SMITH AND Bit A NT POINTS 5 19 



to various buildings on the point. Along the southern shore there is a 

 ridge of sand dunes, and on the western point beyond Further creek 

 these dunes are built around on the northern side of the point. The 

 contours are sketched at approximately 5-foot levels. The oldland on 

 the point is nowhere more than 10 feet high west of the Life Saving 

 station. The dunes are in places 20 and 25 feet above high water. 



Inasmuch as the tombolo was never completed from Nantucket to 

 Marthas Vineyard, a great deal of sand has been carried to the north 

 of Tuckernuck by the currents. This sand has been built into the 

 Tuckernuck, Muskeget, and other shoals which will be considered in a 

 later paper. The many sand dunes in the large sand dune area of Eel 

 point and the action along the northern shore of Nantucket west of the 

 town will be discussed in a later paper. We will now proceed to consider 

 the sand brought around to the north of the island and deposited near 

 the town. 



Brant Point 



The sand carried along the northern part of Nantucket from the west 

 has been built out into the foreland in front of the cliff forming Brant 

 point. This point has been built out into the harbor, with its axis about 

 at right angles to the general direction of the inflowing and outflowing 

 tidal currents, and represents one of the tidal cuspate forelands which 

 the writer has previously described* The point extends about a mile 

 to the east of the cliff. It appears to have been built as a bar extending 

 to the east toward the lighthouse and then curving back toward the town. 

 At first this must have inclosed a lagoon which has now been filled up 

 into a marsh. There are traditions of sailing in behind this bar and 

 anchoring in the area north of the Point Breeze hotel. The outline of 

 this point was probably at first very similar to its present form. The 

 point, however, has extended farther to the east, as is shown in the change 

 of the position of the lighthouse. The old lighthouse, built in 1856, is 

 now 600 feet back from the light built in 1900-1901. The last hundred 

 feet of this distance has been built more rapidly than the first portion, 

 as it has extended about 100 feet in the four years from 1898 to 1902. 



It is a question of a good deal of interest to know exactly how these 

 tidal cuspate forelands are formed, and the writer hopes to find, by a 

 study of this point, some of the things which control and determine the 

 growth of such points, which appear to grow directty into the main tidal 

 current in ai^ bay. It is for this reason that the writer proposed the 

 scheme of eddies formed between the old land and the main in and out 



* Shoreline topography, Proc. Am. Acad. Arts and Sci., vol. xxxiv, pp. 214-220, 



