The title of this vintage postcard from approximately 1910 says Commercial Street. Do you recognize those buildings? What are they like today? Not so totally different, than today and just as crowded, just with different people. They are all on there way somewhere. Perhaps to the theater, a bar, a restaurant? There were always plenty of businesses to choose from, even 100 years ago. What’s the town like when it’s not so busy? Take a look at Remaining in Provincetown. Now available at bookstores, online, and at Amazon.com. Like us on Facebook.
Tag Archives: provincetown massachusetts
St. Peters Church in Provincetown
Visit St. Peter’s Church today, and you’ll be visiting the new church dedicated in July 2008. The original church was destroyed by fire in January 2005 and only one stained glass window was saved. But the church, dedicated in October 1874 is very much integral to the Provincetown community. Initially when the church was opened, the majority of the parishioners were Portuguese fishermen and their families, according to the church’s website, they comprised well over 50 percent of the town’s population. The church figures into the storyline of the new murder mystery released in April, Remaining in Provincetown. Many of the characters are parishioners. Want to read more? Now on sale online and at bookstores as well as at Amazon.com. Like us on Facebook.
Provincetown’s Oldest House, a full cape
Built in approximately 1746 Provincetown’s Oldest House
Located on Commercial Street on the West End of Provincetown, the house purported to be the oldest house was once open to tourists but now is privately owned. As you can see in this antique postcard, the house was once a shop. Artists Elizabeth and Coulton Waugh ran the Ship Model Shop and Hooked Rug Shop in the Cape Cod cottage built in approximately 1746. In the front of the house was an arch made of a whale’s jawbone.
Architecturally a full Cape, said to have been built by Seth Nickerson, a ship’s carpenter. Two front windows flank a central doorway and the windows abut the eaves. Inside are wide-board floors. It is said that Nickerson built the house from wood salvage from shipwrecks.
Painter and photographer John Gregory, and Adelaide Gregory, a concert pianist, bought the house in 1944. They opened the house to the public, on occasion, but today you’ll just have to imagine its interior as you walk past. Just as you’ll have to imagine just what happens behind closed doors, unless you read Remaining in Provincetown, the new murder mystery released this month, available at stores, online and at Amazon.com. Like us on Facebook.
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Mayflower Heights and Horses in Provincetown
The geography of Mayflower Heights in Provincetown certainly looks different in this antique postcard when you are approaching by horse and carriage! Not that many people living in Provincetown, on the tip of Cape Cod actually owned horses. A boat was a more practical means of transportation, for this small town overlooking the Cape Cod Bay. As written in The Log of Provincetown and Truro on Cape Cod Massachusetts by M.C.M. Hatch, published in 1939:
“In 1829, a Provincetown minister could write to a friend: –“would you believe that there is a town in the United States with eighteen hundred inhabitants and only one horse with one eye? Well that town is Provincetown and I am the only man in it that owns a horse, and he is an old white one with only one eye.”
There’s all different sorts of interesting things you can read about Provincetown written in the past. Or you can read a brand new murder mystery, Remaining in Provincetown by S.N. Cook now available in bookstores, online, and at Amazon.com. Like us on Facebook. Thank you!
Provincetown Cape Cod, where did the name come from?
How did Provincetown, Massacusetts get its name?
According to Agnes Edwards book, “Cape Cod New and Old” published in 1918, after the union of the Plymouth and Massachusetts Bay colonies in 1692 Provincetown, then a part of Truro. became a fishing hamlet. In 1741 it was set off as a precinct of the Province of the Massachusetts Bay Colony Initially the lands retained, were owned by the colony. Province of the Massachusetts Colony became Provincetown. Sounds logical to me. What may not be logical to someone who doesn’t live in Provincetown, why sewage and water usage are such hot button issues. When it comes to real estate use and development, these things are very much on the minds of the characters in the new murder mystery novel, Remaining in Provincetown by S.N.Cook. Now available online and in bookstores, including Amazon.com. Like us on Facebook.
Provincetown’s first Italian restaurant a gay love story
Cesco’s Italian Restaurant
opened in 1916
Going up Bradford Street in Provincetown, just beyond the Milldred Greenfelter East End Playground on the corner of Howland Street, there used to be a very popular Italian Restaurant. Called Cesco’s, as you can see above, it had its own postcard printed, the name comes from an abbreviated version of its chef and owner Francesco “Cesco” Ronga, known fondly as the “Spaghetti King of Cape Cod.” Francesco met and fell in love with artist Fred Marvin, the half brother of Mary Heaton Vorse, in Naples and followed Fred to Provincetown. The two men were devoted to one another for 50 years. Located in an extension of their home, the restaurant drew clientele from all over New England and was in operation from approximately 1916 to 1934. One of the characters, Frank Chambers, in the new murder mystery novel Remaining in Provincetown, has his own restaurant, “The Indigo Inn. ” Creating new recipes for Frank is a passion, almost an obsession. Want to read more about Frank and the other characters in the new novel everyone’s talking about. Pick up a copy, now available online and a bookstores including Amazon.com. Like us on Facebook.
Hollyhocks a Provincetown Cape Cod favorite flower
Hollyhock Lane glimpse of the Provincetown harbor
Admiring the gardens as you walk downtown is part of the summer experience when you visit Provincetown and hollyhocks are a favorite flower. Their height and various colors makes a nice contrast to other blossoms. According to English botantist Wedgewood, The name holly came from “holy” because the first of the plants brought to southern Europe came from the Holy Land, having been transplanted there from the orient. It does well in all climates and soils. During the Middle Ages, and it is mentioned as “holy-hoke”, an adaptation of the Welsh name, in a British horticultural treatise of 1548. Here is another lovely antique postcard.
Holly Hock Lane with the Provincetown monument in the background.
If you enjoy reading about Provincetown, you should enjoy the murder mystery just published this month, Remaining in Provincetown by S.N. Cook, available online, at bookstores and at Amazon.Com. Like us on facebook.
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Provincetown takes center stage in new book
Remaining in Provincetown
By S.N.Cook.
Truro Works. 306 pages
$12.95 Trade Paperback
Provincetown, that enigmatic town on the tip of Cape Cod, is part of the title of the newly released murder mystery Remaining in Provincetown, and it is the core focus of a perfect mystery lite. A story that delves into the thoughts, fears, and aspirations of a medley of characters as varied in their socio-economic and sexual orientations as the town in which they reside.
Roz Silva, is the power hungry publisher/editor of the town’s (fictitious) weekly newspaper The Provincetown Observer. Widowed three years earlier, with two teenage daughters, she is attractive and lonely—so lonely she’s been carrying on what she thinks is a secret love affair with the new town manager, who just happens to be married. But in a small town, there are no secrets. Certainly talented and sensitive Frank Chambers, a chef and owner of the highly regarded Indigo Inn, knows of Roz’s indiscretions and he’s not going to pass judgment on who she sleeps with when he is too busy worrying how to get his restaurant staffed for the upcoming season and whether the HIV virus he’s carrying will develop into a full blown case of AIDS. But he and his good friend Bruno, an Innkeeper with a weakness for young boys, do know one thing, they don’t like Roz and they want to start an alternative publication—a magazine.
And then there is the murder. Sonny Carreiro, Portuguese American native son, insurance agent, and real estate developer is mysteriously shot in front of his home on a Sunday evening and there are no witnesses. But there are plenty of suspects. He’s been separated from his wife Sarah for several months. Why did she leave him? He’s not on speaking terms with his business partner Beau Costa. Where was Beau on Sunday night? Who in Sonny’s past, may have a score to settle?
Set in the early 1990s in a version of Provincetown which contains many actual businesses and locations used in a fictional context along with newly created places and situations that may feel oddly familiar, the book brings to life a town known for its beauty and the unique diversity of its inhabitants. Available online at Amazon.com and at local bookstores in trade paperback, 306 pages $12.95 retail or as a kindle ebook, it is destined to become a mystery classic.
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Hanging out in Provincetown Cape Cod
New Central Hotel in Provincetown, Massachusetts now Crown & Anchor
The name of the Inn in Provincetown’s center may have changed from New Central Hotel to Crown & Anchor, but people still hang out and check new visitors walking by, particularly at the height of summer. This beautiful setting on the tip of Cape Cod is filled with a multitude of historic buildings, has a view of the Bay, many art galleries, shops, and fine restaurants. Some visitors come once and never leave, Remaining in Provincetown, the name of the new murder mystery novel released just two weeks ago, everyone’s talking about. Now available at Amazon.com as a trade paperback and on kindle. Like the Facebook page.
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Writing about the nature of Provincetown, Cape Cod
Once the dunes were covered with forests,” writes Mary Heaton Vorse (1874-1966) in her classic book about Provincetown entitled, Time and the Town, The early settlers cut them down and made their houses and vessels of them The old houses in Provincetown are made from timber cut here.”
Vorse first came to Provincetown in 1907 for a short vacation, ended up buying a house and staying on and off Cape Cod for the rest of her life. She writes eloquently about many things including the sand dunes. “The dune walks. A great wind will lift them bodily. A vast crater will appear where last year there was one. The wind piles up a mountain of sand and things may begin to grow upon its top. Then the mountain will be again leveled off. There is space here. There is an expanse that gives the illusion that the other side of the dunes is a great way off, as one feels in the West, looking over a great mesa.” Time and the Town was published in 1942.
Provincetown has continued to attract and inspire writers. What are the mysterious dynamics of the town? Intrigued to read more? Check out Remaining in Provincetown, the new mystery novel now available at Amazon.com in trade paperback or on kindle. Like the Remaining in Provincetown Facebook page and keep the conversation going.
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