“Oh yeah, I’m the type of guy that likes to roam around, I’m never in one place, I roam from town to town…”
With the famous rock-and-roll song, “The Wanderer” playing in the background, Mattapoisett Museum Curator Connor Gaudet strolled down the center aisle of the museum to the podium. He began his presentation at the April 24 annual meeting of the Historical Society members. His topic: the Wanderer, the whaling bark that is the featured theme for the museum’s upcoming summer season.
But the history Gaudet intends to share is less a history lesson of the beloved ship and more how it has been cherished through the decades. First, however, a very brief refresher of Wanderer’s history.
In 2018, Seth Mendell, the highly respected historian for all things tri-town, gave a lecture on Wanderer’s history. Mendell wove a true story that included the air at the busy shipyard being scented with pine and tar, the sounds of saws at work and the ringing of nails penetrating wood that would be nearly deafening.
The Wanderer began construction 1877 and was eased into the harbor the following year, April 16, 1878, on a flood tide. It was the last of two ships built in Mattapoisett, Gaudet stated.
It was surprising to learn from Gaudet’s presentation that when the Wanderer was set afloat, the whaling industry was already two decades past its prime. “The distillation of petroleum to create kerosine had been discovered by Dr. Abraham Kessner in 1849. Oil was struck in Titusville, Pennsylvania, in 1859. The proliferation of ‘rock oil’ combined with a fast and easy method to create lamp fuel was a pretty good indication that the whaling industry’s fate was sealed. Indeed, whale oil reached a peak price in 1856, topping out at $1.77 per gallon.
“By 1896, that same gallon would cost only 40 cents. By the turn of the century, only a few vessels were still plying the seas for whales, usually with underpaid, green crews from the Azores, Cape Verde or West Indies, who saw the trip as a chance to emigrate to the United States.”
Gaudet continued, “When she was built in 1878, the world seemed to be starting a slow transition into a more modern age. It was the year Edison patented the phonograph, and Edward Muybridge produced a series of stop-motion photographs in order to prove that all four feet of a galloping horse are off the ground at the same time, thus accidentally creating the first known motion picture. By 1915, the New England whaling industry was in such decline that Miss Emily Bourne announced her plan to build and give to the City of New Bedford a museum dedicated to keeping and sharing the history of its whale fishery, lest it be forgotten and slip away into the past. Now, when someone builds a museum to preserve the legacy of the profession you are currently engaged in, it might be time to start looking for other work.”
Yet, right up until the day the Wanderer’s last moments sitting in salt water came, people wanted it. Gaudet says that the last crew gets a bad rap for losing the ship. “At least four of the 12 men on board had crewed on the Wanderer before. I’m sure with more research we can find the other crew members on other previous voyages. My point is that the crew has gotten a bad rap for losing the ship. I suggest that it was not a ‘green crew’ that caused her to wreck but one of the worst storms the region had ever seen to date. The Great Gale of 1924 not only wrecked the Wanderer but inflicted enormous damage across Rhode Island and the South Coast of Massachusetts. It was commemorated later that year in a photo booklet documenting the destruction. It was comparable to the Hurricanes of (19)38 and ’54.”
“On September 30, another storm caused her to finally break up on the rocks she had rested on for 35 days.”
As the years went by, the Wanderer has enjoyed notoriety, and people have created souvenirs and a variety of Wanderer-branded items, including the museum, which had ball point pens made from wood salvaged from the ship.
The summer exhibit will feature items created and branded “The Wanderer.” Gaudet has a favorite memento, but he’s not telling.
“With all the changes that have taken place in this town over the last hundred years since we supposedly ‘lost’ the Wanderer, one of the biggest constants, when you think about it, has been the overwhelming presence of the Wanderer. On T-shirts, the town seal, stores’ names, Christmas ornaments, yearbooks, souvenir spoons and a million other tchotchkes, the Wanderer has transcended the ages, a town mascot for five-plus generations.
“We love our summer people, don’t get me wrong. But we’re proud of our working-class history. We built things that lasted. We built things that still last – even a hundred years after they supposedly left us.”
One piece of the Wanderer that remains is a mast, now hanging in the museum’s carriage house, where memories permeate the structure. “They call me the Wanderer, yeah the Wanderer, I roam around around around around…”