by Jeff Shaw
Rocks don’t get a lot of love. Well, unless it’s Bob Seger performing; or how alive one feels after catching his now iconic Ford commercial [Ohhhh, like a rock!] Even playing rocks, paper, scissors; more often rock seems to get covered by paper even though rock should crush paper or scissors in a face-to-face battle. And Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson; he seems to be doing way too much to maintain his Rock-like image. How about Rocky Balboa? I mean…
…okay, okay, I could go on, and on, but I’ll pause here and pivot to rocks of the geological kind. Because Cape Cod is home to some really big – and really old rocks.
Let’s start with the oldest, Hokum Rock, located off Hokum Rock Road in Dennis. It is estimated to be 300 million years old! It was moved by glacial activity from north of Boston about 50,000 years ago.
Measuring 14.5 feet high and 98 feet in circumference, Hokum Rock is also the second largest erratic boulder on Cape Cod. (The largest erratic boulder on Cape can be found on the Outer Cape and will be covered another time.)
Wondering about the name? Well, legend has it that an aged Nobscusset Indian descendant once lived there and would ask “Who Come?” when someone was near. Another legend is that an Indian named Hokum lived nearby.
To learn more about Big Rocks on Cape Cod, check out the Cape Cod Times and Wicked Local.
May 30, 2025