Do a Google search today on the term “windmills of Cape Cod” and the first page of results is full of articles and stories about the wind farms proposed for Nantucket Sound.

Not that is bad, but unfortunately…

Mostly relegated or eclipsed from the results are the resources and information on the history of windmills of Cape Cod and the Islands, and the importance they played in the region’s history.

The Cape is blessed with a generous supply of wind from Mother Nature and historically, windmills were erected on the Cape to grind corn and to provide sea water for the great saltworks.

So let me briefly take you back to an early Cape Cod when windmills were as common as the mackeral and whaling fleets of the region.

THE BIRTH OF THE SALTWORKS

During the revolutionary war the British blockades meant salt was difficult to come by. And salt was a critical commodity for both humans and livestock, and especially as a preservative. To compensate for lack of availability the area turned to the sea to harvest its never-ending supply. Saltworks sprung up all over the Cape, but it required huge amounts of sea water to generate an appreciable amount of salt.

Initially, the salt was produced by evaporating sea water in kettle boilers over a fire. Eventually, large wooden vats were used to contain the sea water and solar evaporation replaced the wood burning fires for boiling the sea water.

WINDMILLS BRING THE OCEAN TO THE SALTWORKS

In answer to getting the large amounts of sea water from the ocean to the vats, windmills were introduced to pump the salt water to the saltworks along water-tight hallowed-out pine logs. The barriers to mass production - and profits - solved, by the 1840’s there were about 880 saltworks scattered throughout the cape and most had windmills.

Today these windmills on Cape Cod have all but vanished. Most were torn down but a few were moved, restored and linger on in some towns such as Eastham and Orleans - defunct and relics of a different age.

These reminders grind no more corn, nor pump sea water to create salt. They’re icons of an age when the Cape was wilder and a trip along the Outer Cape’s arm meant an extremely long walk across a foreboding and exposed landscape.

THE WINDMILLS OF TODAY ON CAPE COD

Because of the continuing fascination with windmills over the years people have constructed mock structures purely for aesthetic reasons. One is at a main entrance onto the Cape at the Sagamore Bridge where electricity turns the arms but not wind.

For a resource listing a number of the windmills on Cape Cod you can see today check out this web site: http://www.windmillworld/world/capecod.htm

In addition to the dismantlement of the windmills the board woods of the saltworks used to collect the salt was recyled into building homes, and most towns on the Cape have at least one house constructed of saltworks wood.

Resources:
An Old Wind Blows - http://archive.capecodonline.com/special/windfarm/anold8.htm
The Saltworks of historic Cape Cod by William P. Quinn
Windmills on Cape Cod & Islands by Fredrika A. Burrows
Cape Cod Companion: The History and Mystery of Old Cape Cod by Jack Sheedy and Jim Coogan

For more ideas on things to see and do on Cape Cod check out my Cape Cod vacations page here.

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Cliff Calderwood
Publisher
New England Vacations Guide