A bit of Maine's complicated border. From campobello.com

Last night I found myself wondering whether in colonial America, the future provinces of Canada were just more British colonies. Was there any real difference between Nova Scotia (then including New Brunswick) and Massachusetts (then including Maine)? In 1700 did one side think of itself as part of a different nation or did the concept of Canada and the United States appear only after the Revolutionary War?

Ignoring for the time being the huge part played by France, by the 1770s all of the colonies were known as part of the  British Empire until the War of Independence. Thereafter the northern colonies were called British North America. Ontario and Quebec became the Provence of Canada in 1841 and the rest joined as the Dominion of Canada in 1867. So the answer is yes, the concept of Canada as a nation was a result of the independence of the 13 colonies to the south.

The northern colonies were where those loyal to the Crown fled during the revolution. I was surprised to learn that among my ancestors were loyalists.  My 6th great grandfather John James Glassford (1708 – 1792), a farmer in the Albany, NY area, because of his allegiances was chased out, had his home burned and lost 300 acres. He and his wife and family had to settle on the British side of Niagara and to petition the British government for restoration of his losses. Many present day Canadians can trace their ancestral roots to New York and New England.

Maine border claims, blue is the current border. From http://www.upperstjohn.com/history/northeastborder.htm

In the early days of our state we even had an almost-war with Canada over our northern boundary.  The Aroostook War started in 1838 because the Treaty of Paris, which ended hostilities after the War of Independence, was vague about the border. No shots were fired but both sides spent huge amounts on war preparations. Fort Knox near Bucksport on the way to Acadia from Boston is evidence. The Aroostook War deserves a post of its own, so in this context let’s just say it began a tradition of compromise and cooperation between Maine and her Canadian neighbors, Quebec and New Brunswick.

Maine’s border with Canada stretches 611 miles, third to Alaska’s 1538 miles and Michigan’s 1160 (but most of that is through the Great Lakes).  There are some odd border areas. For example, in order for Canadians to get to Campobello Island, they have to take a ferry from Deer Island, New Brunswick or more easily, drive across the border to Lubec, ME and cross on the short bridge. Two border crossings. Campobello Island is fittingly home to Roosevelt Campobello International Park, jointly administered by the Canadian and American park services.

The Aroostook Valley Country Club has nine holes on each side of the international border. During Prohibition, American golfers could amble over to the Canadian clubhouse and have a few drinks before heading back. Until the heightened security following 9/11 this was no big deal. Then the border patrol got into the act, informing golfers they were breaking the law if they crossed to the second nine holes without going through the nearest border crossing. See  U.S. swings at terrorists, hits golfers – Chicago Tribune. Things got even sillier when it was revealed that farmer Nick Pedersen couldn’t get to his New Brunswick farm without using a local US road, which he had been doing for 80 years, without Customs involvement. The complicated convolutions of his situation can be seen here.

From Google Maps

In Estcourt Station, Maine, (above) just at the very top of Maine and opposite Quebec, is an odd little outpost accessible only by Canadian roads. Besides a few farmed fields the only thing going on on the American side is a gas station, where Canadians can save a few dimes on a gallon of gas. The new security regime warns Canadians to check in at the border crossing before buying gas, which most ignore. Michel Jalbert ignored it and it cost him 5 months in jail and $5,000 in bills, fees and lost income while being held in a US jail. Admittedly, he had a shotgun and a criminal record, but it seemed to most a hefty price for saving a few bucks in gas.

from wikipedia. The sign warns customers to go to customs. The border is at the granite post.

Lost in all of this is the genuine affection between our two nations and the warm feelings between neighbors and relatives across the line. Atlantic Canada especially seems to identify itself with the States, it seemed like everyone I met in Nova Scotia, as well as local hero Alexander Graham Bell, spent considerable time in the US. Now it is necessary to have a passport or passport card to get across, although I got onto Campobello in 2009 without one. Somehow the border crossings make us seem like enemies, but I’m hopeful this is a passing phase.

One possible origin of our state’s name is a province in northern France. Most visitors are surprised to learn that there are parts of Maine today where the French language is a significant presence if not dominant, just an hour or two from SeaCat’s Rest. In Aroostook County, Maine’s biggest and furthest north, over 18% of the population speaks French at home. In York and Androscoggin Counties in southern Maine, the numbers are 6-12% and 12-18% respectively. How did this happen?

Flag of Acadia from wikipedia

One would expect that the nearness of francophone Quebec would account for some of our French speaking citizens, but that’s not the whole story. Actually, there are two French cultures in Canada and Maine, the Québecois and the Acadians. The Québecois hale from the more northern and urban parts of France and the Acadians probably came from more rural western France. Self-separating into Quebec and the now Canadian maritime territories (Acadia) respectively, they developed along slightly different lines, were isolated from each other and now speak somewhat different versions of their language. Over the centuries the Acadians have arrived at their own unique language, the latest version called Chiac, a hybrid blend of French syntax and grammar, ancient French words and modern English. Chiac is mostly spoken in eastern New Brunswick and is on a bit of a cultural upswing, with rap groups like Radio Radio and the animated Acadieman, all conversing in Chiac. As a non French speaker I can’t begin to differentiate between the version of  French spoken in northern Maine and Chiac, maybe someone can inform me. I do remember sitting in a restaurant listening to a French conversation peppered with English words; it was unique.

Acadian settlements today, from wikipedia

Historically, the Québecois were fairly secure in their province but the Acadians got pushed around, forced to mix with English and developed a fierce independent spirit. The Acadian Expulsion of 1755 by the British was a traumatic and seminal event and forced relocation of at least 10,000 from Nova Scotia to many parts of North America, including Louisiana and the Carolinas. Meanwhile their fertile farms were taken over by English speaking colonists and later, loyalists fleeing the War of Independence. By 1780 the Acadians were allowed to resettle their former areas, but the better lands were taken. It was around this time that many chose to settle in northern Maine, in the upper St. John river valley.

arrival of Acadians to Madawaska, Maine, from http://www.acadian-cajun.com

It was here in Aroostook County in the early 1800s that the Acadians dug in their heels. At that time Maine’s borders were in dispute between Britain and the new United States. The Acadians didn’t much care, they had settlements on both sides of the border. They had their own flag and considered the two powers to be unnecessary bothers. Among them were also Québecois.  Meanwhile, the French presence in southern Maine was still absent. That was to change in the 1860s when abundant waterpower developed the textile milling industry. Québecois came and filled those jobs in Lewiston, and Maine’s second largest city became very French.

Lewiston factories c. 1910, from wikipedia

Not so long ago francophone Mainers were looked down upon. Kids were forced to speak English in school and made to feel ashamed of their heritage. Now we have a governor whose first language was French. He’s not a great governor, but he’s broken one barrier. For a more thorough treatment of the subject, check out this UMaine website about Maine Acadians. Here’s a quote from there:

One Fort Kent woman in her early 30s echoes the sentiment of Valley residents who frequently report negative experiences associated with the prohibition on French in public schools. She refuses to teach her children her own native language because she was embarrassed about her speech in school; she wants to make certain her children do not develop a French accent.

Portland Head Light at the park

Many folks who come to SeaCat’s Rest for lodgings near Acadia National Park want to see a bit of history, and hope to see a few lighthouses too. Although Freeport and its retail attractions seem to be a popular stop for a route from the south, my vote would be for Fort Williams, just south of South Portland in Cape Elizabeth.  Here not only can you visit a bit of local military history, you can see two of Maine’s towering lighthouses. Portland Head Light, Maine’s oldest lighthouse (commissioned by George Washington in 1790), is right in the park and houses a museum and gift shop which are open daily 10-4 from Memorial Day to the Friday after Columbus Day. Admission is $2 for adults and $1 for kids. Winter hours are the same, but on weekends only.

Ram's Head Lighthouse from Fort Williams Park

Also visible from the shore is Ram Head Lighthouse. Entering Portland harbor means negotiating the passage between these two lights. It’s been said for centuries that all the world’s navies could fit into Maine’s many deep harbors and this was the worry in 1899, when president McKinley ordered the fort’s construction. From then until just after the close of WWII, big guns and underwater mines were at the ready. And the guns in place for WWII were big indeed, twelve inch in diameter and capable of hurling a projectile ten miles across the water.

But the guns are gone and what remains are masonry parapets where the guns once stood and the various other batteries. Battery Blair, home of the big guns is now partially underground. The town of Cape Elizabeth purchased the fort in 1966 and used it to dispose of extra soil from a sewer project. Now plans are underway to restore some of the buildings and excavate some of the added soil.

Battery Erasmus Keys

Two of the original buildings are uncovered and can be visited. Battery Keys was used for watching the mined area and firing upon ships which failed to identify themselves. Nearby is the Goddard Mansion, built by lumber baron John Goddard in 1858 and later (1896) purchased by the army to house enlisted men. Speaking of firing on ships, none of the guns ever did. They were used for practice only, and the guns were decommissioned after WWII.

Goddard Mansion

Fort Williams Park is not only about history. There are more than 90 acres of grassy fields, dog walks, tennis courts and picnic areas welcoming over a million visitors per year. Winter brings cross country skiers and skaters. So plug 1000 Shore Road, Cape Elizabeth into your car’s GPS as you head to our Acadia and take a break. You have only three more hours to go!

Guests of SeaCat’s Rest, our affordable Acadia lodgings, often ask what the best trails are in Acadia National Park, and I am called upon to recite pros and cons about the dozens (hundreds?) of trails available. So from time to time I write about one so that guests can find better info from this website instead of my fallible memory.

Guidebooks will often lead with the most popular trails and at some times of the year these trails may be a bit too crowded. The Beech Cliff Trail is off-the-beaten-track enough to almost guarantee an uncrowded experience. An instant measure is how full the parking lot is. If a trail lot is so filled with vehicles they are spilling out onto the roadside, you may wish to keep looking. It is no accident they call the west side of the island the “quiet side”. This is where the Beech Cliff Trail is.

Fomitopsis sp., growing on spruce

There are actually two ways to get to this trail. One starts at the Echo Lake beach lot at the bottom of Echo Lake just before Southwest Harbor on Route 102. This option involves a very vertical ascent and narrow cliff-edge trail suitable only for a mountain goat. This section is also known as the Beech Cliff Ladder Trail. Instead I would advise option two, entered from the other side of the ridge. Rather than driving to the bottom of Echo Lake, find Beech Hill Rd., just at the south end of Somesville. Turn right (west, assuming you are going south on 102) and when possible take left turns until you find yourself at the trailhead lot, about 2 miles from Somesville.

The first half of this short (.6 mile) trail winds through spruce woods but gradually becomes steeper and a bit more challenging. Finally you emerge at the cliff edge where you see Echo Lake and the ocean beyond. I hope you brought your camera!

Many times I’ve walked the trails of Acadia National Park wondering whether the trail I was on was worth the effort, or just a random cut through the woods, perhaps following an old deer trail. Then I emerge on a waterfall, panorama or other breathtaking vista and I remember that this area was loved and trekked by America’s first generation of  “rusticators” who felt that it needed to be protected and preserved for all. Most trails in Acadia are like this, works of natural art discovered 100 years ago and handed down to us intact.

The Beech Cliff Trail is often closed in the early summer because it is a nesting site for endangered peregrine falcons. To find out if the trail is closed call 288-3338 or go to www.nps.gov/acad.

Humpback whale, from C. O. A.

One of our recent guests to SeaCat’s Rest wanted to come in early October, but was concerned that the whale watching cruises would be over by then. I contacted Bar Harbor Whale Watch Co. and they told me that the usual end point for whale trips was anytime after the middle of  October, and the reason is that the whales pack up and leave, and arrive again in May (cruises start in June).

The twenty-first century “whaling industry” is much different from the 19th century, when whales were hunted for their fat content in pre-petroleum America. Besides the whale watch trips, which are not as disruptive and invasive as you may think, College of the Atlantic has a major program of whale study, including the  Adopt-A-Whale program and stranding rescue. Both these programs are done by Allied Whale, and more can be learned by visiting the Bar Harbor Whale Museum. Whale adoption helps to fund research and is quite affordable. For $30 you can adopt a finback or humpback whale and for $40, a mother and calf pair. You get adoption papers too! A great Christmas gift idea.

You may think the whale watch boats chase down the whales and bother them. Actually, once the boat is in the area, the whales like to come by for a visit. They like to roll around and show off, seeming to enjoy the encounter. Whales are very intelligent animals, a finback’s brain weighs 6.9 kilograms, five times a human’s. If the boats were bothering them I think they’d let us know, and the College of the Atlantic (C.O.A.) and Allied Whale would not accept funding donations from the cruise operators.

Besides smaller marine mammals and birds, the whales you are likely to see on the whale watch boats leaving from Bar Harbor are finback, humpback and minke. Occasionally the endangered northern right whale is sighted. At 130 tons and a length of up to 89 feet, the finback is the biggest in the area, second only to the blue whale. Humpbacks come in second with a length of 56 feet and a weight of 45 tons, but they’re the most athletic, as the above sequence of pictures reveals. Finally, the minkes weigh 5-10 tons and are up to 35 feet long.

The trip out to the whale habitat is long, about to the middle of the Gulf of Maine, or halfway to Nova Scotia. This is serious ocean out here and the waves are often big swells. Until the new catamarans (twin hulls) were adopted, the journey was unpleasant for folks with sensitive stomachs. Now it’s much better, but the motion can still be a factor. The twin hulls also mean a faster trip so more time is available for watching and less for getting there.

Most of the activities in and around Acadia National Park are environmentally benign and the whale watch cruises are no exception. At around $62 for adults ($11 for kids under 6 and $31 for older kids) the price for a trip is not cheap but also not outrageous. Spend the following day on a hike for free (scroll down for one) and the daily cost averages lower. Thanks to youtube poster Richard for this fine video:

From http://www.nps.gov/acad/photosmultimedia/Earthquake-Effects.htm

There’s a joke that goes: things are so bad in California, even the earthquakes are moving east. On October 2, 2006 at 8:07 PM a 4.2 magnitude earthquake rocked Mount Desert Island. The epicenter was in the ocean just off Schooner Head, north of Sand Beach. We felt it here at your Acadia vacation apartment, SeaCat’s Rest. It was kind of like a big invisible gravel truck driving through our house. Nothing fell over and I’m sure our west coast friends would laugh at our reaction. One response from San Francisco to the Virginia quake of August 2011 was, “We eat 5.9 for breakfast.”

Reported effects, 10/03/2006, from http://earthquake.usgs.gov

What a shame they can’t let us have a little excitement! But really, the effects were quite mild. The worst damage was done to trails in Acadia; primarily precipice trail, where true to its name there are sections where the steep ascent got littered with rocks, some quite big. Fortunately there were no hikers on this trail at 8:07 PM on October 2.

From http://www.nps.gov/acad/photosmultimedia/Earthquake-Effects.htm

The rocks that fell were part of unstable formations anyway, subject to frequent similar events usually due to freeze/thaw cycles. Besides the precipice trail the only other affected spot was on the Park Loop Road, which was closed for a while until heavy equipment could clear the rubble.

So how common are earthquakes in Maine and what does it say about our plate tectonics? A report in the Seismological Society of America says,

No seismically active geologic structures have yet been confirmed in the northeastern United States (Ebel and Kafka 1991).

According to the report, small tremors in the area can be attributed to remnants of ice age glaciation; layers of rock still rebounding from the weight, which I interpret from their “minor offsets of glacial striations”. But the report goes on to caution,

Nevertheless, the persistence of small-earthquake activity over time and the historic occurrences of past damaging earthquakes (e.g., Ebel 1996; Ebel 2000; Ebel et al. 2000; Ebel 2006) indicate that there must be some seismically active structures in the region that are capable of hosting earthquakes above magnitude 6.0. Because such earthquakes are capable of causing significant damage, there is great incentive to learn which structures are seismically active in this heavily populated region.

Our earthquakes are  “intraplate” earthquakes, we have no clashing tectonic plates below us. A map of historical New England quakes looks like a shotgun pattern. The only area which can be considered an exception is Quebec, where the top of Lake Ontario and the Gaspé peninsula show clusters of quakes. We had two other notable quakes, one in 1940 and another in 1755. These were dish-breakers and chimney-topplers, but not killers. Besides these, there were many rumblers, and we can expect many more. If the past is any indication, Mainers and visitors should not be too worried.

This post is to introduce a new static page on affordableacadia.com. It is a page dedicated to the weird stories I have discovered while researching my family the past few years.  These are the stories my parents and grandparents failed to tell me. If you find the names of your great grandparents like I did and start to search through newspapers in the area where they lived, you may find some amazing stuff. My grandfather’s brother got caught stealing chickens in 1913.

Uncle Willie, chicken stealer

Another grandfathers brother’s child ended up in prison for a while. His son still is in prison, for life. Murders, suicides, dirty tricks, deviants, check it out. The permanent link is on the right at the bottom.

This is nothing to do with Maine, or SeaCat’s Rest, our Acadia vacation seaside apartment.  I wish I could tie it in somehow, but my family roots are in Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan and Indiana. Maine is not in my family history, just my present. So find out all our family secrets here, and let me know if you find some of your own. It’s a blast!