Issue for October 17, 2024

Celebrating 36 years of local news

Scouts spend weekend at wildlife refuge

The Moosehorn National Wildlife Refuge in Barring, is a 30,000-acre treasure that is home to over 225 species of birds, endangered species, resident wildlife and for one weekend in September it was also home to Gods and Demigods and nearly two hundred Scouts and leaders… by Chuck Mahaleris

CAMPAIGN 2024

CAMPAIGN 2024: Candidates address issues concerning Maine voters (Part 1)

CENTRAL ME The following are the responses candidates provided to us based on a questionnaire we sent out. (We received so many responses, they couldn’t all be included in a single issue of the paper. This is part one of those responses. Please view part 2 in this issue)…

CAMPAIGN 2024: Candidates address issues concerning Maine voters (Part 2) (new)

CENTRAL ME This is the second part of the responses candidates provided to us based on a questionnaire we sent out…

CAMPAIGN 2024: Forum at China library hears local candidates

CHINA Candidates’ opening statements, summarized, in the order given…

CAMPAIGN 2024: China candidates’ night October 9

CHINA Three candidates for the state legislature and six candidates for China town offices spoke to an audience of more than three dozen at the Oct. 9 candidates’ forum at the Albert Church Brown Memorial Library in China Village…

Town News

Lack of school bus drivers major concern

VASSALBORO The major topic at the Oct. 8 Vassalboro School board meeting was the difficulty of finding people to drive school buses…

China transfer station manager: Things are going smoothly

CHINA – China Transfer Station Committee members held a short and cheerful meeting the morning of Oct. 8. Transfer station manager Thomas Maraggio and committee member Rachel Anderson, who volunteers at the free for the taking building, both said things are going smoothly…

PHOTO: Steeple down, but saved

VASSALBORO Sadly, the steeple on the 36-year-old Vassalboro United Methodist Church was removed by Burke Roofing, of West Gardiner, on Thursday…

Vassalboro community calendars are coming

VASSALBORO For 19 years members of the Vassalboro United Methodist Church (VUMC) have prepared and delivered a community calendar on which birthdays, anniversaries and memorials can be listed at no cost…

PHOTOS: Youth football action in Oakland

CENTRAL ME Game photos from Casey Dugas, Central Maine Photography…

Name that film!

Identify the film in which this famous line originated and qualify to win FREE passes to The Maine Film Center, in Waterville: “Take your stinking paws off me you damned dirty ape!” Email us at townline@townline.org with subject “Name that film!” Deadline for submission is November 7, 2024.

LETTERS: Will someone do something!

from Marilou Suchar (Vassalboro) — The view outside my picture window is anything but picturesque. It is a dump – not a land fill ­ ­– but junk, garbage, trash and a disgusting dump that is breeding rats…

OPINIONS: Open letter to Vassalboro residents

from Christopher French (Selectboard member Town of Vassalboro) — To the respective Voters of the Town of Vassalboro: In addition to the Presidential election this upcoming November the [Vassalboro] selectboard has presented three referendum questions for your consideration and support…

Local happenings

EVENTS: Fall Fest in Vassalboro

VASSALBORO A “Fall Fest” will be held at Vassalboro United Methodist Church (VUMC), on Saturday, October 26, 9 a.m. – 2 p.m., when crafts and homemade pumpkin and apple baked goods will be for sale. During the same hours, a variety of “To Go” hot soups, chili and mulled cider will be available to take home…

EVENTS: Explore China’s transportation history at upcoming presentation

CHINA — The China Historical Society is pleased to invite the public to an engaging presentation on the history of the Wiscasset, Waterville & Farmington (WW&F) narrow gauge railway. This event, featuring local experts Bob Wallace and Phil Dow, from the Albion Historical Society, will take place next Thursday, October 17, at 7 p.m., at the China Baptist Church…

EVENTS: Veterans urged to take part in Veterans Day parade

WATERVILLE/WINSLOW — All veterans and community members are invited to participate in the Waterville Veterans Day parade on Monday, November 11, 2024. Lineup begins at 10 a.m., at The Elm, 21 College Ave. Waterville. A ceremony will be held at Castonguay Square, on Main St., at 11 a.m…

EVENTS: Vassalboro library to host theatrical play

VASSALBORO – Vassalboro Public Library will host a theatrical play, to take place at the Vassalboro Grange, 353 Main Street, for two exclusive shows, Saturday, October 19, at 7 p.m., and Sunday, October 20, at 2 p.m…

Tyler Sheets named to dean’s list at University of Maryland Global Campus

FAIRFIELD – Tyler Sheets, of Fairfield, was named to the dean’s list for the summer 2024 term at University of Maryland Global Campus, in Adelphia, Maryland.

Local students enroll at St. Lawrence University

CENTRAL ME – Members of the Class of 2028 begin their St. Lawrence University adventure, in Canton, New York, as one of the most academically distinguished cohorts in the University’s history. St. Lawrence University welcomed the following new students: Lola Caruso, of Norridgewock, Nina Dabas, of Winslow, and Eliot O’Mahoney. of Whitefield.

CALENDAR OF EVENTS: China Historical Society to hear about WW&F

CHINA – The China Historical Society announces Bob Wallace and Phil Dow, from the Albion Historical Society, will do a community presentation on WW&F narrow gauge, on Thursday, October 17, at 7 p.m., to be held at China Baptist Church. The public is invited… and many other local events!

Obituaries

CHINA – John Gibson Mayo, 87, passed away Sunday, October 6, 2024, at his home in China. John was born on February 23, 1937, a son of Ogilvie and Eleanor (Napolitano) Mayo…

Around the Kennebec Valley: Augusta education – Part 1 (new)

MAINE HISTORY — The town – now city – of Augusta was created on Feb. 20, 1797, when the Massachusetts legislature, responding to a local petition, divided the town of Hallowell… by Mary Grow

Around the Kennebec Valley: Education in 18th & 19th centuries, Part III

MAINE HISTORY — The local responsibility for public education made it one of the first topics for voters in each newly-organized 18th and 19th century Maine town. Frequently, historians wrote, it was not easy for people in a low-cash economy to raise money to pay a teacher, provide instructional materials and maintain a building… by Mary Grow

Around the Kennebec Valley: Education in 18th & 19th centuries, Part II

MAINE HISTORY — Massachusetts residents who moved to Maine brought with them the Massachusetts enthusiasm for education, as noted last week. Alma Pierce Robbins, in her 1971 Vassalboro history, quoted from a report coming, ironically, from an October 1785 Portland convention called to discuss separating Maine from Massachusetts… by Mary Grow

Around the Kennebec Valley: Education in 18th & 19th centuries, Part I

MAINE HISTORY — One of the many questions your writer has not yet answered – and may never – is why, in the 1700s, people left comparatively comfortable homes in Massachusetts and similar places to come to the Kennebec Valley, on the Massachusetts frontier… by Mary Grow

Common Ground: Win a $10 gift certificate!

DEADLINE: Wednesday, October 17, 2024

Identify the people in these three photos, and tell us what they have in common. You could win a $10 gift certificate to Hannaford Supermarket! Email your answer to townline@townline.org or through our Contact page. Include your name and address with your answer. Use “Common Ground” in the subject!

Previous winner: Shirley Kinney, Augusta

Town Line Original Columnists

Roland D. HalleeSCORES & OUTDOORS

by Roland D. Hallee | Isn’t it amazing how when you begin a conversation with someone, inevitably, it always leads to the weather. What would we do if we didn’t have the weather to talk about? Maybe some of us would never speak…

THE BEST VIEW

by Norma Best Boucher | Glenna Johnson Smith of Presque Isle died August 8, 2020, at the age of 100. She had been a potato farmer, an educator, a columnist, an editor, a dramatist, a poet, an author, and a community leader…

Peter CatesREVIEW POTPOURRI

by Peter Cates | A ten-inch 78 (Mercury 6373) features two country and western songs – (A Heartsick Soldier on) Heartbreak Ridge; and Missing in Action; both sides focused on a soldier fighting in Korea and the horrors of separation from home, wife and family amidst the noise of exploding shells…

SMALL SPACE GARDENING

by Melinda Myers | You’ve probably read you should remove and dispose of insect pest-infected and diseased plant material to reduce these problems in next season’s garden…

VETERANS CORNER

by Gary Kennedy | Beauty is as beauty does. I recently read an article about a tribe in Asian. We will call them the Ubuntu Tribe. An anthropologist proposed a game to a group of very young children. The eldest was perhaps 16 years old…

FOR YOUR HEALTH

HEALTH | The latest Cancer Risk Survey: Breast Cancer Edition from Myriad Genetics shows that more than half (63 percent) of women do not know that breast density can reveal an increased risk of breast cancer…