page_title: Cape Cod
section_title: Modern era
hierarchical_section_title: Cape Cod / History / Modern era
caption_attribution_description: English: Cranberry picking on Cape Cod, Massachusetts; from a 1906 postcard published by the Hugh C. Leighton Company, Portland, Maine.
context_page_description: Cape Cod is a geographic cape extending into the Atlantic Ocean from the southeastern corner of mainland Massachusetts, in the northeastern United States. Its historic, maritime character and ample beaches attract heavy tourism during the summer months.
  As defined by the Cape Cod Commission's enabling legislation, Cape Cod is conterminous with Barnstable County, Massachusetts. It extends from Provincetown in the northeast to Woods Hole in the southwest, and is bordered by Plymouth to the northwest.
  Since 1914, most of Cape Cod has been separated from the mainland by the Cape Cod Canal. The canal cuts 7 miles roughly across the base of the peninsula, though small portions of the Cape Cod towns of Bourne and Sandwich lie on the mainland side of the canal. Two highway bridges cross the Cape Cod Canal: the Sagamore Bridge and the Bourne Bridge. In addition, the Cape Cod Canal Railroad Bridge carries railway freight and provides limited passenger service onto the Cape. Cape territory is divided into 15 towns with many villages.
context_section_description: Cape Cod became a summer haven for city dwellers beginning at the end of the 19th century.  Improved rail transportation made the towns of the Upper Cape accessible to Bostonians, such as Bourne and Falmouth. At the beginning of the twentieth century, the Northeastern mercantile elite built many large, shingled "cottages" along Buzzards Bay.  The relaxed summer environment offered by Cape Cod was highlighted by writers including Joseph C. Lincoln, who published novels and countless short stories about Cape Cod folks in popular magazines such as the Saturday Evening Post and the Delineator.
  Guglielmo Marconi made the first transatlantic wireless transmission originating in the United States from Cape Cod, at Wellfleet. The beach below the bluffs where his station was located is now called Marconi Beach.  In 1914, he began construction of a new transatlantic wireless receiver station in Chatham and a companion transmitter station in Marion.  In 1920, the stations were acquired by RCA and, in 1921, Chatham began operations as a maritime radio station communicating to ships at sea using the callsign WCC.  WCC supported the communications of Amelia Earhart, Howard Hughes, Admiral Byrd, and the Hindenburg. Marconi chose Chatham due to its vantage point on the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded on three sides by water. Walter Cronkite narrated a 17-minute documentary in 2005 about the history of the Chatham Station.
  Much of the east-facing Atlantic seacoast of Cape Cod consists of wide, sandy beaches. In 1961, a significant portion of this coastline, already slated for housing subdivisions, was made a part of the Cape Cod National Seashore by President John F. Kennedy.  It was protected from private development and preserved for public use.  Large portions are open to the public, including the Marconi Site in Wellfleet.  This is a park encompassing the site of the first two-way transoceanic radio transmission from the United States. (Theodore Roosevelt used Marconi's equipment for this transmission.)
  The Kennedy Compound in Hyannis Port was President Kennedy's summer White House during his presidency, and the Kennedy family continues to maintain residences on the compound. President Grover Cleveland maintained a summer home in the Gray Gables section of Bourne. Other notable residents of Cape Cod have included actress Julie Harris, US Supreme Court justice Louis Brandeis, figure skater Todd Eldredge, composer and radio personality Canary Burton, and novelists Norman Mailer and Kurt Vonnegut.  Influential natives included patriot James Otis, historian and writer Mercy Otis Warren, jurist Lemuel Shaw, and naval officer John Percival.
caption: Cranberry picking in 1906
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