In the tentative early settlements along the Atlantic coast, the
ocean meant everything -- offering ties to the outside world and
yielding an abundance that allowed colonists to establish thriving
outposts. With industrialization in the nineteenth century, some of
these coastal communities grew into important cities. Other
settlements -- the ones that are the affectionate focus of this
book -- fell behind and survived in relative isolation.
Bypassed by the transportation and industrial revolutions, the
places surveyed by Warren Boeschenstein have remained unspoiled by
the usually unstoppable forces of the modern world. These towns
have since become cherished landmarks because of their remarkable
natural settings and cultural legacies. Dotting the coast from
Maine to Florida, they exemplify historic America at its best.
In Historic American Towns along the Atlantic Coast,
Boeschenstein celebrates the scale and style of these places --
more than 140 towns in all -- and offers wonderfully evocative
descriptions of each. The book divides naturally into three
regional sections: North Atlantic, Mid-Atlantic, and South
Atlantic. In these areas, Boeschenstein focuses on nine places that
are among the oldest continuously inhabited settlements in North
America, towns that still possess a delightful pedestrian scale and
sense of community, towns whose physical settings evoke
time-honored qualities: Castine and Kennebunks' Port, Maine,
Edgartown, Massachusetts, and Stonington, Connecticut, in the
North; Ocean Grove, New Jersey, and New Castle, Delaware, in the
Mid-Atlantic; and Edenton, North Carolina, Beaufort, South
Carolina, and Saint Augustine, Florida, in the South.
Each of thesecoastal villages reveals a different past, and
Boeschenstein gives each story its due. Ocean Grove is the
accomplishment of primarily one generation, the fervent post-Civil
War Methodists. Beaufort reflects most magnificently not one but
several generations of antebellum planters, who, over a century,
asserted their authority and importance. In Kennebunks' Port,
Victorians built a community distinct from that of the earlier
Federalists. In Stonington, New Castle, and Edenton residents
"infilled" buildings, intermixing structures from different
periods.
Using nearly 200 historic maps, drawings, and photographs to
illustrate the spectrum of change in these communities, the author
also examines qualities common to all: location, community, scale,
and time. Here, on the coast, the quality of time is tangibly
evident. The reliable rhythms of the tides magnify the perceptions
of time repeating and time passing. Human history permeates
buildings that reflect the values of different periods. Animal
migrations mark the seasons -- birds along the Atlantic flyway,
fish through the nearby ocean currents, and vacationers in search
of the sun. Geologic time, the most ancient of all and the one
usually most hidden, is readily visible within the communities in
which water, wind, and sand have worn away the land's edge to
reveal the distant past in the underlying strata.
Engagingly written and handsomely illustrated, this book is a
fascinating guide for coastal travelers and offers a useful
framework for historic preservation and innovative town
planning.
"All of these towns] have experienced the inevitable economic
cycles, population shifts, technological revolutions, political
changes, humandisasters, and natural calamities that communities of
this age have faced... In every one, intimacy is a part of everyday
life -- continually fostered by the human scale of the town fabric,
the pedestrian orientation, and the proximity of people to
institutions and commerce and to other people." -- from the Preface
(pp.xi-xii)
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