From the Loring House Essays
Like many people who did not grow up in Hull, I knew the town for its beach and for memories of Paragon Park. Hull was a place to visit on a warm summer afternoon. It was Nantasket Beach, ice cream, the ocean, and then the drive home. I knew it was an old community, but I knew very little about its history. If someone had asked me about Fort Revere or the families who first settled here, I probably couldn’t have told them very much.
That began to change when Nicky and I became the caretakers of the Loring House, believed to be the oldest surviving house in Hull Village.
One of the unexpected gifts of living in a seventeenth-century home is discovering that history is no longer something you simply read about. It becomes something you encounter almost every day. One discovery quietly leads to another. An old beam leads to a family name. A family name leads to a town record. A town record leads to a military roll. Before long, you realize that the places you pass on an ordinary walk have stories stretching back centuries.
On Saturday, July 11, the Town of Hull will celebrate Bastille Day by rededicating the memorial at Fort Revere honoring the French soldiers who came to the aid of the American colonies during the Revolutionary War. More than two hundred French soldiers who died while stationed in Hull are buried there. Their sacrifice became part of the larger story of American independence, even though it is a chapter many of us were never taught.
As I have been researching the history of the Loring House, I discovered that members of the Loring family also played a small part in that story. Samuel Loring of Hull appears in the Massachusetts Revolutionary War records serving in the defense of the Massachusetts coast during the Revolution.
Can I say with certainty that Samuel Loring stood on the very ground where Fort Revere now stands? No. History deserves more respect than that. But Telegraph Hill was already an important defensive position overlooking Boston Harbor, and Samuel’s duty was to defend this coastline. It is difficult to stand on that hill without wondering if he once looked across the same harbor that still lies before us today.
One of the things this old house has taught me is that places reveal themselves slowly. They are generous with their stories, but never in a hurry. One discovery opens the door to another until, almost without realizing it, you stop seeing a place simply as somewhere you live and begin seeing it as somewhere you belong.
Tomorrow I will not be at the ceremony. My calling will take me to a funeral where I will have the privilege of walking with a family through grief and remembrance. Nicky and Oonagh, however, will be there. Oonagh’s Girl Scout troop has been invited to help unveil the newly rededicated monument.
There is something quietly beautiful about that.
More than two centuries ago, members of the Loring family were helping to defend the community that surrounded this old house. Tomorrow, another little girl who now calls the Loring House home will help honor those who crossed an ocean in support of American independence. She will probably remember standing with her friends far more than she remembers the speeches, and perhaps that is exactly as it should be. History often plants seeds long before we understand what they will become.
Living in the Loring House has changed the way I see Hull. I no longer see only a beautiful seaside town with a wonderful beach. I see a community whose stories are woven into its streets, its shoreline, its homes, and the lives of ordinary people. Every walk seems to uncover another thread connecting the past to the present. The house has not simply introduced me to its own history; it has introduced me to the history of Hull itself.
Perhaps that is one of the unexpected gifts of becoming the caretaker of an old house. You begin by believing you are preserving a building. Somewhere along the way, you discover that the building has been preserving the stories of a community all along.
Tomorrow, one family will gather around a graveside while another gathers around a monument. Both are acts of remembrance. Both remind us that the lives of ordinary people matter, that sacrifice should not be forgotten, and that every community is shaped by those who came before us.
As I continue discovering the stories of the Loring House, I have a feeling I am only beginning to understand the stories of Hull. There are more roads to walk, more names to learn, more photographs to study, and undoubtedly more surprises waiting just around the next corner.
Sometimes history isn’t found in the pages of a book.
Sometimes, it is just over the hill.
