This past week the Bayshore Baptist congregation put on a Thanksgiving dinner for the community, inviting one and all to come, and delivering meals to those who couldn’t get out. That got me thinking of the story in The Year of Jubilo, Ruth Sawyer’s 1940 novel set in Haddock Harbor, aka Lincolnville, and this story about Christmas in what is today’s Bayshore Baptist Church.

Ruth Sawyer, a Newbury award-winning author of books for children and adults, had another literary connection as the mother-in-law of Robert McCloskey – Make Way for Ducklings, Blueberries for Sal, Burt Dow Deep Water Man – books that many of our children were raised on, especially Maine and New England kids.

Young Lucinda Wyman and her family have fallen on hard times, losing their brownstone in New York City, and coming to live in their drafty summer “cottage” on the shore of Penobscot Bay, the very house that today is the Victorian by the Sea B & B. Notice the Lincolnville names and surnames highlighted in this piece. Ellis Freeman was indeed the stage driver in those years, and Ben Butler and his wife, Helen Eliza, lived on Atlantic Highway right across from the road that led to the Wyman’s cottage. The year is 1895.

The Harbor had a community Christmas, held on the Eve in the little white church that favored no one denomination where Harbor folk just worshiped God simply and with full hearts. Everyone had a share in the Christmas celebration. The men tramped the woods for ground-pine and straight growing balsams. Everyone who had a stove not in use loaned it; and half a dozen besides the two regular ones were set up in front of the windows their pipes fitted into wooden sashes to let the smoke out. Everyone who could spare lamps brought them, to amplify the light the hanging lamps gave. 

First there was to be supper; that was the women’s part . . . after the supper would follow what Harbor folk called “feats and entertainment.”

Aunt Abbie Duck kept a grab bag at the store. You put in your hand and drew out a name. Whoever it was – man, woman or child – for him you fetched a present, marked it, and put it on the tree. You could make, or pay as much as two bits. Lucinda drew Hapenny, the nitwit, and remembering that Ellis Freeman had said he had a sweet tooth she made him a box of candy.

By five that Eve of Christmas every family in Haddock Harbor had chores done and was in its best bib and tucker. Ben Butler harnessed both horse and mare to his pung, filled it half full of hay, put in the bear robes and hot demi johns and bounced Betsy Eliza in with: “Hey, Bet, ho, Bet, I bet ye this’ll be the best Christmas we’ve had in these parts.. . then he drove away with a flourish of bells to pick up the Wymans. 

Everything was in the church proper; it had to be that way, for they could not heat two great spaces. In front of the pews long tables had been set up, covered with linen cloths. As the steaming dishes were put upon the table the line of hungry folk formed and everyone helped himself with plate and food, with hot chocolate or coffee, and gathered in the pews to eat and to laugh together. 

And such food: fried chicken, roasted chicken, fricasseed chicken with dumplings, roast duck, roast goose, suckling pig, mashed potatoes, fried potatoes, creamed potatoes, mashed turnips, buttered carrots, jams, jellies, pickles., cranberry sauce, hot biscuits, johnny cake, sally lunn, pies, cakes, puddings. And there was no counting how many times a body went up to fill his plate ad cup again 

It was gay; it was warm; there was good company; good spirits, neighborliness such as the Wymans, in the refined air of Aunt Emily’s brownstone house, had never experienced. Aunt Emily’s Christmas celebrations had become such a hidebound tradition no one of the family had dared dispute them. …Aunt Emily might serve terrapin, but what was that compared to Hen Drinkwater’s lobster chowder? Aunt Emily might serve s plombieres, but what was that compared to Gramma Snow’s top-shelf squash pie? That had cream and eggs and raisins in it, none of which her lower-shelf squash pie could boast.

The women stacked what food was left, put dirty dishes into hampers, while the men talked man’s talk of logging, of winter fishing through the ice, of calves and colts to be born in the spring. If you counted every man there and what he had in money put aside, you would not have found a round two thousand dollars between the lot of them. That is, barring Joe Thomas, he of the money-bags. But in their tidy farms, in honesty and decency and good will, in health and self-respect, and in the gift of fruitful work and blessed sleep, they could have been accounted wealthy men.

First came the Christmas tree; a present for everyone, names read of the giver as well as the one who received it. Many were jokes; many were useful things, wrought carefully with much labor. Ellis Freeman gave Lucinda hers – a fine new ten quart pail, and he had written on it: “For Lucindy, from her old stage-driver. May she live long and pick a ton of berries.”

Then came the feats and entertainment: ….the clever tricks Cal Carvercould do with matches, cards, and coins. Zeb and Hen Drinkwater’s older boy could perform half a dozen tunes on his saw: “Money Musk” and “Turkey in the Straw” and “Old Black Joe.” Nate Pendleton tied knots and untied them again with flips of his rope, and he performed almost a miracle before the clustering pack of children who hemmed him in. He dropped a carved ship into a bottle and showed how with pulling threads he could raise masts and rigging. 

The French twins performed on the melodeon; Old Cap’n Coombs did imitations on his fiddle. He could make wind grow from a soft, soughing into a shrieking gale; he could imitate the sound of ropes cutting the air, of being whetted by wind, of running out quick and taut. He could imitate the sound of every barnyard creature; and finally he played one sea chantey after another….

This excerpt is printed in Ducktrap: Chronicles of a Maine Village. The Year of Jubilo can still be found on used book sites; might make a good Christmas present for a young reader (or even an old one). 

So. Christmas 2022 in Lincolnville, coming up. Do we see any resemblance to this sentimentalized version of a poor and isolated community’s Christmas celebration 127 years ago, a version that was already improbable in 1940 when it was written? Except that it was meant to be seen through the eyes of a fourteen-year-old girl. Later in the book another character, an impoverished and unloved young woman, makes an appearance, and no, her plight is never alleviated.

The folks of Haddock Harbor/Lincolnville really knew one other, knew the “nitwit” had a sweet tooth, knew Gramma Snow could make two versions of her squash pie, and that Joe Thomas had dough. Can we say that today?

Perhaps not with everyone, but I remember Ruth Felton’s zucchini relish, can hear Rosey Gerry’s Maine accent, spot John Williams’ bike by its flashing light from half a mile away. I know that’s Will Brown from a distance by the little dog he’s walking. I recognize another guy by a certain baseball cap worn at a certain angle. I don’t need caller ID; I can identify most callers just by their “Hi Diane” voice.

Small towns can be either suffocating or comforting. A lot depends on where we are in life. To young kids it’s just home, but by middle school they’re meeting those Camden kids at area programs and on teams. High school can’t come soon enough for most eighth graders.

Then, by late high school, they’re restless, looking to college, a job or the military, a chance to move around and out of state. We may only get a glimpse of them at the holidays or a for a week or two in the summer. Suddenly everyone’s got a kid in Japan or Costa Rica or Kenya, Florida or Boston, almost anywhere but here.

Until, that is, they start a family. Now Lincolnville looks good, the perfect place to raise their own kids. They may not actually move back, but at least they spend more time here and come to talk about it as home.

We year-rounders, life-longers keep the flame burning, and the first Saturday in December it’s a real flame. We’ll build a giant bonfire on the beach, decorate the Beach Schoolhouse (AKA the LIA/LHS building), make piles of sandwiches and drop off plates of cookies throughout the day. There’s enough variety that parents can tell their kids it’s supper.

This community Christmas party is sponsored by the Historical Society and Lincolnville Improvement Association with the welcome help of cookie bakers around town. Bake a batch of your favorite holiday cookies and drop them off at the building – 33 Beach Road – anytime during the day this Saturday. The door will be open. Hannah Burke mobilizes dozens of LCS students to make decorations, Briar Lyons and Aaron Boetsch are in charge of the bonfire, and Morgan Keating will lead the carol singing.

We gather around the bonfire as the sun sets – that would be 3:58 p.m.on Dec. 3 – and sing Christmas carols. The kids run wild up and down the beach, the ferry pulls out on its last trip of the day to Islesboro, and now it’s comforting, now it’s familiar. Our faces have grown older since last we gathered – noticeably older on the grandmas and grandpas, but only a bit more harried on the moms and dads trying to keep track of their offspring.

Santa arrives predictably at 4:30 on a fire engine, gathering all the kids around, while the older crowd pulls In closer to the fire to sing a few more carols. People start to walk up Beach Road to the Schoolhouse where there’s food and music and warmth, a chance to meet up with neighbors.

This year the Beach Schoolhouse will be open from 3-6 p.m. with a display of Jax, the intricate and varied jack-in-the-boxes made by Jane and Allan Ross in the 1980s and 90s in their Ducktrap workshop. Several local people worked for them, crafting the wooden boxes and assembling the figures that would eventually pop out of the boxes. The LHS has collected and borrowed some 30 different Jaxes: clowns, a fairy godmother, a frog prince, lion, Shakespeare, Sherlock Holmes, Ben Franklin, Puss in Boots, a nurse, a samurai warrior, a dragon, Santa, and more.

Vintage paper dolls, a collection of turn-of-the-century humorous Christmas cards, and a sleigh-full of teddy bears will be on display in the LHS museum upstairs. Downstairs children can decorate gingerbread cookies in the kitchen, and take home sheets of paper dolls and jack-in-the-box kits.

Stop in before the bonfire for a cookie and a look around, then walk or drive down to the Beach; skip it if it’s too cold, and hang around the Schoolhouse. There’s actually a nice view of the fire from the upstairs windows.

We’ve learned that Santa will not be coming up to the building this year as he has in the past. Once upon a time we had a Santa suit and each year various local guys played the jolly old elf. Do we have a Santa in town, one with his own suit, and a yen to dress up in it? Let me know: Diane at 323-1237 or 789-5987.

See you Saturday, 3 at the Schoolhouse, 33 Beach Road or 4 at the bonfire. By the way, ask Don French about his great-grandfather, Joe Thomas. Don lives in his house.

Christmas City

When our kids were small we’d drive down to Rockland after dark to show them the lights. “I heard on WRKD that it’s Christmas City,” the guy who owned Lobster Lane Bookstore in South Thomaston told us one day when we were browsing his shelves, “Imagine that; the wife’s gone up to see it” he said, shaking his head. Of course, then we had to check it out. What really impressed them, though, were the three story buildings.

Have you driven through Lincolnville Beach after dark lately? That would be any time after 4 p.m. these days. The tree, that  seems like it was a mere sapling just a couple of years ago, is now a proper town Christmas tree, 25 feet tall and covered in lights, thanks to Mike Grant of Grant's Tree Care and his two assistants, Lucas and Jacob, who put the lights on the tree at no charge to the LIA. Each of the street lamps are decorated with red bows, a wreath and strings of lights thanks to Mark Cini, owner of the Spouter Inn. And once again, Rob Newcombe has filled the Robie Ames boat, near the kiosk, with lighted trees and greens. The Spouter Inn is brightly lit, and on the other end, so is the Whales Tooth.

So, parents, take the kids down to Christmas City, aka Lincolnville Beach and save the gas to Rockland.

Rabies Clinic in Town

The Waldo County Humane Society is sponsoring a free rabies vaccination clinic on Dec. 10, 9-11 a.m. at the Lincolnville Fire Station, 470 Camden Road.

Dogs must be on a leash and under the control of their owners at all times and cats must be in a carrier.  Owners are asked to bring proof of their animal’s previous vaccination.  Masks for humans will be required in the buildings. There’s a $7 fee for pets that don’t live in Waldo County.