News & Stories

By Jeffrey D. Crocker Captain Alexander Crocker (1843-1890) was the son of Deacon Timothy and Harriet (Alexander) Crocker.  He resided at 358 Sea Street in Hyannis. Captain Alexander Crocker House at 358 Sea Street in Hyannis He was one of many Barnstable men who heeded the call to support the Union forces during the Civil War.  At the age of nineteen, in 1862, he served in the Union Army’s transport service on the James River in Virginia. During the Civil War, specifica

The site near “Brickyard Creek” in West Barnstable is a natural clay deposit – material left by the glaciers of over 15,000 years ago.  One or more potteries had been established in this area since at least the 1820s. Before that time, pottery needed on the Cape had to be transported from Plymouth and elsewhere.  Many items were damaged during transit.  Pottery experts note that pottery from West Barnstable may have typically had a green glaze, been marked with wavy and strai

The short answer is that no one really knows. Or rather, it has been lost to time. For sure, Barnstable, Massachusetts is named after Barnstaple in Devon, England.  The pronunciation is the same, but the modern spelling differs.  ( Barnstable, Devon, England )   Who first named our town (and later county) “Barnstable” is unclear.  The explorer Captain John Smith— who first coined the name “New England”—is said to have invited Prince Charles (later King Charles I of England (

By Jeffrey D. Crocker Few people today realize that the village of Barnstable was once home to a remarkably talented nineteenth-century poet, one who has largely been forgotten. I first learned of him some years ago when my family discovered a leather-bound, handwritten journal of poetry in my grandfather’s attic. The volume contained nearly a hundred poems and bore the date of 1840. Its author was listed as F. W. Crocker.  Curious to learn more, I searched the archive