The huge 11 ton boulder the local fishermen called “The Boiler” had been lodged in the mud just off Fish Point at the entrance to the Pool or harbor on Great Cranberry Island. The Pool, a good sheltered harbor for schooners, is shallow with a 2-foot draft at low tide, rising to an 8 to 10 foot draft when the tide is in. Vessels kept in the Pool were deep draft vessels and only came in and went out at high tide. There was an area called the "Deep Hole" in the Pool where six or more vessels could anchor. “The Boiler,” about 6 feet wide and 4 feet above the bottom, was not visible when the tide was in and, therefore, a hazard to navigation in the narrow channel. It was called "The Boiler" because the water "boiled" around it when the tide came and went.
Samuel Newman Bulger (1835-1919) caught his boat on it one time. Enoch Boynton Stanley (1820-1903), “Uncle Jimmy’s” father, told Sam to turn his vessel around and it would come off the rock. The tide came in, the boat spun around and floated off the rock.
Ralph Warren Stanley remembers his great uncle, Lewis Gilley Stanley (1869-1957), William Doane “Uncle Jimmy” Stanley’s brother, telling him about the enormous effort it took to move “The Boiler.”
“First the group of men went out on several low drain tides to dig around the rock to break the suction. When they finally got enough dug away, they put an iron eye bolt into the rock, put a big log across two dories and tied a line to the rock. When the tide came in it sank both dories. They worked for months on the project.
Next time they tried to move ‘the boiler’ they used four dories and just barely floated the rock. The dories were down to the gunnels.
With a line on the dories, eight or nine men stood on the shore where they wanted it and hauled it hand over hand about 80 yards toward them, but before the rock reached its destination, the eyebolt [which had been welted into the top of the rock] came out and the dories popped out of the water.
They just left the rock there where it sank on the north side of the Stanley wharf (E.B. Stanley & Sons - the Stanley wharf - on the map - now gone). ‘The Boiler’ is still there.
“William D. Stanley and others have at last accomplished their long cherished wish to remove the rock designated as “the Boiler” from the channel near the Fish Point. After much hard labor, they succeeded, by the help of 4 dories in raising, floating and dragging it across to the flats, owned by the late Capt. John Stanley, when it struck a rock and in hauling on it caused the welted iron bolts to pull out, and “the Boiler” was anchored somewhat sooner than had been bargained for, but as it is now safely landed it will probably be allowed to remain where it is. It is very doubtful if any further attempt will be made to change its position, and as it is estimated to weigh 11 tons, it will be the cause of much comment for years to come. Wm. D. Stanley is very elated the he with a few others, should have accomplished the feat of removing the rock, which during the last 140 years has been in the way, and a menace to all boats coming in and going out from all parts of the creek, and they are to be congratulated for having removed the dangerous obstruction.” The Bar Harbor Record, February 23, 1900 - Cranberry Island.
“The Boiler, Great Cranberry Island,” Southwest Harbor Public Library, accessed November 22, 2024, https://demo.digitalarchive.us/items/show/9320.Item 13332
