Cape Cod Times, August 23, 2019
SOUTH DENNIS — Imagine you are renovating a 1791 sea captain’s home, and you decide to remove the attic floor to create more space in an upstairs bedroom. You’re pounding away, removing floorboard by floorboard, when something falls out. It’s an 18th-century child’s shoe. And then another shoe, clearly having belonged to an adult.
There is a phenomenon, particularly in England, but in many other countries as well, of single shoes having been found hidden away in historic homes. “Concealed shoes” were apparently so common that England’s Northampton Museum retains a Concealed Shoe Index, in which findings of such shoes are recorded. Theories abound that the hidden shoes were meant to ward off evil spirits, bring good luck or bring fertility.
And that’s not all that the current owners discovered upon renovations in 2012; reading primers, powder horns, a woman’s hat and a poster were also found, as were coins and buttons from the Revolutionary War, from both “Red Coat and Colonial uniforms,” according to the owners. In its 200-plus years of existence, they’re only the third owners of this home, said to have been built by the sea captain Nathaniel Baker.
Photo Gallery: Take a look inside this home
Renovations meant raising the entire structure to carve out a full basement and build a solid foundation. All of the original bricks were kept, as were pots from a “bottle dump” discovered upon excavation — this was where colonists placed items no longer needed — pots, bottles, etc., many of which are now filled with plants and adorn the outside of the house. Other unique features of this home include a tiny room, known as a “borning room,” to the side of the dining room, and a “trap door” to the basement.
