If I let my mind wander away from the daily minutia that clutters it much of the time (what to make for dinner, did I pay the phone bill, is the laundry dry, yet), the drive into Lincolnville from Belfast is full of the spirits of so many people now gone. Perhaps I’ve listened to too many stories told over kitchen tables, stories of long ago childhoods that certainly weren’t mine. But then I’ve lived here, near Lincolnville Beach and Ducktrap for 46 years, plenty long enough to have made my own stories.

There’s a spot in Northport, heading south on Atlantic Highway, where the road crests a high point and suddenly the whole of the Camden Hills — home — opens up. It’s a breathtaking vista that only lasts a few moments at 60 mph, but it was the site, more than 100 years ago of an accident that had tragic consequences.

 It was a cold January day when William Barton, a cooper with a farm at Ducktrap, “had a load of barrel hoops to deliver to Searsport, and he set off on the icy roads in his wagon. On a lonely hill in Northport the horse slipped, toppling the wagon over. William was pinned beneath it with a broken leg. Perhaps he had set out late in the day, or maybe it was storming, but for whatever reason no one came along the roads for hours, while he lay in pain in the ice and slush of the road. Finally he was discovered and carried home.

 “He wouldn’t hear of a doctor coming to see to his leg, insisting instead that his wife set it. She did the best she could, but the damage was already done by the hours under the wagon. First infection, then gangrene set in. For nearly two months William lay in his bed, still refusing to see a doctor. In March he died.” (fromDucktrap: Chronicles of a Maine Village, by Diane O’Brien).

 William’s daughter, Hazel was a very old woman when she told me this story and how it changed her life forever. The then seven-year-old and her mother had to leave the farm at Ducktrap; for the next several years the mother worked as a cook at various places, with the two changing lodgings with each job. She was working at Camden’s Bay View Hotel (now the Village Green) when she suffered a fatal stroke, leaving Hazel to be raised by her Aunt Annie, her mother’s sister.

 Annie had a restaurant in Camden, and probably because she had to work every day, she sent 12-year-old Hazel and her cousin, a year older, to stay in the Ducktrap farmhouse for the summer.

“They set off on foot one morning, carrying their suitcase with all their clothes, and some food, between them. The Atlantic Highway was hot and dusty in the summer sun, and they had seven miles to walk. When they were almost to Lincolnville Beach, Warren Pitcher, the mail carrier, picked them up and drove them part way. Finally they got to Ducktrap, to the house Hazel and her mother had left years earlier.”

The rest of Hazel’s story is in Ducktrap: Chronicles of a Maine Village, available at Western Auto, Schoolhouse Museum, Beyond the Sea, Lincolnville Fine Art Gallery, and Sleepy Hollow Rag Rugs, all in Lincolnville. And I should mention here that Hazel Barton, later Dyer, was Rosey Gerry’s grandmother.

 If the hill in Northport resounds with William Barton’s agonizing ordeal on a January day and Hazel’s sad girlhood, another spot, right at the town line speaks of summer days and carefree childhoods.

The Ames farm, known to many as the empty and deteriorating saltwater farm that straddles the town line — house in Northport and barn in Lincolnville — is today owned by Point Lookout and gives that resort their saltwater access through the dooryard of the farm. But for some 150 years, maybe more, it was home to the Ames family; at the same time as Hazel was growing up on the farm at the other side of the Ducktrap Stream, Mary and Robie Ames were raising a houseful. There was Isabel, Merton, Alwilda, Robie Jr., and Edwin.

 And, just down the road, and on the other side, another boisterous family arrived every single summer: Austin and Grace Wade of Lynn, Massachusetts, brought their three — Connie, Dorothy and Preston — to Austin’s boyhood home, the “last house in Lincolnville” as it’s sometimes called.

As the three Wade siblings told me: “They took the Boston boat, leaving the city at 5:30 p.m. and arriving at Lincolnville Beach at 7 a.m. Their mother was always seasick before they were out of Boston Harbor. Following the pattern of many families, they and their mother would spend the whole summer, with their father only coming up for a two-week stay or for the time he could spare from business.

 There were blackberrying expeditions, picnics, hopping over holes in the outhouse, and hours of playing with Robie, Alwilda, Edwin, and Merton Ames. Connie remembered Robie Sr.’s fishhouse, “sunk a foot into the ground, and smelled good of old fish and creosote and nets.”

What I remember most of what they told me that day was how the children — the Ames and the Wades — ran back forth across Atlantic Highway all day, barefoot in the dusty, sandy road, weeds and grass growing in the middle.

This Tuesday, August 23 is needlework night at the Lincolnville Community Library. Everyone who enjoys knitting, quilting, felting or doing any other work of that kind is welcome to come any time between 4 and 6 p.m. to work on their favorite projects.

 Next month the Lincolnville Community Library book group will be reading books about food—perhaps a memoir by a “foodie,” a novel with a culinary theme, or a book on food history and culture. If you’d like to join in, the Library has a good selection of “food” books including “How to Cook a Moose” by Kate Christensen,

“Garlic and Sapphires” by Ruth Reichl. “Julie and Julia” by Julie Powers, “Animal, Vegetable, Miracle” by Barbara Kingsolver, and “Living In a Foreign Language: a Memoir of Food, Wine and Love in Italy" by Michael Tucker as well as many more. On Tuesday, September 27 at 6 p.m. the group will meet to talk about the various books they’ve read and enjoy snacks inspired by those books.

 On a personal note, Wally and I have found ourselves reading more books this summer than we have in several years, and Librarian Sheila Polson’s suggestions for what we might like have been right on target. Wally wanted a book that would draw him in quickly. Sheila said that Paul Doiron’s The Poacher’s Son was a good choice. It sure was. This local author (former editor of Downeast Magazine) writes about a Maine game warden and his entanglements with various criminal elements in the course of his work. And there are six more volumes in the series with Warden Mike Bowditch’s escapades. Pretty soon I was reading them too, and we had Paul Doiron’s books all over the house, with one of us always one volume ahead of the other. Our niece/summer houseguest started picking them up too; all in all, three of us had read all seven by the beginning of August.

 Sheila’s next recommendation was for Laurie King’s The Beekeeper’s Apprentice, the first of nine sequels in the Mary Russell mysteries; the houseguest and I fell into that series, while Wally veered into Richard Russo’s latest, Everybody’s Fool  at the recommendation of a friend. Since the Library only has the first of the Mary Russell mysteries Sheila has been getting them for me through Interlibrary Loan. And by the way, the Library board recently decided to pick up the postage cost to send Interlibrary Loan books back, so it’s all free to us, the reader.

Do you have your free Lincolnville Library card yet? If you’re a Lincolnville resident you’re entitled to one; stop in when the Library’s open (Tuesday 4 to 7 p.m., Wednesday 2 to 7 p.m., and Friday and Saturday 9 a.m. to noon) and get yours! To learn more, call 763-4343 or email .

The 111th Camden High School Alumni Banquet was held on August 12th at Point Lookout with 185 attendees, many travelling long distances to get together with old friends. The Camden High School Alumni Association Board of Directors thanks all the Sponsors, Scholarship and Auction donors for their generous contributions. Quality auction items are accepted throughout the year; contact David Ames by email damesref@tidewater.net or phone, 789-5118. Last years Scholarship recipients, Eliza Boetsch and Nicki Fowlie gave brief summaries of their first year college experiences. Any member of the Camden Hills High School Senior Class may apply for a scholarship.

Special Recognition Awards went to Teddy Wilcox and Roy Bennett, with a posthumous award to Swiss Hardy; son Steve Hardy accepted it. Diann Robarts Henderson, Class of '63, is the new incoming president of the CHS.

A new Lincolnville event is in the works for this fall: Pickles, Preserves and Pies: A Joyful Harvest Festival.

The date is October 1, and the tentative schedule of events starts with the grape harvest at Cellardoor, apple harvest and cider-making at Sewell’s Orchard, Pickle sale and judging, Extension “how to preserve” class, soup or sandwich lunch at our local restaurants, etc., preserves and jams sale and judging, “how to make pickles” class, pie sale and pie eating contest, crowning of Kings/Queens of Pickles, Preserves, and Pies.

Phew! There’s a busy day! It’s all capped off with the Grange’s Fall Supper.

Everyone’s invited to bring their own pickles, preserves and pies to sell for fun or profit. Table fees and cooking class registration fees benefit the several scholarship funds for local students: L’ville Business Group, L’ville Improvement Asociation and L’ville Women’s Club, King David’s Lodge and Tranquility Grange.

Most of us grow beets in the garden, kind of a habit, I think, though many people claim not to like them. If you have a bounty of beets this summer, try this cold soup:

COLD POLISH BORSHT

8 beets,peeled and cubed

1 C chopped onion

1 t vinegar

1 1/2 t salt

2 t sugar

6 C water

1 C sour cream

2 C cooked diced potatoes

1 1/2 C diced cucumbers

2 T minced parsley or dill

 Combine beets, onion, vinegar, salt, sugar and water in a saucepan. Bring to a boil and cook over medium for 45 minutes or until beets are tender. Cool. Mix the sour cream with a little of soup until smooth, then combine with the rest. Stir in the potatoes and cucumbers. Chill. Garnish with the dill or parsley (I like to use both)…

Backyard Wildlife

Ron Leadbetter has had a great time this summer watching the babies in his Hope backyard, including a doe with her newborn fawn, and a few days later another doe, this one with newborn twins. Those babies are growing up now, but then the other day he spotted a porcupine in his driveway, just a few feet from where he was standing. And it had a baby. Mama reared up on her backend, and the little porky nuzzled up and started nursing, right in front of the surprised Ron! And when it was done, the baby touched noses with Mama, almost as if they were kissing. I’ve never heard of anyone seeing that!