This station is one of the new type of life-saving stations, with
commodious quarters for the keeper and crew, large boat room and
lookout. It was built in 1896, and manned in 1897. The late Capt.
Isaac G. Fisher, who was keeper of the Peaked Hill Bars Station at
the time, was placed in charge of the station and a picked crew of
surfmen. Captain Fisher continued as keeper until ill-health caused
him to resign from the service. Capt. William Sparrow, now keeper of
the Point Allerton Station, who was No. 1 man under Captain Fisher,
acted as temporary keeper until Captain Bickers was placed in charge.
The station is located on the narrow strip of beach at the tip end of
Cape Cod, Provincetown, one-eighth of a mile east from the Wood End
lighthouse. Its approximate position as obtained from the latest coast
survey charts is latitude north 42° 01′ 15″, longitude west 70° 11′
30″. From Provincetown the distance to the station over the sand dunes
and along the beach is about three and one-half miles. Across the head
of the harbor, a way that is accessible when the tide has ebbed, the
distance is much shorter. The station is supplied with two five-oared
surf-boats of the Race Point model, two beach carts, with guns,
breeches-buoys, etc., and one life-car. The patrol from this station
extends three and three-quarters miles north, and two and one-quarter
miles south. This is the only station on Cape Cod where the surfmen do
not meet and exchange checks with the surfmen from other stations, time
clocks being employed to record the performance of duty of the patrol.
[Illustration: WOOD END STATION.]
No total wrecks have occurred within the province of this station
since Captain Bickers has been in command, and no persons have been
taken ashore by the crew either in the surf-boat or breeches-buoy,
although a large number of vessels have met with disaster near there.
The following vessels have been assisted and floated by Captain Bickers
and crew: the yawl _Adventurer_, the barge _Paxnos_, and the schooners
_Clara_, _Zephyr_, _Caviar_, _Manomet_, _Joseph I. Johnson_, _St.
Bernard_, _Marjorie Brown_, _Gladstone_, and _Lewis H. Giles_. Captain
Bickers and his crew also assisted in the rescue of the two men,
members of the crew of the schooner _Two Forty_, who had been adrift in
an open boat for fourteen hours.
“Tom,” the pet cat at the Wood End Station, while not being able to
aid in the work of life saving, often goes out with the surfmen on
their lonely patrol along the beaches to keep them company. “Tom” knows
every foot of the beaches and seems to delight in going out with the
surfmen, whether the weather is fair or stormy. “Tom” often meets the
surfmen half-way along the beach as they are returning from their
patrol, running along ahead of the men as if to show them the way to
the station. “Tom” is the pet of the crew and is well taken care of by
them.
“Jim,” the horse which is at the Wood End Station, is owned by Captain
Bickers, the keeper. He was raised on Cape Cod, and has been connected
with the station for one year or since Captain Bickers assumed charge
of the station. “Jim” is an intelligent animal, and has upon more than
one occasion been of valuable service to the crew, by hauling apparatus
to scenes of disaster. “Jim” knows when bad weather prevails, and is
ever ready to do his share in the work of saving life or property.
[Illustration: JIM, THE HORSE KEPT AT WOOD END STATION.]