As a thunderstorm passed over Islesford at 7 a.m. on Oct. 17, I turned on the VHF radio to hear what kind of weather the lobstermen were experiencing. In the space of a half-hour they heard thunder and saw lightning, hail, rain, rainbows and double rainbows. “I’m looking at the sun and I have rain blowing into my ear, great Maine weather!” was the comment from Jim Bright aboard his boat, SCORPIO’S LADY.
The cold damp weather on Election Day did not prevent islanders from getting out to vote. We actually have two voting districts in our town to serve the current 209 registered voters. District 1 is on Great Cranberry Island with 82 registered voters. District 2 is on Islesford with 127 registered voters. Each district has ballot clerks who are appointed by their parties at a caucus and are recommended by the Town Clerk. Voters on Great Cranberry were served at the Community Center by ballot clerks Barbara Stainton (D) and Louise Strandberg (R), and by Beverly Sanborn as deputy registrar and warden. When there were only four ballots left and still more people to vote, Beverly called over to the Town Clerk on Islesford and the extra ballots were sealed, signed for, and delivered to Cranberry by Paul Allen who was returning from his day of work at the fishermen’s coop on Islesford. At the Islesford Neighborhood House, voters announced their names to Barbara Bryant (D), picked up a paper ballot, entered one of two wooden voting booths, checked their chosen boxes and then deposited the ballot through a slot in the top of a locked wooden ballot box. Ann Fernald (R) checked off the name of the departing voter. Betty Sprague served as warden and Frances Bartlett was there as Town Clerk accompanied by Deputy Town Clerk Denise McCormick. Voter turnout for our town was excellent. One hundred seventy-eight people voted including absentees. In the presidential race John Kerry received 119 votes and George Bush received 51.
The heating season has started and the cost of heating oil delivered to the island is $2.23 per gallon. It is time to start using the wood stoves. Bruce Fernald remembers from his childhood the sound of the coal shovel scraping across the floor in the cellar as his father, Warren, loaded the coal furnace. Warren recalls the black Home Clarion wood stove in his boyhood kitchen that was converted to oil when he was six. During the oil embargo in the mid 1970s Warren bought his first chainsaw. At age 76 he still cuts splits and stacks his own wood from trees that have blown down on the island. He is proudly able to heat his whole house from the wood stove in his kitchen. “I figured I’ve saved over 60 thousand gallons of heating oil that are still out there in the world,” he told me. With so many people using wood for heat, there is plenty of competition whenever a tree blows down in a storm. Bruce Fernald and David Thomas recently made phone calls to a property owner, just minutes apart, when a large maple tree came down in a storm. They are working together to cut it up and they will each end up with over two cords of hardwood for their efforts.
On Sundays there is only one boat leaving the islands around 3 p.m. and returning from Northeast Harbor at 3:30. David Bunker brings the CAP’N B from Great Cranberry so that the larger SEA QUEEN can remain in Northeast to make the first trip out to the islands at 7:30 on Monday morning. On Nov. 14, the Sunday trip looked like a boat trip in mid December. The snow from Saturday was still on the ground, the cabin was full of people, and more people and packages filled the available deck space outside. Whether you are picking up your own supplies or doing an errand for a friend, you almost never return to the island empty-handed.
As the holidays approach, the days get shorter and the mail boat will be more crowded. Publications from the Great Cranberry Island Historical Society and the Islesford Historical Society make great gifts and you can order them right from the Internet. Two Web sites with an abundance of information about our islands are: www.cranberryisles.com and www.islesford.com. The Cranberry Isles web site lists the publications from both historical societies and there are connecting links where you can read excerpts from many of the publications. Even if you do a lot of shopping in cyberspace, you will no doubt leave the island at some point for a few errands. When you start loading up on supplies for the holidays, treat yourself to the 3:30 boat with a high tide for loading and unloading on Dec. 3, 4 and 5, and then again on Dec. 16, 17 and 18. May you all have happy holidays and a new year with good health and peace.
— Barbara Fernald
Islesford
Nov. 15, 2004