The Fishermen’s Festival, a popular event which has been ushering in the spring season in Boothbay Harbor since 1974, is being discontinued by the Fishermen’s Memorial Fund committee, which maintains the fishermen’s memorial on the harbor’s east side and oversees the annual festival.

The biggest reasons for the decision to end the annual event: Changes in the fishing industry and declining interest in participation. The Blessing of the Fleet and Memorial Service will continue, although the time of year is expected to change, and fundraisers for the upkeep of the memorial itself may be scheduled during the year. Some festival events have also been incorporated into the Windjammer Days festivities.

Festival coordinators have struggled to keep the festival going in recent years and in 2015, several activities were canceled, including a crowd-pleaser, the trap hauling contest; there were no entries. Likewise, participation on tug of war teams, crate running, bait shoveling, the codfish relay race and the lobster picking and eating competition has dropped dramatically in recent years. Many of the original committee members are no longer involved, and the responsibility has been passed along to a few younger fishermen who find themselves struggling with little back-up support.

Over the years, the festival has made changes in the types of events scheduled, in keeping with the fishing industry itself. Earlier contests, such as net mending, shrimp picking, clam shucking, fish filleting and others, were discontinued when most of the shore-side processing plants closed down, and newer events took their place. Longtime festival-goers have seen many different events over the 40-plus years, but it has been increasingly difficult to come up with contests which reflected the local fishing industry, today, mostly concentrated on lobstering. Groundfishing, scalloping, shrimping, seining and many other fisheries are practically non-existent in Boothbay Harbor today.

The Fishermen’s Memorial Fund committee has tried to keep the festival alive despite industry changes, keenly aware of its economic impact on the peninsula, with a number of businesses opening for the season in April, ahead of their normal schedule, to accommodate the influx of visitors as well as returning cottage owners.

Board members agreed that an attempt should be made to preserve the memorial service and blessing of the fleet, and will reschedule it for later in the season, when more commercial boat owners have their vessels in the water in preparation for the summer season. The Fishermen’s Memorial Fund committee will continue to be responsible for overseeing the memorial itself, which attracts visitors year-round to view the bronze dory and to read the list of fishermen lost at sea.