Featured Mainsheet Articles
Our Mainsheet newsletter, produced biannually, provides Museum news and updates and includes story and photo highlights from our collection. Below is a list of featured articles from previous issues of the Mainsheet. For full PDFs of published issues, click here.
The Log Books of Captain Anthony Howes
by Nancy S. Bundy “for we see people almost every day disappointed in their hopes & desires and we are taught to believe it is all for the best.” August 22, ...
Prosperity from Whaling Created New-Style Houses in the 1840s
By Susan F. Witzell, Archivist Eldredge house, c. 1900, Fay Family Collection In 1842 two new homes were built on the main road into Woods Hole village. ...
The Loose, Untailored Fabric of History—the Treasure Trove in the Archives
By P.K. Simonds Fans of the Woods Hole Historical Museum are sometimes confused to see signs, postcards or old issues of Spritsail referring to us as the Woods Hole Historical ...
The Eaton Collection and New AccessionsThe Hurricane of 1938
by P.K. Simonds 75 years ago this September a hurricane with no name slammed into our shores and wreaked more devastation than any storm had in 70 years — ...
The Story Of Some Cannon Balls, A Tale Of Cooperation, Not War
by Susan F. Witzell, Archivist During late 1813 and early 1814 the British war ship Nimrod spent a great deal of time and effort patrolling, blockading and marauding Vineyard Sound, ...
Quissett Oral History and the Fay Farmhouse
Quissett Oral History and the Fay Farmhouse By Susan F. Witzell, Archivist Quissett Oral History In the early 1970s, Molly Willett of Quissett and several friends, Isabel ...
A History Mystery
by Susan F. Witzell In January 2014, our director Jennifer Gaines received a phone call from Jeff Sauvé, Associate Norwegian-American Historical Association Archivist from Northfield Minnesota. He had been given ...
The Younger Joseph Story Fay
By Susan F. Witzell, Archivist Joseph Story Fay, August 25, 1896, in Woods Hole. Photograph by Baldwin Coolidge. When I published the first-ever biography of our earliest summer resident, Joseph ...
Train Stations and Ferry Terminals in Woods Hole
by Susan F. Witzell The Old Colony Railroad, originating in Boston, was extended from Monument Beach in what is now Bourne to Woods Hole during the years 1870 to ...
The Old Stone House Rejoins The Old Candle House – or Why I Love Archivists
by Mark Foster “View Across Eel Pond No. 3” (usually titled “MBL Site”). Photo by Baldwin Coolidge, ca. 1893. Courtesy MBL Archives. I could tell you stories about ...
