Outermost House Guided History Walk

Please join historian and author Don Wilding for a history walk exploring how the Cape’s outer beach inspired author Henry Beston’s “The Outermost House.” Published over 95 years ago, “The Outermost House,” is among the nature literary classics that spawned the modern environmental movement and served as an inspiration for establishment of the Cape Cod National Seashore. Born on June 1, 1888 in Quincy, MA, Beston eventually became an ambulance driver in World War I. After the war in the 1920s, he lived on the Cape at Coast Guard Beach in Eastham. Beston built a two-room dune shack called the “The Fo’castle” and wrote the book about his experience at the edge of land and sea. The Blizzard of ’78 swept away the Outermost House, but Beston’s impressions of living a year on the beach have endured. This walk is co-sponsored by Harwich Conservation Trust and Eastham Conservation Foundation.