A toast to many, many more years of Shoaling for generations to come! – G. Harvey
Unfortunately with the production of any program, some stories end up on the “cutting room floor.” But I found these worth conveying to the viewers as additional interesting bits of Shoals information.
Dinah Tucke
Many religious ministers served the residents of the Shoals beginning in 1637. Perhaps the best loved and longest serving was Reverend John Tucke, who arrived on Star in 1731. He stayed for over 40 years as priest, teacher, physician and friend. The Shoalers had very little cash so he was paid in fish for his services, and given the value of Shoals Dunfish, Tucke was the highest paid minister in the province of New Hampshire.
Tucke owned two black slaves, whom he baptized on Star Island. No one knows when Candace died, but after Tucke’s death in 1773, her twelve-year old daughter Dinah joined Tucke’s daughter, Love, in nearby York, Maine. She died in Newburyport, Massachusetts in 1802.
Chef Maria Parloa
Along with many of the artistic and literary personalities who visited the Shoals, another was Maria Parloa, one of the most popular cooking teachers and cookbook authors of the nineteenth century. Orphaned when young, she supported herself by working as a cook in homes, hotels and summer resorts.
Parloa wrote nearly a dozen cookbooks and in 1872 published her first book, The Appledore Cook Book, named after the Appledore House Hotel, while serving as a pastry cook there for many years. Later she became one of the original instructors at the Boston Cooking School. In 1883 she opened a cooking school in New York City where in the evenings she taught immigrant girls for free. No photographs exist of this fascinating and accomplished cook.
Pigeon Express!
And, in the days before long distance messaging, an interesting form of communication was used on the Shoals. Day-trippers could visit the islands and enjoy a noontime meal. Passengers would board in Portsmouth and a crewmember would take a count of those intended for lunch. He wrote the total on a note, attached it to a carrier pigeon and off the bird flew to Star Island. The pigeon arrived before the passenger boat, and the kitchen staff was informed as to how many places to set for the next meal.
Celia Thaxter passage from Among the Isles of Shoals
I love this passage that Celia wrote describing her early years on White Island with her borthers - it's amazing how they could amuse themselves for hours on that tiny island:
"It takes so little to make a healthy child happy; and we never wearied of our resources. True, the winters seemed as long as a whole year to our little minds, but they were pleasant, nevertheless. Into the deep window seats we climbed, and with pennies, for which we had no other use, made round holes in the thick frost, breathing on them till they were warm and peeped out at the bright fierce, windy weather, watching the vessels scudding over the intensely dark blue sea."
Celia Thaxter
