November 6, 1955           

Dear Customer:

November sixth marks the fortieth anniversary of the R. Scott Knight Store. We have all worked and struggled together thru two wars and a depression. We all have had our moments of discouragement, happiness and sorrow. Now as we reach this milestone along the way we wish to express to you our deep appreciation for your patronage and loyalty thruout the years. It is to you, our friends and customers that we owe a debt of gratitude for whatever measure of success we may have attained and we hope that the future may unfold rich blessings to you all.

As usual we are offering a varied and useful selection of Christmas gifts and including an excellent line of greeting cards, wrappings, lights, toys, flash cameras, watches etc. Remember, too, that the Harvest Sale of canned vegetables, juices and fruits is still on.

Call often—always glad to see you.

                                                Most sincerely, Eleanora M. Knight, Helen and Bob, and all the force

 Scott Knight, the store’s founder and long-time owner had died just a few years shy of this anniversary, but his widow, Eleanora, and daughter and son-in-law, Helen and Bob Harvey, continued to run it for some years more. From the many stories that are still told around town about Scott, apparently many people owe him a debt of gratitude as well, for he helped them in many ways as they “all worked and struggled thru two wars and a depression.”

Jennie Morse Pearse wonders how the store ever survived since no one paid cash if they could help it. Her mother, Callie Lermond Morse, would call Scott before going to the Center for her groceries to find out what he needed that she had surplus of in her garden. She traded dry beans, garden vegetables, eggs and butter at different times for the staples she needed from the store. In hard times, when a family could neither pay cash nor barter anything, Scott simply carried them on the books.

One family was burned out, and neighbors started a collection for them. When Scott was approached to contribute he pulled out his account book and drew a line through the more than four hundred-dollar bill that the family owed him. At the end of the Depression he did the same thing with many of the outstanding accounts, then promptly began running tabs for them again.

With forty years in business Scott Knight’s store is remembered in its different eras and from different perspectives. To a child such as Doris Miller Holmes going Christmas shopping with her daddy in 1924, the place was magical with its kerosene lights, glass counters and candy jars. Maxine Moody remembers when Scott had the post office in the back of the store, and that he got free tickets for putting up posters advertising the movies that were playing in local theatres. Then he’d use the tickets to take the kids in town to the show.

Valerie Moody Giusto, growing up in the forties and fifties just across the street from the store, remembers going in almost every day and getting her favorite ice cream cone, orange-pineapple. Young Ron Leadbetter, at about the same time, had a peculiar taste for raw hamburger; Scott would greet him with “want your usual?” then hand him a scoop of freshly-ground beef! Both Ron and Valerie worked at Scott’s as children and young teens. Ron remembers hauling stock from the storage building next to the store on the homemade trolley that ran on iron tracks. Valerie was just ten years old and earning Christmas money when she worked there. She says:

“As you go in the door on the right was a huge glass showcase with dishes of all kinds of candies, and a scoop that gave you a penny’s worth. Also, on top of the showcase were clear-covered jars of different kinds of candy—licorice, candy canes, pretzels. Next was the ice cream freezer with an old cone holder on top which held about six cones at a time. Along the back of the store was a long counter where we waited on customers.

There was a string holder above, and a huge cutter with a roll of paper on it for wrapping meat and cheeses. The cheeses came in huge round containers. The cheese was the best aged cheese I ever had. We used to call it Rat Cheese. There was a long cooler with all kinds of meats. Lots of canned goods, crackers and cereals along the walls. Barrels of different things like pickles and kraut. A cooler for soda, mostly coke, orange, root beer and Moxie. In front of the store was a huge window with lots of glass knick knacks and gift items.

Clothing, jackets, pants, underwear, socks, dresses, silk stockings for men, women and children. Also pajamas, toys, books for kids. Wrapping paper, ribbons, cloth, sewing items. A little bit of everything in the store.”

Bessie Heal Dean says Scott took telephone orders, and once a week went out on the road in his Model T truck delivering. He carried a crate of eggs and had a barrel of kerosene fastened to the side of the truck. Over the years the truck was upgraded but the service stayed the same. The work force fluctuated through the years including, besides various neighborhood children from time to time, Carrie Parker, Winnie Leadbetter, Dot Dean, Seraphine Faulkingham, Evelyn Michelson, Marian Brown, all women who lived in or near the Center. Ron Leadbetter remembers his mother coming home on summer evenings with her arm aching from scooping ice cream all day. Knight’s store was known for its delicious ice cream and people drove from neighboring towns for a cone on a summer day.

Knight’s store was the place to get the news—maybe even a little politics—along with an orange-pineapple cone or the daily paper. Native or flat-lander, sooner or later everyone shopped at Scott Knight’s. One evening Lou Polan, recently arrived from New York City and living in the old Chester Dean place, came in wondering what was going on at the Grange as it was all lit up when he drove by. The clerk leaned across the counter and whispered conspiratorially, “The Democrats are meeting. They have a right too, you know.”

From Staying Put in Lincolnville: 1900-1950

According to the 1859 map of Lincolnville, just before the Civil War when the population was at its historic peak of 2,174, our town had:

16 stores

19 schoolhouses

14 lime kilns

4 saw mills

3 grist mills

There were seven stores in the Center, four at the Beach, two in Slab City (near the Chester Dean Road corner), two at Youngtown and one at Ducktrap. In 1880 twenty-one-year old Edith Philbrook, who lived next door to today’s Whales Tooth Pub, kept a diary. She frequently went “downstreet” to shop for the things she needed – writing paper, cloak tassels, cambry, lace, a pair of rubbers, picture frame, starch, oilcloth, a chamber set, combs, pair of gloves, corsets, lamp chimney, candy, braid, needles, wallpaper. At spring cleaning time she walked to Ducktrap for the lime to whitewash the ceilings, sooty from the winter’s fires and kerosene lamps.

I hadn’t stepped foot in a store from the middle of March until late May. With a son willing to get my groceries every week and curbside pickup for chicken feed and other essentials, this long hiatus from shopping should have been my dream come true. As the daughter of a woman who shopped recreationally (and dragged me along as long as she could), I went in to adulthood proclaiming to anyone who’d listen that “I hate shopping.” How silly.

Then came the virus and first off all the non-essential shops closed. Right away that meant no Fiddleheads Artisans and Heavenly Yarns in Belfast, Rockport Blueprint and the Cashmere Goat in Camden. Even Hannafords and the hardware stores, which stayed open, but not to me, an at risk 75-year-old woman by virtue of her age.

It turns out I really like shopping. Seeing the merchandise in real life, chatting with the storekeeper, walking out with a new ball of yarn or a much-needed pair of shoes or a bottle of exactly the type of glue for a project or finding an old fashioned incandescent bulb for my baby chicks. You can’t order those things on line or over the phone. You need to see them, pick them up, read the labels.

Small neighborhood stores tend to come and go; it’s not an easy business. “Retail jail” one young woman called it after a few months running a local fish market a few years ago. Storekeepers are memorable, at least to the customers who rely on them. A daily visit to the store – for a cup of coffee, the newspaper, a breakfast sandwich, a slice for lunch or a cold beer for the ride home at the end of the day,– becomes a comfortable ritual. We get to know each other – customer and the clerk behind the counter.

Our neighborhood store for many years was Rae’s Butcher Shop, just up from the Beach. I stopped in every day for one reason or another: a just-out-of-the-oven baguette or a pound of hamburger or a six-pack of Wally’s favorite beer – Natty Light. It was Bo and Penny Rae’s store; he was the butcher and cut up the beef and pigs we raised. He taught me how to cure the brisket – corned beef. “Put it in a brine strong enough to float a potato under the surface for 72 hours.” “Fry the uncured bacon [pork belly they call it today] with salt and a little molasses,” he said; it was delicious. I think he sliced it for us.

Di Lord, who’d been at LCS when Wally was teaching principal, worked for Bo and Penny for many years. One July morning it was Di in tears behind the counter that confirmed the terrible news we’d just heard, that Penny’s son, Scott, had been murdered in Northport. Years later, long after Rae’s closed, Di ran the Beach Store until it was sold to new owners this past fall.

So much came back to me on hearing that Bo passed away last week at his home in Belfast. I’m so glad to have known him.

Today’s small stores – and we still have a few – have adapted to this newest hardship of living with a highly contagious virus. The Lincolnville General Store, R. Scott Knight’s store, has just put its entire inventory on line. Throughout the spring they’ve been providing curbside service.

Drake’s, at the corner of Beach and Camden Roads, continues to provide pizza, cold drinks, groceries, breakfast, liquor and wine as well as gas. Though I’ve only gone in for gas during this time of Covid, the parking lot continues to be full at breakfast and lunch times and the late afternoon coffee klatch.

Dot’s at the Beach does curbside pickup as well as, now, inside service. They’ve set up outside picnic tables now that the weather’s gotten warmer.

Rose Lowell’s Dolce Vita Farm provides a weekly pickup menu, Saturday morning baked goodies, and pop-up pizza nights.

Green Tree Coffee Roasters has been open as well, a favorite spot to get a cup to go or a pound of freshly roasted coffee.

Then there’s the Beach Store. Owen Weyers, along with his son and daughter-in-law, certainly picked precarious times to start a new business, a small town store on the coast of Maine. Stop by and check out their menu of breakfast sandwiches, pizza, sandwiches and salads. Every Friday they promise a special; this week a meatball sub. Watch the LBB (L’ville Bulletin Board) for it.

Town

The Mid-Coast Solid Waste Corporation will be holding its Annual Household Hazardous Waste Collection Day on Saturday, June 20, 2020 from 12:30 to 3 p.m. at the facility located at 90 Union Street in Rockport.  More details can be found here or call 236-7958.

David Kinney writes: 

“The front counter of the Town Office will be open to the public for all services from 8:30 a.m. – 5 p.m. (M-Th) closing at 4:30 p.m. on Fridays for in-person service. Online services will continue to be available for your convenience. Please enter through the front door. You must be in line by 4:30 PM in order to be assisted.

“As only two customers will be allowed in the building at any time, we expect that lines at the Town Office may continue throughout the month of June. We ask that you please be patient with staff as they assist other residents. Please keep in mind that you may be asked to line up outside of the building in order to keep a six-foot distance from the person in front of you and to allow those. 

“The Board of Selectmen and other boards, committees, and commissions will continue to meet virtually using Zoom throughout this time. Please visit the Town’s web site here for more information on how to view and participate in online meetings.”

Call the Town Office to arrange for an absentee ballot for the July 14 Town Meeting.

Library

The Library is doing curbside book delivery now; if you have a library card (and they’re free for every Lincolnville resident) you can order up to six books at a time. Check out the Library’s entire collection here, click on “Books and Resources” and then “View the Library Catalog." 

To order materials, email or call 706-3896 (local number) and leave a message. Please provide a phone number with all orders so we can call with any questions. 

Pickup is by appointment on Wednesdays from 3 to 6 p.m. and Saturdays from 9 a.m. to noon. 

A Beach Summer Resident

A long-time Beach resident, Bob Willis, passed away recently. It’s been several years since Bob was able to get to Maine, but I’m sure there are many who remember him. His soft, southern accent was a delight. And in one of those weird coincidences we have now and then, he and I somehow discovered that his second cousin in Richmond, Virginia was my college roommate.