18 Commercial Street

Red House

Red House, the plaque says – a bit needlessly, since the house is clearly that. A white-on-blue enamel plaque, designed by Claude Jensen, shows a Cape Cod house on a scow on the waves, with the narrow stretch of Long Point and its lighthouse in the distance. That indicates a house that was floated across the harbor from the antebellum settlement on the point. Once called the Gilbert Spencer cottage, 18 Commercial Street was built around 1830. It seems to have acquired its distinctive color in the 1930s, when it was acquired as an annex by the Red Inn, across the road at 15 Commercial Street, which used it to house workers and overflow guests.

26 Commercial Street

Before it was floated over, the 1850s Frances Abbott Cottage stood at the western edge of Long Point. The fluted pilasters and entablature identify this house as vernacular Greek Revival. It was the home to the Joneses in the mid-20th century: Carolyn, who helped organize the Camp Fire Girls, and her daughter, Helen, who was active in the Nautilus Club.

31-41 Commercial Street

 
Masthead Resort

From 31 to 41 Commercial Street are seven buildings on 450 feet of beachfront, collectively the Masthead Resort, owned and operated since 1959 by John J. Ciluzzi Sr. (b 1923) What seems at first like a completely random group can actually be discerned as a symmetrical compound of three substantial houses at the ends and center — No. 31, the Old Furniture Shop; No. 37, a Long Point floater; and No. 41, the Helena Rubinstein summer home — with two cottages in each of the two interstices.

34 Commercial Street

A meticulously cared-for house, 34 Commercial Street is part of the Long Point diaspora in the West End. It was constructed in about 1830 and was the residence of Joseph Emery, in the center of the original settlement out at the point. In the mid-1950s, Jane Harrison had a jewelry store here, selling enamel-on-copper earrings, bracelets, rings, pendants and pins.

43 Commercial Street

Dr. Don’s Landing

Dr. Don’s Landing, a condominium at 43 Commercial Street, occupies a building that once stood at the center of the Long Point settlement, where it was built around 1840 for the whaling captain John C. Weeks Sr., whose son lived at 42 Commercial Street. Harriet Weeks Spear was born here in 1851, when the house will still across the harbor. It was ferried over when Harriet was seven years old and she continued to live there well into her 80s, after completing a half century as a high school teacher. She married at the age of 70.

45 Commercial Street

 
Jones Locker Condominium

For a period in the 1970s, when Provincetown was at its nonconformist zenith, a neo-Classical belfry, topped by a tapering cupola and whale windvane, stood outside (or very near) 45 Commercial Street. You can get a good glimpse of it inside the back cover of Provincetown Discovered (1986), by Edmund V. Gillon Jr. The remarkably out-of-place structure was also photographed in 1976 by Josephine Del Deo as part of the Massachusetts Historical Commission Inventory. Could it have been associated with the Shore Studio Gallery next door at 47 Commercial Street? I’m eager to learn more.

46 Commercial Street

A full Cape with Victorian trim, 46 Commercial Street was originally the home of Richard Tarrant at the east end of Long Point. It was constructed in approximately 1820. The Rev. Frank Orr Johnson, the priest in charge of St. Mary of the Harbor in the late 1920s and early 30s, lived here. A hand-painted plaque, “La Mantia / La Velle,” refers to the owners, Raffaello LaMantia, an artist, and J. Edward LaVelle, who purchased the property in 1988. The couple had been together 53 years at the time of LaVelle’s death in 2013. ¶ Updated 2013-11-17

47 Commercial Street

 
Labrador Landing Condominium

The Labrador Landing Condominium at 47 Commercial Street occupies a large 1835 structure that distinguished for its dimensions early on: it was the only two-story house on Long Point, where it belonged to John Williams. In 1947, Donald F. Witherstine opened the Shore Studio Gallery. It was one of the first and most important commercial galleries in town. “We could use the amazing Mr. Witherstine in 57th Street also,” Edward Alden Jewell wrote in The New York Times that year. “He is a force, a whiz, a conflagration.”

49 Commercial Street

Twin Bays

The Twin Bays studio apartments at 49 Commercial Street is one of the most immaculately maintained houses in the West End. Passers-by in summertime can count on seeing its window boxes in profuse bloom. There are twin bay windows on the ground floor and unusual twin attic windows. Built around 1820, this was the home on Long Point of Prince Freeman. It was in the center of the settlement, on the shores of Lobster Plain. George S. Payne, an artist who depicted old wharves and fish houses in the late 19th century, once owned this house.

51 Commercial Street

Prince Freeman Apartments

Nathaniel Freeman lived in this modest house, built in 1818 in the center of the Long Point community. Catherine and Edward Dahill opened the Prince Freeman Apartments in 1949, taking the name from the first baby born at Long Point. Now called the Prince Freeman Westend Waterfront Compound, 51 Commercial Street continues to be run and owned by the Dahill family.

58 Commercial Street

Notable for its two front doors, this large house at 58 Commercial Street began its days out on Long Point in the 1830s, though its original owner is not known. This was the property of Frank Williams at the turn of the 20th century, when it was denominated 43 Commercial Street.

59 Commercial Street

This Long Point transplant at 59 Commercial Street was, until recent years, the home of the Center for Coastal Studies, an “independent, nonprofit, membership-supported institution dedicated to research, public education programs and conservation programs for the coastal and marine environments.” It was founded by Dr. Charles (Stormy) Mayo, Dr. Barbara Mayo and Dr. Graham Giese. It is now at 115 Bradford Street, leaving this fine old house to return to domestic service.

61 Commercial Street

Long point floater. The home of Fannie C. Chipman (±1865-1954), the daughter of Stephen F. Atwood and Adelia C. (Morgan) Atwood, who lived at 10 Atwood Avenue. Like her mother, Mrs. Chipman was active in the Centenary Methodist Church. (“Mrs. Fannie H. Chipman,” The Advocate, 23 December 1954.)

212 Commercial Street

Global Gifts | Muir Music | Norma Glamp’s

Though it looks like part of a compound with the Art House theater — and is in fact on the same tax lot — 212 Commercial Street was constructed between 1850 and 1870. (The Long Point exhibit at the Pilgrim Monument and Provincetown Museum identifies it as a floater.) James Matenos owned the property in the mid-20th century and offered rooms for transients and ran a shoe repair shop. The building was firmly pinned on summer visitors’ retail map by 1960 with the Paraphernalia apparel store — “everything to make you Happily Dressed (except culottes!)” it declared in an ad just before Bastille Day. In 1963, Mary Rattray Kanovitz, a costume jeweler from the East Village, opened the Queen of Diamonds, a clothing and accessories store.

† 329 Commercial Street

 
Former Long Point School House | Former Post Office | Arnold’s Radio and Cycle Shop

During the Long Point diaspora of the mid-19th century, the settlement’s most prominent public buildings — the school house and post office — are both reputed to have made the voyage across the harbor. The post office wound up at 256 Bradford Street, the school house at 329 Commercial Street, where it remained until a disastrous fire in 1949, serving in its latter years as the home of the appliance and bicycle shop of Arnold F. Dwyer (±1918-1998), which is still in business, though on a far more modest scale.

473 Commercial Street

 
MacMillan House

Provincetown’s most famous native son — Rear Admiral Donald Baxter MacMillan (1874-1970) — was an intrepid and imaginative Arctic explorer, anthropologist, geographer and naturalist. Though he traveled more than 300,000 miles in 30 trips to the far north, he lived just blocks from where he was born (524 Commercial Street). This building was originally the barracks for the Civil War batteries at Long Point. MacMillan was the last survivor of the 1908-09 expedition in which Robert E. Peary claimed to have reached the North Pole. But “Mac” was no mere adventurer. His goal was “to bring back to scholars of all kinds bits of useful knowledge about this little-known great domain.”

3 Nickerson Street

 

This house — a favored post card subject in the early 1900s when Nickerson Street was still a magnificent elm allée (never mind the caption that calls them willows) — was built by Elijah Doane on Long Point. Seemingly a picture-perfect slice of Americana, 3 Nickerson Street served briefly as a studio for Norman Rockwell.

 

5 Nickerson Street

 

The medicinal properties of cod liver oil have long been appreciated — children’s grimacing faces to the contrary notwithstanding — and it follows that money was to be made from this elixir on Cape Cod. And that’s what Nathaniel E. Atwood did out on Long Point, where he built this house. Myrick C. Atwood succeeded him and lived in this structure after it was transported to town, joining a small colony of floaters on Nickerson Street. Its best known and best loved inhabitant, for more than 50 years, was the painter Mary Cleveland “Bubs” (Moffett) Hackett (1906-1989), pictured above. Her many admirers, among whom I count myself, see sophistication and passion in what look like naïve or primitive canvases at first glance.

 

6 Nickerson Street

 

It’s tempting to imagine what views this delicate, if incongruous, bay window would have commanded when 6 Nickerson Street stood out on Long Point, housing Heman Smith. But that’s pure fantasy, of course, since the window is a much more recent addition to the structure. A view of the house from the driveway, however, helps you see what looks like the roofline of the original floater — under all those alterations. The property changed hands several times in the 1990s. It is now owned by James E. Watkins of Boston. • Historic District Survey • Assessor’s Online Database ¶ Posted 2013-05-20

47 Pleasant Street

 
47 Pleasant Street Condominium

Two eras of town history, both now seeming almost equally remote, are embodied in this odd-looking mashup. The south half of the hybrid, pictured above, is a classic three-quarter Cape. It is believed to have stood originally at the east end of the Long Point settlement, where it served as the home of one Jonathan Smith, whose storehouse was not far away. Like the other buildings on the point, it was floated over to Provincetown in the mid-19th century, after which it was grafted on to a two-story house on Pleasant Street.

1 Point Street

 
Nancyann Meads, the longtime proprietor of Edwige, 333 Commercial Street, acquired this home in 1985 from her parents, Lawrence W. Meads (b ±1933), a ship’s carpenter, and his wife, Nancy P. Meads (b ±1936). The previous owners were Edwin Norwood Snow (±1886-1953), a professional painter, and his wife, Catherine Nancy (MacFarlane) Snow.

3 Point Street

 
Capt. William W. “Billy” King (±1932-1976) of the F/V Patricia Marie and his wife, Patricia Marie King (b ±1934), bought this house in 1961 from Richard E. and Lorraine Adams. They lived here with their six children. The Patricia Marie was lost while scalloping off Pollock Rip on 24 October 1976. Captain King and six crew members, all Provincetown men, went down with her. It was the worst such catastrophe in the modern era, devastating this close-knit community. Almost no corner of town life was untouched by the absence of these men or the presence of their widows and their fatherless children.

5-7 Point Street

 
West End Condominium

This was the home of Barnabus Atwood out on Long Point, according to the Long Point exhibit at the Pilgrim Monument and Provincetown Museum, and was located near the schoolhouse (later 329 Commercial Street). Edward G. Benz of Orleans converted the property into a three-unit condo in 1995.

9 Point Street

 
Victor DeCarlo (1916-1973) was, as were so many in Provincetown, a product of the Art Students League of New York. He also studied with the muralist Jean Charlot at the Fine Arts Center in Colorado Springs, at the Corcoran College of Art and Design in Washington and at the Accademia di Belle Arti di Firenze. After serving in the Pacific Theater during World War II, he returned to Europe, married Sibylle Schneider, then came back to his native New Haven. The DeCarlos bought this property from Antonio and Patricia L. Silva in 1965.

3 Soper Street

This was the home of Robert Smith when it was out at Long Point. Rest of the entry to be written.

5 Soper Street

 
This house, a floater at the core, was owned by Timothy Cowing when it was out at Long Point. It was purchased from the Cowing family in 1953 by Rachel “Rae” (Silva) White (b 1933) and her husband, Robert William “Bob” White (1926-2011). The daughter of Manuel Peter Silva (d 1942) and Annie Elizabeth (Lee) Silva (1893-1984), Rae was delivered by midwife on Pearl Street and grew up at 123 Bradford Street. Her siblings were Malcolm Glaspell Silva (named in honor of the playwright Susan Glaspell), Emanuel Raphael Silva, Elizabeth Jane (Silva) Rosenblatt and Norbert Lee Silva. In 1950, she married Bob White. Their children are Sharon Suzanne (White) Walker, Maxine Rachel (White) Notaro, Roberta Lee (White) Magowitz, Rachel Elizabeth (White) Peters and Shawn Robert White.

6 Winthrop Street

 
Atwood-Foss House

This was owned by John Atwood Jr. when it was out at Long Point.