The daily morning journal and courier., 1898-01-11
NATIVES OF NANTUCKET
CHARACTERISTICs DESORIBED BY
 MR. HALLETT OF STAMFORD.

"Reminiscences of Ben Franklin Quality of Physical Health, Industry and Fru- Eality Which Have Left Their Impress Upon Many Generations--An Interesting Article by We'll Known Architect.
 With regard to the general belief that Benjamin Franklin was production of Bostonian factors, inheriting his traits of character from that cultured and characteristic center, we are at this late day. we think prepared to successfully disprove. It may be true in the ab- stract that he was finally born there, as by the skin of his teeth, so to speak; but that that famous locality had any, thing to do with producing such a char acter as his we must utterly and hatly deny. The old story of poor Benjamin's exploits, of travelling by water from Boston to New York, of footing it thence to Philadelphia, where he arriv- ed ragged and almost bare of foot, with but a dollar In his pocket and a loaf of bread under his arm-all this Is eamil- jar, but we now propose to unfold an- other tale, and get down to solid truth, and show whether Boston or Nantuck- ct is entitled to the honor of originating such character as that possessed by Benjamin Franklin.
 The ancient inhabitants of the island Of Nantucket were a peculiar people. Their peculiarites in our judgment were results of a number of known causes of which the leading ones were as follows: The islanders, to begin with, were of English origin, and coming to this place their natural traits of character were, so to speak, caged up on the island by the surrounding seas, so that the contagion of touch with neighboring communities could not have an equalizing effect on their nature, as Is the case with those living on the continent. Consequently, being left much to themselves, they would necessarily develop differently from the English people they had come out from, and also unlike their neigh bors on the main land They would of course exhibit such characteristics as present circumstances and time develop ed in them, combined with the natural proclivitiAs implanted in them original ly. Most of the men roamed the high seas in quest of leviathan; and in good sooth it must be said of them that for a century and more they led the world in this direction, not only in endeavor, but in results. This produced in them emu- lation, courage daring and self-reliance, while the purity and strength and salt ness of the ocean air gave them, as it will any of to-day, a constitution of iron; and it Is not anaiss to say, in pass ing, that thousands of the descendants of those hardy men now living are ex- isting on the acquired capital of physi- cal stamina gained on the briny deep by their great grandfathers.
 The women, left much at home by themselves, were cuitivating the vir- tues of industry, frugality, patience and hope, for they could make more palat- able meal out of next to nothing than most others could with their abundance. most others could with their abundance; remnants, cut in squares and lined with burlaps, with applied work in color by way of ornamentation and which to- day would rate as valuable antiques, while patience and hope were exemplifi- ed in them in waiting two, three and sometimes four years for return of spouse from the voyage. All these qual- ities existing in the parents would in evitably, in process of time, be trans rnitted to the offspring, the peculiar climate of the place rendering the same extremely hardy. To-day you may roam over the island and breathe in the strong sweet wild odor of the commons which seems to go deep down into the lungs, and which odor no doubt is caus- ed by the conmingling somehow of the salty atmosphere and the peculiar veg citation of the place. This is no doubt what inpelled that invalid resident here, the late Charles O'Connor, to de- clare the climate to be the most salu- brious of any he knew.
 Our subject, however, is not at all to boom Nantucket, but to show the effect of climate and environment on the pro- ducing character; and besides it is a 6act that everyone is more than half what he or she was made previous to actual birth. And just here is point. The old Nantuckers, in a word, were full genuine character. And what lies at the bottom of all character? The metaphysicians answer at once, truth. And so it was--that ancient and relia- ClC lOih SOuio DC pOliitSo lo dS POSOoSS- ing the underlying qualities I am here stating, of integrity, industry, frugali- ty, strength of mind, body, etc, which we may say were precisely the charac- teristics possessed by Benjamin Frank lin.
 In the year 1885 Josiah Franklin, the father of Benjamin. left England and came to settle in Nantucket. After a short time he married for his second wife Ia daughter of Peter Folger, a leading citizen of Nantucket" Benja- min was the fifteenth child, there being seventeen in all. He was born January F, 1706, and lived eighty-four years.
 Of the original ten clans of Nantuck- ct, as they have been termed, the Fol- gers were one, and to which native poet some twenty-five years ago refer red as "the knowing Folgers," implying we suppose, superior intelligence, so that. putting together all the various facts and characteristics I have named, and with that other one recorded of Franklin, l. e., that he was five feet ten and a half inches tall and portly besides 1t is fair to presume that he had his fathers physique with the ma ternal Folger mentality; combination all told that would go far toward mak- ing him what he was. We can also baor rx,itnpsS from oYl,, ou,, f;ov,