Nantucket
Nantucket | |
|---|---|
| Town and County of Nantucket | |
 | |
 Flag  Seal | |
 Location of Nantucket in Massachusetts | |
  Nantucket Location in the United States  Nantucket Nantucket (the United States) | |
| Coordinates: 41°16′58″N 70°5′58″W / 41.28278°N 70.09944°W | |
| Country | United States |
| State | Massachusetts |
| Settled | 1641 |
| Incorporated | 1671 |
| Government | |
| • Type | Open town meeting and consolidated town and county |
| • Town Administrator | Libby Gibson |
| Area | |
• Total | 105.3 sq mi (272.6 km2) |
| • Land | 47.8 sq mi (123.8 km2) |
| • Water | 57.5 sq mi (148.8 km2) |
| Elevation | 30 ft (9 m) |
| Population (2020) | |
• Total | 14,255 |
14,758  | |
| • Density | 298/sq mi (115.1/km2) |
| Time zone | UTC−5 (Eastern) |
| • Summer (DST) | UTC−4 (Eastern) |
| ZIP Codes | 02554, 02564, 02584 |
| Area code | 508 |
| FIPS code | 25-43790 |
| GNIS feature ID | 0619376 |
| Website | nantucket-ma |
Nantucket (/ˌnænˈtʌkɪt/) is an island in Massachusetts, United States, about 30 miles (48 km) south of the Cape Cod peninsula.[2] Together with the small islands of Tuckernuck and Muskeget, it constitutes the Town and County of Nantucket, a combined county/town government. Nantucket is the southeasternmost town in Massachusetts. The name "Nantucket" is adapted from similar Algonquian names for the island.[2]
Nantucket is a tourist destination and summer colony. Due to an influx of tourists and seasonal residents, the population of the island increases to around 80,000 during the summer months.[3] The average sale price for a single-family home was $2.3 million in the first quarter of 2018.[4]
The National Park Service cites Nantucket, designated a National Historic Landmark District in 1966, as being the "finest surviving architectural and environmental example of a late 18th- and early 19th-century New England seaport town."[5]
History
[edit]![](https://couplestory.pages.dev/bl-https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Clinton_Folgers_"Horsemobile".jpg)
Etymology
[edit]Nantucket probably takes its name from a Wampanoag word, transliterated variously as natocke, nantaticu, nantican, nautica or natockete, which is part of Wampanoag lore about the creation of Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket.[6] The meaning of the term is uncertain, although according to the Encyclopædia Britannica it may have meant "far away island" or "sandy, sterile soil tempting no one".[2] Wampanoag is an Eastern Algonquian language of southern New England.[7] The Nehantucket (known to Europeans as the Niantic) were an Algonquin-speaking people of the area.[8]
Nantucket's nickname, "The Little Grey Lady of the Sea", refers to the island as it appears from the ocean when it is fog-bound.[9][10]
European colonization
[edit]The earliest European colonial settlement in the region was established on the neighboring island of Martha's Vineyard by the English-born merchant Thomas Mayhew. In 1641, Mayhew secured Martha's Vineyard, Nantucket, the Elizabeth Islands, and other islands in the region as a proprietary colony from Sir Ferdinando Gorges and the Earl of Stirling. Mayhew led several families to settle the region, establishing several treaties with the indigenous inhabitants of Nantucket, the Wampanoag people. These treaties helped prevent the region from becoming embroiled in King Philip's War. The growing population of settlers welcomed seasonal groups of other Native American tribes who traveled to the island to fish and later harvest whales that washed up on shore. Nantucket was officially part of Dukes County, New York, until October 17, 1691, when the charter for the newly formed Province of Massachusetts Bay was signed. Following the arrival of the new Royal Governor on May 14, 1692, to effectuate the new government, Nantucket County was partitioned from Dukes County, Massachusetts in 1695.[11]
Nantucket settlers
[edit]European settlement of Nantucket did not begin in earnest until 1659, when Thomas Mayhew sold nine-tenths of his interest to a group of investors, led by Tristram Coffin, "for the sum of thirty pounds (equal to £4,912 today) also two beaver hats, one for myself, and one for my wife".[12]
The nine original purchasers were Tristram Coffin, Peter Coffin, Thomas Macy (an ancestor of William H. Macy), Christopher Hussey, Richard Swain, Thomas Barnard, Stephen Greenleaf, John Swain and William Pile. Mayhew and the nine purchasers then each took on partners in the venture. These additional shareholders were Tristram Coffin Junior, James Coffin, John Smith, Robert Pike, Thomas Look, Robert Barnard, Edward Starbuck, Thomas Coleman, John Bishop and Thomas Mayhew Junior. These twenty men and their heirs were the Proprietors.[13]
Anxious to add to their number and to bring tradesmen to the island, the total number of shares was increased to twenty-seven. The original purchasers needed the assistance of tradesmen who were skilled in the arts of weaving, milling, building and other pursuits and selected men who were given half a share provided that they lived on Nantucket and carried on their trade for at least three years. By 1667, twenty-seven shares had been divided among 31 owners.[14] Seamen and tradesmen who settled in Nantucket included Richard Gardner (arrived 1667) and Capt. John Gardner (arrived 1672), sons of Thomas Gardner.[15] The first settlers focused on farming and raising sheep, but overgrazing and the growing number of farms made these activities untenable, and the islanders soon began turning to the sea for a living.[16]
Sherburne
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Before 1795, the town on the island was called Sherburne.[17] The original settlement was near Capaum Pond. At that time, the pond was a small harbor whose entrance silted up, forcing the settlers to dismantle their houses and move them northeast by two miles to the present location.[18] On June 8, 1795, the bill proposed by Micajah Coffin to change the town's name to the "Town of Nantucket" was endorsed and signed by Governor Samuel Adams to officially change the town name.[19]
New Guinea
[edit]The early settlers brought enslaved African Americans to Nantucket. Although slavery was not abolished on the island until 1773, earlier in the century freed African Americans established a neighbourhood called New Guinea (later Newtown) on the south-west outskirts of the main town, near the windmills on Mill Hill. The community thrived during the 18th and 19th centuries, with shops, churches, a school and a dance hall as well as houses. The building on the corner of York and Pleasant Streets, founded in 1824 as a school, church and meeting-house, was acquired by the Museum of African American History in 1999. During the nineteenth century, Nantucket, which by this time was predominantly Quaker and supported the abolition of slavery, became part of the Underground Railroad, providing sanctuary to African Americans escaping slavery on the mainland.[20][21] New Guinea was also home to Hawaiian Islanders who worked on the Nantucket whaleships, and to Wampanoags who had married into the African American community.[22][20]
The Wampanoags
[edit]When English settlers arrived on Nantucket in 1659, the island was populated by Wampanoag Native Americans, one of the Indigenous peoples of the Northeastern Woodlands, who had been living there for thousands of years. As many as three thousand people lived on the island in groups governed by sachems.[23]: 17, 21 Within two years of their arrival, the settlers had persuaded two of the sachems, Wanackmamack and Nickanoose, to relinquish their rights to the island in exchange for 66 pounds sterling, equal to £10,805 today).[23]: 26-7 In 1750 the deeds were upheld by a judge from the General Court of Massachusetts in spite of petitions from the Wampanoags claiming that the sachems had not had the authority to sell the land.[23]: 52 The Wampanoags converted to Christianity and took up trades that were useful to the settlers, becoming, for example, carpenters and weavers.[23]: 40 When the whaling industry developed on Nantucket in the 18th century, Wampanoag men went to sea and often made up half or more of the crew of the whaling ships.[23]: 44-6 By the beginning of the 18th century, a system of debt bondage had been implemented to provide local colonists with steady access to a pool of Wampanoag labor.[24]
During the century that followed the arrival of the settlers, the Wampanoag community did not thrive, and by 1763 they numbered only 358 people. Various factors contributed to this decline, including the destruction of the ecosystem that had sustained them, the disadvantages they faced in competing in the developing money economy, losses at sea, and the detrimental effect of rum on their health.[23]: 45-6,54 In 1763 the Wampanoag community was struck down by an epidemic of unknown origin, which killed 222 of them while leaving local colonists unaffected. Some of the survivors left Nantucket and some married into the small African community on the island.[23]: 52-4 Two children, Abram Quary and Dorcas Esop, who were born after the epidemic and lived until 1854 and 1855, have been acknowledged as Nantucket's last Native Americans. Wampanoags from Martha's Vineyard and Cape Cod have since then lived on Nantucket.[23]: 56
In 2021, the Nantucket Annual Town Meeting voted to replace the Columbus Day holiday with Indigenous People's Day.[25]
Whaling industry
[edit]In his 1835 history of Nantucket Island, Obed Macy wrote that in the early pre-1672 colony, a whale of the kind called "scragg" entered the harbor and was pursued and killed by the settlers.[26] This event started the Nantucket whaling industry. A. B. Van Deinse points out that the "scrag whale", described by P. Dudley in 1725 as one of the species hunted by early New England whalers, was almost certainly the gray whale, which has flourished on the west coast of North America in modern times with protection from whaling.[27][28]
At the beginning of the 18th century, whaling on Nantucket was usually done from small boats launched from the island's shores, which would tow killed whales to be processed on the beach. These boats were only about seven meters long, with mostly Wampanoag manpower, sourced from a system of debt servitude established by local colonists—a typical boat's crew had five Wampanoag oarsmen and a single white man at the steering oar. Author Nathaniel Philbrick notes that "without the native population, which outnumbered the white population well into the 1720s, the island would never have become a successful whaling port."[16]
Nantucket's dependence on trade with Britain, derived from its whaling and supporting industries, influenced its leading citizens to remain neutral during the American Revolutionary War, favoring neither the British nor the Patriots.[29]
Herman Melville commented on Nantucket's whaling dominance in his novel Moby-Dick, Chapter 14: "Two thirds of this terraqueous globe are the Nantucketer's. For the sea is his; he owns it, as Emperors own empires". The Moby-Dick characters Ahab and Starbuck are both from Nantucket. The tragedy that inspired Melville to write Moby-Dick was the final voyage of the Nantucket whaler Essex.
The island suffered great economic hardships, worsened by the "Great Fire" of July 13, 1846, that, fueled by whale oil and lumber, devastated the main town, burning some 40 acres (16 hectares).[30] The fire left hundreds homeless and poverty-stricken, and many people left the island.
By 1850, whaling was in decline, as Nantucket's whaling industry had been surpassed by that of New Bedford. Another contributor to the decline was the silting up of the harbor, which prevented large whaling ships from entering and leaving the port, unlike New Bedford, which still owned a deep water port. In addition, the development of railroads made mainland whaling ports, such as New Bedford, more attractive because of the ease of transshipment of whale oil onto trains, an advantage unavailable to an island.[31] The onset of the California Gold Rush in 1849 further lured many of Nantucket's workers from whaling, as many islanders abandoned whaling in pursuit of opportunities in the West. The American Civil War dealt the death blow to the island's whaling industry, as virtually all of the remaining whaling vessels were destroyed by Confederate commerce raiders.[32]
Later history
[edit]As a result of this depopulation, the island was left under-developed and isolated until the mid-20th century. Isolation from the mainland kept many of the pre-Civil War buildings intact and, by the 1950s, enterprising developers began buying up large sections of the island and restoring them to create an upmarket destination for wealthy people in the Northeastern United States.[33]
Nantucket and towns on Martha's Vineyard contemplated seceding from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, which they considered at various town meetings in 1977, unsuccessfully. The votes were sparked by a proposed change to the Massachusetts Constitution that would have reduced the size of the state's House of Representatives from 240 to 160 members and would therefore reduce the islands' representation in the Massachusetts General Court.[34][35]
Geology and geography
[edit]
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of 304 square miles (790 km2), of which 45 square miles (120 km2) is land and 259 square miles (670 km2) (85%) is water.[36] It is the smallest county in Massachusetts by land area and second-smallest by total area. The area of Nantucket Island proper is 47.8 square miles (124 km2). The triangular region of ocean between Nantucket, Martha's Vineyard, and Cape Cod is Nantucket Sound. The highest points on the island include Saul's Hill at 102 feet (31 m),[37] Altar Rock at 100 feet (30 m),[38] and Sankaty Head[39] at 92 feet (28 m).[37]
Nantucket was formed by the outermost reach of the Laurentide Ice Sheet during the recent Wisconsin Glaciation, shaped by the subsequent rise in sea level. The low ridge across the northern section of the island was deposited as glacial moraine during a period of glacial standstill, a period during which till continued to arrive and was deposited as the glacier melted at a stationary front. The southern part of the island is an outwash plain, sloping away from the arc of the moraine and shaped at its margins by the sorting actions and transport of longshore drift. Nantucket became an island when rising sea levels covered the connection with the mainland, about 5,000–6,000 years ago.[40]
The island and adjoining islands of Tuckernuck and Muskeget comprise the Town and County of Nantucket, which is operated as a consolidated town and county government. The main settlement, also called Nantucket, is located at the western end of Nantucket Harbor, where it opens into Nantucket Sound. Key localities on the island include Madaket, Surfside, Polpis, Wauwinet, Miacomet, and Siasconset (generally shortened to "'Sconset").[41]
Climate
[edit]According to the Köppen climate classification system, Nantucket features a climate that is Cfb (oceanic), a climate type rarely found on the east coast of North America.[42] Nantucket's climate is heavily influenced by the Atlantic Ocean, which helps moderate temperatures in the town throughout the course of the year. Average high temperatures during the town's coldest month (January) are around 40 °F (4 °C), while average high temperatures during the town's warmest months (July and August) hover around 75 °F (24 °C). Nantucket receives on average 41 inches (1,000 mm) of precipitation annually, spread relatively evenly throughout the year. Similar to many other cities with an oceanic climate, Nantucket features a large number of cloudy or overcast days, particularly outside the summer months. The highest daily maximum temperature was 100 °F (38 °C) on August 2, 1975, and the highest daily minimum temperature was 76 °F (24 °C) on the same day. The lowest daily maximum temperature was 12 °F (−11 °C) on January 8, 1968, and the lowest daily minimum temperature was −3 °F (−19 °C) on December 31, 1962, January 16, 2004, and February 4, 2023. The hardiness zone is 7b.[43]
| Climate data for Nantucket, Massachusetts (Nantucket Memorial Airport), 1991–2020 normals, extremes 1948–present | |||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Month | Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | Year |
| Record high °F (°C) | 63 (17) |
61 (16) |
66 (19) |
83 (28) |
85 (29) |
92 (33) |
92 (33) |
100 (38) |
86 (30) |
83 (28) |
74 (23) |
63 (17) |
100 (38) |
| Mean maximum °F (°C) | 53.3 (11.8) |
50.8 (10.4) |
56.9 (13.8) |
66.4 (19.1) |
75.4 (24.1) |
81.2 (27.3) |
84.0 (28.9) |
83.4 (28.6) |
78.7 (25.9) |
72.8 (22.7) |
63.8 (17.7) |
57.9 (14.4) |
86.3 (30.2) |
| Mean daily maximum °F (°C) | 39.5 (4.2) |
40.1 (4.5) |
44.2 (6.8) |
52.2 (11.2) |
60.7 (15.9) |
68.7 (20.4) |
75.4 (24.1) |
75.7 (24.3) |
70.4 (21.3) |
61.9 (16.6) |
52.8 (11.6) |
45.1 (7.3) |
57.2 (14.0) |
| Daily mean °F (°C) | 33.1 (0.6) |
33.5 (0.8) |
37.9 (3.3) |
45.5 (7.5) |
53.8 (12.1) |
62.2 (16.8) |
69.0 (20.6) |
69.0 (20.6) |
63.7 (17.6) |
55.2 (12.9) |
46.4 (8.0) |
38.6 (3.7) |
50.7 (10.4) |
| Mean daily minimum °F (°C) | 26.6 (−3.0) |
27.0 (−2.8) |
31.5 (−0.3) |
38.8 (3.8) |
47.0 (8.3) |
55.7 (13.2) |
62.6 (17.0) |
62.4 (16.9) |
57.0 (13.9) |
48.6 (9.2) |
40.0 (4.4) |
32.2 (0.1) |
44.1 (6.7) |
| Mean minimum °F (°C) | 10.0 (−12.2) |
13.6 (−10.2) |
17.8 (−7.9) |
28.7 (−1.8) |
35.8 (2.1) |
46.6 (8.1) |
54.2 (12.3) |
52.5 (11.4) |
44.6 (7.0) |
34.8 (1.6) |
26.5 (−3.1) |
17.9 (−7.8) |
8.3 (−13.2) |
| Record low °F (°C) | −3 (−19) |
−3 (−19) |
7 (−14) |
20 (−7) |
28 (−2) |
35 (2) |
47 (8) |
39 (4) |
34 (1) |
22 (−6) |
16 (−9) |
−3 (−19) |
−3 (−19) |
| Average precipitation inches (mm) | 3.18 (81) |
2.84 (72) |
3.84 (98) |
3.60 (91) |
2.98 (76) |
3.00 (76) |
2.72 (69) |
3.00 (76) |
3.59 (91) |
4.39 (112) |
3.79 (96) |
3.93 (100) |
40.86 (1,038) |
| Average snowfall inches (cm) | 8.1 (21) |
9.6 (24) |
6.9 (18) |
0.9 (2.3) |
0.0 (0.0) |
0.0 (0.0) |
0.0 (0.0) |
0.0 (0.0) |
0.0 (0.0) |
0.0 (0.0) |
0.3 (0.76) |
6.5 (17) |
32.3 (83.06) |
| Average extreme snow depth inches (cm) | 4.0 (10) |
4.6 (12) |
3.1 (7.9) |
0.2 (0.51) |
0.0 (0.0) |
0.0 (0.0) |
0.0 (0.0) |
0.0 (0.0) |
0.0 (0.0) |
0.0 (0.0) |
0.1 (0.25) |
3.1 (7.9) |
7.6 (19) |
| Average precipitation days (≥ 0.01 in) | 11.6 | 10.2 | 10.5 | 11.9 | 11.7 | 11.6 | 11.9 | 13.1 | 12.5 | 13.1 | 10.9 | 12.4 | 141.4 |
| Average snowy days (≥ 0.1 in) | 4.8 | 5.0 | 3.7 | 0.7 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.3 | 3.9 | 18.4 |
| Source: NOAA (snow/snow days/snow depth 1948–1973)[44][45] | |||||||||||||
In 2021, a 270-page coastal resilience plan was drafted to deal with issues related to climate change: groundwater table rise, coastal flooding, high tide flooding, and coastal erosion.[46] The plan identified forty proposed projects over the next fifteen years at a cost of $930 million.[46] The coastal resilience advisory coordinator anticipated damages through 2070 of $3.4 billion if nothing is done to fight sea level rise.[46]
Demographics
[edit]| Census | Pop. | Note | %± |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1790 | 4,555 | — | |
| 1800 | 5,617 | 23.3% | |
| 1810 | 6,807 | 21.2% | |
| 1820 | 7,266 | 6.7% | |
| 1830 | 7,202 | −0.9% | |
| 1840 | 9,012 | 25.1% | |
| 1850 | 8,452 | −6.2% | |
| 1860 | 6,094 | −27.9% | |
| 1870 | 4,123 | −32.3% | |
| 1880 | 3,727 | −9.6% | |
| 1890 | 3,268 | −12.3% | |
| 1900 | 3,006 | −8.0% | |
| 1910 | 2,962 | −1.5% | |
| 1920 | 2,797 | −5.6% | |
| 1930 | 3,678 | 31.5% | |
| 1940 | 3,401 | −7.5% | |
| 1950 | 3,484 | 2.4% | |
| 1960 | 3,559 | 2.2% | |
| 1970 | 3,774 | 6.0% | |
| 1980 | 5,087 | 34.8% | |
| 1990 | 6,012 | 18.2% | |
| 2000 | 9,520 | 58.3% | |
| 2010 | 10,172 | 6.8% | |
| 2020 | 14,255 | 40.1% | |
| 2025 (est.) | 14,758 | [47] |