Out of Our Past

Thirty Years of Local History, Part II

Tue, 10/25/2016 - 7:00am

Last time I described some of the townspeople I've been involved with in my 30-year pursuit of local history and some of the projects I did with or aided by them. This is a continuation.

Projects with Asa

A long project — lawyer Asa Tupper and I went over a few hundred of his 1,000s of local title notes, many scorched in the 1942 fire of his father Cyrus's office on Commercial Street. We repackaged them as Asa told me about the properties' history, really a master’s program in Boothbay history. I sensed his vast internal map of our towns, lines drawn on the flat earth in his mind; and the webs drawn from family to family to land, linking the land and us in a dimension that moved backward in time to 1730. I hoped someday to see such a mental map myself. He took me to the courthouse and showed me the basics of creating a title chain and drawing out properties. I've done hundreds since.

Asa and I walked Oak Street and Townsend Avenue stopping at each building to consult his memory which dated to about 1905. I filmed him reminiscing about the stores and homes, standing or vanished, and who had lived in them. My video making started in 1987 at the urging of founding trustee Cecil Pierce, who I filmed also, resulting in maybe 40 in all. It was quite an undertaking since many, like Ethelyn Giles, Reuben McFarland, Carroll Gray, Hazel Poore, and Asa required seven or more visits. You know you're in the right place when the photos on the walls, such as Hazel's, are of relatives as well as long-gone family oxen and milk cows.

Projects with Red

Red Giles, born 1912, and I rode around the whole region as he showed me the houses he and his family moved which I'd write up. Also, there was no good photo of the Giles horse-powered house moving windlass (actually a capstan) so I built a model in baby steps under Red's directions. First the skids one day, then the crosspieces another, and so on until it was finished.

Another: in February to May 1996 we rode around much of North Boothbay with him telling me what he knew about every pre-World War II house and who had lived there. I'd snap a pic, take notes, and go to the town office to get the map and lot and current owner from Bonnie or Tracey. We did more than 300 until he could no longer go, but the project continued with others for a year, such as Vincent Lewis, Lester Barter, and John Welsh. Red hauled logs with horses in the woods, so he also pointed out all the lots he'd helped clear, many more than once.

Though Red dropped out of high school very early to work for his father, he remembered everything he'd done with a lawyer's mind for parsing the details of events and keeping them in the right stalls. He got cancer and laid down on his Giles Hill couch to die in July 1996. I'd try to get his goat to get him up on his feet. One day I walked in and said in a belligerent tone, "Are you just going to lie there and die?" Red said, "I'm gonna lie here, but I don't know if I'll die” — parsing as usual. He knew where he stopped and other forces began.

Whys and Wherefores

These two articles mention just a sliver of the countless people who led me to Boothbay's historic places. I wanted to cover what had been ignored — the dailyness of Boothbay life as a small Maine town, and to resurrect neglected topics and segments of the population, the modest, land-based, workaday people of Boothbay. My interest falls off sharply after 1850, but there is more info after and, of course, images to help as the 1800s chugged on.

Pre-industrial Boothbay, the rural self-sufficient time is my favorite, and that might have been affected by those who helped me, workingmen and women mostly. Pockets of old-timey customs continued to the mid-1900s by those brought up with 1800s ways, and I could see, through their customs and words, into another time. My old friends, particularly those with a farming background like Hazel, the Gileses, and Carroll Gray, used words that were fast disappearing, such as "dresser" for kitchen counter, "stove up" for ruined, "frock" for a jacket, "up attic" (like down cellar), "hove" for throw, "swole up" for swollen, and "chimbley" (that's how it's spelled in the 1700s) for chimney. The old expressions keep you grounded like the old buildings.

Originally I thought it was sufficient to do research and file it for future interested people. But I soon felt badly that local history was shut in pitch-dark drawers. In late 1988 I asked the Register about submitting a monthly column, and editor Mary agreed. I thought the articles would consist of already compiled but forgotten info from the collection by me and others, but mostly it's been me. My favorite compliment — Mildred Stickney said, "You let me see how things used to be." I'm grateful to the paper since the column has helped raise our visibility in the community and elsewhere, and they've been glad to have it.

Holdings

Our holdings have greatly expanded. Researchers are asked to send their finished product. All significant letters and emails on subjects are in the building, and there are notes, however brief, of the most deserving conversations. It's been a very time-consuming but worthwhile effort, and I'm glad to say the museum is one long paper trail! The benefits of the written word, snatched out of thin air and fixed on paper instead of drifting into oblivion, can move into the future.

My goals are: being accurate, doing justice to the known and the unknown in small town life, and cataloging for the future. With 30 years and more than 600 articles and a few books, my and others' writing have helped deepen people's understanding of this little place, at least for those who are interested. Despite the huge strides we've made in gathering knowledge, it represents just a vanishingly small amount, but the hunt suits my life just fine. And the same holds for the many volunteers who help organize and care for the contents of the museum. I do have and have had wonderful help over all the years.