Those of you who venture out towards Eagle Island in Casco Bay are familiar with the Little Mark Island Monument. Having sailed the length and breadth of the Maine coast a number of times, I am quite sure that there is nothing else like it in these parts, which has made it a popular topic of conversation for locals who ply the waters of Casco Bay and beyond.
As most of us know, mariners have a penchant for telling tall tales. Perhaps this is done to “pull the leg” of a gullible listener, or perhaps it is just a way of passing the time or exercising the imagination. One thing’s for sure-stories of the origin and purpose of this monument have been told around the cracker barrel for a very long time, and there are many variations.
The one heard most often is that the 12-foot square room at the base of the monument was designed as a shelter for shipwrecked sailors. This version is usually told with a wry smile. According to some, Admiral Robert Peary, who purchased nearby Eagle Island in 1877, provisioned the monument with food for any sailors so unfortunate as to end up at such an uninviting spot.
Today the room is occupied by storage batteries used to power the monument’s light. Sorry, shipwrecked sailors!
Another fanciful story is that the Coast Guard intended to build a lighthouse at this location but ran out of funds so settled for this much smaller structure, placing a small stationary light atop it. The story that was circulated in my childhood, which seems to be long forgotten, is that local fishermen’s wives contributed their cookie jar money to build this monument as a beacon for their returning sons and husbands.
A tale with possibly more credibility appeared in the Portland Herald on June 4, 1935. According to it, the monument replaced a wooden structure, which had once served as a “day mark to navigators.” The article seemed to become more whimsical when it stated that the small room in the monument’s base had “in the past” served as a shelter for sheep pastured on the island. Why anyone would graze sheep on such a small, barely accessible rocky outcrop is difficult to fathom. The article incorrectly calls the island “Mark Island,” and therein may lie the source of possible confusion-there are two other nearby islands called “Mark,” both much larger and more easily accessible, thus more logical venues for sheep grazing.
A version that many have heard but no one seems to believe is that this is one of the few possible evidences of the early presence of Norsemen in our waters. Another is that the pre-Algonquin “Red Paint People” built it. While documented as seafaring people, the fact that they lived several thousand years ago raises serious questions.
Finally, and this seems the most credible, 19th-century charts show a course extending from Small Point through the channel between Haskell and Little Mark Islands. The monument would serve as a highly visible navigation aid providing a beacon for mariners returning to Casco Bay from Downeast via this route, leaving it to port. This would be the shortest passage into the inner bay.
Turning to early-recorded history, according to a September 11, 1827 article in Portland’s Eastern Argus newspaper, a 50-foot high “stone column” had recently been erected “by order of government” on Little Mark Island, as a “land mark for vessels running into or passing Harpswell or Broad Sound.” It was constructed of rubble stone collected on the island at a cost of $1,200.
Today it stands 65 feet high, but I have been unable to learn the year it was rebuilt to today’s larger stature.
With an 18- foot square base and walls three-feet thick, initially it was painted in “perpendicular” black and white stripes except near the top which was black on all sides. For as long as anyone I know can recall, it has been painted white all the way to the top with a broad vertical black stripe on each side.
According to Dorothy Simpson in The Maine Islands in Story and Legend, a beacon atop the structure was installed before World War II. Other sources date the beacon to 1827, the year the monument was built, although how it would have been powered in that day is open to question.
There is no known record of who built it, although it was almost certainly someone local. Chebeague Islanders are considered, by Chebeaguers of course, the most likely artisans as they had a reputation for such work and were close at hand. The crane on one of Chebeague’s numerous “stone sloops” of that era would have been a suitable mechanism for the heavy lifting involved in building such a structure.
In closing, the author admits to some concern that, by revealing the historical facts he may be depriving Casco Bay’s tellers of tall tales of one of the favorite targets of their whimsies. On second thought, these folk are not known for letting facts interfere with their imaginations, so there probably is little to worry about.
Eldon Mayer is a long-time Chebeague summer resident, now retired and spending much more time on the island. His family’s Chebeague roots date back into the late 19th century.