Welcome to the Wellfleet Historical Society & Museum
Our mission is to tell the story of Wellfleet through research, collections, and programs. We are dedicated to preservation and sharing through exhibitions, tours, programs and lectures, oral history projects, research, working with local schools, and special events. To help fulfill this mission, we have a new addition and are renovating the existing building to create an integrated and fully accessible experience for visitors.
An important part of the cultural history of Wellfleet can be seen and told in the physical presence of the Historical Society & Museum structures. When the renovation is completed, the WHS&M will consist of four connected buildings, totaling approximately 8,000 square feet. With a broad brick forecourt and period landscaping, we already present a united, welcoming face on Main Street.
The repurposed historic structures of the WHS&M are designed to inspire a sense of place and cultivate an engaged community. With our new expanded presence—more accessible and energy efficient—we will be able to involve more of the public in museum programs, town events, and volunteer opportunities. The WHS&M is a vibrant center that honors the Wellfleet community, promotes the importance of preserving and understanding the past as it informs our future.
The WHS&M could not undertake all this important work without the generous grants from Wellfleet’s Community Preservation Committee and the Massachusetts Cultural Council and generous individual donors. Our sincere thanks and gratitude for all the support!
What’s old is new again!
Our Building History
The Payne Higgins Store & Wellfleet Public Library
The Wellfleet Historical Society & Museum was founded in 1951 by Lydia Doane Newcomb along with other forward-looking community members. They purchased the former Payne Higgins Store as a base of operations. This building is on the west side, to the far left looking at the front of the complex. Built in 1854, this is a wonderful mis-mash of architectural styles: Greek Revival at its core, with added Italianate elements and Gothic Revival windows to entice a passerby to stop and look and come in. It has a long, continual history of serving Wellfleet.
Payne W. Higgins and his wife, Maria Penn Freeman, operated a “dry and fancy goods” store on the first floor from 1854 until 1910. Soon after, the town government purchased the building for its offices and library. In 1939 the town offices moved to their current location in the center of town in the relocated, former South Wellfleet Second Congregational Church; the Wellfleet Public Library stayed here until 1956 when it moved to the top floor of Town Hall.
Dr. Mitchell’s Office and John Mulcahey’s Studio
The wood-frame structure, second from the left, connecting the Payne Higgins Store with the next-larger building, was built sometime in the 1870s. It provided an office for a Dr. Mitchell. Projecting outwards, to the current forecourt, was the Newcomb hardware and plumbing store, built in the 1920s. Artist John Mulcahey used this structure as a studio and gallery from 1967 until his death in 2012. This added portion was removed as part of the Museum’s renovation, to provide a forecourt for gatherings and seating, and a welcoming entrance.
The Federal House
The core of the complex is now the elegant Federal-style wood clapboard house on the right side, built around the mid-19th-century. The double glass-and-panel doors indicate the original front entrance, leading to a graceful spiral staircase. Also of this period are the baseboards, door and window architraves, and wall surfaces, excellent surviving examples of Federal-period detailing.
The first recorded owner of this largest structure of the reimagined WHS&M was a Wellfleet master mariner, later a carpenter and real estate investor, Captain Samuel Curtis. It is not known if he lived here with his wife (Mary Fish) and their large family or rented it out. It is also not recorded if the next owners, Thomas Jacobs, also a master mariner, and his wife Abigail, both of Provincetown, ever occupied the house. They sold it to the First Congregational Church in 1874. The building then likely served as the parsonage for 65 years. Sometime in the 1880s, the building was divided into two units, with a section operating as a boarding house. A Greek Revival-style east wing, to the far right as you face the building, was an early addition to the main house and provided front and back parlors. The entire building was reverted to a family home and occupied from 1939 until it was purchased by the WHS&M in 2007.
The Main Streetscape of Wellfleet
The newly renovated and landscaped WHS&M is a prominent and welcoming landmark as you enter Wellfleet. The ochre hue of the east side façade is historically accurate, determined after forensic paint analysis. The distinctive and once common color resulted from beginning made, in part, from the decomposed matter harvested from the bottom of a South Wellfleet bog. The bricks needed for foundation work were saved from a demolished New Bedford factory. The sidewalk is lined with recently planted Linden trees, an echo of the specimens’ alleged arrival in Wellfleet in 1849. They were amongst salvaged nursery stock from England and Scotland when the full-rigged Franklin wrecked at Newcomb Hollow in 1849. Wellfleet’s maritime history is reflected in the front benches that are in the shape of giant cleats, a sturdy fixture to secure a rope, bolted to the deck of a boat or dock.
The Museum’s integrated buildings invoke Wellfleet’s Main Street as it appeared in the mid-1800s, a reminder of the town’s culture and complexity. The WHS&M is part of the Wellfleet Center Historic District which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. This area was dominated by the town’s commercial and maritime activities during a prosperous period in the 19th-century, and also included churches, municipal buildings, and residences.
What’s old is new again!
Tracing the history of old structures is often challenging. Determining when a home was built, who lived and worked within its walls, and what changes were made over the years, is not always documented. Searching county deeds and probate records and a structural analysis of the building are sometimes needed when there are no definitive archival sources. A more complete history of the buildings of the WHS&M is being undertaken as research continues.
