139 Commercial Street

Studio | 139½ Commercial Street.

An intriguingly short-lived structure turns up in a perusal of the Sanborn insurance maps that the Town of Provincetown has made available on its website: a large, waterfront artist’s studio, with two floors overlooking the harbor. The thing is, it does not appear on the 1919 or 1938 maps, meaning that it evidently stood for less than 19 years. I might infer that the adult children of Capt. Manuel Costa (1849-1912) and Jacintha “Jessie” (Cabral) Costa (1857-1926) — there were seven of them — built the studio to generate extra income from the property. If so, it didn’t prevent two foreclosures during the Great Depression. It’s all a mystery for the time being.

¶ Last updated on 6 February 2019.

139 Commercial Street on the Town Map.

Also at 139 Commercial Street:

RE/MAX Long Point | Building 1.

Building 2.

Building 3.

Dwelling | 137A Commercial Street.

Cabral’s Fish House.

Smith’s Wharf.

Thumbnail image: Detail of Plate 4 from the 1929 Sanborn Company insurance map, in the Town of Provincetown online document center, Document No. 2883. I added the red highlighting around the studio to make it easier to discern, and made the water a single shade of blue, for the same reason.