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Cape Cod National Seashore
Forty miles of Atlantic beach and dune on the Outer Cape
Henry David Thoreau walked the outer beach of Cape Cod in the 1850s and wrote that a man could stand there and put all America behind him. Much of that shore is still wild because of Cape Cod National Seashore, which protects about 40 miles (64 km) of Atlantic beach, along with marshes, kettle ponds, heathlands and the shifting dunes of the Province Lands. President John F. Kennedy, a Cape Cod summer resident who had co-sponsored the bill as a senator, signed it into law on August 7, 1961. The seashore covers about 43,600 acres (176 km²) across six towns from Chatham to Provincetown.
The Outer Cape is a glacial deposit, and the ocean is taking it back. Its sand cliffs retreat a few feet a year, and in 1996 Highland Light in Truro was moved about 450 feet (137 m) inland to keep it from falling. The cliffs at Wellfleet hold the site of Guglielmo Marconi's station, which in 1903 sent the first two-way transatlantic radio messages between the United States and Europe. Gray seals have returned in large numbers, and great white sharks have followed them close to swimming beaches. Dune shacks once used by artists and writers still stand behind the beach at Peaked Hill Bars.