The Gallant Vagabond THE OFFICIAL NEWSLETTER OF THE HENRY BESTON SOCIETY

AUTUMN 2014 EDITION

DOCUMENTARY FILM PROJECT ‘The Perfect Home’ Campaign McAleer ‘Kicks’ off Collection donated at Chatham to Beston screening Society Orpheum rough The Henry Beston Society is pleased to cut program, announce that the family of author John McAleer online drive set for donated its Beston/ Coatsworth/McAleer Col- holiday weekend lection to the The Henry Beston Society’s docu- nonprofit on May 30. mentary film project has been coming The collection includes together piece by piece, and now there’s correspondence between enough for the public to view on the Dr. McAleer and Coat- silver screen. sworth, a.k.a. Mrs. Henry Fresh off a rough cut screening of Beston, dating from Nov. film segments in front of 55 people at the 17, 1970 to Feb. 1, 1977, Newburyport Film Festival’s WIP (Work along with Dr. McAleer’s in Progress) Workshop at the Screening Beston collection of Room Theater in Newburyport, Mass., books and memorabalia. on Sept. 20, the movie showcase now Dr. McAleer, who shifts to Cape Cod for Columbus Day died in 2003, was the weekend, when producer Don Wilding best-selling author of over and director Christopher Seufert (on a dozen books, including Mooncusser Films) will host a rough the Pulitzer Prize- cut screening and Q&A session at the nominated biography, Chatham Orpheum Theater, 637 Main Ralph Waldo Emerson: “I know my father (John McAleer, pictured above at St. in Chatham, on Cape Cod. Days of Encounter. Dr. The program will be held on Satur- McAleer wrote critically- the Fo’castle in 1971) is delighted that we have found the day, Oct. 11 at 10 a.m. Admission is acclaimed studies of perfect home and caretaker for the Beston-Coatsworth- free. Doors open at 9 a.m., and coffee, Thoreau, Dreiser, the McAleer collection! Thank you for keeping this important pastries, breakfast sandwiches, and Out- Edgar Award-winning Rex part of American history alive.” ermost House theme merchandise will be Stout: A Biography, and available for purchase. Continued on Page 2 -- Andrew McAleer Continued on Page 2

SUPPORT PROVIDED BY: Attorney Karen Underhill Paul Glenn & Charitable Foundation Trust Koulouris Sheila Mott Silver Hollow Audio Page 2 The Gallant Vagabond/Autumn 2014

Massachusetts area Screening: Chatham event Oct. 11 lecture/ rough cut screening schedule Continued from front page scale of “Rewards” for those who con- tribute to the project. Books and other The holiday weekend also marks media, along with photography and art- the beginning of a second campaign work, will be among the items offered by the Beston Society on Kickstarter. for various levels of contributions. com, a well-known crowdfunding The rough cut screening at the New- website. The Beston Society has a goal buryport Film Festival was one of two of raising $10,000 in 30 days to cover films presented at the WIP Workshop production costs (which includes video Series, along with another seaside- services, and fees for actors, clothing, n Saturday, Oct. 11 at 10 a.m.: Special rough cut theme film, Rise and Fall, an eight-min- and other props). ute feature by filmmaker Casey Atkins screening presentation at the Chatham Orpheum The campaign is an all-or-nothing about erosion on Plum Island along the Theater, 637 Main St., Chatham. (508) 945-4900 proposal; the target goal (in this case, North Shore of Massachusetts. $10,000) must be achieved by Nov. 10 chathamorpheum.org The presentation included a new epi- to claim the amount pledged. sode that focuses on how Henry Beston n n In 2012, the Beston Society ran a Thursday, Oct. 16 at 7 p.m. Friday, Nov. 21 at 10:30 a.m. went from a stint as an ambulance successful Kickstarter campaign, rais- Holliston Public Library, 752 Washing- Eastham Council on Aging, 1405 driver for the American Field Service ing $5,000. This enabled the Beston ton St., Holliston. www.hollistonlibrary. Nauset Road, North Eastham. Please in France during World War I to his org RSVP at (508) 255-6164. Society to produce a five-minute video recovering from the horrors of the con- trailer while also collecting enough flict on Cape Cod’s Outer Beach. n Wednesday, Oct. 22 at 11 a.m. n Tuesday, Nov. 25 at 2 p.m. footage to produce a 10-minute episode Support for the Beston Society Cambridge Center for Adult Educa- Cornerstone at Milford, 11 Birch St., from the film. Production of the documentary film project was made tion, 56 Brattle St., Cambridge. Pre- Milford. cornerstonemilford.com feature-length project is broken into possible in part by the Cape Cod Five registration required. www.ccae.org small fundable sub-projects that will n Cents Savings Bank Charitable Foun- Wednesday, March 11 at 7 p.m. be streamed as “webisodes,” while also n Wednesday, Nov. 5 at 7 p.m. Brookline Adult Education, 115 dation Trust, the Arts Foundation of being used to help in soliciting distribu- Norfolk Public Library, 139 Main St., Greenough St., Brookline. www. Cape Cod, Glenn and Sheila Mott, the tion channels, such as PBS. Norfolk. http://library.virtualnorfolk.org brooklineadulted.org Inn at the Oaks, Silver Hollow Audio, Kickstarter campaigns feature a and Paul Kourlouris. McAleer: Scholar’s collection donated to Beston Society

Continued from front page the definitive novel of the Korean War, Unit Pride. A professor of English Literature at Harvard and then Boston College for more than half a century and, a permanent fellow at Durham University, Dr. McAleer, at the time of his death, was completing the defini- Entrance to the Henry Beston Society office in North Eastham on Cape Cod. tive biography of Jane Austen. His es- say, Solar Electricity, was featured in the book, Heaven Is Under Our Feet. CONTACT US For many years he taught the American Personal Narrative course at , a native of Boston College -- a course structured Hingham, was a writer of fiction and • Visit out websites at www.henrybeston.org and around the works of Henry Beston. poetry for children and adults. She www.outermosthousemove.com He was also a past president of the won the 1931 Newbury Medal from • Follow us on Facebook and Twitter. Thoreau Society. the American Library Association “I know my father is delighted that recognizing The Cat Who Went to • Call us at (508) 246-7242. we have found the perfect home and Heaven as the previous year’s “most • E-mail us at [email protected] caretaker for the Beston-Coatsworth- distinguished contribution to American • Mailing address: P.O. Box 407, North Eastham, MA 02651 McAleer collection!” wrote Andrew literature for children.” In 1968 she • Our office is located at Main Street Mercantile Plaza, 3 Main McAleer, the author’s son, in a letter was a highly commended runner-up last week to the Henry Beston Society. for the biennial, international Hans St., Unit 31, in North Eastham (just off Route 6, across from “Thank you for keeping this important Christian Andersen Award for chil- the Fairway Restaurant). Office hours by appointment only. part of American history alive.” dren’s writers.

For many years (John McAleer, pictured above) Thank you to eCape.com/Cape Cod Today taught the American Personal Narrative course at for hosting our website since 2002, and to Boston College -- a course structured around the the Cape Cod Times/ capecodonline.com for hosting our blog since 2007. works of Henry Beston. The Gallant Vagabond/Autumn 2014 Page 3 The Outermost House goes to London Nearly 5,000 miles of ocean separate the outer beach of Cape Cod and England, but that didn’t stop one of the Cape’s biggest icons from being featured in the Chelsea Flower Show in London this spring. Henry Beston’s classic book, The Outermost House, was front and center in the Massachusetts Garden, an exhibit at the Chelsea Flower Show that was sponsored by the Massachusetts Office of Travel. Designers Susannah Hunter and Catherine MacDonald Pop artist Sir Peter Blake Susannah created a Cape Cod garden, inspired reads the Beston Society’s copy of The Outermost Hunter by the beauty of the sand dunes, the House in London. coastline and dune shacks of the Cape. The exhibit also included a worn copy of Beston’s began on this concept, and architect Julian Hunter Dame Jacqueline Wilson, author of the Tracey book from the collection of the Henry Beston So- was commissioned to design it. That’s when The Out- Beaker series of books and a one-time frequent ciety. Wendy Northcross of the Cape Cod Chamber ermost House entered the picture. visitor to the Cape, took a photo of the book to get a of Commerce arranged the loan of the book from “I showed him pictures of the Provincetown dune copy. Matthew Barzun, the U.S. Ambassador to the the Beston Society, brought it to London, and then shacks and he began his research and quickly dis- U.K., “was obviously familiar with it as he’d spent returned it to the Cape Cod nonprofit. During this covered The Outermost House and was completely every childhood holiday on the Cape,” Hunter noted. process, The Outermost House mingled with folks inspired by the whole concept of Henry Beston and Then there was pop artist Sir Peter Blake, best with ties to the Tracey Beaker series of children’s the house and the fact the house was moved and known for co-creating the sleeve design for the books, a United States Ambassador, and The Beatles. finally swept away, giving it an almost legendary Beatles’ classic album, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Hunter, an internationally known designer of quality,” Hunter recalled. “It was only then that I read Club Band. handbags, accessories, and furnishings (clients the book and thought it was amazing. It should be “Sir Peter Blake was indeed reading (the Beston include Nicole Kidman and Uma Thurman), first got essential reading for everybody! We then got really Society’s) copy (of The Outermost House) and was the idea for the exhibit after a visit to Provincetown lost in that being pivotal to the whole atmosphere and fascinated by the idea of the book,” Hunter said. “To last summer. “There was something so extreme about design of the garden.” be honest, I don’t think the book has ever had much the beauty and scale of nature there,” Hunter said. “I Quotes from the book were laser-etched on to profile in the U.K., but I’d love to be able to track if saw the dune shacks there and Rob Costa from Art’s the steps and posts and the cedar bench inside. “My there has been an increase in sales here at all, as so Dune Tours gave us some tales of the people who favorite quote is ‘Of the three elemental voices, that many people I spoke to at the show said they were had inhabited them over the years and some history of ocean is the most awesome, beautiful and varied,’” off to buy a copy!” surrounding that.” Hunter said. “Maybe it’s because I was brought up by The Massachusetts Garden received a silver medal After returning to the United Kingdom, work the sea in Scotland.” placement in the show.

Classrooms head out to the Great Beach Beston Society executive direc- Ashton, Cami Hanson, Chuck Hanson, tor Don Wilding will once again be and Richard Kapit. interacting with students from Tahanto m Regional High School. Last year, it Back in June, Peter Wells submitted this item to our Facebook page: NEWS AND NOTES “Henry Beston’s poetic prose has sometimes been compared to The was at the school in Boylston, Mass. King James Bible and to Shakespeare. This time, it will be on the Outer And, since June is Henry’s birth month Beach of Cape Cod. (June 1, 1888), here, with apologies to For the last couple of years, TRHS Cole Porter’s Kiss Me Kate, is a little faculty members Peter Doherty birthday greeting. (English), Steve Pacheco (social stud- ies) and Lisa Sequeira (science) have THE BARD OF Don Wilding of the Henry Beston Society, third from left, leads a walk with presided over an interdisciplinary stud, students from Franklin Pierce University at Coast Guard Beach, Eastham. NAUSET-ON-OCEAN with Henry Beston’s The Outermost House taking center stage. “Thank you so much for taking the presentation also made its way into But the writer of them all, Wilding will be leading a walk with time to share your deep knowledge of the classroom this summer as part of a Who will bring forth your emotion, the Tahanto students at the Cape Cod The Outermost House with our class, class for Nauset Continuing Educa- Is the writer people call National Seashore in mid-October. wrote instructor Brett Amy Thelien tion at the Nauset Middle School in The Bard of Nauset-on-Ocean. It will be Wilding’s second seashore in a note to the Beston Society. “Our Orleans. walk with students in 2014. In May, walk with you added another layer of Expanded into a three-hour class Brush up your Beston. Wilding led a group of students from understanding to the students’ read- over three one-hour sessions, six Start quoting him now. Franklin Pierce University of Rindge, ing of Beston, and underscored the students signed up to get an even more Brush up your Beston, N.H., in a walk at Coast Guard Beach dynamic nature of life on the Great detailed account of the story of Henry And your readers you will wow! in Eastham. The students were reading Beach. I can’t wait for the film!” Beston and The Outermost House. Henry Beston’s The Outermost House m Wilding extended thanks to the class: (to the tune of “Brush up your as part of their Coastal Ecology class. Wilding’s Henry Beston’s Cape Cod Molly Mead, Robin Hubbard, Arrona Shakespeare”)” Page 4 The Gallant Vagabond/Autumn 2014

THE GREAT WAR TO THE GREAT BEACH

THESE ARE THE SECOND TWO attitudes in the war.” ger of Beston’s hometown of Quincy, Verdun had been considered to be one INSTALLMENTS IN A SERIES about “Just then, they hear a shell coming Mass., recognized as “the greatest of the quieter places on the Western Henry Beston, author of the Cape Cod in. They dive for cover, it passes and battle in the history of the world,” in Front, but a week after Beston’s ar- nature classic, The Outermost House, explodes nearby …” April of that year. rival, the Germans began attacking the and his service in World War I, which As Henry described the scene in his At Verdun, Beston later said that fortified city. began 100 years ago. For more,visit the book, A Volunteer Poilu: “I saw the “the German atrocities were probably Beston biographer Daniel Payne, Beston Society blog. (www.henrybeston. sentry crumple up in the mud. I was the greatest. They launched a whole whose critical literary biography of org, click on “Blog.”) the first to get to him. A chunk of the laboratory of gases into the French; Beston, Orion on the Dunes, is due out m shell had ripped open the left breast to and gas masks saw great service.” As from Godine Publishing next year, tells It had only four months since Henry the heart. Down his sleeve, as down a Francis Russell would write many a story of a wounded French lieutenant Sheahan, who would later come to be pipe, flowed a hasty drop, drop, drop years later, Henry would “live through that Beston ferried back from the front known as Henry Beston, author of The of blood that mixed with the mire.” the somber slaughters of the Marne lines. Outermost House, left the comforts of Payne described Beston’s “rather and the Somme with extraordinary “The lieutenant said they had lost Quincy, Massachusetts, and arrived in grim jest” following the incident: luck.” one of the men in their unit and went France to serve as an ambulance driver “All the American volunteers had a In A Volunteer Poilu, Beston wrote to look for him, but they hear a voice in France’s battle with Germany in two-week crash course in identifying that “the first village on the road to coming from a shell crater, in French “The Great War.” It wasn’t long after shells. At the end of the two weeks, Metz had tumbled, in piles and mounds but with a German accent, ‘French- he was transferred to the Bois-le-Pretre those who passed the course went to of rubbish, out on a street grown high man, Frenchman, come over here,’” (the Priest’s Woods) that he would be the funeral of those who didn’t.” with grass. Moonlight poured into the Payne said during an interview for introduced to the worst that the con- Four months later, Beston would roofless cottages, escaping by shattered the Beston Society’s documentary flict, later to be known as World War be transferred to the front at Verdun, walls and jagged rents, and the mounds film project. “It turned out to be a I,” had to offer. a fortified city in the French interior. of débris took on fantastic outlines and German officer with a group of his “He’d been closer to it than a lot What awaited him there was what cast strange shadows. In the middle men who were mortally wounded, of people — they put him on the front would later be referred to as “the great- of the village street stood two wooden and were down in this crater, and he lines because he spoke fluent French,” est battle in the history of the world.” crosses marking the graves of soldiers. was begging the lieutenant to kill said writer Gary Lawless, who has His journey through hell was only It was the Biblical ‘Abomination of them. At first, the French lieutenant also been the caretaker for Beston’s beginning. Desolation.’” says, ‘No, we’re not going to do that,’ “Chimney Farm” in Nobleboro, m Beston came across “the oddest but then realized it was the only hu- , since 1986. “He saw some In 1915, 27-year-old Henry Sheahan sight (he had) ever seen,” at Bois le mane thing to do. So he and his men awful stuff — wholesale slaughter and (later known as Henry Beston of Pretre, he told The Patriot Ledger after lobbed grenades into the crater until just that indifference to human pain The Outermost House fame) came to his return from France: “In walking the cries and the moaning ceased, and suffering.” France to serve as an ambulance driver through the wood, cut and but with and then they returned back to their On his way to the front, Beston met in the American Field Service during a little more than the trunks stand- lines. So this is the kind of thing that up with a French soldier, who wanted the First World War. Early on, the ing we saw an object in the tree. We Henry is seeing and hearing about on to know where the U.S. stood when it American volunteers were kept away investigated and found, pinned in a a constant basis during the battle at came to the war. from the front, but it was only a matter branch, a human heart. Someone had Verdun.” “The soldier was very, very anxious of time before they were right in the been blown to bits and by a strange Beston would leave the front in to hear what the people in the United heat of battle. chance the heart had found lodgment April of 1916, but the fighting at States thought,” noted Beston biog- After witnessing his first death in the tree.” Verdun continued into the summer. rapher Daniel Payne. “‘Do they think up close, there were more horrors to By February of 1916, he was In 2000, it was estimated that the we’ll win the war? Will the United witness, even before he was called into transferred to the Western Front on 10-month battle claimed over 714,000 States enter the war?’ He and Henry service during the Battle of Verdun in the hills north of Verdun-sur-Meuse in casualties; another estimate had the talked at some length about American February 1916, which The Patriot Led- northeastern France. For a long time, number at 976,000.

P.O. Box 407 North Eastham, MA 02651