Plum Island Windmills
This old block print is a pretty close representation of what the PI windmills looked like.
Windmill Whale Collection
I created a collection of sculpted whales from ancient windmills that were at the southern end of Plum Island (now Sandy Point State Park).
From the 1918 Publication of the Ipswich Historical Society:
“In the 1820s a Frenchman, Gilshenan by name made examination of many localities along the American coast to erect a salt works. Coming at last to the Ipswich Bar at the end of Plum Island, he exclaimed, “This is the best place I have seen for making salt from sea water.”
In all there were six windmills, a dam and assorted apparatus….
Twenty eight vats were dug into the peaty sod adjoining a canal eight feet wide and ten feet deep. Sea water was pumped up by six old-fashioned windmills to a height of twenty or thirty feet and then was allowed to fall upon a heap of brush through which it trickled to the vats securing thus a large evaporating surface. Being exposed to the heat of the mid-summer sun, the water gradually dried away and crystals of salt appeared in the shallow vats.
A storm destroyed most of the windmills and buildings. A local farmer salvaged some of the boards, and planks. They remained in a barn in Rowley, MA until now. I have created a collection of these “Windmill Whales” from the ancient timbers. It is likely that the original trees from which the planks were made were living in the 1600’s!
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