|
|
Photo Elspeth Pierson
Jim Bakker, PMPM executive director, and Rex McKinsey, King Hiram’s Lodge master. |
|
|
Photo courtesy PMPM
On Aug. 20, 1907, not an inch of the street could be seen during the parade celebrating the laying of the Monument cornerstone. |
|
Cornerstone centennial
Reenactment & parade celebrates icon’s anniversary
By Elspeth Pierson
Banner Correspondent
PROVINCETOWN — The Pilgrim Monument will celebrate its centennial anniversary this Monday, Aug. 20. One hundred years ago on that day, Grand Master John A. Blake, Governor Curtis Guild and President Theodore Roosevelt laid the cornerstone for the Monument.
Much pomp and circumstance surrounded the event. Roosevelt arrived in Provincetown Harbor on the presidential yacht Mayflower along with eight battleships. As part of the 1907 ceremony each battleship simultaneously fired off a 21-gun salute.
Monday’s celebration includes a parade and a re-enactment ceremony depicting the laying of the cornerstone. At noon, dignitaries, media and over 100 Grand Master masons of Massachusetts will arrive via ferry at MacMillan Pier where Provincetown’s harbormasters, selectmen, Coast Guard and local masons will greet them. Cannon and militia fire will welcome the ferries as they round the point into the harbor. From the pier, a parade will wind through town (taking Ryder Street to Bradford Street to High Pole Hill Road) and end at the Pilgrim Monument and Provincetown Museum. There the commemorative ceremony will take place.
A number of exciting historical highlights will take place during Monday’s ceremony, says Jim Bakker, executive director of the Pilgrim Monument and Provincetown Museum (PMPM). The first will occur at 1 p.m. when the parade reaches the Monument. At this time, the newly restored bell in the Provincetown Public Library belfry will toll for the first time. In 1835, George Holbrook, one of the foremost bell makers in America, cast the bell. The belfry and bell were lifted down from atop the library in 2002 for reconstruction and were returned in late July. Library trustees have held off ringing the bell for the first time, however, until Monday’s celebration.
Amazingly enough, one guest at Monday’s celebration was also present at the first ceremony 100 years ago. Frances Raymond who attended the 1907 ceremony in her mother’s arms, will complete a historical circle on Monday when she greets the parade at the Monument. The Raymond family has lived in Provincetown for over 200 years. The 102-year-old Raymond can also be seen on Fisherman’s Wharf, where her picture hangs in Norma Holt’s “I Am Provincetown” photo exhibit of strong local women (she is the picture on the far right).
For more history in the making, Provincetown Postmistress Kathy Colbridge will be at the ceremony performing commemorative stamp cancellations for collectors with a postmark specially designed for the event.
The biggest historical feature of the ceremony, however, will be the re-enactment of the cornerstone laying. Members of King Hiram’s Masonic Lodge of Provincetown will perform an abbreviated version of the original ceremony. King Hiram’s Lodge was founded by Paul Revere in 1795 and its members have been involved with the Pilgrim Monument since its conception. Many lodge members were involved in the original plans and design for the Monument, as well as the building process.
Lodge members today are still very involved with the Monument. Rex McKinsey, Provincetown’s harbormaster, lodge master and historian, has helped organize and fund-raise for the centennial event. For him, the Monument has both personal and cultural significance.
“I’ve had a personal attachment to the Monument since I first sailed into this town in 1995,” says McKinsey. “I’m a washashore — I came from New Orleans by boat. When I spotted the Monument against the dunes at dawn, I thought we were close, but we watched it all day before we arrived.”
In addition to this personal connection to the Monument, McKinsey also feels connected to it for cultural reasons. Having done a considerable amount of historical research on the structure, he believes that the Monument has a lot to teach both locals and visitors about their community. “What jazzed me up when I learned the history of the monument,” he says, “is that our community really isn’t all that different from what it was in 1907.”
Well, let Frances Raymond be the judge of that.
Pick up a copy of PMPM’s “Centennial Anniversary” booklet for an assortment of fascinating stories surrounding the Monument’s creation.
|
New house plan threatens change to Hopper landscape
Tempers flare at Seashore meeting
For Your Information
Outer Cape Worship Services
|
|
|
|
|
Aug 16th, 2007