a walk through Provincetown....

We've visited here many times before, and love the lively, eclectic feel to the town (as well as the yummies from the Portuguese Bakery).  

But yesterday we took a private architectural, arts, history, and garden tour of the central and western parts of the town and saw a whole different Provincetown.  Walk with us....

We started at the harbor with a little historical and geological background...the Cape is growing by a half inch annually; oh, look---out there (way, way, way out there...I would have zoomed a bit if I knew I was going to use this!) is Ft. Useless and Ft. Ridiculous, with poison ivy growing on the hills between them.  

We'll save the Mayflower saga for later...

 

Next up was a stroll through City Hall, and not your run of the mill City Hall at that.

The  inner office  of the City Clerk held a collection of Chaffee's work, the outer space had this Charles Hawthorne; another administrative room had the Ross Moffett.  There is so much art owned by the city, that they are rather desperate to find spaces to display it.  The City Hall halls were filled...offices doubled as display space...it was a mid-century working museum.  A real treat.

From there we moseyed to the bas-reliefs of Cyrus Dallin commemorating the first landing of the Mayflower.  (Bet YOU thought they first landed at Plimouth, right?)

 

From there we strolled by..

the Atlantic House Bar, most likely the oldest continuously operating gay bar in the country, and the hang-out of a slew of writers from the 20's, including Tennessee Williams (a nude picture of him walking the Provincetown beaches hangs in the bar, but we didn't go in) and Eugene O'Neill.  

Remember O'Neill's Desire Under the Elms, and the evil Abbie Putnam who murdered her daughter early in the play?  She just happened to be named for the Provincetown librarian who refused the drunken O'Neill entrance to her library...even after he won the Pulitzer Prize.  (We librarians have standards!)

We saw the last Georgian house in the town...after the revolution, we called the style Federal.  

Here an early architect combined some Egyptian revival and Greek revival.

  There were 1/2 Capes.  And 3/4 Capes. And full Cape Cod cottages.

This house supposedly rests on top of remains of a Viking long house.  At least, that's the story.  

 

When you see this little plaque...

it indicates the home is one of 38 floating houses...those houses once part of the Long Point community on the tip of the peninsula that were put on rafts, 'floated' across the bay, and relocated when the community closed in the 1850s.  

Our tour continued to Land's End Inn, undoubtedly the premiere place to rest your head...

the views were stunning...

 

We strolled passed tiny year-round homes...

(the City Clerk used to live here)

 

and tiny seasonal places...

(Ernest Hemingway stayed and wrote in a one of these little gems)

 

We passed Alice Brock's home...

an accomplished artist, but probably more well known as the Alice of Arlo Guthrie's Alice's Restaurant (1966) fame.

Hans Hoffmann lived and created in the same house and studio owned by Frederick Waugh.

(by this point in the tour, this former art history major is totally salivating....and not just because of the heat and humidity, which surely must be setting records today)

 

We snuck around secret garden paths...

We saw modern structures....the Murchison House designed by Walter Gropius; a home designed by the Hariri sisters. 

 

It was a lovely day.

 

Comments

[Zeta]

Fantastic place!
Thank you for the tour!

[Laura]

I think I could smell salty sea air while looking at your pictures...

[AsKatKnits]

Wow, incredible photos! I have never visited, but you make me long to be there...right.now!

[Debbie]

Beautiful pictures, thanks for sharing! I want to live in that little house once owned by the city clerk!

[Jacqueline Webb]

Oh my what a fabulous place all that history. Great photos thanks so much for sharing both the photos and the tour. Jackie

[Ann]

We spent part of our honeymoon there 51 years ago. it looks much the same. Thanks for the tour this morning.

[Caffeine Girl]

I haven't been there for a long time, but it is still as beautiful as I remember.

[steph@woolythyme]

Me too!!! 

Sent from my iPhone

[Pip]

P-Town...fills the heart, the mind, and the soul. So full of history and treasures around every corner...and the great shops. Thank you soooo much for the lovely pics and so glad you had such a wonderful day.

[Karen]

Home lovely!

[karen]

I love these kind of vacations! the learning sight seeing kind but only on a brisk fall day where you can wear lots of wool :) Thank you for sharing!

[Tien]

Such a charming town! The tiny houses are adorable (and ahead of their times now that tiny is so "in").