Boynton-Webber American Legion Post #179, in South China, will be hosting a turkey dinner for veterans, and one guest, on Wednesday, November 8, starting at noon, at the South China Legion Hall, at 79 Legion Memorial Drive, South China.
PFAS detected in area water supplyChina select board chairman Wayne Chadwick suggested to his fellow board members at their Oct. 10 meeting the possibility of installing solar panels on the closed landfill at the Alder Park Road transfer station.
Palermo resident Troy Nelson proposed the idea, Chadwick said. He pointed out that the three-phase power to which a solar development would connect is already available at the transfer station.
Chadwick envisioned leasing the area to a solar developer; board member Janet Preston suggested a town-owned project.
Other board members, and town manager Rebecca Hapgood, agreed the idea is worth exploring, though they were concerned the footings for the panels would go deep enough to puncture the landfill cap. They talked of finding documentation on closing the landfill, and of other types of solar-panel ground mounts.
Hapgood reported less welcome news from the transfer station: late on Friday, Oct. 6, a state Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) staffer told her testing had found PFAS (Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) in the station’s water supply, and in two private wells nearby.
Hapgood said the DEP plans to test more wells in the vicinity. The holiday weekend had delayed follow-up; board members postponed action for more information, including the extent of the contamination, whether the capped landfill is the cause and the cost of providing PFAS filters at the transfer station.
China residents presented two issues involving cooperation with adjoining towns.
Scott Pierz, executive director of the China Region Lakes Alliance (though he said he intends to resign the position soon), expressed concern about the unusually low level of China Lake.
According to a state DEP water level order, China Lake is supposed to be drawn down in the fall. The drawdown is intended to flush out algae after the lake has “turned over” – layers of deep cool water and warm surface water have mixed, so that nutrients from the bottom rise toward the surface. Pierz is concerned the drawdown is too early this year.
The Town of Vassalboro owns and controls the China Lake outlet dam. Pierz recommended establishing better communications between China and Vassalboro and perhaps seeking a role for China in dam management.
Jeanette Smith, chairman of the Thurston Park Committee, returned to the issue of access to the park, discussed at the Sept. 25 select board meeting (see the Sept. 28 issue of The Town Line, p. 2). Contrary to the report on that meeting, she said committee members would prefer the southern access to the park, if it can be made possible.
The Yorktown Road runs through the park, from Albion on the north to the Mann Road on the south. The road was discontinued many years ago, with a public right of way retained. However, the landowner on the south treats that end of Yorktown Road as his private driveway and does not want park visitors using it, Smith said.
From the north, a dirt road liable to washouts runs down a steep hill that Smith said is intimidating to some drivers. The hill is partly in Albion and partly in China, and Albion is not maintaining its section.
Smith said she attended the most recent Albion select board meeting to talk about the road and found board members “willing to work with China.” They offered to find out the legal status of their section of the road – one audience member thought it had been discontinued, Smith said – and to continue discussion.
Smith said there are now two bids for each of two Thurston Park projects, road repair and a storage building. Select board members postponed action, hoping for at least three bids to choose among.
In other business Oct. 10:
Board members supported her recommendations, citing the need to protect China’s natural resources.
The next regular China select board meeting is scheduled for 6:30 p.m. Monday, Oct. 23.
Nelson, the horse owned by Charles Horace “Hod” Nelson, of Waterville. (photo courtesy of Lost Trotting Parks Heritage Center)
Another locally-bred trotting horse, even more famous than General Knox (described last week), was Nelson.
Nelson was a bay horse. The color is described on line as “a reddish-brown or brown body color with a black point coloration on the mane, tail, ear edges, and lower legs.” Several on-line pictures dramatically contrast his dark mane with his lighter body. He stood a little over 15 hands (readers will remember a hand equals four inches).
He was born in 1882, probably in January. Various on-line sources say his sire (father) was Young Rolfe, born in Massachusetts and brought to Waterville by Charles Horace “Hod” Nelson, owner of Sunnyside Farm, before he was a year old.
Nelson’s dam (mother) was Gretchen, a daughter of Gideon, who was a son of Hambletonian. Thomas Stackpole Lang, of Vassalboro, brought Gideon to Maine around 1860, one of many well-bred horses he introduced to the Kennebec Valley.
Hambletonian (1792 – March 28, 1818) was a famous British Thoroughbred who won 18 of his 19 races before being retired to stud in 1801. The Hambletonian Stakes for three-year-old trotters, run annually since 1926, honors the British horse. This year’s race was held Aug. 5 at Meadowlands, in New Jersey.
The horse “Nelson”
Nelson the man (whom your writer will disrespectfully call “Hod” throughout this article to minimize confusion) bred, trained, raced and deeply loved Nelson the horse. Stephen D. Thompson’s long and well-researched article on the website losttrottingparks.com, titled “When Waterville was Home to Nelson, the Northern King,” gives a great deal of information about horse and man.
Nelson first attracted attention in 1884, winning a race for two-year-olds at the state fair in Lewiston. At the 1885 state fair in the same city, he won two cups, as the fastest three-year-old and the fastest stallion, and set a record.
He continued his winning ways in 1889 in Boston, Massachusetts, and in Buffalo, New York, where he won a $5,000 stake before, Hod wrote, 40,000 people.
On Sept. 6, 1890, in Bangor, he set a world record for a half-mile track. From there he was shipped to Illinois, where, on Sept. 29, 1890, in Kankakee, he set what Samuel Boardman, in his chapter in Kingsbury’s Kennebec Cunty history, called “the champion trotting stallion record of the world” over what Thompson said was a mile-long track.
This record stood for a year, Boardman wrote, until September 1891, when it was broken in Grand Rapids, Michigan – by Nelson.
After September and October 1890 races in Illinois and Indiana, Nelson and Hod returned to Sunnyside for the winter. In November, Hod, but presumably not Nelson, attended a “Banquet in celebration of the Champion Trotting Stallion Nelson at the Elmwood Hotel.”
Due to rumors that the 1889 Boston race had been fixed, Nelson and Hod were suspended by the National Trotting Association from December 1890 to Dec. 6, 1892. (Thompson wrote that Hod had refused to fix the race, but apparently someone else did and Hod was somehow caught up in the scheme.)
The suspension did not preclude racing, apparently, because E. P. Mayo, in his chapter in Edwin Whittemore’s Waterville history, described Nelson’s many journeys and busy fall schedules in 1891 and 1892.
Hod took Nelson to Michigan in October 1891 (or earlier? – see Boardman, above) for more racing; this time, according to Thompson’s account, he lost one race. Mayo said this western tour, “which was nothing short of a triumphal procession,” began in Saginaw, Michigan, and included nine cities in Michigan, Iowa and Indiana.
The duo apparently returned immediately to Maine, because on October 30, Thompson wrote, Nelson left Waterville “[i]n his own train car” with three grooms and Hod for Chicago’s American Horse Show. He was received enthusiastically at stops along the way and “Became the idol of the show!”
(Mayo said Nelson’s triumph at the Chicago horse show was in 1890, rather than 1891; he, too, said Nelson returned from Indiana and rested a week in Maine before heading to Chicago, and he, too, used the word “idol.”)
In 1892 and 1893, Mayo wrote, Nelson continuing racing and exhibiting at many tracks, from New Jersey through New England to New Brunswick.
On June 24, 1902, Hod drove Nelson in Waterville’s Centennial parade. According to William Abbott Smith’s account in Whittemore’s history, they were right behind the carriages containing “invited guests,” city officials and the centennial organizing committee.
After Hod and Nelson, Smith wrote, came “Horses from Sunnyside Farm, driven by young ladies, two mounted, handsomely arrayed.”
At his last public appearance, on “Nelson Day” (honoring both horse and man), held Sept. 10 at the 1907 Central Maine Fair, in Waterville, Nelson “received the cheers of thousands as he went around the track with his old time style, and was visited by thousands in his stall” (according to a Dec. 9, 1909, Waterville Sentinel obituary for the horse that Thompson quoted).
Hod put Nelson down on Dec. 1, 1909, at Sunnyside Farm. Thompson described plans for his burial and grave marker, but apparently failed to find the marker or its presumed location.
An inscribed granite marker at the Sterling Street Playground, in Waterville, honoring the life of Nelson. The playground is part of what was once Sunnyside Farm, the home of Nelson. (photo by Roland Hallee)
In the Sentinel article, Hod described his horse as “a clever old fellow and…kind to everybody. In all his life he has only bitten at two or three persons and would not have done so then had they let him along [sic] or had they not been intoxicated. He could tell when a man had been drinking and seemed to take a dislike to them on that account.”
Hod added that someone offered him $125,000 for Nelson when the horse was eight years old, and he refused.
In 1994, Nelson was elected to the Harness Racing Hall of Fame’s Hall of Immortals, horse division. One source says he was the only Maine-bred trotting horse so honored.
Another indication of his fame, according to on-line sources, is that Currier and Ives made six prints of Nelson. The famous New York City printmakers also did portraits of Lady Maud and Camors, two of many horses sired by Thomas Stackpole Lang’s General Knox.
Charles Horace “Hod” Nelson
“Hod” Nelson
Hod Nelson was born April 16, 1843, in Palermo (or China; sources differ), the younger son of a storekeeper named Benjamin Nelson and his wife Asenath (Brown) Nelson. Hod spent his life farming and breeding horses, with an interruption during the Civil War.
According to the Find a Grave website, quoting submitted information, Hod enlisted in the 19th Maine Infantry as a private on Aug. 1, 1862; was “discharged for disability” March 13, 1863; re-enlisted as a private in the 12th Maine Infantry on Oct. 2, 1865; and was promoted to first sergeant before his honorable discharge March 3, 1866. Later, he was commander of Waterville’s W. S. Heath G.A.R. Post.
On Nov. 7, 1867, Hod married Emma Aubine Jones, who was born in China, Jan. 31, 1848, the only child of Francis and Eliza (Pinkham) Jones. An on-line genealogy lists no children of the marriage.
Hod owned a farm in China until 1882, when he bought what became Sunnyside Farm, off the Oakland Road – now Kennedy Memorial Drive (KMD) – in Waterville.
Thompson, through diligent research, established that Sunnyside Farm was on the south side of KMD between Nelson and Carver streets. He quoted an 1888 description that said there were actually two farms on the 540 acres of pasture and hayfields.
The farm for the brood mares and foals included three barns and “a fine residence” (presumably Hod and Emma’s home). The farm for the stallions had “two large barns” – and in 1888 a third was being planned – and a “substantial, old-fashioned house” where the employees lived.
By April 1894, Hod had another farm in Fairfield, mentioned in an April 23, 1894, article in The Kennebec Journal that Thompson found. Nelson’s dam, Gretchen, age 27, was still living at Sunnyside, and still had “the same fine limbs, the same straight back, and general proportions of beauty as a filly of four or five.”
Hod had 76 horses at Sunnyside and 41 “brood mares and colts” at his Fairfield farm, according to the article.
Later in life Hod suffered health issues – Thompson mentioned his war-related disability – and financial problems. By mid-March 1915 he was seriously ill, and Emma, who was caring for him, had a stroke. Her nephew took Hod to the veterans’ home at Togus, where he died on March 29, 1915.
Emma recovered and lived in a Waterville apartment until her death on Aug. 12, 1916, Thompson wrote. (An on-line genealogy dates her death Aug. 11, 1916.)
Hod and Emma Nelson are buried in Waterville’s Pine Grove Cemetery. One on-line genealogical source says the same cemetery holds the graves of Hod’s brother, Edward White Nelson (1841 – Nov. 9, 1906), Edward’s wife Cassandra Marden Worthing (born in Palermo, July 16, 1843, and died in Waterville Dec.7, 1903) and at least three of their four children, Hod’s nieces and nephew.
The Find a Grave website does not list Edward or Cassandra Nelson in Pine Grove cemetery. It does show the tombstone of their son (and Hod’s nephew), lawyer and Congressman John Edward Nelson (July 12, 1874 – April 11, 1955).
Kingsbury, Henry D., ed., Illustrated History of Kennebec County Maine 1625-1892 (1892).
Whittemore, Rev. Edwin Carey, Centennial History of Waterville 1802-1902 (1902).
Website, miscellaneous.
by Mary GrowThe China planning board’s public hearing on Novel Energy Systems’ proposed community solar garden on Parmenter Hill Road, scheduled for Oct. 10, was canceled due to lack of a board quorum. A new hearing date will be set and announced.
Galen Neal
A career and technical student in China was recognized for excellence at the 2023 SkillsUSA Championships, held in Atlanta, on June 21-22. More than 6,000 students competed at the national showcase of career and technical education. The SkillsUSA Championships is the largest skill competition in the world and covers 1.79 million square feet, equivalent to 31 football fields or 41 acres.
Galen Neal, from China and a student at Mid-Maine Technical Center (Waterville), was awarded a Skill Point Certificate in Photography.
Skill Point Certificates were awarded to all national contestants who met a threshold contest score. The Skill Point Certificate represents workplace readiness in the occupational specialty and students can add the certificate to their employment portfolio as an indicator of proficiency.
Students were invited to the event to demonstrate their technical skills, workplace skills and personal skills in 110 hands-on competitions including robotics, automotive technology, drafting, criminal justice, aviation maintenance and public speaking. Industry leaders from 650 businesses, corporations, trade associations and unions planned and evaluated the contestants against their standards for entry-level workers. Industry support of the SkillsUSA Championships is valued at over $36 million in donated time, equipment, cash and material. More than 1,200 industry judges and technical committee members participated this year. All SkillsUSA Championships competitors were honored on Friday night, June 23 at the SkillsUSA Awards Session at State Farm Arena.
The SkillsUSA Championships event is held annually for students in middle school, high school or college/postsecondary programs as part of the SkillsUSA National Leadership & Skills Conference. The national, nonprofit partnership of students, instructors and industry is a verified talent pipeline for America’s skilled workforce that is working to help solve the skills gap.
by Mary GrowThe topic at the Sept. 26 China planning board meeting was the proposed community solar garden on the west side of the section of Parmenter Hill Road locally called Moe’s Mountain.
Minnesota-based Novel Energy Systems has begun the application process, planning to lease 13.73 acres of the southern part of Maurice Haskell, Jr.’s land and use 6.87 acres for a fence-enclosed array of about 2,300 solar panels. The lease is for 25 years, with a five-year extension possible.
Scott Tempel, permitting specialist for Novel Energy Systems, zoomed in for what was announced as a presentation but turned into a question-and answer session.
After Tempel’s initial description, four audience members, including abutting property-owners, had many questions, mostly about effects on nearby residents and the natural environment.
Tempel explained a community solar garden signs up area customers, residential and commercial, who are rewarded with a 10 percent discount on electricity bills. Who is allowed to join depends on state regulations; Minnesota allows anyone in the same or an abutting county, but he does not yet know Maine rules.
The proposed China project would generate 975 kilowatts, power enough to support from 50 to 75 subscribers, depending on usage, Tempel estimated. The plan calls for panels that would tilt to follow the sun, maximizing daily production time.
The power generated will go into the grid. The connection with Central Maine Power Company’s line will be mostly underground; there will be five utility poles at the beginning of the access road, Tempel said.
He expects most of the power generated will stay in Maine, he told one audience member, but he cannot guarantee that CMP will not send a single electron out of state.
The application will include a maintenance plan. Tempel explained the site will be planted with native grasses and plants attractive to pollinators, and mowed minimally. He told board member Michael Brown, a farmer by profession, that sheep could be allowed to graze inside the fence, as in Minnesota, but not goats, because goats would eat the wiring and climb on the panels.
By state law, the application will include an approved decommissioning plan. Tempel said Novel has submitted one to the Maine Department of Environmental Protection and is awaiting a response. He told Brown decommissioning includes removing everything, including underground wires.
Audience members were concerned about contamination, especially metals, affecting soil and groundwater. Tempel said there is little chance of the solar panels spreading invasive elements. There are not yet studies of long-term – 25-year or more – impacts.
One woman asked about electromagnetic effects. Tempel said the issue, if there is one, is not electromagnetics, but voltage; and because solar arrays are well-grounded, the usual effect is to reduce any stray voltage in the area. He offered to look up studies.
Audience members seemed skeptical of his reassurances, sometimes shaking their heads in apparent disbelief. When he said a solar farm seldom affects adjoining property values and if it does, it might enhance them, there were disbelieving snickers. Planning board co-chairman Wall asked Tempel to provide studies.
Wall said she and codes officer Zachary Gosselin will have a complete copy of the application available for review at the China town office as soon as possible. The office, at 571 Lakeview Drive, is open Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday from 7:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. (closed on Wednesdays), and the first and last Saturday of each month from 8 to 11 a.m.
Wall said the next opportunity for questions will be at the board’s public hearing on Novel’s application. It is currently scheduled for 6:30 p.m., Tuesday, Oct. 10, probably in the China town office meeting room (if not, in the nearby portable building where the board met Sept. 26).
After the hearing, Wall said, the board will review the application for completeness and conformity with town requirements for a commercial development. China does not have an ordinance specifically for solar developments.
If the board approves the application, there is a 30-day window during which an appeal may be made to the China board of appeals.
Tempel said Novel currently plans to start construction in the spring of 2025 and finish by that fall. The active construction work usually takes from six to eight weeks, but the timetable depends on weather and availability of materials and supplies.
photo credit: United Valley Democrats Facebook page
The United Valley Democratic (UVD) Committee ‘End-of Summer’ Event will instead celebrate Autumn on Saturday, October 7, at 327 Stevens Shore Road, in Palermo. It was originally scheduled the day the hurricane passed close to Maine’s coast, when many residents lost their power.
United Valley Democratic Committee (formerly the China Democratic Committee) was recently organized by combining Democratic committees from the adjacent towns in the Sheepscot River Valley including China, Vassalboro, Palermo and Windsor. While continuing to grow with other towns, the UVD committee meets regularly on the third Tuesday of each month at 5:30 p.m., and welcomes new members. Their facebook page has the most current event details.
Mark Brunton, chairman of the UVD Committee, explained the need for the reorganization, “UVD brings people together to make our communities stronger, healthier and improve the lives of all our neighbors. It made sense to combine our committees to raise our visibility and let people know they are welcomed to join us.”
To show your support, join the United Valley Democratic Committee’s Fall Celebration on October 7, from 2 – 8 p.m.
For more information, contact the UVD Committee at unitedvalleydems@gmail.com.
Contributed photo
Students in Mrs. Dunn’s class had an amazing first day of school at China Primary School! They got to make crowns to celebrate the occasion, and everyone was smiling at the end of the day! Wishing them a great year of learning as they start their educational journey at RSU #18!
by Mary GrowThe Sept. 25 China select board meeting began with a request from two landowners on the section of Parmenter Hill Road known as Moe’s Mountain. They seek a China moratorium on power line development, like those adopted by Albion and Palermo voters in the hope of influencing the proposed LS power line.
Joshua LaVerdiere and Jesse Haskell said one of the potential power line routes would run over the hill, including over Lowell “Moe” Thomas’s grave, destroying a scenic view, damaging the natural environment and reducing the value of their homes and farmland.
Select board members discussed options at length.
A moratorium requires an ordinance adopted by town voters. There is not time to add a question to the Nov. 7 ballot; the next annual vote will be in June 2024.
For a special town meeting, China has a quorum requirement: 100 registered voters are needed to open the meeting.
Select board members can call a meeting on their own initiative; or they can require the interested parties to collect more than 200 petition signatures requesting a meeting, in order to demonstrate public interest and increase the chance of attracting 100 voters.
A draft ordinance could be part of a petition for a meeting; or select board members could present an ordinance to voters. LaVerdiere and Haskell suggested adapting Palermo’s, which was adapted from Albion’s. Daniel Pepice, joining the meeting later in the discussion, provided a copy.
Jeanette Smith, chairman of China’s Thurston Park committee, added that the LS power line might run close to park boundaries.
LS Power is supposed to send letters to potentially affected landowners. Smith has not received one referring to the park. LaVerdiere said he never got one; Pepice estimated 40 percent of potentially affected landowners in the China-Palermo area have not been notified.
Select board members voted unanimously to ask town attorney Amanda Meader to review the Albion/Palermo ordinance. They hope to have her opinion by their first meeting in October, when they will consider whether to call a special town meeting or to require a petition for one.
Smith attended the Sept. 25 select board meeting to talk about repairs in Thurston Park, still recovering from the Dec. 23, 2022, rainstorm that caused major washouts. Two trails were damaged when fallen branches blocked culverts. There were also washouts on the access road in Albion, though Smith said it is usable.
Transfer station returns to stickers Jan. 1
Beginning Jan. 1, 2024, China and Palermo residents will need a sticker on their vehicle to enter the China transfer station. Stickers will cost $2, and should be available at town offices by Nov. 1.
On a 3-2 vote at their Sept. 25 meeting, China select board members adopted the new policy recommended by their transfer station committee (see the Sept. 21 issue of The Town Line, p. 3).
Board chairman Wayne Chadwick and member Blane Casey voted no. Chadwick said his vote was only because he opposes the $2 fee, not because he opposes stickers.
Town Manager Rebecca Hapgood presented a Transfer Station Access Policy that tells China and Palermo residents where to paste the stickers and explains alternatives for temporary admission (for seasonal residents or contractors working for residents, for example).
“We’ll try it for a year, see how it goes,” Hapgood said.
Residents who paid the $10 fee for an additional RFID (radio frequency identification) tag may return the tag to the town office and, with proof of purchase, get a full refund, between Nov. 1, 2023, and May 31, 2024.
Board members postponed action on the one bid for trail work, hoping for more bids. Because the access road is in Albion, they took no action on road work until Town Manager Rebecca Hapgood finds out whether it is legal to spend China money on an Albion road.
Smith explained that the park committee does not recommend access from the south because the abutting landowner objects. When, years ago, the town legally abandoned Yorktown Road, which runs north-south through the park, a public right-of-way was preserved, she said.
Smith shared a video from a group called National Fitness Campaign that helps build outdoor gymnasiums or fitness courts full of exercise equipment. The campaign approached China earlier this year, she said. She does not consider the idea appropriate for Thurston Park.
In other business:
Because the next regular select board meeting would fall on Oct. 9, the Indigenous Peoples Day holiday, board members moved it to Tuesday, Oct. 10; and because the planning board meets at 6:30 p.m. Oct. 10, they scheduled the select board meeting for 5 p.m.
Pictured, from left to right, Noah Bechard, Eli Redmond, Lukas Stabins, Nathan Polley (YCC Director), Sam Worthley, and Grady McCormick. Sbsent from the photo was Noah Pelletier. (photo by Bailee Mallett)
On behalf of the China Region Lakes Alliance, kudos for the great work done by the Youth Conservation Corps (YCC) during the summer of 2023. The YCC completed five LakeSmart projects on China Lake with additional work at the Cottages at China Lake, and also conducted work for the China Lake Association’s Erosion Reduction Campaign. The YCC also completed two other LakeSmart projects on Webber Pond.