(July 2, 2026) This week we celebrate the 250th birthday of our nation. Nantucket was here long before colonists touched our shores, but when they finally did in 1659, they set about making a home for themselves on this exposed, windswept, sandy spot.
That meant finding means to sustain themselves which, of course, included farming and gardening. The island’s history is, in fact, more closely linked to a history of tending to plants than it is to the short-lived whale fishery. In other words, since the nation’s founding if not before, Nantucket has always had gardens, farms or some combination.
In honor of Independence Day, here follows a brief timeline of Nantucket’s garden history for the last 250 years, compiled from numerous sources including Nantucket Historical Association records and archives, The Inquirer and Mirror, Yesterday’s Island, The New York Times, Ann Leighton’s “American Gardens in the Eighteenth Century” (1976), “The History of Nantucket” by Obed Macy (1880), Barbara White, “Town Farms & Country Commons: Farming on Nantucket” by Debra McManis (2010) and “Nantucket Gardens and Houses” by Virginia Scott Heart and Taylor Lewis (1990).
1776: The birthdate of the United States of America
When the U.S. was founded, Nantucket was still trying to establish itself as a sustainable, thriving community, its residents busily dividing land among themselves into lots for homes and farms.
In his 1787 “Letters from an American Farmer,” J. Hector St. John De Crèvecoeur wrote a friend in England about his visit to Nantucket: “There are but few gardens and arable fields in the neighbourhood of the town, for nothing can be more sterile and sandy than this part of the island . . .”
After colonists arrived in the late 17th century, early attempts at farming had all but stripped the landscape of its vegetation and proved that the sandy soil was not suited for producing in similar abundance to the rest of New England.
By the American Revolution, residents had turned to sheep farming as the best use of the land, yet they still had to eat. Like most of colonial America, Nantucket was planted in the manner and custom of what colonists knew and brought with them from Europe.
Diaries and letters from the period mention residents raising “common culinary vegetables,” storage crops to keep for long winters, fruit trees, berries, grains and field crops for livestock, medicinal plants and herbs, and occasionally some flowers. Most Nantucket gardening at the time was aimed at feeding people, not aesthetics.
• 1816: The Bartlett family began farming the land they still own today
• 1829: Moors End on Pleasant Street begins construction
By this time, the island had experienced a significant population boom. Nationally and locally, interest in botany and horticulture including collecting and introducing non-native plants was on the rise.
Records indicate wealthier owners in town established gardens laid out in formal beds, bordered by boxwood hedges, filled with perennials or vegetables, sometimes including lawns.
People began planting ornamental plants shipped from or originally in Europe and Asia like lilacs and roses, also grapes and fruit trees, as well as shade trees.
The War of 1812, however, caused all kinds of shortages and shipping blockades, so residents continued to rely on each other to produce food in their own back yards for which they often bartered with each other.
• 3,700 residents (after a precipitous rise to over 10,000 and subsequent fall around the short-lived whaling era)
• 1847: First pitch pine planted by Josiah Sturgis
• 1848: Planting of the Liberty Elm at what is now Surfside Road plus hundreds of shade trees in town
• 1856: First Nantucket Agricultural Fair
• 1857: First commercial cranberry operation established
• 1878-1879: Botanical Society of Nantucket founded by Catherine Starbuck
• 1899: Rosa rugosa introduced to Nantucket
When the Nantucket economy tanked after the whaling era ended, town leaders encouraged community members to take up agriculture to fill in the gap, hoping to revive the economy.
Farming and back-yard gardening was encouraged. Photos from the era show even in-town gardens containing food crops and livestock.
The Nantucket Agricultural Society was launched to both build a social network around farming, share best practices and build a market for goods.
Gradually, agriculture as an economic driver was replaced by tourism, and summer people brought with them the desire for pretty gardens. Flowers took over the scenery. Rambling roses were introduced to Sconset.
• 3,000-3,500 year-round residents
• 10,000 residents summer peak
• 1922: First deer introduced to Nantucket
• 1929: Monaghan Sisters purchase Greater Light
The early 20th century saw continued emphasis on ornamental gardens, as well as full-scale efforts to control and/or beat back nature.
Ragweed and poison ivy control was a civic priority. At the same time, the introduction of so many non-native plants started to have consequences.
The great Hurricane of 1938 hit New England hard and spread the dreaded chestnut blight northward. Pitch pine brought with it beetles. Invasive weeds moved into fields and yards.
Native plants like sea lavender were nearly wiped out from over-picking. Bird’s foot violet became extant. The Nantucket aesthetic of cottage gardens filled with roses, daylilies, hollyhocks, lilies, hydrangeas and other perennials and flowering shrubs, bordered by white picket fences and arbors, surrounding emerald green lawns took hold.
1976: 200th birthday • 4,300-4,600 houses
• 5,300 year-round residents
• 15,000-20,000 residents summer peak
• 1941-45: World War II victory gardens
• 1959 Nantucket Garden Club incorporated
• 1963 Walter Beinecke Jr., founds Sherburne Associates
• 1975 Hadwen House garden restoration by Nantucket Garden Club
Mid-century Nantucket was heavily populated by farms and vegetable gardens, especially during the war years. As recalled by the late Donald Visco in an oral history recorded by Mary Miles in 2003, the war years were tough.
“Everybody had a victory garden and everybody had animals and there were farms everywhere,” he said.
People once again relied on each other for food. Bartering returned. Yet a short three decades later by our 200th birthday, Nantucket was a thriving tourist destination, in no small way due to the influence of Walter Beinecke, whose company Sherburne Associates bought and renovated many Nantucket commercial properties and introduced a standard garden “look” that persists to this day: flower-filled window boxes hanging on shingled exterior walls, lush flowering roses and hydrangeas lining the streets, neatly trimmed privet hedges and perfectly coiffed lawns.
Garden designers, nurseries and landscape companies flourished, expanding and repeating the aesthetic to complement the Historic District Commission’s architectural guidelines.
Sad stories also abounded with the proliferation of non-native plants, including the spread of giant reed, Japanese knotweed and Dutch elm disease.
• 12,500 houses on 9,700 unique properties
• 17,000-20,000 year-round residents
• 80,000 residents/visitors summer peak
• 2000: Sustainable Nantucket founded
Today, there is no arguing that Nantucket’s gardens are beautiful and run the gamut from simple back-yard plots to large, elaborate landscapes that include pools and curated tableaus of exotic plants.
There is a growing trend, however, to come full circle, back to our roots, to the plants and landscape look that were here at the start of our shared U.S. history. Chemical fertilizer and pesticide use is discouraged in favor of natural remedies and organic solutions.
Local farming is on the rebound. People are restoring gardens to include native plants and grasses, rescuing endangered species and establishing pollinator gardens to support diverse ecosystems, eliminating invasives and otherwise adapting their gardens to a changing climate, one that will require botanical and human resilience.
There is no doubt that Nantucket will always have gardens. What will be here on the 300th anniversary of our country remains to be seen.
Comments are closed.