Pilgrim-Related Events and Families (part 1)

Introduction: In this article, Melissa Davenport Berry shares stories and photos of events and families related to the Mayflower Pilgrims. Melissa is a genealogist who has a website, americana-archives.com, and a Facebook group, New England Family Genealogy and History.

It is almost Thanksgiving and this year I serve up some clippings about Pilgrim-related events and families, from the old newspaper archives via GenealogyBank and the Provincetown (Massachusetts) History Project. May you find this dish fun and filling.

1945: Prepping for the Annual Beachcomber’s Ball

In this photo, we see: World War II vet Frank Hale Gardner (1920-2004), son of Samuel Asa and Marjorie (Hale) Gardner; and his wife Eloise Cleveland “Weezie” (Woodward) Gardner (1924-2021), daughter of Cleveland Landon and Emily Proctor (Crosby) Woodward. The couple are performing a test run in their 1910 Ford Model T, which will motor them to the annual Beachcomber’s Costume Ball the following evening, 16 August 1945.

Frank is wearing his grandfather’s “tails,” and Eloise is sporting her grandmother’s wedding gown. The theme that year was anything trending in the 1910-1916 period.

The Beachcomber Club formed in 1918 in Provincetown, two years after the founding of the Provincetown Art Association, by a group of men, mostly artists, who met the summer of 1916 in a small building on what was then Knowles Wharf. It is a popular social club and still exists.

Eloise is the granddaughter of Ralph Worthington Crosby (1875-1943), who designed and built the Crosby Catboat, and a direct descendant of Mayflower passengers Edward Fuller, John Howland and Elizabeth Tilley.

The Crosby clan were shipbuilders in Barnstable County, Massachusetts, going back to the late 18th century, starting with Jesse Crosby (1732-1804), son of Daniel and Ruth (Cole) Crosby. Jesse married Ruth Goodspeed, daughter of Moses and Hannah (Allen) Goodspeed.

Other families associated in the shipbuilding trade with the Crosby’s are the Hinckley and Crocker lines, starting with Olive Hinckley (1792-1888), son of Prince and Eunice (Goodspeed) Hinckley. Olive married Louisa Crocker, daughter of Reuben and Mary Ann (Bassett) Crocker. (See links posted at the end of this story to learn more about these family lines.)

Below is a photo of Eloise’s great grandfather Cornelius Worthington Crosby and some of his crew (many were kinfolk, including Eliose’s grandfather) outside the Crosby boat shop in Osterville, Massachusetts, around 1890.

The photograph is labeled as follows.

• Front row, sitting left to right: James Milton Leonard (1862-1944), son of Simeon Lewis and Mercy Mary (Parker) Leonard, who married Lucy Crosby Coffin; Warren Lovell (1850-1933), son of Warren and Mercy Ellis (Boult) Lovell, who married Prudence F. Scudder and 2nd Amelia Emily Whiteley; Cornelius Worthington Crosby (1823-1898), son of Andrew and Thirza (Lovell) Crosby, who married Laura Othella Bassett; and Captain Alexander Bacon (1814-1895), son of Nathaniel and Mary (Eldridge) Bacon, who married Mary M. Cammett.
• Back row, left to right: (standing) Charles Ellis Lewis (1859-1929), son of David Charles and Mary (Jenkins) Lewis, who married Carrie Ada Buckley; (standing) Ralph Worthington Crosby (1875-1943), son of Daniel and Emily Proctor (Fuller) Crosby, who married Ellen Gazille Robinson; (sitting) Herbert Manley Crosby (1871-1959), son of Horace S. and Lucy Ann (Backus) Crosby, who married Velina Parker Ames; (standing while leaning against Herbert Crosby) Harold Crosby; (seated with unidentified boy standing behind him) Oliver Cromwell Coffin (1868-1947), son of Joseph Cartwright and Tryphena (Crosby) Coffin; (seated with unidentified boy standing behind him) Joseph Coffin Crosby (1860-1922), son of Horace S. and Lucy Ann (Backus) Crosby, who married Rosa Parker Lovell; (standing) Billy Granger; (seated) Wilbur Crosby (1873-1947), son of Herbert Francis and Sarah Helen (West) Crosby; and (seated) Charles Alexander Hall (1874-1971), son of Azor D. and Ida M. (Bacon) Hall, who married Ethel May Crosby.

1949: Town Crier – the ‘Battle of the Bellows’

In 1949 the official town crier for Provincetown, Amos Kubik (1869-1961), faced some roaring competition.

This photo caption reads:

The Battle of the Bellows is being currently being waged in the historic Cape town of Provincetown where Anthony (Fat) Francis (right) is trying to howl Amos Kubik (left) out of his job as town crier.

You can view Kubik on the job in this video footage from 4 April 1935, which includes a wedding announcement of Atwood and Bradford.

1952: Hailing GOP Victory

Here is a photo of 83-year-old retired librarian and staunch Republican Miss Abbie Putnam (1869-1958), daughter of Adrian Louis and Adelaide Osborne “Addie” (Cook) Putnam, blowing out the “The Star-Spangled Banner” on her trumpet. She was celebrating the return of the GOP on 4 November 1952 after 20 years of waiting.

I will have more on Miss Abbie and others who are important preservationists in the history of Provincetown coming soon.

1957: Poet of the Dunes Waiting for Mayflower II

It was a very big deal in Provincetown when the Mayflower II arrived in 1957.

Town bard Harry Hibbard Kemp (1883-1960) was founder of the Provincetown Pilgrim Association, of which he named himself president. Here Kemp is shown draped in classic robes of the ancient poets and wintergreen wreath, looking out from his beach front bungalow across the Atlantic awaiting the arrival of the Mayflower II in 1957.

Here is another photo featuring Kemp in honor of his passing. He is dressed in Pilgrim attire holding a figure of a Pilgrim woman doing wash by artist Shelia Burlingame. Kemp urged that this figure be placed near the First Landing in the West End.

Kemp was determined to help debunk the legend of the “Rock” at Plymouth and place Provincetown on the map as the first landing of the Pilgrims aboard the Mayflower in 1620. He performed reenactments of the event, and his first one was on 21 November 1947 in which he shared stardom with town crier Amos Kubik.

To be continued…

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Note on the header image: “Mayflower in Plymouth Harbor,” by William Halsall, 1882. Credit: Wikimedia Commons.

Related Articles:

• Mayflower Descendants: Who’s Who, Part 35 (part 1)
• Mayflower Descendants: Who’s Who, Part 35 (part 2)
• Mayflower Descendants: Who’s Who, Part 35 (part 3)
• Mayflower Descendants: Who’s Who, Part 35 (part 4)
• Mayflower Descendants: Who’s Who, Part 35 (part 5)
• Mayflower Descendants: Who’s Who, Part 35 (part 6)
• Mayflower Descendants: Who’s Who, Part 35 (part 7)
• Mayflower Descendants: Who’s Who Part 35 (part 8)