By Paul Sylvain

As long as anyone in the tiny fishing village of Bucks Harbor can remember, there has always been a mom-and-pop store at or near where a now-vacant, sun-faded yellow building stands at the intersection of Port and Small’s Point roads.

Many old-timers in town still remember Vincent Small’s store that stood further back from where Herb Rose would later build his own store.

By Nancy Beal

Following the ouster of an incumbent select person at the annual town meeting last March and the subsequent, sudden resignation of the other two select persons, the town of Beals is getting back on track under the leadership of new and old replacements.

By 2nd Lt. Peter Duston, USA, Ret.  

This is the story of a lonely cross engraved: “Known but to God,” in remembrance of “D” Day, which began eighty years ago, on the 6th of June, 1944. 

In June 2018, my wife and I visited the U.S. military cemetery on the bluff overlooking Utah Beach on the Normandy coast where the D-Day invasion took place nearly 75 years earlier.  We were in France with the Washington County Children’s Chorus who were on a singing tour.   

For the month of June, the StoryWalk® at Porter Memorial Library in Machias will feature the award-winning children’s book, “Miss Rumphius,” by Barbara Cooney. Readers of all ages delight in the tale of Alice Rumphius, a woman who realized her childhood dreams of traveling the world, residing in a seaside house, and making the world more beautiful. The numerous lupines blooming along the Maine coastline stand as a testament to the real Miss Rumphius, Hilda Hamlin, known as the Lupine Lady, who sowed lupine seeds wherever she went, as well as Cooney's own experiences traveling the world.

By Paul Sylvain & Will Tuell

It’s been said that everybody loves a parade, and that was never more evident than on May 27 in Machias. That’s when a crowd of parade-goers lined Court and Free streets, Colonial Way. and Main Street/Route1 to watch and cheer on the many community groups that participated in this year’s Memorial Day Parade.

by Jonathan Reisman

By Will Tuell

While most teachers and students are eagerly counting down the days until their summer vacation begins, Elm Street’s Karen Fulmer said in an interview last week that this, her forty-third -- and final -- year teaching a third- or fourth-grade classroom at the East Machias elementary school “will be bittersweet.” As much as Fulmer enjoys her students -- every day, every class is different -- she knows that physically she just can’t keep up with another class of energetic and inquisitive nine-year-olds. 

By Paul Sylvain

The Machias selectboard, on May 22, authorized Police Chief Keith Mercier to hire Cutler resident Jim Frauenhoffer as a full-time patrol officer.

Frauenhoffer is a 27-year veteran police officer and detective who retired from the Baltimore Police Department. Mercier told the board that Frauenhoffer moved Downeast around three years ago and only recently began working as a corrections officer at the county jail for the Washington County Sheriff’s Department.

By Jacquie Leighton

On May 13 and again on May 17, students from two local elementary schools in SAD 37 visited the Milbridge Theater & Community Arts Center (MTCAC) for a Maine-themed game and a visit from a local celebrity, a teacher who taught Maine and United States History for more than forty years. 

By Will Tuell

In the 150 years since Charley Jones thumped two homers in the same inning for the long-defunct Boston Red Stockings, 61 Major League Baseball players have achieved the same feat. Last week, Washington Academy first baseman Colby Moholland ripped a pair of fourth inning home runs to put the high-flying Raiders squarely in the driver’s seat against the Golden Bucks of Bucksport. 

By Will Tuell

Blue skies and a warm breeze greeted the 68 cadets -- soon to be law enforcement officers -- graduating from Maine’s Criminal Justice Academy on May 17. The graduates, with throngs of family and friends watching on, began their journey eighteen weeks ago in the dead of winter, leaving loved ones behind as they went through a rigorous training program designed to initiate them into the ranks of Maine’s law enforcement community. 

By Paul Sylvain

Northfield developer Justin King is eyeing a patch of land he owns on King Avenue in Machias to build a “Scandinavian-style” apartment building featuring four 800-square-foot, one-bedroom apartments.

A building permit application was presented to the town’s planning board in April but was denied. The permit was discussed again earlier this month and was granted conditionally over flood zone concerns, King said in an interview last week. King claims those concerns are non-existent in that elevated section of land off Court Street.

by Jonathan Reisman

A 5 a.m. trip to the garden (the black flies are not early/cool morning risers) sometimes clears the head and fuels the column, but when horticultural discipline fails to inspire, careful inspection of the inbox and assorted internet flotsam offers copious column fodder.

Possible People’s Veto of National Popular Vote 

The countdown has begun for the much-anticipated third annual Rhubarb Festival, set to take place on June 1, from 12-5 p.m. at Kendall Farm in Perry. This spring event promises a day filled with vibrant art, delicious rhubarb creations, live music, and family-friendly activities.

By Will Tuell

By Will Tuell

In yet another sure sign of spring, state officials have opened the Down East Sunrise Trail to ATV use. Game Warden Joe McBrine of the Maine Warden Service said in a message prior to the trail’s reopening that, despite severe flooding in January which caused extensive damage to the throughway, ATVers could expect things to be fully back to normal by early-to-mid summer. 

By Nancy Beal

Conversation (and disagreement) recently reported about Union 103 (Jonesport-Beals High School and the Beals and Jonesport elementary schools) and the auditor who reviews its books was prompted by a decision by the superintendent, not by the high school board, as reported in these pages last week (see “Jonesport Selectmen Disagree with High School’s Auditor Change,” Machias Valley News Observer, May 8, 2024). 

By Will Tuell

After months of practice, students from Elm Street School in East Machias (and the surrounding homeschool community) regaled audiences last week with “The Curse of the Frog Prince” -- an adaption of the classic Grimm Brothers’ fairy tale published in the early 1800s that follows a spoiled princess, a cursed frog prince, and their efforts to reverse the curse. The performance was directed by Melina Neilson and produced by Eustacia Landrum.

Calais Community Hospital and Down East Community Hospital are once again bringing in a national speaker for Washington County students.  Last fall, area high school students attended the presentations.

By Nancy Beal 

Jonesport selectmen met for the first time since mid-March last week (Board chair Harry Fish had been on a trans-Atlantic cruise) and tackled an agenda with 11 items on it. The last of these, concerning the school board’s request for a new auditor for Jonesport-Beals High School, prompted most of the discussion. 

By Wayne Smith

C.H. Mathews Store in Cherryfield is in the process of being sold this month. The store has been in the Mathews family since its opening in 1891. It’s being sold by Bruce and Karen Mathews of Milbridge and bought by Ahmad Rehman of Augusta, Maine. Mathews talked with me about his memories of the oldest family-run store in Maine recently, and this is what he said in his own words.