SCALLOP SEASON BRINGS MANY BOATS TO COWESETT BAY

Twenty Thousand Dollars’ Worth of Scallops

Taken From Bay Last Monday (86 years ago)

Soon after sunset on Sunday the boats began to gather in Cowesett Bay. They came from “all over.” They came from as far as Block Island. Before the dawn of September 12 began to appear there were, it was estimated, five hundred boats dotting the waters with their lights, lying to for the official announcement of the opening of the scallop season, when the sun should rise. From East Greenwich everything that could make headway under sail, steam, or gasoline had put out. It was a great sight to see the boats lying there, waiting like race horses, or runners, for the starting signal to be given.

Then, just as the first tip of the sun appeared over the Bay to the eastward, a man standing in the State boat shouted through a megaphone, “Go.” The boats were off at once, dredging hither and thither—they had all, apparently, marked off the most promising grounds beforehand. Some drew out of the ruck and went around Potowomut Point, steering south. They were bound for The Lion’s Tongue, where they say, there is a most excellent “set” of scallops this year. Others hugged in just far enough to avoid the closed and polluted waters of the Apponaug and East Greenwich Coves.

It was a scene which occurs every year now, but it is always new to those who have seen it before; a revelation to those who have never seen it.  Cowesett Bay and that section of Narragansett Bay just around the corner, down on the eastern shore of Potowomut are the great scallop grounds which were opened Monday at daylight; places from which many and many thousands of  dollars  worth of scallops come out of these waters. There are two beds on the north shore of Long Island which rival these beds, but cannot compete with them.

At least two thousand men were abroad on the waters Monday at day light, waiting for the signal to go ahead and dredge the scallops. Scallops. It is said, will be higher this year than ever before< although the  yield will be a good one. There is, it is said, a great difficulty in getting “cutters.” The “eye” of the scallop is the only edible part of the shellfish. The shells have to be opened. The “eye” sent into one receptacle and the “mantle” into another. It takes an expert to open scallops properly, or rather, a person accustomed to doing the trick. The retailers are now charging $1.25 a quart for scallops. Between sunrise and sun- set on Monday scallops to the value of  over twenty thousand dollars were taken out of Cowesett Bay/ The scallop season lasts from September 12 to January 12, 1928.

Scallops will, of course, grow scarcer as the season progresses and the price may go down a little but not much. Anyway, the harvest of scallops which began at sunrise Monday morning will bring in hundreds of thousands of dollars and a large portion of this harvest will be reaped by East Greenwich. The scallops this year are of an unusually good quality. The eyes are large, but by some freak of nature, many of the bivalve which furnish the  large eyes have small shells.

Transcribed by Alan Clarke