, was built in the early
1680s and was moved to this site in 1808. It is the only Cape windmill
on its original commercial site. Resting upon the town green in Eastham
is the oldest and most widely known of all the Cape Cod windmills. The
Eastham Grist Mill was built in Plymouth in the 1680s, which means that
the corn it ground most likely found its way into the mouths of the sons
and daughters of Pilgrims. It was later moved to Truro during the end of
the 18th century by floating it across Cape Cod Bay. In 1798 it was
moved to Eastham. The mill remained in operation until the turn of the
20th century. It was first open to the public in the 1930s and restored
in the 1960s. Nowadays it is open weekends from 10 AM to 4 PM during the
summer months when visitors can see its original wooden machinery that
still operates today--what craftsmanship! Admission is free, but
donations are accepted. Open summers.
Cape Cod National Seashore Salt Pond Visitor Center, Route 6. This
interpretive center features a museum with displays of whaling and salt
works industries, exhibits of early Cape artifacts (including
scrimshaw). There is also a bookstore, an auditorium which shows films
on geology, sea rescues, whaling, Thoreau and Marconi. A large showroom
features exhibits on Cape Cod’s history, geography, natural history and
architecture. During summer evenings, there is always something
happening at the outdoor amphitheater, from slide-show talks to military
band performances. Here you can learn about the geological and natural
elements that make up the outer shores of Cape Cod. Part of the Cape Cod
National Seashore, the center has a fine exhibit room with displays on
various Cape industries, lighthouses, and the lifesaving service. There
is also an auditorium that shows short films about the National
Seashore. The Salt Pond Visitor Center is generally open daily
year-round from 9 AM to 4:30 PM. The summer has extended hours to 5 PM
Route 6, Eastham• (508) 255-3421• www.nps.gov/caco
Eastham Schoolhouse Museum. This one-room schoolhouse was built in 1869
as an elementary school. Around the turn of the century, the town had
three such one-room schoolhouses. These were later joined to form the
Eastham Central School, which operated until 1936. After two of the
original schoolhouse deteriorated in the mid-1900's, the old original
schoolhouse was restored to its late-19th-century one-room status and
serves as a museum of the Eastham Historical Society. It still has two
doors marked as separate entrances for boys and girls. Exhibits include
farming and household implements, Native American artifacts, shipwreck
artifacts, and displays pertaining to area history, including a 13-foot
jawbone from a 65-foot finback whale. The museum is open weekdays in
July and August from 1 PM to 4 PM and weekends in September from 1 PM to
4 PM. Admission is free. Route 6 at Nauset and Schoolhouse Roads (508)
255-0788
Nature Trails: There are five nature trails within this portion of the
Cape Cod National Seashore:
Fort Hill Trail (1½ miles), off Fort Hill Road. Following trail markers,
visitors will pass Indian Rock, where telltale marks on the rock itself
disclose that untold generations of Native Americans sharpened their
tools here. Scenic vantage points disclose incredible vistas of marsh
and ocean. Sharp-eyed hikers will thrill to egrets and blue heron that
inhabit this area. The Trail links up with Red Cedar Swamp Trail (½
mile), which offers boardwalk views of an ecology otherwise unavailable
for viewing.
From Salt Pond Visitor Center, three shorter trails fan out. Buttonbush
Trail (¼ mile), specially adapted for the sight-impaired with a guide
rope, features descriptive plaques in both oversized type and Braille.
Doane Loop Trail (½ mile) is a half-mile wooded circuit about 1 mile
east of the Visitor Center. The trail is graded to permit access by
wheelchairs and baby strollers. The Nauset Marsh Trail (1 mile) skirts
Salt Pond and crosses the marsh via a boardwalk and open fields before
returning through a recovering forest.
Old Cove Cemetery, Route 6 (opposite Hay Road). This was the site of
Eastham’s first meetinghouse shortly after 1644. Mayflower passengers
are buried in its graveyard.
Eastham 1869 Schoolhouse Museum, Nauset Road. This one-room schoolhouse
was used by the town until 1905 but also displays whale jaw bones, an
old tool shed, U.S. Life Saving records and memorabilia from the school
itself. Open summers.
Nauset Lighthouse, Cable Road. One of an original trio of Cape
lighthouses known as the “Three Sisters.” Its tower is 114 feet high,
its beacon—brought from Chatham in 1923—is 25,000 candlepower.
Cape Cod Chamber of Commerce
Routes 6 & 132, PO Box 790
Hyannis, MA 02601
508-362-3225 |
Website
|
Email
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