Joe Lincoln of Cape Cod by James Westaway McCue
Joe Lincoln of Cape Cod by James Westaway McCue is a biographical and literary portrait written in the mid-20th century. The book explores the life, work, and popular appeal of novelist Joseph C. Lincoln, using the people, traditions, and landscape of Cape Cod as its constant frame. The book traces Lincoln’s upbringing in Brewster among generations of sea captains, his boyhood roaming the Cape, and his detour through bookkeeping and art before
discovering his voice in verse and fiction about “Cape Cod Folks.” It follows his breakthrough with Cape Cod Ballads and Cap’n Eri, his steady stream of amiable, humorous village novels and plays, and his deliberate choice to celebrate decency and cheer rather than sordid “problem” fiction. McCue highlights Lincoln’s work habits (pencil drafts in morning sessions), his insistence on types rather than exact portraits, and his reflections on editors, serialization, and craft, captured in interviews (notably with Joyce Kilmer) and anecdotes about O. Henry. The narrative mixes literary appreciation with Cape lore—Yankee shrewdness tales, windmill-making, sea rescues—samples his poetry, and paints his Chatham home, hobbies, and friendships. It also covers collaborations with his son (including the War of 1812 adventure The New Hope), his lectures, stage and film adaptations, and his advocacy for preserving Cape Cod’s character. The closing chapters include his wartime salute to Chatham’s “Victory Market” and the community effort to memorialize him, rounding out a warm, engaging portrait of a writer who turned Cape Cod’s everyday life into enduring popular fiction. (This is an automatically generated summary.)
Read or download for free
For an overview of the different reading options, see our Reading Guide
| Reading Options | Url | Size | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Read now! | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/77475.html.images | 137 kB | |||
| EPUB3 (E-readers incl. Send-to-Kindle) | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/77475.epub3.images | 269 kB | |||
| EPUB (older E-readers) | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/77475.epub.images | 268 kB | |||
| Kindle | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/77475.kf8.images | 962 kB | |||
| older Kindles | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/77475.kindle.images | 941 kB | |||
| Plain Text UTF-8 | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/77475.txt.utf-8 | 121 kB | |||
| Download HTML (zip) | https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/77475/pg77475-h.zip | 472 kB | |||
| There may be more files related to this item. | |||||
Similar Books
About this eBook
| Author | McCue, James Westaway, 1911-1987 |
|---|---|
| Title | Joe Lincoln of Cape Cod |
| Original Publication | Silver Lake P. O., Mass.: The Cape Cod Publishers, 1949. |
| Credits | Steve Mattern and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at www.pgdp.net |
| Language | English |
| LoC Class | PS: Language and Literatures: American and Canadian literature |
| Subject | Authors, American -- 20th century -- Biography |
| Subject | Lincoln, Joseph Crosby, 1870-1944 |
| Category | Text |
| EBook-No. | 77475 |
| Release Date | Dec 16, 2025 |
| Copyright Status | Public domain in the USA. |
| Downloads | 176 downloads in the last 30 days. |
| Project Gutenberg eBooks are always free! | |