Lovecraft's Marblehead

While H.P. Lovecraft never considered any place other than Providence his home, apparently there lay a special place in his dark heart for Marblehead, Massachusetts.

It is impossible these days to see into another person's mind, but I can't help trying especially when it comes to such an inspired writer as Lovecraft. "The Terrible Old Man" was written in 1920 and in it Lovecraft envisions a damp, sagging, creaking, ancient costal town shrouded in darkness and mystery with streets full of dilapidated dwellings piled up on each other like a series of shipwrecks. When he  visited Marblehead in 1922, I can't help but imagine Lovecraft's pleasant astonishment that his dreams had somehow wormed their way into reality. 

According to scholars like Donovan Loucks, Marblehead began to influence Lovecraft's stories from then on, beginning with The Festival. Lovecraft visited Marblehead often after that. It must have provided fresh ground for new stories. Lovecraft certainly mentions the place in many of his letters. Lovecraft wrote that if he was not already so attached to Providence, he would have definitely taken up residence in Marblehead. 

This past summer I had the opportunity to spend a day in Marblehead, Massachusetts, referred to by locals as "Old Town." As a guide, I followed Donovan Loucks' essay Antique Dreams: Marblehead and Lovecraft's Kingsport. 

Though it was hard to get all that close to due to the arrangement of buildings (or perhaps the non-Euclidean geometry peculiar to the place), my first stop was St Michael's Episcopal Church. Dating back to 1714, it is possible that St Michaels is the inspiration for the church described in The Festival.

The Old Town House, probably the inspiration for Kingsport's "Market House" in the The Festival. What Loucks doesn't mention but is something that must have charmed Lovecraft is the strikingly odd triangular convolution of streets to form the "square" (a bit of a misnomer because a square usually requires four sides rather than three).

The Bowen house is said by some scholars to be the inspiration for "the home of my people" in The Festival (Loucks mentions this, then but goes on to argue that other buildings in other towns are more likely to be Lovecraft's source material for that part of the story).

This is Marblehead's Unitarian Universalist Church, possibly an inspiration for some of the details Lovecraft added to Kingsport. This is the church's third and present incarnation and the exact same building Lovecraft would have laid eyes on, if I've got my chronology straight. It is hard to see this rather mundane edifice striking a chord in the fantastical imagination of Lovecraft. But maybe I was just not seeing it in the right light or at the right time of day.

One of the most interesting old buildings I got to see was the Old Powder House that dates back to 1755. This is possibly the "old brick powder-house" that Lovecraft mentions in The Strange High House in the Mist.

"Old North" - the First Church of Christ on Washington Street. I cannot help but feel it was this church that inspired Lovecraft and not the Unitarian Universalist a few streets over. Since the street it is on is very narrow and "Old North" is a large building, the whole thing kind of looms over you. You can't step back and take it in at a safe distance. You have to stare up at it, while it stares down at you.

These are the old alley steps between 13 and 11 Washington street. These narrow and idiosyncratic little passageways that run up and down Marblehead are probably not thought of much these days, since everyone moves around mostly by car. But back even in Lovecraft's day if you went from one place to another in town it was as likely by foot than any other means, so these alleys were certainly more prominent in the psyche of the inhabitants. I was exploring on a bright, clear day, and the sheer number of modern building code violations was terrifying enough. But if you could just picture yourself here on a dark, damp evening with the fog rolling in off the harbor, where the only source of light is a candle in a nearby window, it wouldn't be too great a leap to then imagine the slapping of webbed feet coming up behind you!

This is the "Old Brig" at 42 Orne street. A place of wickedness and wizardry! 

 

This is Old Burial Hill. The oldest headstone is apparently from 1681. Lovecraft uses this place to endow Kingsport with even more ghastly ghoulishness. Honestly  though in reality it is such a peaceful place I could have easily stayed all day and all night. 

Yet another site I could not get all that close to due to the way the non-Euclidean geometry of Marblehead warps the very fabric of space-time. Thankfully there was at least a historical marker.

The Spite House, made mention of in some of Lovecraft's letters, according to Loucks.

Possibly another building or at least possibly another site from The Festival is the Mary A. Alley Hospital. It has a convoluted history and finding it was convoluted. I believe this is the site. 

 

Due to the limited space where it is physically possible even to set foot, Fort Sewall was one of the first places in Marblehead where I felt I might be walking in the actual footsteps of Lovecraft. I do not think he could have kept himself from clambering out onto the very same rocky outcropping just past the fort walls that I did. Standing there, perhaps on a chill foggy morning, Lovecraft could have felt the words welling up inside of him "..the silent and unillumined fort frowning formidable over the snug harbor..."

H.P. Lovecraft (might possibly have) lodged here at 126 Front Street ("Mrs. Bixby's").

116 Front street - a shack indeed (still, I'd live there in a heartbeat). Known as the "Pirate's Hideout" this is another building that Loucks mentions in his guide but then argues is inaccurate to associate with Lovecraft.  

I'm still a little confused on this one. If you Google "Three Cods Tavern Marblehead" you get a place over on Pleasant street. However, it is several block up from the water line.  The Three Cods Tavern that Lovecraft mentions in his letters and Loucks mentions in his guide was supposed to have been hit by a canon ball during the Revolutionary War. Loucks says the tavern is here at 82-84 Front Street, which makes more sense.

This is the General Glover house. Apparently in his letters, Lovecraft called it the "General Clover" house. History is a murky business.

These two alleys are right next to each other in the area near Prospect Hall and one of them is the Prospect Alley that inspired Lovecraft to describe "alleys that are archaic staircases of unhewn stone." Gonna go with the first one, on the left.

Disappointingly stately and upright, utterly lacking in perpendicular acclivities, dry-rot, shadows, bats, cobwebs, fumbling provincial workmanship, or Daedalian convolutions, the Jeremiah Lee mansion still appeared regularly in Lovecraft's letters about Marblehead. I wonder what he saw in the place?

Finally, Loucks concludes his guide with Castle Rock out at Marblehead Neck. Unfortunately, my wanderings did not take me there that day as space-time is a sorely limited and limiting thing. That is more than OK with me though, even if it makes this post more than a little incomplete. It is just one more excuse for me to go back to that area one day and really spend some time there, exploring every "unpav'd hilly street" and "venerable crag" Marblehead has to offer.