John Hay’s Writing Studio Is Giving Writers ‘A Week To Play With Words’

An undated photo of John Hay’s writing studio. COURTESY OF BREWSTER CONSERVATION TRUST Previous Next BREWSTER – Until this past winter, the little shack in the remote Brewster woods sat empty for decades. A stone’s throw from John Hay’s house, the wooden structure he visited each morning marks the beginning and the end of his published work. The naturalist put down every word of his lifetime right here, beginning in the late 1940s. His many books capture life in many forms, including “The Run,” Hay’s history of the migrating herring. But in 2005, after 60 years in Brewster, John and Kristi Hay left for Maine. After they died, a bequest to the Brewster Conservation Trust in 2015 allowed the organization to buy the land. This March, the Trust began developing Hay’s abandoned shack into Cape Cod’s first proper retreat for local writers. “You could see the promise of a great studio,” said volunteer Lauren Wolk, who leapt at the chance to scrub down the interior. “The mice and the red squirrels had certainly had their way with it — and so had the mildew, the dust, the pollen and the dirt.” She and Bob Nash, an old colleague from the Cultural Center of Cape Cod, spent those cold, gray weeks patching holes, painting walls and repairing the chewed-up window frames and worn floor. In June, the Trust opened the refurbished study to select writers, free of charge, to test whether the project might have legs beyond summer. “A lot of people who aren’t writers don’t understand the need for that solitude and that focus,” Wolk said. “But this is a place where people will get it.” A Slice Of History Reborn More than 50 acres of woods surround this no-fuss writing room, offering a serene getaway atop one of Brewster’s highest points. Sun pours in through the large window, where Hay spent his mornings thinking and typing and overlooking Cape Cod Bay until the trees claimed the view. Born in Ipswich, Hay married Kristi Putnam in 1942 and they made their home in the Brewster wilderness when he returned […]

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