The Curran Homestead Living History Farm & Museum's Dinner Buffet Fundraiser on Monday, November 9 at Oriental Jade Restaurant. The public is invited

The Curran Homestead volunteers will be the wait-staff for the evening. The buffet features a large selection of both Oriental and American food choices. The proceeds will benefit the living history farm and museum's restoration and education projects.

Advance reservations can be made by Friday, November 6 by calling 745-4426 or tickets may be purchased at the Oriental Jade on Monday evening. Tickets are limited for the two seatings at 5:15pm and 6:00pm. The cost for the "all you can eat buffet" is $14.00 for adults and $7.00 children (12 and under.) There will be one door prize drawing at each seating.

Clyde Folsom, who was born and raised in Millinocket, has entertained numerous audiences throughout Maine and New England. He says he started telling stories in third grade when he found it necessary to explain to his teachers about why his homework was never done. Telling stories came easy for him then, and he's been perfecting the art ever since. Many of the stories Clyde tells are entirely original, drawing on a lifetime of experiences as a "Mainer" and his uncanny ability to lie with credibility. He spent most of his professional career as a counselor at the University of Maine's Counseling Center where he was employed for thirty-one years.

Attendees will also have the opportunity meet and greet Andy Prusaitis who will discuss his recently completed Eagle Scout Project of renovating the Curran equipment shed, and representatives of the Fields Pond Blacksmithing Association will update guests on the newly constructed education and demonstration center and plans for the future.

For tickets and more information contact Irv Marsters at Bangor Letter Shop (Tel. 745-4426), John Mugnai at Center Drive School in Orrington, (email: jmugnai@cds.u91.k12.me.us) or Karen Marsters at 947-0749, (email: kmarsters@roadrunner.com).

The Curran Homestead, Inc. is a Community Education Project and a 501©(3) Non-Profit Corporation that relies upon its memberships and the community for its support.

kitapsevenkimse@aol.com

October 31st Halloween Event

For Immediate Press Release

The Curran Homestead Living History Farm and Museum and The Fields Pond Audubon Center will be partnering for a Halloween event for kids on October 31 from 10AM-2PM at their locations adjacent to each other at 372 & 216 Fields Pond Road, between Orrington and Holden. Make sure that you come in costume because we will be handing out prizes for the scariest and the most imaginative ones. At the Audubon Center’s You must be BATS! program, kids and parents can learn about bats, bat lore and bat biology. They can play bat games and build a bat box to take home. At the Curran Homestead’s A Not-So-Scary Halloween for pre-school and elementary school age kids, there will be pumpkin decorating, drawing and games of make believe and skill. There will be an ongoing demonstration of apple cider making that kids can participate in, a large bonfire maintained by the Orrington Fire Department ( they will have an engine there for kids to climb on), and rides available on a 1917 Model T pickup truck. Make your way through an outdoor maze and a seemingly endless journey through a barn filled with creatures of the night and day. Also, you can see a blacksmith bending and pounding red hot metal at our new onsite smithy. At 12PM at the Curran Homestead, there will be a 45 minute presentation of live owls to experience and learn about from Birdsacre, a wild animal rescue sanctuary. Enjoy cider, donuts, and baked goods too. Patrons can park their car at either event site and walk from one to the other. The cost is $10 per child and accompanying parents are free ( $20 maximum for families); this fee gives you access to programs at the Curran Homestead and Fields Pond Audubon Center. Come join us for some fun and learning! For more information visit: curranhomestead.org, or contact: Robert Schmick at (207) 843-5550, email: rpschmick1@aol.com.

Build A Smithy, and They Will Come; Strategies for Museum Development

Recently, over twenty five people showed up for the first meeting of the Fields Pond Blacksmith Association at The Curran Homestead Living History Farm and Museum in Orrington, ME. Jim Heckman, a long time blacksmithing hobbyist, offered to get a charcoal fire going on one of the portable forges donated. The coal in the forge was ignited after some coaxing and a rod of metal was heated. The din of hammer play on that rod of metal prefaced a circle forming of blacksmithing enthusiasts around the forge itself on a night with the chill of autumn in the air.
The people that showed up were from distances near and far and of varying skill level as we learned as the first meeting unfolded. The attendance was far more than I had expected; and this recent public enthusiasm is indicative of a favorable turn in our development as a small Maine museum.

The Maine State Museum, with funds from the State of Maine’s New Century Community Program, awarded The Curran Homestead a $2,651.44 Historical Facilities Grant to both improve their collections storage for their blacksmithing tools and equipment while also creating educational programming that focuses on this traditional art. Through generous donations, we have amassed the key equipment for a typical late-19th century smithy and this will be used for both static display and hands-on demonstrations.

Master blacksmith Bob Robinson of the Split Rock Forge in Stockton Springs, ME was especially instrumental in the original design of our smithy and the acquisition of the core of our forge equipment. Robinson went through a formal apprenticeship as a blacksmith in his youth, and continues to work at a forge he built in the 60s. He has done demonstrations at some of The Curran Homestead's past events, and their popularity largely influenced our decision to create a permanent forge for events and education.

I think Doug Wilson, a longtime blacksmith with national recognition from Little Deer Isle, ME, who was among the attendees of the Fields Pond Blacksmith Association, really summed it up when he said that he wondered where he had been when all this readily-apparent interest in blacksmithing had suddenly evolved among men and women of all ages in eastern Maine as he looked around the impromptu circle of enthusiasts that had formed in the barnyard during the first meeting. The breadth of public interest in blacksmithing has become even more apparent since then as dozens of other blacksmithing enthusiasts have made contact with The Curran Homestead.

The other surprise was that there were so many different blacksmithing agendas expressed among our fledgling group. There were those interested in making knives, but there were also those interested in the ornamental, architectural, and the restoration of historical objects using forge methods. Our smithy has since been designed and built large enough to accommodate a wagon, sleigh, or piece of farm machinery for the purpose of repair or restoration. There were also some interested in becoming farriers. Ken Hamilton, who creates 17th and 18th century Indian, French, English and Dutch fur trade reproductions for museums and the like was also on hand. If this isn't an eclectic group then I don't know what is. This group is going to have some fun making stuff together.

After some great conversation around the forge and in our 19th century farmhouse, discussion focused on the creation of the smithy itself. It was a given that stick construction with hemlock and a gravel floor would contribute to the smithy’s historic look, but we also came up with tentative plans for a more efficient side draft masonry chimney design. We have since decided on a two flue chimney with two fire pans attached to them. The construction of the pans has since been promised by a welding class at Washington County Community College.

Considering this number of enthusiasts we chose to electrify the structure and heat it with a wood stove so that it can be used all the time. Utility sometimes took precedence over any strict adherence to some historically accurate aesthetic; we want this place to be looked at, used on a regular basis, and contribute to keeping this traditional art alive and thriving. We plan to hide our lighting fixtures from the purists and work into the night when we can. To the concern of some of our more knowledgeable smithy consultants on another occasion just the opposite was true when form took precedence over function by the volunteers constructing the building. There was seemingly an impromptu decision to adopt a clerestory roof design during construction. In addition to its aesthetic appeal, the design promised to lessen the need for artificial light and welcome solar heat during the winter months. As any knowledgeable blacksmith would point out, in order to judge accurately the color indicators of metal temperature a dimly lit workspace is essential. The clerestory threatened such future judgments. In order to rectify this, it was agreed that steps would be taken to diffuse some of the anticipated seasonal light as well as limit it to the central floor area where there will be no forges located. An obviously appealing building design was saved.

The idea of forming a blacksmith association was a strategy for getting more people interested in what we are doing at The Curran Homestead and getting volunteers to help us do it. Given the progress we have made in constructing the smithy since that meeting, it seems that our goal will be met. Sponsoring this association has also served us in finding a large pool of practicing blacksmiths that are contributing their stories to our oral history archive that, in part, focuses on traditional arts like forging and knife-making. In doing this we realized that creating an oral history archive with an even broader scope was necessitated and had the potential to improve our relevancy to an even larger audience offering more to scholars and educators alike. We are working on making excerpts from these digital recordings available online and an integral part of our future web-based teacher resources. These resources are intended for not only schools within commuting distance that we hope to attract regularly to our physical plant in the coming year, but a larger community of educators that we will assist in making connections with the culture of their own rural communities.

We have recently broadened the scope of our museum collection to include specifically objects that exemplify Yankee ingenuity. In addition, we have sought interviews that directly connect with the ingenious creation of devices, tools, and machinery used on the farm, in the woods, and in the rural homes in Maine. From small hand-tools and hardware to large objects like “jitterbugs,” including homemade log skidders and tractors made from Ford Model Ts and As, these are especially appealing examples of the Yankee ingenuity of the rural Mainer. The re-configuration and re-purposing involved of the discarded, the obsolete, and the used were often the product of economic and geographic necessity that is still very relevant to Maine life. We realize that these important objects are quickly disappearing due to antique auto parts hunters, recyclers, and out-of-state collectors, and it is our hope to preserve a sampling of this part of Maine heritage.

This new focus has come in lieu of an earlier mission to recreate horse-drawn farming. The expense of training and maintaining draft horses, made even more relevant by the fact of having only 30 plus acres with relatively little tillable land, make such a venture unfeasible. Demonstrating early 20th century mechanization on our farm and in our woods with tractor conversions, “make and break” engines, and early tractors like Fordsons is relatively less expensive and promises to distinguish us from other Maine living history museums with similar farming and lumbering themes of other eras. We simply want to offer something that others don’t, and we believe we have finally struck on a way to do that.

We hope to generate the same public enthusiasm for future projects as the recent blacksmithing project. Several of these restoration projects are planned and will result in future demonstrations with a recently purchased 1918 Sears & Roebuck Tractor Conversion, a donated Model A and a Model B pulp log skidder, and a Model T saw mill rig once operated by the Currans themselves. We hope to organize a corps of volunteers interested in pooling their mechanical skills and their desire to learn by doing for this purpose. The reconstruction and operation of a recently donated 19th century shingle mill building is also planned as another step forward in creating multiple scenarios to capture public interest and give all a taste of the past that made us what we are today.

It is the mission of The Curran Homestead to preserve the traditions of the family farm, self-reliance, and ingenuity which were part of so many Americans’ past. Through the continued preservation of our 19th century farmstead and our collections as well as our adaptability to the public’s ever changing desire for new ways to learn and appreciate information, we hope to both preserve a bit of Maine as well as our American heritage so that it may continue to mold future generations.

We anticipate that our recent collecting habits and construction projects will work symbiotically with our effort to increase membership and create a unique brand for our museum. We plan to realize an even greater number of scenarios for our proposed daily programming which we are poised to do for the first time after nearly two decades of limiting our public exposure to four or five annual weekend events. Realizing our financial limitations as a struggling non-profit entity in eastern Maine, we have struck on something that promises to build a unique collection of objects immensely relative to Maine heritage with relatively little money. What makes these objects especially valuable is that we require them to have local provenance documented by a recorded oral history of those who owned, created, or used them.

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Channel 7 TV Coverage to be found at the right.

Click the arrow in the middle of the video clip screen to the right.

Channel 5 WABI TV News Coverage of The Curran Homestead: Click the URL address hyperlink below.

http://www.wabi.tv/news/7415/donation-given-to-popular-tourist-stop-in-orrington

A Blacksmithing Association Open To All Will Have Its First Meeting At The Curran Homestead on September 2, 2009 at 7PM

For Immediate Press Release

The idea of forming an association of blacksmiths was recently conceived by a few people from eastern Maine interested in learning about and creating through this traditional art. Building a forge that this interested group can use for this end is integral to our mission. The forge is scheduled to be built at The Curran Homestead Living History Farm and Museum. On Wednesday, September 2, 2009 at 7PM, the first meeting of this association will be at The Curran Homestead, 372 Fields Pond Rd., Orrington, ME. All blacksmithing enthusiasts are invited to join us.

The Maine State Museum, with funds from the State of Maine’s New Century Community Program awarded The Curran Homestead a $2,651.44 Historical Facilities Grant to both improve their facilities for housing their historical collections and creating educational programming that focuses on blacksmithing. The farm and museum preserves and perpetuates family farm life as it was at the turn-of-the-20th Century. It recently purchased local rough cut hemlock to build a blacksmithing shed with the State Museum award. The structure will be built entirely by volunteers. In addition to housing its collection of blacksmithing tools and accoutrements, we anticipate that it will be an inviting learning and work place for amateurs, hobbyists, and professional blacksmiths alike, according to Robert Schmick, director of education at The Curran Homestead.

Schmick added that “the materials for the project have been delivered, but rain has delayed us only temporarily. We hope to break ground soon. A masonry forge will be located in one corner, and additional portable farrier forges will serve for blacksmithing round-ups and large group instruction and productivity. Through generous donations, we have amassed the key equipment for a typical late-19th century forge, including leg vises, a hand drill press, anvil, hammers, punches, chisels, hardy (s), tongs, but charitable donations of additional items are always welcome.

Bob Robinson of the Split Rock Forge in Stockton Springs, ME was especially instrumental in the original design of our smithy plan and the acquisition of much of our equipment. Robinson went through a formal apprenticeship as a blacksmith in his youth, and continues to work at a forge he built in the 60s. He has done demonstrations at some of The Curran Homestead's past events, and their popularity largely influenced our decision to create a permanent forge for the purpose of hands-on education at the farm.”

“These grants support community efforts to preserve and share the stories of our people, our towns, our families and how we lived our lives,” noted Joseph R. Phillips, Museum Director of the Maine State Museum. “Without these objects and buildings, important pieces of our Maine heritage would be lost.” Secretary of State Matthew Dunlap says a recent report to the Maine Legislature indicated many of Maine’s historical collections (photographs, paintings, natural history collections, letters, etc.) are in danger of being lost to mold, fire, theft, or misuse. “Maine has an estimated 200 million historical objects and records, many in facilities with little or no security, fire protection, or environmental controls. Maine people in local government, historical societies, and libraries are seeking help to preserve heritage,” Secretary Dunlap commented. Small grants have stimulated local citizens and organizations to commit more of their own resources to these projects. “Although financial support is important, recognition of local concerns and effort through an award should also generate a substantial amount of enthusiasm,” Phillips noted.

For more information about the Historical Facilities and Historical Museum Collections Grant Program, call the Cultural Resources Information Center at 287-7591 or email: maine.cric@maine.gov. For information about The Curran Homestead or the first meeting of the blacksmithing association, please contact: Robert Schmick at rpschmick1@aol.com, or 207-843-5550.

Home Depot Volunteers Spend the Day Building and Roofing at the Farm

John Mugnai, President of The Curran Homestead Living History Farm and Museum announced today that twelve Bangor home Depot associates will be spending the day Wednesday (August 19) working at the farm on Fields Pond Road in Orrington.

Mugnai said this is the third year that Bangor Home Depot has committed to spending a day assisting with completing various projects proposed by The Curran Homestead. The Associates use the exercise as both a team-building experience and as a way to contribute to their skills and abilities in support of the non-profit organization’s mission of capturing for future generations the values and customs of rural America and demonstrate a time when self-reliance, cooperation, industry, and thrift were honored traditions.

Some of the Home Depot Associates will concentrate on replacing an asphalt shingled roof on a small carriage barn that houses the farm’s horse-drawn wagons while other Associates construct a new wood-frame garden shed with some new and some reused materials from a shed donated by Fred Hartstone of Bangor, who is a Bangor Home Depot Associate and a member of The Curran Homestead Board of Directors. The new materials were supplied by an award from Home Depot for the garden shed construction and the carriage ell roof replacement. Curran Homestead volunteers dismantled the Hartstone shed and transported used materials to the new site on the Holden side of the farm’s rock wall that defines a division in the town lines of Holden and Orrington. Curran Homestead volunteers will support the effort and offer a barbecue and other home cooked fare in appreciation for the Home Depot Associates’ volunteer contribution.

John Mugnai said "the family farm is vanishing and with each lost farm goes another symbol of Maine’s unique culture"; our goal at The Curran Homestead is to keep some of the traditions of that culture alive. Additionally, Andy Pursaitus and members of Troop 8 are working at the farm restoring an equipment shed as part of the requirements for Andy's Eagle Scout Project. Another project to begin soon involves the construction of a blacksmithing shed made possible through a State of Maine Historic Facilities Grant. This structure will allow for the demonstration of blacksmithing skills, the display of tools and equipment from the museum’s collection, and as an education center for those interested in learning or expanding their blacksmithing skills.

Robert Schmick, Director of Education at The Curran Homestead said "these projects will help us enrich the lives of our children, offer our community many opportunities for wholesome family fun, and serve as an excellent educational resource through museum displays and hands-on activities and programs."

The Curran Family Genealogy

A typed version of this family history was recently given to The Curran Homestead by Mary Elaine Curran Crowe, granddaughter of Dennis Curran ( Chief of the Bangor Fire Department during the Great Fire of 1902), great-granddaughter of Nicholas Curran, and great-great granddaughter of John Curran, brother of Bartlett Curran, the first of the Currans to immigrate from Ireland in the early 1830s, and the great-great-great granddaughter of Nicholas and Bridget Fallon Curran of Cloghmore, County Galway. Mary Katherine Curran and Alfred Curran, the benefactors of The Curran Homestead, descended from another brother of Bartlett Curran, possibly John Curran.

The foregoing pages are a brief review of the events in the lives of the Curran brothers and their cousin Pat, where they came from, where they settled in Orrington, Holden and Brewer, something about their descendants as far as we could gather from our researches including non personal opinions by the writer. There may be some errors but they are not of sufficient importance to affect the current in the lives of the Currans.

The Currans of Orrington, Maine and its environs originated from Cloghmore, County Galway, Ireland. Among the early Irish immigrants to arrive on the shores of the Penobscot River, and probably the first among the Currans was Bartlett Curran (c.1812-1872), who evidently sailed from the Port of the City of Galway in the early 1830s to the United States. In those days the approach to the City of Galway was not difficult; Curran lived in a small village situated on the shores of Galway Bay, on the road that leads to the wild and mountainous regions of Conenara, a western province of County Galway. The reason for his immigration and how he came to accomplish it remain uncertain and unrecorded; however, in June, 1836 there is a record of shared ownership with John Dean of Brewer a lot of land situated in the confluence of Orrington, Brewer, and Holden. It is also recorded that Curran bought Dean’s interest in the east half of the lot on June 23, 1836 so that he became the sole owner of a piece of land.

During this time Curran became acquainted with Catherine Patton of Orrington, the daughter of Tom Patton, and they married in 1838. They lived on his recently acquired land until in 1852 he purchased 120 acres from his father-in-law increasing his land holdings. In 1863, he bought another 50 acres from a Goodwin in Orrington, presumably adjacent to his other holdings. Curran continued to live and function on his farm along with his wife, Catherine, and a son Daniel E. Curran who worked the farm with his father. Bartlett Curran died in 1872 and left his estate to his wife and son. There is no record of Daniel E. Curran after this time. In 1880, Catherine remained on the estate alone, and there is no record of her death. In 1863, Bartlett Curran and his wife Catherine had granted 30 acres of lot 92 in Holden to John Curran and his son Nicholas B. Curran for the sum of $450. Bartlett Curran applied for citizenship with the local courts in 1840 and said that he was 28 years old.

In the late 1840s what are assumed to be the brothers of Bartlett Curran are recorded to have been living in the Bangor area. “These Curran Brothers were the sons of Nicholas Curran and Bridget Fallon in Ireland, and all were born in the vicinity of Cloghmore, County Galway. Cloghmore means “Big Rock,” and tradition tells us that on the shores of Galway bay and near this town there stood a boulder. There were a lot of smaller boulders which seemed to be the predominant product of their farms [ this passage was out of sequence, and it seems it belongs here making “Nicholas” the father of Bartlett, Tom, John , Mike, and cousin Pat the first of the Currans to immigrate to the US from Ireland ].”

They may have come during the Irish famine of 1846-1847. Their names were Tom, John, Mike, and a cousin Pat. They were 20-30 years of age at the time. Tom Curran declared that he had come to the US in 1848 having been born in 1816. Likely as the result of a suggestion from Bartlett Curran, Tom Curran bought 35 acres from Wiswell in January, 1853. This lot was in the vicinity of Field’s Pond in Orrington and not far from the holdings of Bartlett Curran. He married Bridget McDonough [?-1903]. Tom Curran died in 1861. He was survived by his children: Nicholas, William [?-1930], The foregoing pages are a brief review of the events in the lives of the Curran brothers and their cousin Pat, where they came from, where they settled in Orrigton, Holden and Brewer, something about their descendants as far as we could gather from our researches including non personal opinions by the writer. There may be some errors but they are not of sufficient importance to affect the current in the lives of the Currans.

The Currans of Orrington, Maine and its environs originated from Cloghmore, County Galway, Ireland. Among the early Irish immigrants to arrive on the shores of the Penobscot River, and probably the first among the Currans was Bartlett Curran (c.1812-1872), who evidently sailed from the Port of the City of Galway in the early 1830s to the United States. In those days the approach to the City of Galway was not difficult; Curran lived in a small village situated on the shores of Galway bay, on the road that leads to the wild and mountainous regions of Conenara, a western province of County Galway. The reason for his immigration and how he came to accomplish it remain uncertain and unrecorded; however, in June, 1836 there is a record of shared ownership with John Dean of Brewer a lot of land situated in the confluence of Orrington, Brewer, and Holden. It is also recorded that Curran bought Dean’s interest in the east half of the lot on June 23, 1836 so that he became the sole owner of a piece of land.

During this time Curran became acquainted with Catherine Patton of Orrington, the daughter of Tom Patton, and they married in 1838. They lived on his recently acquired land until in 1852 he purchased 120 acres from his father-in-law increasing his land holdings. In 1863, he bought another 50 acres from a Goodwin in Orrington, presumably adjacent to his other holdings. Curran continued to live and function on his farm along with his wife, Catherine, and a son Daniel E. Curran who worked the farm with his father. Bartlett Curran died in 1872 and left his estate to his wife and son. There is no record of Daniel E. Curran after this time. In 1880, Catherine remained on the estate alone, and there is no record of her death. In 1863, Bartlett Curran and his wife Catherine had granted 30 acres of lot 92 in Holden to John Curran and his son Nicholas B. Curran for the sum of $450. Bartlett Curran applied for citizenship with the local courts in 1840 and said that he was 28 years old.

In the late 1840s what are assumed to be the brothers of Bartlett Curran are recorded to have been living in the Bangor area. “These Curran Brothers were the sons of Nicholas Curran and Bridget Fallon in Ireland, and all were born in the vicinity of Cloghmore, County Galway. Cloghmore means “Big Rock,” and tradition tells us that on the shores of Galway bay and near this town there stood a boulder. There were a lot of smaller boulders which seemed to be the predominant product of their farms [ this passage was out of sequence, and it seems it belongs here making “Nicholas” the father of Bartlett, Tom, John , Mike, and cousin Pat the first of the Currans to immigrate to the US from Ireland ].”

They may have come during the Irish famine of 1846-1847. Their names were Tom, John, Mike, and a cousin Pat. They were 20-30 years of age at the time. Tom Curran declared that he had come to the US in 1848 having been born in 1816. Likely as the result of a suggestion from Bartlett Curran, Tom Curran bought 35 acres from Wiswell in January, 1853. This lot was in the vicinity of Field’s Pond in Orrington and not far from the holdings of Bartlett Curran. He married Bridget McDonough (?-1903). Tom Curran died in 1861. He was survived by his children: Nicholas, William (?-1930), Mike [Michael J. Curran or M.J. Curran ?] ( ?-1942 [actually 1941]), Tom Jr. ( ?-1913), and Martin. William left two sons, William and Tom; they lived in Bangor. A daughter married and moved to Portland.

John Curran (?-1885), next to Bartlett and younger by a year or two, probably came to the US about the same time as Tom along with his wife Sara [ or “Sarah” a.k.a “Sally”] Bearwell (?-1872), son Nicholas, and daughters Margaret and Bridget. In 1863 he acquired 30 acres from Bartlett Curran and presumably lived on this farm. His daughter Margaret married Coleman Lee, son of Mike Lee, an early Irish immigrant; they bought 40 acres of lot 25 adjacent to the land of Mike Curran (brother of Bartlett Curran) in 1866. Margaret died in 1925.

Bridget Curran (?-1913)( daughter of John Curran) married John Ford (?-1893), an immigrant from County Galway, one of the three brothers who settled in Holden. Their children were John Ford Jr., Margaret, Mary, Joseph, Thomas, Mrs. Arthur Barton of Bangor, and James.

John Curran’s son Nicholas married Mary Mennihan (?-1877), sister of Dennis Mennihan, from the Town of Craughwell, County Galway. The children included John, Dennis, and Mary. Dennis married a Varley, daughter of William Varley, and their children included: Thomas R. Curran, US Marshall for the District of Maine, and proprietor of the Curran Bott Shop [sic Boot]. Dennis Curran, proprietor of the Connors Shoe Company, William Curran, US Internal Revenue agent, and John, Edward, Raymond, and Emmett [see family portrait].

When John Curran died in 1885, his grandson John inherited 10 acres. The remained of his land holdings went to his son Nicholas B. Curran. After the death of his first wife, Nicholas B. Curran married Alice Hamel. With this second marriage came Dan, James, and Alice. Dan lived on Broadway in Bangor and James lived in Dexter.

“The writer [of the original version of this genealogy ] contemplating the aforesaid deviations by one of the descendants of the Curran from the County Galway, feels that this is only one of the many evidences of aportasy [sic] [apostasy] which is occurring around us every day and can be attributed mostly to apathy and environment. In other words second marriages are sometimes fatal to sons of Irishman as far as maintaining their consistency in religion.

Mike Curran ( ?-1894), another brother of Bartlett, declared that he came to the US in 1851. He was a few years younger than John. In 1854, he purchased 30 acres in Holden and Orrington from Andrew Staple. This land was near Field’s Pond and adjacent to the land of John Curran and John Ford. Mike Curran married Margaret Moylan, the daughter of Martin Moylan and Maria Curran, who died in 1904 at the age of 87. In 1868 Mike Curran bought ½ lot 25, known as the Cobb Lot, and thereby increased his holdings in that vicinity.

In 1880 or thereabouts, there was a Nicholas Curran, about 40 years of age living near the Holden and Brewer line. At that time there were two sons, William and John, living with him, but there is no evidence of his wife. She must have died in the 1870s.

Nicholas Curran, son of Tom, is believed to have married Rosanna Dougherty, daughter of John Dougherty and Alice McAvey of Brewer.

Pat Curran, a cousin of the first Curran brothers, and probably a little younger, came later than the others. His mother, Sara McDonough Curran, came from Cluck a Lora, as it reads on her marker in Mt. Pleasant Cemetery. This is probably meant to be Cloghmore, and this is the only evidence that we have for asserting that the Currans came from that town. Pat Curran married Barbara Morton, daughter of Mike Norton and Margaret Hannon (?-1897). In 1864 he bought 26 acres on the Wiswell Road in South Brewer from Goodwin. Here he lived with his wife and children: Dan E., Rose W., and Hannah. Eventually he moved to Rumford where he died as we have stated above; he is buried in Mt. Pleasant Cemetery, Bangor, ME.

Pat’s mother, Sara Donough Curran, died in 1864., Tom Jr. [ ?-1913], and Martin. William left two sons, William and Tom; they lived in Bangor. A daughter married and moved to Portland.

John Curran (?-1885), next to Bartlett and younger by a year or two, probably came to the US about the same time as Tom along with his wife Sara [ or “Sarah” a.k.a “Sally”] Bearwell (?-1872), son Nicholas, and daughters Margaret and Bridget. In 1863 he acquired 30 acres from Bartlett Curran and presumably lived on this farm. His daughter Margaret married Coleman Lee, son of Mike Lee, an early Irish immigrant; they bought 40 acres of lot 25 adjacent to the land of Mike Curran (brother of Bartlett Curran) in 1866. Margaret died in 1925.

Bridget Curran (?-1913)( daughter of John Curran) married John Ford (?-1893), an immigrant from County Galway, one of the three brothers who settled in Holden. Their children were John Ford Jr., Margaret, Mary, Joseph, Thomas, Mrs. Arthur Barton of Bangor, and James.

John Curran’s son Nicholas married Mary Mennihan (?-1877), sister of Dennis Mennihan, from the Town of Craughwell, County Galway. The children included John, Dennis, and Mary. Dennis married a Varley, daughter of William Varley, and their children included: Thomas R. Curran, US Marshall for the District of Maine, and proprietor of the Curran Bott Shop [sic Boot]. Dennis Curran, proprietor of the Connors Shoe Company, William Curran, US Internal Revenue agent, and John, Edward, Raymond, and Emmett [see family portrait].

When John Curran died in 1885, his grandson John inherited 10 acres. The remained of his land holdings went to his son Nicholas B. Curran. After the death of his first wife, Nicholas B. Curran married Alice Hamel. With this second marriage came Dan, James, and Alice. Dan lived on Broadway in Bangor and James lived in Dexter.

“The writer [of the original version of this genealogy ] contemplating the aforesaid deviations by one of the descendants of the Curran from the County Galway, feels that this is only one of the many evidences of aportasy [sic] [apostasy] which is occurring around us every day and can be attributed mostly to apathy and environment. In other words second marriages are sometimes fatal to sons of Irishman as far as maintaining their consistency in religion.

Mike Curran ( ?-1894), another brother of Bartlett, declared that he came to the US in 1851. He was a few years younger than John. In 1854, he purchased 30 acres in Holden and Orrington from Andrew Staple. This land was near Field’s Pond and adjacent to the land of John Curran and John Ford. Mike Curran married Margaret Moylan, the daughter of Martin Moylan and Maria Curran, who died in 1904 at the age of 87. In 1868 Mike Curran bought ½ lot 25, known as the Cobb Lot, and thereby increased his holdings in that vicinity.

In 1880 or thereabouts, there was a Nicholas Curran, about 40 years of age living near the Holden and Brewer line. At that time there were two sons, William and John, living with him, but there is no evidence of his wife. She must have died in the 1870s.

Nicholas Curran, son of Tom, is believed to have married Rosanna Dougherty, daughter of John Dougherty and Alice McAvey of Brewer.

Pat Curran, a cousin of the first Curran brothers, and probably a little younger, came later than the others. His mother, Sara McDonough Curran, came from Cluck a Lora, as it reads on her marker in Mt. Pleasant Cemetery. This is probably meant to be Cloghmore, and this is the only evidence that we have for asserting that the Currans came from that town. Pat Curran married Barbara Morton, daughter of Mike Norton and Margaret Hannon (?-1897). In 1864 he bought 26 acres on the Wiswell Road in South Brewer from Goodwin. Here he lived with his wife and children: Dan E., Rose W., and Hannah. Eventually he moved to Rumford where he died as we have stated above; he is buried in Mt. Pleasant Cemetery, Bangor, ME.

Pat’s mother, Sara Donough Curran, died in 1864.

Author Wilbur Wolf Will Share His Memoir of a Farm Boy at The Curran Homestead Living History Farm and Museum on Thursday, May 28, 2009 at 6:30 PM

As the first in a series of public oral histories at The Curran Homestead, author Wilbur Wolf, of Orlond, ME, will be offering signed copies of his Memoir of a Farm Boy as well as sharing some of its details in this talk and slide presentation at The Curran Homestead Living History Farm and Museum, Fields Pond Rd., Orrington on May 28 at 6:30 PM. Wolf’s book, which was originally conceived as a memoir for his children, documents his family farm experiences in the 1930s and 1940s. Beginning with the almost two hundred year history of his parents’ upstate New York dairy, he offers details of early mechanization, animal husbandry, small town life, and poignant human relations in a rural community of the past.

According to Dr. Robert Schmick, Volunteer Director of Education at The Curran Homestead, “Wolf’s experiences are becoming more unique with each passing day in America as small family farms are consumed by corporate owned agro-businesses and many more are simply re-purposed for residential subdivisions and strip malls. It is not that the times that Wolf writes of were simpler; it is that there was a close knit community on hand to comfort people during good and bad times, people discovered their own entertainments, and there was both a necessity and personal pride in earning a living from the land and ones own industry that is no longer commonplace. There were a greater number of farms per capita in Maine and the rest of the US, and people not only had the ability to grow more of their own food but supply their local community with lower cost staples not tethered to world petroleum prices.”

Schmick added that “it is our mission at The Curran Homestead to preserve the traditions of the family farm, self-reliance, and ingenuity which were part of Wolf’s experiences, and through continued public talks like this we hope to both preserve a bit of this past so that it may continue to mold future generations. Come pick up a copy of Memoir of a Farm Boy, have it signed, and chat with its author Wilbur Wolf. Mr. Wolf may even play a tune or two on one of our early pipe organs after the talk. Coffee and homemade cooked rhubarb on shortbread will be served. Admission is free, but we are an all-volunteer non-profit organization and would appreciate your donations.

How to Do and Doing as Was Done; Maple Sugaring in Eddington

On a little less than an acre on Jarvis Gore Drive in Eddington, ME these past few weeks my four and a half year old son Gabriel and I rolled up our sleeves and literally took a stab at 6 or 7 maple trees of varying size (but not less than 12 inches in diameter) tapping them for their sap. The practice of tapping trees originated with Native Americans, and once sap was collected in quantity it was boiled to a sweet syrup. Many believe that Native Americans used the syrup to flavor meat and other things, whereas later Euro-Americans came up with the use of indulgent amounts of syrup for their flapjacks, waffles, and everything else that tastes good with it. I have been told that local Maine tribes tapped other trees like Beech in addition to maples of all varieties and box elders too. For the purposes of my own recent maple sugaring venture I didn't stick to sugar maples, which are often chosen for their high sugar content over other varieties of maples. I tapped all the large maples on my property, and these included a number of different types in addition to one or two sugar maples.

Because my son and I have seen trees tapped and sap boiled in recent years as I have made an attempt to have Gabe experience some of the things I experienced growing up in a small town and on the family dairy farm in Upstate New York, we weren't complete novices. My hometown itself is filled with low mountains, hardwood forests, and largely fallow fields from a one time thriving dairy industry that is, except for a few, now largely gone. Many of the trees and woods are still there, although much has been bulldozed and built upon in recent decades. The Town of Warwick is only 49 miles from Manhattan as the crow flies lying near the western part of the New Jersey Highlands, a stop on the Applachian Trail, which we know ends or starts close to here at Mt. Katahdin in Baxter State Park. As a Boy Scout I experienced Warwick's portion of the Applachian Trail first hand on a 50 mile hike in pouring rain to the well known stop, the Delaware Water Gap. There were many shorter trips on the Trail too by Troop 45 that had so much to do with my lifelong appreciation of the woods.

I can't say that my family ever tried to make their own maple syrup on the dairy farm I spent much of my early life on but as a 5 year old I experienced maple sugaring for the first time in Mrs. Bell's kindergarten class at Hamilton Avenue Elementary School in Warwick, NY in 1968. The school itself has been re-purposed as a community center ( my own Eagle Scout project involved repairing and painting two classrooms on the second floor for that purpose way back when), but many of the ancient maples on the property tapped during the spring of 1968 still stand.

Sometime during those important six weeks of sap harvesting Mrs. Bell's class filed out with the other kindergarten classes to an area on the hill above the school where an earlier version of the school had once stood before it was destroyed by fire in the 1920s; its brick footprint is still visible in the grass. Here were two rows of hardwoods that had once marked the entrance to the largely forgotten school. We stood giddily watching as one of the custodians drilled out a hole with a brace and tapped a metal spout in for the benefit of my class. The drips of the seemingly clear liquid were almost immediate as I recall. I only observed recently that sap has a faint amber hue to it when it comes from the tree.

Fortunately, for our own health, we didn't have to wait in the chilly morning air for the metal can that was attached to a hook under the spout to fill to a desirable level. Many of the nearby maples had already been tapped days before, their metal pails filled, and a large quantity of sap brought to the cafeteria kitchen to begin the process of boiling it into syrup long before we paraded out to witness the demonstrational tapping that morning. After we experienced the resounding tap, tap, tap of the sap from the maple, we filed back into school to the cafeteria to witness steam billowing out of the enormous stainless steel pots in the kitchen, and this fact makes me realize now how long ago that really was because they carried out that whole process on gas fueled stoves that taxpayers were undoubtedly footing the bill for.

The expense of gas heat might have been an issue to a few then but today it would simply be cost prohibitive. Accessibility to a wood burning stove makes the process affordable and possible for me today. It's no wonder syrup has practically doubled in cost this year because most commercial makers use more expensive fuels than wood to make their syrup. After my kindergarten class gave their requisite number of oohs and ahs we had a pancake breakfast with homemade, or rather school-made syrup. It was delicious.

It's funny how experiences like that stick with you. Many of our memories today are so often the result of a remembrance of a photograph or something that we experienced second-hand via television, so it is the recorded image or even the experience of someone else shared with us that becomes a large part of our memories rather than the pure and first-hand types of experiences like witnessing a tree tapping and eventually tasting the syrup that originated from it, or lacing on a pair of skates and spending several afternoons falling and getting back up to learn to skate rather than spending that same time watching Olympic hopefuls go through their practiced infinitum skate routines. That maple sugaring experience at Hamilton Avenue is one of my earliest and purest recollections because no one to my knowledge ever snapped a photo that day or has ever mentioned it to me in the four plus decades since. I have thought about it treasuring it for its affirmation of my somewhat romanticized notion of growing up in a small town named Warwick.

My stab at making syrup here in Eddington, ME has much to do with my recent work with the Curran Homestead Living history Farm and Museum in Orrington, ME. Since taking on a volunteer directorship in September, 2008, I have spent much time learning how to do and doing as was done. Most recently, I harvested block ice out on the 200 acre large Fields Pond, which lay directly across from the main house and barns, using hand tools as well as contributing to our recent annual Maple Syrup and Irish celebration where we cooked sap on a well-used Wood & Bishop stove in our formally designated "Sugar Shack" using a stainless steel evaporator.

Bob Croce, a board member of the farm and museum, handled the maple syrup demonstration, as he has done now for eighteen years. He taps trees on his own property near Dedham and cooks up some samples of varying amber color to have on hand for visitors to the annual celebration. He cooks up 10 gallons of the sap during the day of the event; consequently, he has been one of my main sources of information for going ahead and doing the process on my own.

Gabe and I tapped a number of trees that by the last week of March were already past their prime as far as sap getting goes; the holes I drilled for those were bone dry when I pulled out the brace bit. We found 3 or 4 trees that produced the majority of sap we collected, and these trees included one ancient maple that is close to the edge of Jarvis Gore Drive. It, I suspect, is one of the trees that had survived from those trees that long ago lined the entirety of the road from the Old Eddington Road (Rt.9) intersection along Jarvis Gore in old photographs from the late nineteenth century. New Englanders often planted a pair of sugar maples in the front of their houses in the old days, and the two identical in size maples near my own house may be from the Unitarian Universalist parsonage that was originally on the site of my house (1879) in the 1850s and before.

We collected roughly 9-10 gallons of sap using old galvanized tin pails and fitted lids borrowed from The Curran Homestead. I filtered the sap thoughly through four coffee filters set inside of a metal collander. There were moths, bits of bark, and dry spagnum in the sap water before filtering it. We boiled the sap down in some of my late grandmother's Presto Pressure cookers (circa 1950s) on top of our wood stove in the living room. It was a fairly simple process that required a little vigiliance to avoid burning the sap down to nothing and scalding the pot. For the most part, I just set the sap on the stove and checked it when I stoked the fire. I got about 10-11 ounces of dark amber syrup for my efforts that tastes just like the good stuff. I plan on keeping the syrup under lock and key until I can make a pancake and waffle breakfast with it this summer when some of my family comes up to Maine to visit. It will be an exercise in restraint to save the syrup that long; we love pancakes and waffles at our house.

Maple Sap Flows at The Eddington School

Mrs. Diana Higgins' class at te Eddington Pre-School got a taste of maple sugaring this past monday, April 13, 2009 when Volunteer Director of education Robert Schmick of The curran Homestead Living History Farm and Museum in Orrington was on hand to share the details of the sap to syrup process. A Native American legend that identifies the possible origin of maple syrup in America was shared with Mrs. Higgins' class along with the process and tools required for harvesting the sugar rich sap from maple trees. The group filed out in a single line to a nearby maple and witnessed the tapping of a tree with a hand brace. A bucket with lid was fixed to a spout for students to check daily on the process of sap flow, which has been considerable even though sap gathering has largely ended in the area. Mrs. Higgins, Teacher Assistant Marie Sekera, and students were given a taste of newly made Eddington maple syrup drizzled over homemade ginger ice cream from Frank's Bake Shop on State Street in Bangor, which pre-schooler Brian Bates of Eddington commented was "a very good idea."

The Curran Homestead hopes to tap more trees at the school next year, make syrup out at the farm in Orrington, and provide it for a pancake breakfast for the Eddington pre-school and kindergarten." This is the first of our developing outreach to area schools," said Schmick, "and we hope to bring more rural experiences, like maple sugaring, that are among the traditions of our regional identity, to both young and old in our community." For information about this or any of a number of programs The Curran Homestead can offer to your school or organization in the future, please contact Dr. Robert Schmick at rpschmick1@aol.com , or 207-843-5550.

13th Annual Maple Syrup and Irish Celebration

Saturday, April 4, from 10AM-2PM, has been declared the date of the 13th Annual Curran Homestead Maple Festival & Irish Celebration Day by John Mugnai, President of the Living History Farm and Museum Board of Directors. The Curran Living History Farm and Museum on Fields Pond Road in Orrington will come to life with shared yarns spun about the good ole days around the wood burning stove. Meet Bodica and Mulls, the shaggy-haired Scottish Highland cows. Experience an ongoing demonstration of how to make maple syrup. Taste maple syrup and maple sugar sweets. Savor Cathy Martinage’s Irish stew (its main ingredient courtesy of Dan Hughes’ A Wee Bit Farm), and her Irish soda bread too. Sing along with the Irish folk music of Jerry Hughes and band, and hunt for Easter eggs with the kids. Also meet Hugh Curran, an expert of Celtic culture, mythology, and spirituality. It will be a step back in history to a simpler time of fun on the family farm. Admission for members and donors is $5 per adult and $3 per child (under 12). For non-members, admission is $7 per adult and $5 per child (under 12), and this includes refreshments and participation in all events.

Our featured farm animals include two rarely seen Scottish Highland cows sporting their long shaggy hair and horns. There will be someone to share the heritage of these Scottish Highland beef cattle that are known for their low fat, low cholesterol meat. Taste a sample of hormone and antibiotic free Highland beef courtesy of A Wee Bit Farm. It ranks among the best beef in terms of flavor. Board member Bob Croce and Jill Martel will make maple syrup and maple syrup beans for visitors in our onsite sugar shack. Other food offered will include a beef stew with biscuits, Irish soda bread, hot chocolate, and coffee. Ginger ice cream will be also served with a drizzle of maple syrup on top.

Hugh Curran will on hand at the Farm; he is an instructor of Ecology and Early Celtic Spirituality as well as courses for the Peace & Reconciliation Studies Program at UMO. A distant Irish relative of the Farm and Museum’s benefactor, the late Catherine Curran, and her brother Alfred, he spent much time at the farm sitting beside the wood-burning kitchen stove conversing with the late Currans. Curran’s experience includes five years as a Zen Monastic which convinced him of the many connections between the ideals of Zen and Celtic spiritual traditions. His experience also includes the directorship of an area homeless shelter. Curran’s many interests have led to his documentation of oral histories focusing on traditional Celtic story and myth. He is a published poet and has contributed articles to various journals. A DVD of one of his conversations with the late Currans will be shown at 1:30 at the Farm for those interested.

John Mugnai predicts that this 13th Annual Spring Event will be the best to date! Why a maple festival? It’s the late winter season when it’s time to harvest what may be the State’s oldest crop: maple sap. More importantly, Mainers simply need a party at the end of this long and especially snowy winter. For as long as anyone can remember, Mainers have been tapping trees, boiling sap, and sweetening their pancakes, biscuits, doughnuts, baked ham and baked beans with maple syrup; we help to preserve that tradition with this all volunteer staffed event . We are a non-profit educational center that preserves and shares the culture, values, and lifestyle of the family farm in rural eastern Maine from 1875-1950. We rely upon membership, donations, and the community for support.

Quote

"Even today., in societies of almost universal literacy, it is a rare soul who bequeaths to future historians a written account of his thoughts...How can you study a society if you attend only to the expressions of a small and deviant class within the whole?" (Schlereth 142)

References

Schlereth, Thomas J. ed. Material Culture Studies in America. Walnut Creek, CA: Altamira Press, 1999.

Definitions

material culture consists of “artifacts (and other pertinent historical evidence) of the belief systems---the values, ideas, attitudes , and assumptions---of a particular community or society, usually across time (Schlereth 3). It can include “landscapes, tools, buildings, household goods, clothing, and art;” it is the communication of specific human messages through objects (McDannell 2).

References

McDannell, Colleen. Material Christianity; Religion and Popular Culture in America. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1995.

Schlereth, Thomas J. ed. Material Culture in America. Walnut Creek, CA: Altamira Press, 1999.

FOR IMMEDIATE PRESS RELEASE

The Curran Homestead Living History Farm and Museum Receives Two Grants from the Maine State Archives

AUGUSTA-The Curran Homestead Living History Farm and Museum has received $1,738.96 for a Historical Museum Collections Grant and $2,651.44 for a Historical Facilities Grant to improve both the documentation associated with their collection of material culture and to improve facilities housing for their historical collections. The grants were provided by the Maine State Museum with funds from the State of Maine’s New Century Community Program.

One of the projects will include creating archives of oral histories by Dr. Robert Schmick, a volunteer director of The Curran Homestead, that links specific tools for blacksmithing in their collection with their use by a professional blacksmith still practicing traditional techniques. In this series of digital recordings, the uses of each blacksmithing tool in the collection will be addressed as well as step-by-step directions on how to complete a number of forge projects.
Master Blacksmith Robert Robinson of Split Rock Forge in Stockton Springs, ME will additionally share his knowledge of local blacksmithing practices of the past and give instructions on the firing and maintenance of the forge during the metal fabrication process.

These recordings will eventually be made available as podcasts on the Internet. The equipment for recording, processing, and storage of these oral histories provided by this grant will further assist in the completion of a series of recordings on a variety of themes including the material culture of rural life and family farming in Maine and specific farm and commercial tasks particular to our region’s past like ice harvesting and the making of maple syrup, among others.

The second grant will provide the funds for the materials to build a wooden blacksmithing shed on the farm and museum site. This structure will be entirely constructed by our volunteer staff. It will house our collection of tools and accoutrements for blacksmithing that includes a portable forge with a built-in bellows. It will provide a space for blacksmithing instruction, forge projects, and storage of student work in the future.

“These grants support community efforts to preserve and share the stories of our people, our towns, our families and how we lived our lives,” noted Joseph R. Phillips, Museum Director of the Maine State Museum. “Without these objects and buildings, important pieces of our Maine heritage would be lost.” Secretary of State Matthew Dunlap says a recent report to the Maine Legislature indicated many of Maine’s historical collections (photographs, paintings, natural history collections, letters, etc.) are in danger of being lost to mold, fire, theft, or misuse. “Maine has an estimated 200 million historical objects and records, many in facilities with little or no security, fire protection, or environmental controls. Maine people in local government, historical societies, and libraries are seeking help to preserve heritage,” Secretary Dunlap commented. Small grants have stimulated local citizens and organizations to commit more of their own resources to these projects. “Although financial support is important, recognition of local concerns and effort through an award should also generate a substantial amount of enthusiasm,” Phillips noted.

For more information about the Historical Facilities and Historical Museums Collections Grant Program, call the Cultural Resources Information Center at 287-7591 or email: maine.cric@maine.gov .

Ice Harvesting Step-Back-in-History Epilogue

The Curran Homestead had its first annual Ice Harvesting Step-Back-in-History on Sunday, February 15 on Fields Pond directly across the way from the Curran house and barn. There was a turn-out of some 40 plus adults and kids, and many of those kids stepped up to use the tools on hand and actually harvested ice. This was a first for everyone, and there was much enthusiasm displayed in cutting ice block with our authentic ice cutting saws using a circular cutting motion and fishing block out of the frigid waters with ice tongs. Some 30 blocks were hauled up onto the frozen pond surface.

Because of a spell of recent 40 degree Fahrenheit weather in recent weeks, there were actually two layers to the ice blocks harvested. The top was a cloudy mix of 4 plus inches, and the bottom a clear solid mass of 16 inches. Board members Irv and Karen Marsters, Fred Hartstone, Cathy Martinage, and Geralyn Mott were on hand and helped make this happen. Dick Hanson was of invaluable service to this year's harvest leading the preparation for this event as well as the actual cutting of the ice. We look forward to improving our ice cutting technique and invite any future donations of authentic ice cutting tools to add to our collection and lend to greater historical accuracy and the future success of this event.

Now Taking Reservations For Sittings For Your Own Silhouette Portrait

With few affordable heirloom quality gifts out there, The Curran Homestead Living History Farm and Museum is now taking reservations for appointments for sittings for handmade silhouette portraits by Jean Comerford of Portraits in Silhouette of Hardwick, MA on Saturday, April 4, 2009, 10AM - 2PM at 32 Fields Pond Road in Orrington, ME. This mother daughter business features a portrait of a famous New Englander in Yankee magazine each month. They are among a handful of artists nationwide who continue this folk art tradition popular in the US and Europe from the late 18th until the mid-19th century.

According to Dr. Robert Schmick, volunteer director of educational programs at The Curran Homestead, the silhouette portraits done by Ms. Comerford involve a set of very sharp and precise cutting scissors which she uses to snip out a profile of her subject from black paper which is then mounted on white card. What seems most amazing to watch is that through her skill she achieves a likeness in a matter of minutes. I have a double portrait of my son and I and one of my son alone framed that I cherish. The cost is $29 a portrait and $10 for copies. For an additional fee framing is available onsite. Part of the proceeds will benefit The Curran Homestead.

Schmick added that silhouette portraits were available largely by itinerants as late as the 1870s, but they were most popular during the earlier antebellum era before photography became widespread. Framed family silhouettes would have been among the furnishings of rural Mainers throughout the 19th century, and several would not have looked out of place in the Curran House. The State Museum in Augusta has had a large collection of silhouettes of antebellum Mainers on display.

Benjamin Franklin referred to the folk art form as “shade” in a letter to his wife, and this, along with “profile,” were common identifications among others in the late 18th century on both sides of the Atlantic. The art form’s current name comes from Etienne de Silhouette, a general controller for the French government, who had the distinction of being both economic to a fault and passing much time snipping out profiles from paper. The popular and inexpensive shadow portraits were known in England by the name “silhouette” by the 1820s as evidenced by the advertisements of Auguste Edouart. Although single portraits with white backgrounds were the norm, this artist was among those who created elaborate backgrounds with ink washes especially for compositions that included multiple familial portraits like one dating from 1842 at the Winterthur Museum in Delaware.

Silhouettes were both cut and painted, and there were a number of ingenious methods employed from the start to achieve the desired profile likeness. Some required far less skill than others. “Shadowgraph” was yet another given name for the “likeness in bust” that characterized most examples, and this was derived from a mechanical device that cut out a profile in the middle of a sheet of paper. The hollowed out sheet was then adhered to a black or colored sheet that accentuated the profile. There were also full length portraits of individuals available too, and some of these are almost comical in their exaggeration of individual characteristics. The early American artist Charles Willson Peale is known to have offered silhouettes portraits at one of his museum in Philadelphia, one of America’s first.

Portraits in America were largely realized by itinerant artists throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, excluding the few who found early patronage and fame. These itinerants were known to practice a variety of skills to make a living from their town to town and sometimes farmhouse to farmhouse travels. Broadsides and the local papers would advertise the availability of their skills for hire, and exhibitions of their silhouettes were not uncommon at the local inn. With the “sheet method,” a life size shadow produced by candle light, would be traced and then reduced to a preferred size through the use of a contraption called a “pantograph.” Miniature profiles could be produced for lockets or to adorn snuffbox lids. The price of a silhouette, as advertised by William King of Salem, MA in 1804, was “twenty five cents for two likenesses of one person.” King claimed to have traversed New England plying his skills in Boston, New Hampshire, and as far north as Portland. Within a two year period, he advertised that he had made some “twenty thousand profiles,” and if that wasn’t enough of a boast he further claimed to do a likeness in “six minutes.”

Such boasting and showmanship was not uncommon for these “hollow cutters,” as they were often called, incorporating as much flourish and theatrics as they could while doing portraits often before a crowd. This propensity was no better exemplified than by the “Master Sanders K.G. Nellis,” a paraplegic, who with “scissors in toes cut valentines and watch papers very ingeniously, and will also cut the likeness of persons very correctly.” He would also shoot bow and arrow, play the cello, and write with the only limbs he was born with according to an 1836 Salem newspaper advertisement.

For additional information about silhouette sittings or to make a reservation for your sitting on April 4, 2009, 10AM-2PM contact: Robert Schmick at 207-843-5550, or by email: rpschmick1@aol.com .

Join Us for a Step-Back-In-History with Our First Annual Ice Harvest at The Curran Homestead on February 15, 2009, 2-4 PM

On Sunday, February 15, 2-4 PM, we will go out on Fields Pond and harvest a block of ice. This will be a first for the Curran Homestead Living History Farm and Museum, so it is intended to be informal and experiential rather than a formal historical re-enactment. Using authentic ice harvesting tools from our collection, and substitutions for those we don't presently have and seek for subsequent harvestings, we will cut and transport a block of ice up from Fields Pond to the Curran House kitchen where it will be placed in our vintage oak and zinc-lined ice box for the first time in many decades.

The Curran family once harvested ice from Fields Pond in Orrington, ME. Many Maine farmers similarly utilized what ice they had on their property for personal and commercial purposes. At the beginning of the 19th century, ice harvesting was the seventh largest industry in the US with New England exporting their renowned clear ice blocks to such exotic destinations as the Caribbean and India.

This is foremost a learning experience for us, and we hope it will be for you. Those who attend who have first-hand experiences with or information about ice-harvesting are welcome to share with us, for we will appreciate any such input. We will have a warming center in our Sugar Shack at the farm where hot cocoa will be served. Admission is free.

"Battle of the Bands" To Benefit The Curran Homestead on February 7, 2009

"Battle of the Bands" with at least 3 local bands with Orrington connections will perform at Orrington Center Drive School Gymnasium from 7 to 9 PM Saturday, February 7 to benefit The Curran Homestead Living History Farm and Museum at Fields Pond. Admission: $5 Adults $3 Students.

John Mugnai, Assistant Principal at Center Drive School and President of The Curran Homestead Board of Directors, announced the fundraiser. Mugnai will also perform with "Local Singers," a musical group featuring easy listening selections. Another group called "24/7" will feature classic rock selections, and the "Wheezers and Geezers" group will focus on Bluegrass selections.

Ticket stubs will be used to award door prizes provided by Dead River Energy ($100 of fuel oil), The Bangor Home Depot (hardware items), and Bangor Letter Shop (personalized stationery).

Tickets are available at the Center Drive School office, Snowe's Corner Mobil On The Run, and Bob's Kozy Korner Store, all in Orrington as well as the Bangor Letter Shop at 99 washington Street in Bangor. For additional information, please contact Irv Marsters at 207-745-4426.

Epilogue: Presentation to the Brewer Historical Society on Developing an Oral History Project

In my efforts to create some educational resources that The Curran Homestead can use in its outreach to local schools, I have been developing a relationship with some local historical societies and soliticited willing participants to share their personal experiences and histories. In addition to the material culture we have at the Homestead, we have struck on the idea of attaching a voice to both the farm and its holdings of tools and equipment. An ice saw, for instance, doesn't have much educational value unless we can demonstrate how it may have been used and attach some voices of experiences to it.

The idea is that The Homestead's holdings will contribute much more and be more attractive to audiences if we can attach story to them. Using free downloaded software, inexpensive digital recorders, and free website space like blogspot. com and podcastgo.com, I have discovered a means to further disseminate our message and our resources to greater numbers via the Internet. This in no way will subordinate the things we already do, but it will add to it. Such digital and Internet resources, as current scholarship tells us, will only increase the desirability of visiting real sites like our own the more.

I have started recording conversations with local people who have a story to tell about the area's past. Some of these are directly linked to the farm, the Currans, Fields Pond, and Orrington of yore. Some are not connected specifically with our site or to the family farm but of life as it was in rural Maine, and The Homestead has and will continue to serve as a steward of that more generalized history too and make the knowledge of that time and place available for new generations and our time.

To start the ball rolling, I recently taped some three hours with Henry Wiswell of Orrington. Mr. Wiswell has a wealth of knowledge about the area's past and farm life of the 40s until the present. His memories also include stories handed down to him from his own elders about life as it was beyond his own lifespan. Much of our recorded conversation made a connection with his own extentive collection of antique tools and farm implements and his life on a family farm in Orrington. These memories have a direct connection with our own holdings of material culture and the identity of our site.

I plan on making an edited version of my conversation with Henry Wiswell available online with photographs of the material culture he speaks of. The longer unedited version ( that will be slightly "cleaned-up" excluding background noise and interference) will be also be available upon request by those wishing to use it for research or further educational purposes. In addition, Mr. Wiswell has worked in recent years to create a printed text that includes his recollections of Maine farm life. These vignettes include such titles as "Skunk Scare," "Soap Making," "Chores," "Potatoes," and the like. I recently spoke with Mr. Wiswell about the possibility of having him read these so that I will have these rich in educational value resources in his own voice. These too would be valuable for the proposed online resource.

As you know, we recently completed two Maine State Archives grants. One of these is an oral history project that includes proposed conversations with Bob Robinson of the Split Rock Forge in Stockton Springs. The grant application we submitted is below on this blog for your perusal. What this will entail is some 25 hours with Mr. Robinson at his forge. He will talk about the tools and equipment he uses in his forge. These conversations will include such things as how, for example, he lights the forge and brings it to the desired temperature to bend and shape metal, among other valuable details about how forges function and how they served the public of the past. Mr. Robinson is thoroughly knowledgeable of the history and application of blacksmithing in general and locally. These conversations will connect with our own holdings of blacksmithing tools and equipment, and, if we get the desired funding we have applied for, our own onsite blacksmithing shed that we have proposed to construct during the summer of 2009.

Our planned "Ice Harvesting Step-Back" is an activity designed to create a situation whereby we use the ice harvesting tools from our holdings in a hands-on learning experience. In our preliminary discussion at the recent board meeting we proposed that we drill several holes in the ice on Fields Pond the night before we meet using a drill auger. We will use these holes as the starting point from which we saw an ice block using one of our two ice saws. we will use a pair of ice tongs to lift the block from the icy water.

Included below is an article that appeared in the July, 1894 edition of DeMorest's Family Magazine recounting how commercial ice harvesting was done. Commmercial ice harvesting was an integral part of worklife in 1890s Orrington. Mr.Wiswell's family had a stake in a major commercial ice harvesting operation, and the Currans or their forebearers of the farm likely had their own smaller enterprise, given the sizeable ice house structure extant on the property. Because we lack all the necessary equipment to recreate how commercial ice harvesting would have been done as detailed in the DeMorest's article, we hope to merely recreate an approximation of how a smaller operation may have realized a block of ice for refrigerating purposes. It will not be of the quality required by urban consumers in the 1890s.

The plan is to cut a block or two and transport them up to the kitchen of the Curran House where one will be placed in the period ice box donated by Cathy Martinage. We will remove the block at that time, for it is only to demonstrate the action on videotape for educational purposes. We will videotape the whole experience and samplings of it will be made available online through one of our blogs, our facebook account, or our website.

Having mentioned the ice harvesting project at the January 13, 2009 meeting of the Brewer Historical Society where I recently spoke, one member offered some information about his own memories of ice block refrigeration. Apparently, there were still some ice harvesters and block suppliers right up until the 1950s in our area. There was one, according to this source, by the name of "Hanscom" who ran such an enterprise in the Brewer area in the 50s. My source knew that the family was still in the area, and that there is a potential for a recorded oral history there if one were to make the overtures to the family.

I was very excited by the BHS meeting, for I was privy to much history that I should have recorded in the past. Having such a learning experience, it is my intention to regularly attend future BHS meetings because there is so much potential for off-the-cuff discussions with those who experienced history first-hand. A formal sit-down for the purpose of taping an oral history requires preparation, planning, and often delay that threatens this resource from ever being realized. So it is my intention to try to do both the taping of conversations at meetings in the future and one-on-one sit-down recordings.

One BHS member was intrigued by the idea, and its potential contribution to already existing projects in the area. He mentioned the work Galen Cole has been doing in regard to World War II veterans speaking with area school children at the Cole Transportation Museum in Bangor. This has been a high profile educational project as many of you have seen the press coverage. The BHS member suggested that an effort might be made to record some of these conversations between kids and the veterans; they presently are not recorded. Irv Marsters had also recently explored this idea in a conversation with me. I met Lawrence "Bud" Lyford at the meeting who, in addition to his experience as a local hardware store owner for 40 years, served in battle during WWII. Our ten minute plus conversation should have been taped for it was stuff that good oral histories are made of, but I plan to meet with Mr. Lyford in the weeks to come.

The record of the family farm in twentieth century history is seemingly incomplete given its prominent role in the lives of so many and the threat of their increasing disapearance from the landscape in our own time. it is still possible to add to the historical record about the role of the family in The Great Depression and WWII through oral history gathering, but given the age of those who experienced it first hand the next five years in critical to such a project.Farmers were not required to do military service during WWII, for example, because it was believed that food production was just as important as military service during wartime, first-hand accounts of the farmer's service during this era is one that has been understated.

In my own experience, I remember stories related to me by my maternal grandmother about my own grandfather's desire to join the Navy as a pilot trainee during World War II. The thought created tensions between my grandparents at the time; the argument being that if he were to go off to war he would be giving up the profitable dairy that both he and my grandmother had worked to acquire and maintain in their 6 years of farming up to that point. The idea was eventually abandoned after much argument. My grandfather developed his dairy during these wartimne years, while my grandmother worked at a DuPont Wartime Production Factory in Pompton Lakes, NJ inspecting the primers on artillery shells in order to save money to buy more cows. They eventually bought a large farm of 280 plus acres of their own after the war in 1947 from a Brooklynite ( who wasn't a farmer) who had seemingly purchased the farm in 1943 to take advantage of military dispensation.

In addition to the above circumstances which were by no means extraordinary, many veterans of World War II were the sons and daughters of farmers. This theme might be worth fucusing on if we were to develop a project to record the stories of surviving veterans from rural eastern Maine in particular. The themes explored in such a project could also connect to other occupations like ice harvesting, logging, maple sugaring, and bee keeping, to name a few, particular to this region. In one oral history interview recently done the interviewee shared his experiences ice harvesting weeks before being shipped off to the Pacific for active duty in 1942. Such interconnectedness of the lives of veterans with rural Maine heritage would be paramount to this project.

Lawrence "Bud" Lyford, who I met at the BHS meeting, was very interested in the idea of sharing his experiences as a WWII veteran and as the owner of a local hardware store for some 40 years. My argument is that access to the octogenarians that would make up the existing pool of WWII veterans participating in Galen Cole's project, which includes bringing area children with veterans for one-on-one question and answer experiences at the Cole Transportation Museum in Bangor would give us access to the earliest first-hand accounts of our community that we would ever hope to capture in an oral history project. The fact that veterans are sharing these stories in a situation already makes the next step of recording them a logical response especially when these numbers specifically with World War II experiences are declining. Such a project would allow a perpetuation of the sharing process between this "greatest generation" and succeeding generations.

What do we do with with these recordings once we have them? My idea is to eventually run a workshop at one or several schools for teachers. I have taught a course for teachers that focused on the use of primary source materials in the classroom through the State Archives and Records Administration in Albany, New York. I would like to introduce strategies for using oral histories in the classroom, and then allow teachers access to the oral histories we have created. Ideally they would pick one of these and create a series of lessons that relate to their current curriculum. I will be creating several model examples for teachers to understand and experience the concept, and how such a project can be applicable to theior classroom. The teachers would have lessons that they have created that make use of these primary source materials. We would make their lessons available in conjunction with the digital recordings online through our Internet presence.


We already have many oral history recordings that were done by the University of Maine in the 1990s on tape cassettes. These include cassettes with Alfred Curran, one of the museum's benefactors himself, as well as others that knew the Currans. I think it a safe bet that not many have or are listening to them, given that cassette players are on the technological wane (and this was recently confirmed by the Dean of the School of Arts and Sciences who anticpates the need to digitalize much of the collections spearheaded by Sandy Ives). I am in the process of listening to all of these recordings. I plan to digitize them in the months to come and use them for the models for realizing some direct connections for their use in classroom curriculum for elementary, middle, and high school.

Jean (Schmick-Hopkins), my wife, has had experience with oral histories as a teaching tool as well. Jean was a co-recipient and a facilitator of the S.A.R.A Summer Institute grant with me, and she has some great ideas for realizing such a project with elementary school students having been a teacher of 4th and 5th grade for nearly 15 years and currently a 4th grade teacher at Fairmount Elementary School in Bangor.

David Hanna of the Brewer Historical Society recently sent me the following letter in response to my discussion about all of the above at the January 13, 2009 Brewer Historical Society meeting:

Bob: It is nice to meet with you last evening. You provided us with some exciting ideas. I do a newsletter for the historical society and plan to use this article. Would you please let me know if there is anything you don't like or would change. I am hoping that your oral history project will be successful, and that we can get some of our members to participate. I also would like to see local students somehow involved. Our students are just not adequately educated as to the history of our community. I have also written to Jeff Hamadey, our president, and Phyllis Scribner, our accessions clerk at the Clewley Museum, with the opinion that we could benefit from your expertise in using technology to help promote the museum and the society. Thank you again.

What is your Story??

Dr. Robert Schmick addressed the January 13th meeting of the BHS at Brewer Auditorium. Dr. Schmick's expertise is in developing new technologies for museums and is presently the Director of Education at the Curran Homestead Living History Farm and Museum. Presently he is obtaining oral histories of individuals in the area and will incorporate taped interviews with pictures into internet accessible programs. This means that an important link to the past will be made available to everyone. Students and members of the community can use present day technology to obtain information from those who have personal recollections of Brewer during the twentieth century and before. Dr. Schmick is willing to tap the history of our members as well as those in the community that have a story to tell.

An Opinion

I would hope that each member of the historical society would reflect on the legacy that could be left to the community of Brewer by contacting Dr. Schmick and discussing the possibility of being recorded for posterity. I am sure that each of you has a recollection of Brewer's past, be it of one of the industries such as lumbering, ice harvesting, brick making, ship building, Eastern Manufacturing, milling, or the myriad of other businesses. In addition you have recollections of events, and stories that could be passed down to future generations. I encourage you to contact Dr. Schmick at 843-5550 or reach him online at rpschmick1@aol.com

-----David Hanna

Cc: Jeff Hamadey

DeMorest's Family Magazine (July,1894), "A Day on a [an] Ice-Field," by Alvaro Adsitt

The rose vine which climbed the balcony thrusts a spray of creamy blossoms in at my window as if to remind me that it is midsummer. As I lean to smell of them, as one might lean to receive a kiss, there is a rumble and a clatter in the street below, and a yellow-covered vehicle thunders by, upon whose side I read the word "ICE" and straightway my thoughts revert to another and a far different scene and season.

__I see before me a wide expanse of gleaming ice upon which the sun glimmers with a thousand sparkles. Yonder, swaying to and fro as in some mystic dance, go a pair of skaters. If that athletic young man with the bold, black eyes has not yet won the petite fair-haired girl at his side who clings so closely to him, though she is evidently a practised skater, he is more modest than his face betokens. And see how like a frightened gull yonder ice-boat swoops down the wind, swift as the flight of the swallow, leaping and bounding over the hummocks like a greyhound that has sighted his prey!

And hark! From yonder group of men who seem to be so busily at work, comes faintly upon the frosty air a song, a choral as robust, as resonant, as those the sailors sing when their bark is preparing for sea. These are the ice-cutters. No pleasure-seekers these, no makers of festivals, no chevaliers of the ladies but journeymen of nature, laborers who win bread from the fiercest moods of winter, who brave death itself to wrest from the gnomes of the frost the refreshment of thousands while the dog-star rages and the great cities faint under the merciless noon.

__These men sing as they saw and chop and heave, because they are overflowing with health, and because to them the fierce breath that blows from under the North Star is sweeter than the balmy airs from the South; for the midwinter is their harvest time.Come nearer and observe them: big, brawny, honest-eyed fellows, wondering that you should shiver in your furs, though the thermometer marks close upon zero.

Yonder is one with arms bare to the elbows; here is another up to his waist in water upon which the frost-needles collect as he stands; and here is yet another, tugging at a huge cake of ice. Look at him with admiration if you have an eye for physical strength; how the knotted tendons in his great arms and wrists attest the man's vast power. And do you observe he is perspiring, even in this keen air?

__"It is warm work," he tells his neighbor with the ice-saw, who agrees with him.Even during the coldest winter there are but few days during which the ice-harvest may be reaped. The farther north, of course the longer the season; but the farther north you go the farther you get from the your market, and the greater the loss sustained in transportation and storage. So it is not surprising that these men work like engines under full pressure. Besides, as our burly friend, the foreman, observes,

__"You have got to keep movin' or freeze fast."

__Yonder, near the farther shore, where the ice-boats are flitting to and fro and the skaters are wheeling about, there is a narrow strip of ice that the wind has swept clear; but over the larger portion of the frozen expanse the snow has become packed down and partially amalgamated with the mass below.__"All this has to be scraped off before we can begin cutting," our lusty informant tells us. "You couldn't no more cut ice with that rubbish atop of it than you could make a born liar tell the truth, -and, I take it, there ain't nothin' tougher'n that."__A low laugh of rich enjoyment of his own aphorism comes somewhere from the good-natured human jelly, which shakes with the convulsion as if it would liquefy though the thermometer is at zero.

__A long line of horses, each drawing a framework of heavy plank shod with steel, approaches us solemnly. Over the edges of these frames, in general shape triangular with the opening forward, the loose snow rolls and foams like the froth before the bows of a ship.

After the snow is cleared away, the surface of ice beneath, which is more or less porous and uneven, is planed down until the clear, homogeneous body is reached. Sometimes as much as three inches of this "rotten ice" , as it is called, has to be scraped away._"Don't stand still till ye freeze fast, boys," is the good-natured admonition of the foreman as the men pause to exchange a rude jest or a word of gossip and the smoking horses move on again in leisurely procession.

__Our friend tells us that ice must be perfectly clear, and from nine inches to one foot thick, if for home use, and at least twenty inches thick if it is to be exported; since, not withstanding the careful provision made for preserving it, from one-quarter to one-half its weight is lost in transport.

__Where we stand upon this hillock of snow we command a view of the whole busy scene. Ice cutting and harvesting are carried on by exclusively American methods, and with American tools and machinery.__"Who else but Americans could have invented them there?" says our friend, proudly pointing to the saws, plows, harrows, and similar apparatus before us. "Ice is an American institution. English ice is full of holes and so soft it melts if you speak loud; and as for the rest of Europe (he pronounces it "Yurrup") it hain't in sight. In Norway I believe they do have some little fair ice; but one New York hotel would use up the whole crop."

He goes on to tell us that New York and Brooklyn alone use in the neighborhood of three million tons a year, and that we export vast quantities to all parts of the world, in ships built especially for the purpose. __By this time the workmen have taken up their positions near the center of the lake, and the cutting begins. We learn that the ice in the middle of lakes and streams is always harder and purer than that near the shore and is stored by itself as a superior grade. Ice produced in the deep waters of Northern New York and Northern New England is all of high grade; that cut in the Kennebec River is the most celebrated.

__The first process in the cutting is the measuring out of a large square very accurately, the lines being deeply incised with an ice plough. Next, the original square is "marked" in smaller squares or, rather, oblongs, of a known size, generally twenty-four by thirty inches."It won't do to work by rule o'thumb," says the foreman. "The cakes have to be packed exactly, with no waste room. Besides, we can tell to a pound what each cake weighs when we take it out."

__The marker is a sort of harrow drawn by a horse, and provided at the back with an upright which serves both as a guide and as a handle upon which a man walking behind bears his weight so as to cause the teeth with which the left side of the marker is set to bite into the ice as it runs. The right side is a thin runner of steel. This runner is set into one of the plowed lines of the square, the horse is started and the machine travels across the field, the teeth cutting a deep furrow parallel with the side of the square.

Another marker, with its runner set in the groove cut by the teeth of the first, follows, making a second groove. When the square has been marked off thus in one direction, the toothed blades are adjusted to a narrower gauge, and a series of grooves are cut at right angles to the first set. Some markers are provided with several sets of saw-teeth, so that two or more grooves are cut at one time. Those shown in the illustration are of the simpler construction.

Now come the plows. They look like a sort of compound agricultural plow. Into a long, heavy beam are set eight separate blades, or shares, each notched at the bottom. Every plow is drawn by a single horse, and guided by ordinary plow-handles. The blades are set in the grooves made by the markers, and the plowing begins. Is it not a curious sight? See how the particles of ice spout up before the rending blades, like fountains of many-hued jewels blown gracefully before the wind. The surface upon which we stand trembles beneath our feet with a dull, continuous, jarring sound.__The whole square has now been plowed into checkers, each space representing a cake. The next stage is "breaking out". Let us go closer to observe the details.

__"Shall we not be in the way?"__"No," responds the foreman, and "No," say the good-natured, smiling faces of these robust fellows. How is it that laboring or living out-of-doors always seems to make human nature more kindly and genial? - I believe better in every way.So we stand near by and watch these men handle their saws, ice-forks, - heavy, long-tined tridents, - ice hooks, and ice-spades. When a single cake has been broken out, the saw-men begin along the plowed lines, the curious, double-handled saw-blades sliding through the solid substance with marvelous rapidity.

When the ice is very thick the whole cake need not be sawed out; the forks and spades applied to the plowed grooves will cleave it away with perfect accuracy.__The ice is cut away in such a fashion that a long, narrow canal of open water is made, connecting with a water-way always kept free to the shore. As fast as the cakes are severed, men with long-handled hooks seize them and float them down the canal. Let us follow one of these cakes upon its journey.

Along the Hudson and on many lakes and streams, the storage houses are built with their feet in the water, so to say; and in such cases the canals float the ice directly beneath the apparatus which hoists the cakes into the houses. But at the place illustrated, Burlington, on Lake Champlain, the storage buildings are at some distance from the lakeside, and the breakwater intervenes, requiring a deal of sliding, teaming, and skidding before the ice reaches its resting-place.

Here is what looks like a sort of half-finished toboggan slide; a rude, slanting framework of heavy timbers up which the cakes are jerked and pushed, in rapid succession, to the crown of the breakwater, then allowed to rush down upon the opposite side, by dint of their own weight, with a whirr and a flash, till they are skillfully checked at the bottom by workmen ready to receive them as they come.

Pause a moment and note the scene before you. In the foreground, the slide, - not a beautiful object, it is true, though as to its usefulness the incessant clash of the descending cakes speaks loudly; at its foot, the workmen, the rude sledges and the heavy teams; beyond, the snow covered expanse; and still beyond, the snow-covered expanse; and still beyond, the ice-houses turning their peaked ends toward us, steamer landings, factories, sheds, long rows of buildings, a stately dwelling or two, a church spire, the faint blue smoke from tall chimneys, all backgrounded upon a hazy horizon of leafless, wintry-looking forest.

__Now let us go on. We cannot go down the slide, unless you are willing to take undignified passage on one of those swiftly coursing blocks of ice; so we must even crawl down the bank as best as we may, putting our scraped shins and bruised flesh down to the general account of the day's experience.

The rough but highly practicable double-runner sledges are drawn up in succession at the foot of the slide, and as the cakes come down, as if with a frenzied intent to shoot, like unchained meteors, into space beyond, they are deftlly caught, and meekly take their places upon the waiting vehicles. One of these sledges has just received its complement, and starts slowly away, drawn by a pair of stout, hog-maned, awkwardly built, white horses, which, like all of the equine race we have seen here, seem to take their toil philosophically, as a necessary, but not intolerable, evil. The driver stands behind his load, and is, apparently, as deliberate, philosophical, and good-natured as his team.

This load, our friend informs us, weighs seven thousand pounds, - three and a half tons; but then, as the foreman says, "sledding is a heap sight easier than wheeling."__The route from the lake to the storage-houses is between dreary-looking sheds and forbidding fences. It is altogether a depressing aspect. Broken blocks of ice, perhaps the evidences of previous disasters to sled-loads, strew the discolored and frozen track.

__Even the shouts and songs of the drivers as they urge their teams along cannot put cheerfulness into the hopelessly uncomfortable scene. It seems to us, bitter as was the cold upon the lake, that as we enter the court-yard before these enormous wooden erections, strengthened with giant timbers and bound with iron bands, where the ice is stored, the cold becomes more searching and merciless from the proximity of these thousands of tons of crystallized water. There are no windows visible, and nothing that you would call a door. The blank walls and shelving roofs have a repellent air.

__Some of these edifices have an amazing capacity. They hold all the way from twenty thousand to sixty thousand tons. Their walls are double, and the space between is filled with saw dust or other non-conducting material. Only a few boards and loose straw is interposed between the ice and the earth, and one layer is superposed immediately upon the other; but in some of the more improved storage-houses along the Hudson, the earth is coated with tanbark, and there is an additional plank sheathing on the wall packed with tan.

__The cakes are unloaded from the sledges upon a staging. Though these glistening oblongs are very heavy, the men with their long hooks whirl them hither and thither as if they were mere straws.__"It ain't the strength," explains the foreman, who still accompanies us, "it's the knowing the how of it. Put Samson himself up there on that staging for the first time, and tell him to spread himself on those cakes, and I'll venture he'd ask for an unlimited vacation after half an hour's work, besides busting half the cakes, barking his own shins, and smashing the toes of everybody around.

Ice has got to be coaxed; you can't drive it. If you set yourself to make it go one way, it'll be surely go the other; and if you use it rough, look out for legs! For it's bound to get square. But just you tickle it up a bit with your hook, kind of advise it to go the way you want, as if you were anxious for its best interests, and, bless you! You can send it spinning twenty yards wit a twist of your little finger. Just look there. See how that cake runs along, as if it knew where it was to go and was ready to oblige."

__This load, our friend informs us, weighs seven thousand pounds, - three and a half tons; but then, as the foreman says, "sledding is a heap sight easier than wheeling."__The route from the lake to the storage-houses is between dreary-looking sheds and forbidding fences. It is altogether a depressing aspect. Broken blocks of ice, perhaps the evidences of previous disasters to sled-loads, strew the discolored and frozen track.

__As the cakes slide across the staging from the sledges, they are gripped, put into a sling, and hoisted by an ordinary pulley tackle drawn by a team. Up go the masses with a creaking and groaning of blocks; the cake is disengaged and disappears within the dark recesses; the horses back and the sling comes down for another load; and so the hoisting and lowering goes on unremittingly all day.

__The Foreman listens with what seems to us an envious air as we tell him that we have seen ice-houses near the metropolis where the ice was drawn up by inclined plane by steam power and conveyed by other planes, ascending or descending, to all portions of the building, with lightning-like rapidity, so that gangs of twenty men, working vigorously, were scarce able to settle the cakes in place so swiftly did they arrive.__"Well," he observes, with a sigh, " we ain't come to that yet up here. But one thing I can tell you: steam h'isting don't make prime ice; no more do patent fixin's. And we've got prime ice, if we do have to store it by hand and horse-power.

New York's a great place, I allow, and it's got nigh about everything, I reckon; but it ain't got the climate to make first-class, A No. 1, gilt edged, no discount ice."__Having thus relieved his feelings he smiles good-naturedly, and, as if fearing he had wounded our local pride, adds:__"New York air about the center of creation, I'm bound to admit. My nephew Jabez Stephens spent a month there once, and ever since he won't wear nothin' but store clothes. He says a visit to New York is a 'liberal education' ; though after all he can't spell for shucks."

We are now in the ice-house itself. What a gloomy place! And what a deathlike chill strikes to the vitals from those frozen mountains on either hand, upon which the feeble rays of the outer day, finding their way in at the door, glint and sparkle with a weird lustre, such as we are told gleams about an arctic "pack."__We are glad to escape into an intermediate space between two buildings, across which runs a bridge-like gutter, along which men are skidding the ice. Propelled by men with hooks, the heavy cakes are sliding in quick succession with a rumbling noise.

__What manner of men are these that labor in shirt sleeves in those regions whose breath is vaporous ice, where, warmly clad as we are, the very flesh seems quivering upon our bones? Yet yonder robust fellow pauses to pass his arm across his perspiring forehead. And here comes another, wet from head to foot and trailing water after him at every step, - a trail which freezes almost as it falls! As he approaches the foreman he shows his white teeth in a broad smile.__"What's come to you, Joshua Smart?" asks our guide. "Ye look a bit damp."__"Yas, some so, boss," replies the newcomer. "Fell into the consarned canal. Got under the ice, too, and mighty nigh about tuckered out afore they pulled me up."

__"Well," says the foreman, "you must be a blamed fool not to know enough to keep out of the drink where ye've made your living since you were a shaver. Go home and get some dry duds on; and look you, Joshua, don't stop to gab on the way, or you might get cold.

__Joshua Smart departed with a loud slapping of sodden trousers; and presently, having seen all there was to see, we heartily thanked the foreman and made our exit in turn, highly gratified with the result of our expedition, but, at the same time, well pleased to return to a rousing fire of New England hickory logs, and a substantial New England supper which was eaten with appetite wholly unsectional, concluding with a plunge into a billowy New England feather bed, and the dreamless slumber which falls to the lot of the just and the tired.

Alvaro Adsit