We are so excited to be partnering with Tales of Cape Cod for their 2023 season! View the program schedule and buy books below.
All programs begin at 7 pm. Admission prices, unless otherwise noted, are $15 for nonmembers; $10 for members. Open seating, we do not sell advance tickets. Receptions follow. Book signings, courtesy of Titcomb’s Bookshop, when applicable. Memberships, which allows for reduced admission prices, can be secured at the door.
WHERE: The Olde Colonial Courthouse, 3046 Main Street, Barnstable Village, MA 02630
May 15th Kick Off: Sandy MacFarlane - Swirling Currents
Fifty years ago, shellfish farms were a rarity. Wild harvest depended solely on Mother Nature's generosity and the only way shellfish were available. Sandy MacFarlane describes the muddy road to today's vibrant shellfish industry that produces the succulent morsels we love and helps to preserve the waters we love just as much. Sandy's presentation will be followed by a book signing and a wine and raw bar reception.
June 12: Kevin Doyle and Karen Rinaldop - On the Road to the Mayflower
About the Program:
The 60-year-old Church of England didn't tolerate dissension, so the movement of some sects to worship in their own way led to harassment and persecution. The Separatists in Scrooby, a small hamlet 200 miles north of London, decided to leave the birthplace of William Brewster, and move to the far more tolerant country of Holland across the North Sea. The few hundred followers of Reverend John Robinson found employment in Amsterdam in 1609 and lived there for three years. They missed the bucolic life of Scrooby, so resettled 40 miles south in the university town of Leiden where they lived for ten more years.
The presentation will have you walk in the footsteps of the Pilgrims along the canals and past the buildings that have existed for a thousand years. You will take a photographic journey through the historic sites that the Pilgrims saw daily. It is the prequel to the popular "In the Wake of the Mayflower" where the authors recount the challenges and accomplishments of the 53 survivors of the voyage that shaped the course of Colonial and indigenous history.
About the authors:
Karen Rinaldo is an artist and visual historian who was commissioned in 1994 to paint an accurate portrayal of "The First Thanksgiving" that Scholastic Books selected as a "masterpiece" to teach American history. The Smithsonian Museum of the American Indian along with the local Wampanoag Tribe also cite the scene as authentic. That became the wellspring of the book she co-authored with Kevin M. Doyle, a retired combat veteran, Revolutionary War historian, and author of many articles on vignettes in history that deserve to be remembered. Both authors live on Cape Cod and are active in historical associations.
June 26: Don Wilding - The Portland Gale of 1898
On the night of November 26, 1898 with a killer storm of historic proportions approaching, the steamer Portland set out from Boston. By the following night, the winter hurricane sent the vessel to the depths of Massachusetts Bay off Cape Cod claiming nearly two hundred lives. On the Cape, a few dozen victims of the Portland disaster washed ashore, while ships piled up in harbors, high tides swept away railroad tracks and the landscape and beaches were changed forever. Several Cape Cod mariners went to sea and never returned, caught in the gale's evil Clutches. Don revisits this disaster and the heroic deeds of the US life saving service and the Cape's citizenry in what came to be known as the "Portland Gale." Don Wilding's Website Link
July 24: Kate Storey - White House By The Sea
Hyannisport Massachusetts is where, for 100 years, America's most storied political family has come to celebrate, bond, play, and also grieve. Journalist Kate Storey, author of the new book "White House By The Sea: A Century of Kennedys at Hyannisport" and talks about the Kennedy relationship to the Cape. Kate Storey is a Writer-at-Large for Esquire covering culture, politics, and style. She spent two years as Hearst Digital Media's News Director, managing an international shared news desk.
August 7: Deborah Swiss - Tin Ticket
Historian Deborah Swiss relays the compelling true story of survival and triumph of the human spirit through the eyes of three ordinary women who led extraordinary lives and were among the founding mothers of modern Australia, now being made into a television series by Midnight Madhouse Productions.
August 28: Michael Tougias - Extreme Survival
September 18: David Gergen - Hearts Touched With Fire
David Gergen is a professor of public service and founding director of the Center for Public Leadership at the Harvard Kennedy School, positions he has held for over a decade. In addition, he serves as a senior political analyst for CNN and works actively with a rising generation of new leaders. In the
past, he has served as a White House adviser to four U.S. presidents of both parties: Nixon, Ford, Reagan and Clinton. He wrote about those experiences in his New York Times best- seller, Eyewitness to Power: The Essence of Leadership, Nixon to Clinton (Simon & Schuster, 2001).
This book cannot be returned due to publisher restrictions.
