The house at 26 Maine St was built by boatbuilder and Sea Captain Nathaniel Ward Jr. in 1812. Nathaniel Ward Jr.’s eldest son, Charles, who inherited the house from his father, became the second American Consul to Zanzibar in 1846. Not the most diplomatic of diplomats, his explosive relationship with the Sultan Seyyid Said nearly...
Month: January 2023
Captain Daniel Walker’s Kennebunkport Legacy
Kittery shipwright John Walker, no relation to the Walkers of Walker’s Point, purchased a 20-acre lot of land in Arundel in 1740. His 21-year-old son Gideon was at that time apprenticed with a tanner in Rowley, Massachusetts. John Walker left his son the Arundel lot when he died in 1743. Gideon Walker built a home...
U.S. Navy Battleship time trials Cape Ann to Cape Porpoise
Cape Porpoise residents had a front row seat to watch the official United States Battle Cruiser speed trials from Seavey’s lookout up on Crow Hill. Each trial consisted of 2 trips over a carefully measured course that ran 41.65 knots at sea from Cape Ann, Massachusetts to Cape Porpoise, Maine. The battleships would circle for...
Elmer Chickering
This Elmer Chickering photograph was taken in 1883 from Lower Village looking across the old drawbridge into Dock Square. Elmer Chickering of 21 West St Boston came through town in his handmade photography saloon during the summers of 1882 and 1883. You can recognize his cabinet cards by their gilt Chickering watermark, though the watermark...