Hand-cranked entertainment

Jan. 1, 2000 – Temp. 40 at noontime. Wind NW light, bar. 29:90, rising slowly. Another new year has arrived. Jeri Spurling, our daughter-in-law, fetched us a jar of lobster stew and our friend and neighbor, Lillian Alley (an excellent cook) brought us some muffins and cups of custard. This year is starting out very nicely. A quiet evening with a bit of rain and sleet starting after dark.

Friday, Jan. 3 – Wind NE 10 knots. A gray morning, temp. 24 at noon. Ted Jr. came into say goodbye, as he is leaving for three weeks for the little “banana republic” of Costa Rica, Central America, to take a Spanish immersion course. He will be well within the tropics. Blowing hard here by midnight and wind due east now.

There was a meeting today of the fund raising committee for the new Manset property the town has acquired. The public relations committee met them in the afternoon on Great Cranberry Island. On Jan. 7 the Cranberry Isles board of selectmen will meet at the community center, followed by a meeting of the land management commission. One of the results of these meetings is the land management commission’s Quarterly Status Report, which is posted on the Cranberry Isles website and soon to be on the Islesford.com website.

Jan. 17, Friday – Temp. 24, wind 15 knots NW at noon. Cindy Thomas, our Islesford librarian, recently attended a conference for other outer island school and town librarians in Rockland, sponsored by the Island Institute. She says there are 16 new books this week at our library. Malcolm Fernald returned a little while ago from Nova Scotia. He visited friends at Dalhousie University.

Jan. 19, Sunday – Temp. 30 at noon, snowing and wind east 15 knots. Church today and Joy Sprague shoveled off our walk for us. Rev. Doug Hare and wife, Ruth, visited us in P.M. I haven’t felt too well this winter and have stayed indoors mostly. We had a nice chat and Doug brought his portable communion kit and had communion with Cara and me. A full “wolf” moon last night. Tonight it is still near full and near the planet Jupiter.

Jan.22 – wind NW 30 knots, temp. 8 above zero at noon. The oil man filled our tanks today. We recently borrowed a video from the NE Harbor Library, a rather old but very good film made in 1939, “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.” I heartily recommend it. Stars are Jimmy Stewart and Jean Arthur.

Sunday, Jan. 26 – Temp. at noon 30 and wind W at 10 knots. A gale warning out. Some light snow in P.M. The P.M. ferry boat came a bit early. Ted Jr. is back from Costa Rica.

HB, 29, Wed. – Wind SW today at 12 knots, temp. 24 at noon.

The “dip of the month” club is still going strong on Islesford. Hugh (Bud) Dwelley, our historical society president, is taking a Caribbean cruise with his wife, Shirley, and his cousin Dale Hadlock and Dale’s wife, Jeannine, in early February aboard S.S. ENCHANTMENT. Bud asked if he could join the club and take his “dip” from aboard the cruise ship. An emphatic “no” from the judges. The rules specify: “you have to achieve a horizontal position in the ocean or a lake that is above the 43rd parallel of latitude.”

Sunday, Feb. 2 – Temp. today 31 at noon and wind NE at 25 knots. It is Groundhog Day and it stayed overcast. Some light snow in p.m. Edgar Blank is relief skipper on the ferry boat SEA QUEEN today. The telephone man came over today to work on our island phones. Somehow some of them got “buggered up” a mite and the numbers got changed so you didn’t know whom you might get when you called a known number. It did relieve the monotony of a winter’s day somewhat, sort of like opening a surprise package and wondering what you might get…

Feb. 7, Friday – Wind SW 12 knots and temp. 29. A sunny day, all day. Angela Hardy fetched us the school newspaper this morning. She was a substitute teacher today and helped the school children with their house-to-house delivery of the Cranberry Press. Gloria (Bunker) Gordon died today in Cherryfield. She grew up on the island and lived many years here. Sunday, Feb. 19 – Temp. 34, wind SW 12 knots at noon. Another church day. War, possibly with Iraq, looks closer…in a recent conversation with a NE Harbor cousin, Alice Carter, I learned that her grandson, Christopher Moore, a recent graduate of Maine Maritime Academy, is shipping out soon as 3rd Assistant Engineer on the U.S. Navy’s Military Sea Lift Command ship BOB HOPE, a huge roll on-roll off cargo ship. She is 950 feet long with a beam of 150 feet. Their plans are to leave soon for the Persian Gulf. It reminds me of my youth some 60 years ago at the beginning of World War II. It had just graduated from the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy at King’s Point, New York, and was deck officer on a U.S. Lines cargo ship bound for some Asiatic destination. My ship, however, was only 420 feet long. Feb. 13, Thursday – wind NW 30 knots at noontime, temp. 8 degrees. Lots of ice about the docks this winter, and it has to be broken up to get into the lobster car for lobsters. And sometimes on windy days you have to wait. Dave Thomas is supplying mail order customers fairly well, some with steady orders. He most always, however, can manage to get out a few from their icy storage.

Feb. 14 – Temp. 2 degrees above zero at noon and wind WSW at 20 knots. At 6 a.m. ’twas 8 degrees below zero and vapor flying on “old ocean.” Valentine bingo parties on both islands tonight. On Islesford the event was held in the school house instead of the Neighborhood House, warmer and cozier with Valentine signs everywhere and very delicious potluck desserts provided for the 11 children and 17 adults. Bingo games took place eventually, and intermission performance by Sally Bloom’s music students. The total amount of money brought in by both our islands was nigh onto $5,000. But Great Cranberry raised the most. It will be used for the Cranberry isles Heritage Campaign, which is trying to raise as much money as possible in 2003 to lower the town’s property tax increases resulting from the recent land purchase for guaranteed island access in Manset. The best of luck to us all. We are going to need it.

Lee Ham was 90 years old today. Early in the day, Franny Jo Bartlett, our town clerk, presented him with the Islesford gold-handle cane, which is given to the oldest member of our island. Lee is also the oldest living lobster fisherman from the Cranberry Isles, although inactive in that for several years. I can remember when he had his big black 40-foot boat built at SW Harbor by Chester Clement in 1934. I went lobster fishing with Lee for several winters some 40 years ago. He kept that boat and used it for the rest of his lobstering days. He told me that he owned it for 43 years.

Feb. 16, Sunday – 10 below zero at 6 a.m., but 9 above by noon. Wind NW 8 knots, barometer way up to 30:60. The full “Snow” moon very low in the west at 6 a.m. The Old Farmer’s Almanac says today: “Winter’s back breaks!” Let us hope so. These cold days we are having lately remind me of many of my school days of 70 years ago. It wasn’t too uncommon then to have a few 20 below zero days occasionally. In 1923, as I have mentioned in past stories, the ocean around our islands froze solid enough for people to walk to SW Harbor and return, which several hardy souls did. An old friend and near neighbor, Ken Jarvis, a young man at that time, told of walking to SW Harbor and enroute stopping off at Gilpatrick’s Cove, NE Harbor, to see if his Uncle Frankie Stanley’s sloop, on its iced-in mooring there, was all right. And how he wore moccasins on that long, cold, hard walk and how his feet and legs ached for days afterward. Aunt Cindy Fernald, grandpa Spurling’s oldest sister, born in 1842, told Ken that 44 years earlier she had walked to SW Harbor, too. Aunt Cindy lived in the old large house once sitting across the road from my home here. I have before me a copy of a map from atlas of 1881, of our Cranberry Isles with the houses and their owners’ names at that time. Only 16 dwelling houses on Little Cranberry and this old house was one of them and in many ways the most interesting and also most mysterious, built about 1865 and at one time a three family home. I played there much during my childhood when the Leightons, Aunt Cindy’s great grandchildren, lived there. But when Aunt Cindy was young and had married Capt. Edward Fernald, known as “Ped,” this was their home. He owned several sailing vessels and had shares in others.

A family diversion on the island in the winter time in those days was to have parties and gatherings, with hand cranked ice cream and music (hand cranked) on a Victrola. A stone mason who lived here then had a fine one with cylinder records, and he and his wife, Olive, whom he usually hauled along on a big sled complete with ice cream and Victrola stored aboard, would visit around amongst the neighbors. Also many homes had a collection of stereo-slide pictures, in true third dimension with the twin eye glass viewer that had the fancy name of “stereoscope.”

There are other stories about this old house. Its wooden sink, little hideway cubby holes and forgotten space under the parlor floor with its shelf of bottles once filled with old Nova Scotia rum. Their daughter, Belle, married Ben Moore, called by some “Ben the Banker.” He was an extra good cook but a rather irresponsible husband. He would sometimes ship out on a fishing schooner to the Grand Banks of Newfoundland without leaving word with Belle. Being known as a good cook, he was always in demand. He was a good smoker of fish also, and as a boy, I can remember him working with herring and finan haddie in his little smokehouse shack near where the museum is today. The old dwelling house is gone now, torn down in 1983, replaced by a fine new home that looks similar in design. This one is owned by Chris and Eric Sandberg.

Wed., Feb. 19 – Temp. 38, wind WSW 10 knots. A gray day but a mite warmer. Katrina Howard phoned from Florida (she is secretary of our Islesford Hist. Society), partly on business, as Cara and I are two of the trustees. Katrina is working on a very interesting and artful project. Ashley Bryan is here for a few days but will leave on Sunday. He will be flying soon to Port Elizabeth, South Africa, which is on the SE end of this huge continent, on the Indian Ocean side.

Feb. 23, Sunday – Wind ENE 20 knots at noon. Temp. 32, bar. Low at 28:80. A stormy morn but moderated some since last night. Still some snow and sleet at 6 a.m. Power went off about 3 a.m. just before Dave and Cindy Thomas got an urgent phone call from Rob Mocarsky, who was here for a few days with his wife, Katya, who was expecting a baby. Rob teaches school this year at Jackman, Maine, and they thought they could squeeze in a few days here and still have time to return to Jackman before the baby arrived. But things worked out differently, as the baby had other plans. Dave quickly came to the rescue. Rowing off, in the storm, to his mooring to get his big lobsterboat JUST-A-PLUGGING, he picked up Bob and Katya at the dock and they made an exciting, fast trip by sea and by land to the Bar Harbor hospital. The baby arrived at 9:44 a.m. and all was well. Patrick Emanuel Mocarsky weighed in at nine pounds and 14 ounces. Congratulations to the new family and thanks to Dave Thomas for a happy ending to some anxious moments. Also, thanks to Edgar Blank for going after the Bangor Hydro men. Electricity was restored to the island by 11 a.m.

Feb. 28, Friday – Wind ENE , light. This has been a good winter to watch winter sports on TV. The subzero weather, frequent snowstorms and such have been good for the snow lodges, but some of us are looking forward to an invasion of robins. The forecast is for March to frolic in like a lamb but with cold weather just behind it. Don’t put the snow shovels away just yet! Happy spring time!

– Ted Spurling Sr.

Islesford