A Growing Legacy
Each autumn, cranberry bogs across the South Shore turn a vibrant crimson, ushering in the annual harvest season. The tart little berries are native to New England. The earliest record of cranberry cultivation dates to 1816 when a man named Captain Henry Hall, of Dennis, noticed that the wild cranberries in his bogs grew better when sand blew over them. Captain Hall began transplanting his cranberry vines, fencing them in and spreading sand on them. This year marks the 200th anniversary of cranberry farming in Massachusetts.