Cape Cod rug hooking mysteries! Chasing the early 20th century Rug Hooking shop in Provincetown!

Added: 2026-06-01

[00:00:01]Welcome back to Ribbon Candy Hooking.

[00:00:03]I'm Deanna.

[00:00:04]I'm on vacation here at Cape Cod. This is our place we've been coming for over 40 years. I'm onto a great rug hooking mystery today. There's been a few things that have come together in a weird way.

[00:00:15]One of them was when I gave my sermon on rug hooking at church last summer, a guy who had just come for the first time, it was the first time he'd been to the church, first service he'd seen there, um he came up to me after because I had a display of my hooked rugs, if you remember, and he was telling me about his uncle, he thought it was his uncle, it turned out to be his grandfather with further research, uh once had a or worked at a rug hooking store in Provincetown, which is at the tip of the Cape. So, I have some research from him, I've done a little bit of digging there, kind of hit uh a speed bump, and I thought, well, when I come to the Cape this summer, I'll see what I can figure out. So, the other day, I was at my favorite store in the world, The White Cat in Cotuit, which is also on the Cape, and I was visiting with my friend Pat, who owns The White Cat, it's in her house, you've seen me do videos there, and I wrote a feature on it for one of the Magpies last year, and um ooh, birds fighting in the sky, look at that, look at that, look at that, who's that?

[00:01:18]That's like, what is that? A hawk?

[00:01:20]Oh, they're fighting, I wonder if that's in the nest.

[00:01:22]>> an crow.

[00:01:23]>> Yeah, and there's a bunch of seagulls going crazy. Um I was over at Pat's, and she gave me this adorable picture. It's like a little print that's been hand-painted, and said, I you know, I think that you'll appreciate this more than me, so I've been holding it for you. And it's a hooked rug shop with a picket fence out front, and I thought, holy Christ, where where is this, right?

[00:01:45]Will this fit in with my research? And then I noticed on the edge of it, I wonder if you can see, number 57.

[00:01:54]I went back to the email I got from my friend Tim at church, and he said number 57, a certain street in Provincetown, was where the Hook Drug Store was in the 1920s and 1930s. And I looked at a photo he sent me of the house now, and it's definitely this house, still with a picket fence out front. So, we are headed up to Provincetown today. I'm going to go to this address to conclude this video and show you what this little Cape Cod rug hooking store from the 20th century looks like today. I'll see you in P-town.

[00:02:29]Well, hey, I am driving over to P-town, and a few exciting things just happened, including a conversation in the car. So, make sure you pan over there, Ted, cuz I'm seeing that Provincetown Monument way off in the distance. Do you see it there? Sticking way up on the left. The truck is going by right now.

[00:02:47]But, we're driving through We're going out to the tip of Cape Cod for our adventures today. So, at this point, the land gets more and more narrow, and there's a beach on both sides. We're seeing the beach on both sides. You're going to start seeing the sand dunes over there. Show the sand dunes there, Ted. And I'll show you driving through the sand dunes. One of the patterns that's coming out in the Spilling the Tea book is called Endless Trees, and Leah's doing that pattern. It refers to the fact that when the pilgrims landed here, because they first landed in Provincetown and then at Plymouth.

[00:03:23]Um when they first landed here, this whole area was covered with trees, and then they cut so many of them down that the breezes blew the ocean breezes blew, and now there really are not any mature trees out here. If you look at the sand dunes here, you can see it's just sand.

[00:03:37]Nothing can take hold. It's like over 90% silica, the ground.

[00:03:42]As we and well, I'll show you the dunes as we drive through the dunes. We're just driving over here, and I've got that picture in my bag. I'm super excited. I was saying to my husband, I wonder if the Hook Rug store that was apparently here in the 1930s and 1940s was here during the time that Peter Hunt was here, the great Cape Cod decorative artist furniture painter called Peter Hunt. I have a chapter about him in the second Design Like Book, which I'm not ready to put out yet, still working on that. And I'm working on a secret pet project about rug hooking on Cape Cod.

[00:04:16]Certainly Peter Hunt will be featured in that because I think that one of the great inspirations for Peter Hunt's decorative painting was Hook Rugs. And I just thought to myself, wouldn't it be interesting if Peter Hunt's store on the Commercial Street in Provincetown was here during the time that this rug hooking store that I just found out was for sure in Provincetown in the 1930s and 40s, wouldn't it be curious if they were here at the same time? And they were here at the same time. Because Peter Hunt arrived in the 1920s and left, I think in the early 1950s. You can read all about that in the great book called War Paint. That's It's about Helena Rubinstein, who is who Peter Hunt came with in the first place. But take a thing of that sign. Welcome to Provincetown.

[00:05:02]And stay on the Stay on the dunes so they can see the dunes, Ted. They're so magical and beautiful. Read the book War Paint if you're interested in this subject. Peter came with Helena Rubinstein, who was the great sort of professional arch enemy of what's her name? Elizabeth Arden. So a lot of that book is set here. Look at how beautiful these dunes are. We just see wild wild dunes and scrubby trees until we get to the center of Provincetown, which is literally right on the ocean, right on the tip of Cape Cod, and it is the furthest land point out. You can't count the two islands, right? Nantucket Martha's Vineyard because they are not land points. This is going to be where we're going to be today and where that rug hooking store used to be is the furthest land point out. I'm going to go this way. I'm going to go the shore route to Europe. Hey, stay with me, Ted, because in just a minute we're going to make this corner and we're going to see the ocean ahead of us.

[00:06:04]And maybe you can see the Provincetown Monument when we get a little bit closer out there, but you'll see all of the rows of little vacation huts, right? No plumbing, lots of vacation huts that date back to the early 20th century. I'm seeing a glimpse of the ocean. See if you can get the ocean as we make this corner, Ted, and the P-town Monument, and then we will log off and I'll come back on and resume the video if we can find that house that used to be the hooked rug store. I see the Provincetown Monument. Do you have it?

[00:06:41]Get the sign again.

[00:06:43]And we'll be back to you in just a few minutes.

[00:06:47]So, disconnect. So, this is not This is not our destination. So, this remains a mystery, unfortunately. There's no reason Okay, so I checked the address that my friend Tim from church gave me and it is this house.

[00:07:03]This house in the 1920s and 30s was a hooked rug shop. This is the oldest house. This is referred to as the oldest house in Provincetown. Get a shot of the kids over there. They are so cute.

[00:07:14]So, at that time this was a hooked rug store and maybe it shared it with another business. Get a nice It's not this house, unfortunately. This house is a cute picket fence. It's also on a corner. This says 57, but I thought maybe it was wrong cuz this is number 72.

[00:07:31]Although the the numbering might have changed over the years. Ooh, the numbering might have changed, but this still doesn't look like that house.

[00:07:38]Let's look at it from this side, just in case. Come with me to this side.

[00:07:42]But in the meantime, get a nice video.

[00:07:44]this. This is the This is 72, but was it always 72?

[00:07:52]You know, I don't know. This could have been This could have been it at one point.

[00:07:57]I don't know.

[00:07:59]>> No.

[00:08:00]>> But how can you be sure? There is the chimney right there.

[00:08:03]There would have been a little a different fan light there.

[00:08:06]It's probably not the house, right?

[00:08:08]>> No.

[00:08:09]>> Cuz then it would have to be a porch on this side.

[00:08:13]Well, then we don't know where We know that this was a rug hooking store in the 1930s and 40s. That's for sure because the my friend Tim was a family member.

[00:08:22]Turned out to be his grandfather who helped at this store selling hook rugs.

[00:08:26]This is the commercial street in Provincetown. The ocean is right there.

[00:08:30]Let's get a shot of the ocean.

[00:08:38]See the ocean right there through the trees?

[00:08:41]So the ocean is right here. So I don't know where this place is. This might not even be on Cape Cod. I was hoping that this was this place and it's not. But all the same, this was once a rug hooking store in the early 20th century.

[00:08:55]I don't know any of the patterns for sure that were sold here, but just pan back and imagine people coming and going through the little picket fence to pick out some rugs back in the day. Some hook rugs in the early 20th century must have been amazing. This I don't know. This might just be a composite of some sort. I don't know if I'm ever going to solve this mystery, but at least I know what this once was in the early 20th century and that's exciting. So I guess it's a success. Is it a success?

[00:09:29]We took a really long walk and gave the kids a lot of exercise before lunch. So in that regard, it's definitely a success. Pan back one more time just to show the house in full cuz it's so pretty.

[00:09:41]Oh, look at the trolley coming. Get the trolley, Arion. It's so cute.

[00:09:48]Things have changed, but yes, this is the oldest house. I wish I lived here.