An overgrown cellar hole on a windy, lonesome Lincolnville hilltop — Harvell Hill — is all that’s left of Carl and Elizabeth Mathews’ house. When their house caught fire on a June morning in 1917 their three little girls were alone; their mother had gone to fetch the father, working nearby. As the Camden Herald reported:

“The little four year-old daughter, seeing the flames, took her little sister, age two, by the hand and led her from the house, while the eight month old baby, Ora Howe, lay on the bed as the mother had left her. Their deepest sorrow is in her loss. The father made heroic efforts to save her. First going through the burning door, he rushed to the cradle and brought it out; the scene was the most pathetic when he found it was empty. The mother cried that it was on the bed, and he then broke through a window but to no avail, only coming forth with cut and burning hands. …Everything was lost, only the clothes which they wore. ….. The sympathy extended the bereaved parents in their great sorrow is universal.”

On the other side of town, a handsome old house near Youngtown Road, a home currently full of life and fun, is the site of a less dramatic tragedy. In that kitchen, several generations ago, a mother rocked her dying child until its breath stopped.

Two lives gone, two families devastated by their loss, the one event tense and electrifying, the other simply heartbreaking. The first, a fire nearly 100 years ago, comes down to us through an article found in a musty volume of bound newspapers. The second is the kind of story that gets attached to the memory of a house or a place, is remembered and passed on down the years. Our own house is imbued with such stories, some from the generations before us, and some of our own.

This has been a hard couple of weeks for our little corner of the world, specifically for the community of Hope. Two lives lost unexpectedly, one dramatic and sudden, the other, nearly as sudden, and simply heartbreaking. I never met Jim Laurita or the elephants, yet I can’t get them out of my mind. Nor did I know Sarah Doubleday, the young Hope woman who died just as she was about to step into her career, but her loss weighs heavily in my heart as I think of her family and all who loved her. I suspect I’m not alone in grieving these two people I didn’t know, but who were each a part of our community. It’s the way it is in a small place.

The semi-annual Old-Timers Luncheon, held at the Lobster Pound starts at 11:30 a.m. Monday, September 12. It’s a great, big community lunch; you get to decide if you’re an old-timer or not. Although invitations are sent out to determine a rough count, there’s always room for a few more.

Becky Dunton’s Wednesday morning Fitness Class, held at the Community Building, will start at about 9:30 a.m. this week, not the usual 9 a.m. Contact her for the right time; people may join any week.

Local writer Laurel Ericson Ames and musician Will Brown will open the Library’s Fall Concert Series this Wednesday, September 12, 7 p.m. Laurel, author of “Katherine Elizabeth, Full of Grace”, a young adult novel, will discuss her book and the process of getting it published through Maine Authors Publishing. Local favorite Will Brown is an accomplished guitar player and singer who has performed throughout the state with musicians such as Gordon Bok and the group Meteora. Tickets are $10. For reservations, call Rosey Gerry at 975-5432. For information about the library, call 763-4343 or email (please note new e-mail address).

The Lincolnville Improvement Association’s meeting Thursday starts at 5:30 p.m. with a potluck, followed by Bob Olson speaking on “The Future Ain’t What It Used to Be.” All welcome; bring a dish to share.

The Schoolhouse Museum is open until Columbus Day week-end, Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, 1-4 p.m. Located on the second floor of the old Beach School, 33 Beach Road, it’s handicapped accessible via a chair lift. There are dozens of photo albums to look through, genealogies of local families, interesting displays, and lots more.

Due to the large size (31 students) of this year’s first grade, the school committee is looking for a second teacher.

The Grange supper scheduled for September 20 has been cancelled because the pump is being replaced. The Grange’s annual flu clinic will be held as usual, later in the fall. Details next week or contact Rosemary Winslow, 763-3443.

How Our Town Works

According the Maine Municipal Association municipalities in Maine are organized in one of two forms of government: the direct, town meeting form of government where the legislative body of the community is the town meeting, or the representational form of government where the legislative body of the community is the town or city council. Lincolnville is governed by the first, the town meeting form of government. Rockland, for example, has a city council and therefore, the representational form of government.

The Town Charter, adopted in 2002 and last amended in 2013, describes the duties of our town administrator, David Kinney. David, who just finished up his 11th year in Lincolnville this past May, answered some questions I posed via email:

Q: What's the most challenging part of the job?

A: “Balancing people’s desires for services with their willingness to pay.  At times it seems as though the requests for local government to do things or projects are limitless, but our collective willingness to pay for these things or projects is certainly limited.”

Q: We've built a school, fire department, and renovated the town office during your tenure, as well as lots of road improvements; can you list those?

A: “For road improvements the most comprehensive improvements have been to Heather Hill, Brodis, Tuckerbrook and Thurlow Roads.  And although it wasn’t a Town project, the Route 1 reconstruction through the Beach took a fair amount of time and effort.”

Q: What big future project or challenge does the town face?

A: “One challenge that local government is always faced with is understanding what the citizens want from it. Understanding the vision that the community has for itself and then setting a course to get there is critically important. We are here to do what the community wants done.  We have to be careful not to focus on the “squeaky wheel” to the detriment of other and perhaps more important items.  Our focus needs to be on what is for the good of the community and not individual or personal agendas.  We need to continue to work together for the betterment of our community rather than individually to divide the community.  In the long run “win-win” situations are much better than outcomes with “winners and losers”.

“At the moment rather than “new” big projects, we are currently focusing our efforts at maintaining the infrastructure already in place to make sure that we are good stewards of public property, and that we don’t allow ourselves to neglect what we have worked so hard to acquire.  The next “big” project will be the rehabilitation of the wooden wave screen in Lincolnville Harbor.  We hope to undertake this project, funded with grant funds and a local match, this fall and winter.”

Lincolnville resident Carole  Hallundbaek, who works for Waldo County Healthcare, Inc., sent along their newsletter, which includes this statistic from a Republican Journal article: according to a study by Feeding America, a non-profit network of 200 food banks, almost 6,000 people in Waldo County, including 2,000 children, don’t have enough to eat. To locate area food pantries, call 930-6720. SNAP recipients can use their EBT cards at these Farmers’ Markets and get a 25% discount:

Belfast Farmers Market  
Fridays, 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., Waterfall Arts

Unity Market Day 
Saturdays, 9:00-1:00pm, 
Unity Community Center, School Street

Bucksport Bay Farmers Market
, Thursdays, 2:30-5:30pm, Bucksport Post Office

Here’s a fast, easy, and economical late summer supper: Fresh Tomatoes with Pasta

In a large bowl cut up 3-4 tomatoes, 1-2 minced garlic cloves, fresh or dried basil, and a couple of tablespoons of olive oil, salt & pepper to taste. Let it stand for an hour or more at room temperature. Cook a pot of pasta; then drain and add the hot pasta to the tomatoes. Mix it up and sprinkle with cheese – parmesan, brie, mozzarella, or whatever you’ve got on hand.

Sandy Delano with more memories of his grandparents’ farm at 504 Youngtown Road:

At any one time the farm had 15 or 20 cats, most lived in the hayloft in the barn and were so wild one couldn’t get near them. Grandmother always had one or two she would be trying to tame and usually one or two became sociable enough and would come into the house. They were in the minority. They kept the rodent population down but one could always find a rat roaming about the barn after dark and occasionally in the house. My Dad used to take a flashlight and his model 62, .22 caliber, Winchester rifle into the barn at night to shoot rats for sport. He usually got a few.

In the kitchen was a gasoline powered washing machine with a hand-cranked set of rollers to squeeze water from the wet clothes. The tub of the machine was filled by hand

and emptied the same way. Clothes were hung to dry on clothes lines strung between the house and the apple and pear trees down on the front lawn. A clothes pole supported the clothes lines. A clothes pole was nothing more than an alder or some other tree with a fork in the top and long enough to keep the line filled with wet clothes from dragging on the ground. People passing by today wouldn’t understand why such things weren’t kept out back at least but, back then the only traffic was usually a neighbor or a relative, whose wife hung his clothes in the front yard to dry too.

The refrigerator in warm weather was the dug well at the top of the driveway which Grandma lowered perishables into to keep cool or placed in the pantry covered with cheesecloth to keep the ever-present flies away. Milk from the several cows which

Grandpa kept was placed in large pans in the pantry until ready to be turned into cottage cheese or churned into butter. Grandma had a wooden churn; I was allowed to turn the crank. It was top loading and had wooden paddles inside attached to the crank. A bung in the bottom allowed it to be emptied after the butter had been removed. Grandma cleaned this churn by pouring scalding hot water into it, and it was stowed away carefully and allowed to dry before use again.

A wood box was kept behind the cast iron kitchen stove. My job, when I stayed overnight, was to keep it filled with firewood. If it was not filled and the stove went out during the night it could be a chilling experience in the morning gathering more wood for the stove from the woodshed.

The kitchen table was circular and made of oak with extra leaves to be inserted for extra dinner guests. The chairs when not in use were kept along the kitchen wall. Along the top of the same wall were hooks to hang coats, jackets and other apparel as the house had (still has) very little closet space. A foot pedal powered sewing machine with a circular steel button box was kept in front of the window overlooking the driveway. Grandma made or mended many of the clothes for the family on that machine. She also used it to make patchwork quilts, several of which still exist. Before the sewing machine was moved there, a horsehair filled couch, which Grandpa napped on, was kept there. A mirror sitting on a small shelf with leather strops hanging from it to sharpen the straight razors Grandpa shaved with was on the wall between the upstairs and living room doors. We keep a telephone there today.

On the east kitchen wall were the cupboards. Dishes, and cooking supplies were stored up top and the drawers below contained the towels, cookbooks and other miscellaneous items. One of these items was a German flare pistol brought home from France by Grandpa Carver and now in the care of the Lincolnville Historical Society. Every kid in the family tried to use it as a plaything but, being very large and heavy, it was impractical as a plaything. That’s probably the reason it survived. Flour was kept in a barrel under the cupboard. Grandfather used this to make the biscuits and the cookies. He had been a Mess Sgt. During WWI and a cook in the logging camps up north. He made a mean biscuit. My job was to cut the raw biscuits with the biscuit cutter and then to poke a depression in the top. They went very well with Grandma’s homemade raspberry jam.

Grandma canned food all summer long. She had a large steam canner and lots of glass jars. She preserved pears, raspberries, strawberries, green beans, corn, mackerel, plumbs, tomatoes, pickles, beets, etc. Cabbage, carrots, turnips, apples, and potatoes were kept in large wooden bins in the basement. Popcorn was strung up to dry in the large chamber over the kitchen. The canned goods were stored on shelves in the basement.

Read more about Russ and Jenny Carver, Sandy’s grandparents, in Staying Put in Lincolnville Maine, 1900-1950 (Available at Western Auto, Schoolhouse Museum  or Sleepy Hollow Rag Rugs )

 To be included in This Week in Lincolnville, contact Diane, ragrugs@midcoast.com with events, family milestones, wildlife sightings, anything to do with our town.