On the Gloucester site that is as random, weird, and fascinating as America
itself.
The term “Americana”
gets thrown around a good bit, and I suspect we mean as many different things
by it as that Wikipedia article suggests—but if I had to boil it down, at least
for this AmericanStudier, I think I would have to go with what Weird Al
Yankovic argues in “The
Biggest Ball of Twine in Minnesota” (off of the UHF album from 1989). “Kids, this here’s what America’s all about,”
the song’s teary-eyed patriarchal speaker claims of the titular site and the
many parallel (and all real!) ones for which they already have their window
decals (“There's Elvis-O-Rama,
the Tupperware Museum, The Boll Weevil Monument, and Cranberry World, The
Shuffleboard Hall Of Fame, Poodle Dog Rock, And The Mecca of Albino Squirrels”).
Along the coast near Gloucester is a site that, while not quite as
strikingly strange as those, is pretty weird and unique in its own right: Hammond
Castle. This faux medieval castle was built by eccentric inventor John Hays Hammond, Jr.,
between 1926 and 1929, and if the existence of a medieval castle on Massachusetts’
Cape Ann isn’t random enough for you, the three purposes for which Hammond
built it (as elucidated on the Castle’s official website, linked above) should
help: “as a backdrop for his collection of Roman, medieval, and
Renaissance artifacts; as a wedding present for his wife Irene Fenton Hammond
to prove how much he cared for her; and to house the Hammond Research Corporation,
from which Dr. Hammond produced over 400 patents and the ideas for over 800
inventions.” I don’t mean to downplay that third motivation, since Hammond was
indeed a serious and successful inventor (he’s known, for example, as the “Father
of the Remote Control”)—but still, that’s a pretty eclectic set of
rationales, no?
So unlike The Biggest Ball of Twine, about which Al’s speaker asks “Oh, what
on Earth would make a man decide to do that kind of thing?,” we have a definite
answer (a trio of them, even) for Hammond Castle. But Al’s larger point, as
further elucidated in the next lines—“What was he trying to prove? Who was he
trying to impress?—still stands. The sheer audacity and hubris, the excess,
and, most of all, the striking randomness of the Castle demands our attention
and (my best pitchfork-carrying impulses notwithstanding) a begrudging respect.
Probably didn’t hurt that on the day I visited the Castle was closed to host a “Psychic
Faire,” and I happened to arrive just in time to see some of the psychics
emerge from the medieval door in full regalia. Makes me want to write a song,
actually.
Special post this weekend,
Ben
PS. What do you think? Other Gloucester or Cape Ann connections you’d
share? Other sites you’d highlight?
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