A 'holey' Quincy story of how a sea captain invented a doughnut that didn't sink

QUINCY – Is this one of those stories just waiting to have a hole punched in it?

The thought did occur to me, the more I learned about Hanson Crockett Gregory, a 19th-century sea captain buried in the Sailors Snug Harbor Cemetery in Germantown.

There is a fairly recent headstone on Gregory's grave, placed there in 1982.

It was paid for by Dunkin' Donuts, approved by the Quincy Cemetery Department and dedicated at a ceremony attended by the full student body of the Snug Harbor Elementary School at the time.

The inscription on Gregory's gravestone reads: "Recognized by the National Bakers Ass'n. as the inventor of the doughnut. Born Camden, Maine 1832. Died Quincy, Mass. 1921."

Quincy, known as the City of Presidents, has also enjoyed its reputation as the place where Dunkin' Donuts, the multinational coffee and doughnut company, got its start in 1948.

It turns out that Quincy's claim to doughnut fame has another leading character – Capt. Gregory.

The city's Environmental Treasures program celebrated the winter solstice in December with a walking tour of some of the most scenic places in the Germantown neighborhood at sunset. Several local history events were noted.

Sally Owen, the founder of the program, included a visit to Gregory's grave in the Sailors Snug Harbor Cemetery.

"Did you know that Quincy is also where the man who invented the doughnut is buried, after a lifetime at sea?" Owen asked in announcing the tour. "And that those sea voyages were the reason he came up with a new way of deep-frying the dough, with a hole in the center?"

Maura O'Gara led the walk and found a number of people were amused by Quincy's double doughnut connection.

Tour-goers were given some background. On March 20, 1916, a news story in The Quincy Patriot newspaper referred to a story in a Boston newspaper about Gregory, described as the man who invented the hole in the doughnut.

The Quincy reporter quoted Gregory, then in his 80s, recalling how, at sea, the sailors used to eat doughnuts in diamond shapes or as long twisted strips of dough.

The problem, Gregory said, was that the outside part would fry all right, but the inside would remain raw dough.

"I said to myself, 'why wouldn't a space inside solve the difficulty?'" Gregory is quoted as saying. "And then I got an inspiration. I took the cover of the ship's tin pepper box and I cut into the middle of that doughnut the first hole ever seen by mortal eyes. Well sir, them donuts were the finest I ever tasted. No more indigestion, no more greasy sinkors. Just well done fried through donuts. "

Gregory told the reporter that he returned home to Camden and showed his mother how to make the new doughnuts, and soon they were everywhere. He never got around to taking out a patent. He did plan to make a doughnut cutter, but someone else did it first.

Gregory lived his final days at the Sailors Snug Harbor Home in Quincy and died there at age 89 in 1921.

Owen recalled that years ago, when the late Ward 1 City Councilor Leo Kelly led a walking tour in Germantown, he included a visit to Gregory's grave.

While planning the solstice tour, Owen found a children's book, "The Hole Story of the Doughnut" by Pat Miller, illustrated by Vincent X. Kirsch, published in 2016.

Miller tells the story of how Hanson Gregory, while a teenager and a cook's helper at sea, took balls of dough and punched holes in them to make then cook more evenly. (There are several versions of how he did this in various sources.)

In the book, Miller describes how when the balls of sweetened dough were first deep-fried in lard, they were crisp around the edges. However, "their raw centers, heavy with grease, made them drop like cannonballs in the stomach. Sailors called them sinkers."

Gregory had an idea. The book says:

"He took the round lid of a pepper can and cut perfect holes in the center of each sinker. Then he tossed the rings into the bubbling lard."

"The cakes were brown and sweet and fully cooked. Sighs of delight rose above the noisy sea. AHH! Yum. Another please! Tasty! Good! A new breakfast tradition was born."

Owen was intrigued by the book. Before the tour, she returned to the sailors' graveyard in the gated cemetery behind the Snug Harbor School.

The cemetery was the final resting spot for some 33 sailors from 1856 to 1950.

Dunkin' Donuts knows what the dunkers want

On June 15, 1982, The Patriot Ledger ran an article headlined "Sailor Who Rolled in Dough Honored," with a kicker headline above it, "Dunkers were nuts about his creation."

The story described Gregory as "the man whose brainchild was holey." His original small, white gravestone had disappeared at some point and his grave was unmarked – until the Quincy Cemetery Department and Dunkin' Donuts had a new, 2-foot stone placed with an inscription and an image of an anchor inside a doughnut.

Local politicians, ministers and the entire Snug Harbor Elementary School student body, with teacher Harold Crowley, attended the ceremony in 1982.

Owen and O'Gara believe all of this adds new luster to Quincy's doughnut connection.

At the end of the tour, to add a fresh taste to an already seasoned story, O'Gara passed out Dunkin' Munchkins Donut Hole Treats as they watched the sunset. (The bite-sized Munchkins were introduced as a separate product by Dunkin' in the 1970s and today more than 800 million a year are sold.)

William Rosenberg, the founder of the Dunkin' Donuts chain, opened his first coffee and doughnut shop in 1948 at 543 Southern Artery. Called the Open Kettle, it served coffee, pastries and sandwiches.

Today, a Dunkin' is still at the location, complete with the sign "Original Dunkin' location Established 1950." In 1955, the first Dunkin' Donuts franchise opened.

Owen has noted that this country already has a National Doughnut Day (or Donut Day) on the first Friday in June. Maybe, she suggested, "we can add a National Donut Hole Day to honor Hanson Gregory."

Maine official skeptical of claims

Because Gregory came from Camden, Maine, the Camden Public Library receives steady inquiries about the doughnut hole stories.

Ken Gross, director of the library's Walsh History Center, greets the inquiries with amusement and skepticism.

"We have quite a file on the doughnut story. There is never-ending interest in it," Gross said.

"He (Gregory) did come from Maine and he was a sea captain." Then he added, "He lived in an era when there were lots of tall tales. I think there is more delight than truth in the story.

"There was indeed a Capt. Hanson Gregory, but everything else rings as a tall tale, embellished for the audience."

Reach Sue Scheible at sscheible@patriotledger.com.

This article originally appeared on The Patriot Ledger: Inventor of the doughnut is buried in Quincy