THE CASTAWAY

Originally published in Boston Magazine.

By Jake Halpern

Add Boston Magazine as a preferred source on Google to see more of our stories in your Google search results.

On a typical Monday morning , 63-year-old Judy McDevitt wakes upshortly after sunrise and walks across the creaking wooden floor of hersmall beach cottage to feed her dog and two cats and then get breakfastgoing for herself. If the sky has been cloudy and her solar-poweredelectrical system is low on juice, she avoids using the TV ormicrowave. On the other hand, if the sky is cloudless and there hasbeen no rain to fill her water barrels, she may use her faucetsparingly. After breakfast, if she needs to use the bathroom, sheeither trudges across her backyard to her outhouse or uses an antiquechamber pot.

On cold mornings she may throw a piece of driftwood or a few chunksof coal into her Elmira cooking stove, which is arguably her mostimportant possession, for in the depths of winter it's the only thingthat keeps her from freezing to death. In general, McDevitt has few, ifany, complaints about her hermitlike existence, which is something of across between the lives of the Swiss Family Robinson and Henry DavidThoreau.

At heart, McDevitt is a minimalist. She likes the simple pleasuresof living on an island—gathering firewood, tinkering with herjury-rigged plumbing system, repairing her boat, composting, and,perhaps best of all, walking down to the beach, where she has a perfectview of the Boston skyline.

That's right. Hard as it may be to believe, one of the last realfrontierswomen in all New England lives within a few miles of SouthStation on a rocky spit of land known as Peddock's Island. And she hasbeen here, surviving winters and battling the challenges of isolation,for 44 years. When she first moved out to the island, in 1961, thePrudential Center was a blank spot on the horizon. Ever since then,McDevitt has been within a quick boat ride of Boston and yet a worldaway, eking out a hardscrabble life and watching the city grow.

As it turns out , Peddock's Island has been inhabited for a verylong time. In fact, the oldest skeletal remains ever found in NewEngland come from Peddock's Island and are roughly 4,100 years old. Inmore modern times, Peddock's has been home to a string of steelyinhabitants, including an English planter named Leonard Peddock in the1620s, a garrison of soldiers loyal to the rebel cause during theRevolutionary War, and a band of Portuguese fishermen who took upresidence here in the 1880s. By far the largest settlement ever erectedon the island was Fort Andrews, whose troops guarded Boston Harbor from1904 to the end of World War II. In 1953 the entire island was sold toan entrepreneur named Isadore Bromfield, who did pretty much nothingwith the place. By the time 19-year-old McDevitt arrived, it was averitable ghost town: The Army was long gone, Fort Andrews wasdeserted, and the Portuguese fishing village had essentially become asummer colony. Basically it was just McDevitt and her husband, Eddie,who had been hired by Bromfield as caretakers.

I meet Judy McDevitt on a brisk afternoon after hitching a ride tothe island on a small tugboat. McDevitt stands on the dock, leaninginto a stiff headwind. A few days earlier, with a little finagling, Ihad convinced a park ranger to give me McDevitt's cell-phone number.“Yeah, I'll show you around,” McDevitt had said over the cracklyconnection when I finally reached her. “Just let me know when you'recoming.”

McDevitt is a handsome woman with barley-colored hair, moss-greeneyes, and a build so slight she seems to teeter in the wind. On herfeet she wears sturdy hiking boots, and for extra support she leans onan old umbrella that she uses as a cane. “I would have got you with myown boat, but I haven't been feeling too well,” she saysapologetically. “I'm just getting over cancer, you see. Last fall theytook out my esophagus and replaced it with part of my stomach.” As ifthis weren't enough, McDevitt explains, she also had a hip replaced notlong ago. “Aw, anyway,” she says with a quick shrug, “let's get going.”Moments later she is limping off at a brisk pace toward the ruins ofFort Andrews.

Together we walk down a crumbling asphalt road, speckled withpebbles and weeds, which leads into the fort's old parade grounds. Allsaid, the ruins of the fort include some 26 buildings, almost all incomplete disrepair. Windows are smashed, doors missing, roofs caved in.Everywhere nature is reclaiming its ground with a steady encroachmentof vines, bushes, and trees.

Eventually, McDevitt and I make our way into the heart of the fortand pause for a moment at the center of an old intersection. “Thatbuilding over there was the bakery, and that was the old gymnasium,which had its own bowling alley, and this here was the firehouse,”explains McDevitt, flourishing her umbrella about while gesturingtoward various crumbling facades. “Back when we were the caretakershere, there was still a fire engine here—it was a '37 Ford with twospark plugs for each cylinder—and we used to drive it around. We alsohad a jeep to plow the snow. Of course, the whole place was in a lotbetter shape back then.”

Did she ever get spooked, being on the island by herself?

“Oh, there were times when it was a little scary,” replies McDevittwith a wry smile. “Sometimes you had vandals coming out here to stripthe place of copper, and then, other times . . . well, it just feltlike there were ghosts here. Always has.”

She leads the way down a tree-covered street, past a number ofabandoned, red-brick homes with gaping black windows—the sort thatinvite the imagination to flicker for an instant with the image of aface that once belonged. Suddenly McDevitt stops in front of one ofthese houses, which still bears an address: #15A. “This used to be myhome back when my husband was the caretaker for the island,” sheexplains. “We lived here with our four children.”

As we continue farther into the fort, McDevitt talks about herfamily. Her husband, Eddie, who she divorced in 1978, has long sincemoved back to the mainland. Her children have all grown up and becometugboat captains. This has left McDevitt pretty much on her own. In thesummers, a handful of residents who own cottages in the old Portuguesefishing village still come out to spend a few months on Peddock's. Buteven they are thinning out. Ever since 1970, when the state took theisland by eminent domain, officials have been hoping to turn it into asprawling state park—devoid of private residences. Finally, in 1993, acompromise was reached in which all current residents, includingMcDevitt, are allowed to keep their homes for the rest of their lives.After each dies, however, the state will assume ownership of thatproperty. “This place is a living history,” McDevitt says. “And I hateto see it disappear, which seems to be the agenda of the state. Butwhat can we do?”

Eventually the two of us wander away from Fort Andrews and down tothe beach, where we come upon a small, gray-shingled cottage surroundedby hills of gravel and clusters of daisies. “This is where I live now,”explains McDevitt. “I did the whole water system myself, which is goodbecause I can fix it myself. If I spring a leak, I'll go find a pieceof pipe or whatever I need and put it together like Rube Goldberg.”McDevitt stares admiringly at her handiwork for minute or so. “That'sreally the beauty of this place: building up your self-reliance. Itmakes you feel more confident and gives you satisfaction, so when youdo have a chance to relax, you feel like you accomplished something,sort of like the pioneers, I guess.

“I wouldn't want to live on an island in Maine,” she continues.

“Why not?” I ask.

“Too far from Wal-Mart,” replies McDevitt with a sheepish smile. “Yeah, sometimes it's nice to go into town.”

Our conversation is interrupted by the distant wail of a policesiren. “Sounds like it's coming from Wollaston Beach,” McDevittmumbles. For a moment we both strain our necks and look toward Quincy,Boston, and the world at large over the hill that blocks our view. Fromwhere we're standing, it's impossible to see.