Baked beans. Is there anything more New England? Or anything more Maine?

Beans are a “New World” crop, introduced to the wider world along with potatoes, tomatoes, corn, and peppers following the European “discovery” of America hundreds of years ago.

It is said that the Native Peoples introduced the woefully unprepared European colonists to the concept of cooking dry beans with water over a slow fire, or buried underground with hot coals. Add some salt pork, some molasses, you got baked beans. A cheap and filling meal, and, apparently, could be cooked Saturday night, so the leftovers would be consumed on Sunday, preventing the need to cook on the Sabbath.

Regardless, Saturday night beans, with or without those gross red hot dogs, are a Maine tradition. Nothing made my Dad happier than a pot of baked beans, with white bread — the spongier the better. And he would regale us with tales of cold beans on toast on a Sunday morning. My Mom, a child of the Chicago suburbs, learned quickly how to make beans.

Man, I hated beans as a kid.

But bean suppers (or “suppahs” if you will). Seemed like almost every Saturday night when I was a chid someone was holding a bean supper somewhere in town. We would gather at the grange or the LCS cafeteria for a massive potluck. Beans, of course, but also pasta salads, fresh biscuits, jello salads, and oh so many pies….

These suppers have supported various causes for generations.

So last Saturday I found myself at the Tranquility Grange, just up from the Center. An old building in need of a little TLC. The Grange Hall is a remnant of our agrarian heritage, a social club that brought rural families together, and a community gathering place.

The Tranquility Grange, as it is today, was built in 1908, though it stands on the site of two prior granges, both destroyed by fire, one of them an arson. Allegedly there was a competing dance hall in town and, well ask my mother for the rest of the story…. The Tranquility Grange is on the National Register of Historic Places, and for many years was the site of our annual Town Meeting.

Back to Saturday night.

It had been a while since I had been to a bean supper at the Grange. My wife suggested that the last time we went was back when we were still dating. That seems possible. We both went to a lot of bean suppers as kids, but as parents, trying to wrangle our young children in this naturally chaotic environment seems vaguely terrifying.

And then there was that dang pandemic.

But the Tranquility Grange needed repairs, and Rosey Gerry, who I recently dubbed “The Bard of Lincolnville” on this website, was on it. 

I grew up listening to “A Prairie Home Companion” on Saturday nights, and Rosey decided we needed our own version — “A Canaan Plantation Companion” —Canaan, of course, being the original name of the settlement in the Center.

Supper was served in the Grange basement, and there was indeed Jello salad, and oh-so-many pies. I believe there were well over 130 meals served. Not bad for this little town. The kitchen was staffed with bean supper veterans, as well as their offspring, learning the trade. 

Full of beans, literally, the townsfolk gathered for the show.

Peter Salidino on piano, Lise Becu on fiddle, Corrine Gentry on fiddle and vocals, Dagney Ernest on vocals, Karin Wormer on sound effects, Will Brown on sound effects and vocals and guitar. The poems of Paul McFarland, stories by Sandy Delano and Diane O’Brien.

I even got a line in the radio drama, Rosey’s Lincolnville take on, “Guy Noire, Private Eye.”

Well, shucks, it was just a really good time on a Saturday night in this little town on the coast. Money was raised for a good cause, and we got to be together, the old and the young, those who’s family have been here for generations, and those who just arrived.

As Rosey stated in his “News from Canaan Plantation”, which finished the evening: We are all “from away”.

Program at the Lincolnville Library

On Wednesday, June 7, at 6:30 p.m., the Lincolnville Community Library will host author Linda Buckmaster. Elemental: a Miscellany of Salt Cod and Islands is Ms Buckmaster’s work on the beauty and realities of the islands of Maine, Newfoundland, and Northwest Scotland. Elemental is also one of three finalists for the 2023 Maine Literary Award. Through fact and fiction, poetry and prose, Ms Buckmaster tells the tale of how the salt cod made its mark on communities from the North Atlantic to the Caribbean.

CHRHS Baccalaureate March Through Camden

5 p.m.  Monday June 5, the seniors will march through downtown Camden, on their way to the baccalaureate. Cheer on the graduating seniors of Lincolnville, Hope, Appleton, Camden and Rockport, as well as many from St. George and Northport. Congratulations to all of you, and I have to especially call out  my beautiful niece Zoe O’Brien! Now go and make your little towns proud with all that you do!

Well, this week is shaping up to be cool and rainy, a quintessential week for early June on the coast of Maine. The kids are getting restless. Be kind to any teachers in your lives. Tell me your news, ceobrien246@gmail.com, be nice and behave.