photo: vassalboro.net
The Vassalboro Public Library will hold a $2 Holiday Book Sale for the entire month of December.
There will be a great selection of books, media, and puzzles: fiction, non-fiction, and children’s books.
Social distancing, hand sanitizer, and facial coverings are required. Space is limited to one family or individual at a time in the book sale room. the library is located at 930 Bog Road, East Vassalboro, 04989.
Fill a bag for $2!
Due to COVID-19, it is realized that many holiday festivities have been modified, canceled, etc. The St. Bridget Community Center, in North Vassalboro, has created an outdoor display of which people can become a part. The faces of the shepherds, angel and kings have been cut out so that individuals can take their picture(s).
Contributed photo
Contributed photo
A similar statue in Winslow with the rifle in hand (left), and the statue in Vassalboro missing the rifle (right). (The Town Line file photos by Isabelle Markley)
The two pieces of the missing rifle found by Nate Gray. (photo courtesy of Vassalboro Historical Society)
Looking up at the Civil War memorial statue standing guard over Monument Park on Route 32, in Vassalboro, you may notice something missing. Although the proud Union soldier stands tall, gripping the muzzle of a 19th century rifle, the bottom portion of the chiseled gun he holds is gone. Where it disappeared to has been a source of continuing mystery and speculation in the town of Vassalboro. But now, after more than 50 years, a part of this lost history has been found.
The commemorative statue was commissioned in 1905 by the town of Vassalboro from Hallowell sculptor William Tregembo for a cost of $1,075, according to a copy of the contract kept by the Vassalboro Historical Society.
The bottom half of the rifle was broken off and lost “in the late ‘60s or ‘70s,” said Janice Clowes, president of the Vassalboro Historical Society. It is unknown whether the incident was an act of vandalism or an act of God.
Nate Gray
Nate Gray, an employee for the Maine Department of Marine Resources, stumbled upon several broken sections of the missing relic last week while investigating a blockage at the Outlet Dam, courtesy of a couple of nature’s impulsive dam builders.
“Beavers had plugged the gates at Outlet Dam,” he said. “I went to observe the beaver activity [and] while watching for the beavers, I happened upon the rifle pieces. I scooped them up and delivered [them] to the town office for safe keeping.”
According to Gray, “Local legend has it that some pieces [of the rifle] had been found in the past and kept in the former town office. Those pieces were lost or misplaced in the move to the new town office. True? Not true? We may never know. Time has a way of blurring past events.”
There has been some talk of restoring the statue to its former glory, especially considering Vassalboro will be celebrating its semiquincentennial anniversary next year.
“There have been a couple people looking into the possibility of finding grant money or fundraising to get the ball rolling,” said Vassalboro Historical Society president Clowes. “Vassalboro turns 250 in 2021, [and] I think it would be a great birthday present to the town.”
An alternative view of the rifle pieces found. (photo courtesy of Nate Gray)
The Vassalboro Community School Jobs for Maine Graduates (JMG) program will be doing their annual Christmas wreath sale, starting right now until the week after Thanksgiving. They will still be taking orders when they get back from Thanksgiving break.
These are locally-grown and assembled wreaths out of Skowhegan, and a company they have worked with for the past six years. They are fresh and very reasonable. The money goes to the JMG program which in turn the students decide on different nonprofits that could use help during the year.
Students research and vote on where they will spend the money
The prices are as follows: Classic- $25; Blue Royal- $28; and Plaid Bow- $28.
by Mary GrowNot surprisingly, the Covid-19 pandemic dominated discussion at the Vassalboro School Board’s Nov. 17 meeting, leading to reluctant decisions and much praise for everyone involved in keeping the town school safe.
The most unenthusiastic decision was to postpone winter sports – basketball and cheerleading – as Assistant Principal Greg Hughes recommended. In addition to concern about indoor sports potentially spreading disease, the gymnasium is hosting after-school child-care until 5:30 p.m., severely limiting its use for sports, Hughes said.
Board member Jolene Gamage called the unanimous decision “unfortunate but understandable.” Given the unpredictability of the virus’s spread, board members agreed to revisit the issue at their December and January meetings.
On the recommendations of Superintendent Alan Pfeiffer and Principal Megan Allen, board members also agreed unanimously to continue the Wednesday early release days at least through January 2021. The class-free afternoons give teachers valuable time to continue to adapt their teaching materials and methods to remote learning and to exchange ideas and suggestions, Allen said.
Reports from Pfeiffer, Allen, school nurse MaryAnn Fortin and teacher/technology coordinator David Trask assured board members things are going well at Vassalboro Community School, under the circumstances.
There was heavy emphasis on safety measures for students, staff and families.
VCS has just reopened on an alternate-days basis after two weeks of 100 percent remote learning after one positive coronavirus test. Allen believes the closure averted a possible spread of the virus.
“I feel really good about that call. I think the CDC (Center for Disease Control and Prevention) recommendation was spot on,” Allen said. She thanked Pfeiffer and Fortin for supporting the decision.
Pfeiffer in turn thanked all the staff for being “hypervigilant” and doing more than their required jobs when necessary. Having no precedents to follow makes their situations extremely difficult, he pointed out.
Pfeiffer said he is in frequent touch with superintendents throughout Maine, especially those in the immediate area, and with Erskine Academy Headmaster Michael McQuarrie. On Nov. 17, following a third reported case of coronavirus, McQuarrie announced that Erskine would go to fully remote classes until Nov. 30. He emphasized that each case originated outside the South China high school; there has been no evidence of transmission inside the school.
Fortin expects soon to receive a supply of rapid-screening tests that can be given to staff members or students who show symptoms that might be coronavirus, with parental permission before a student is tested.
Vassalboro has a shortage of bus drivers, Pfeiffer said. Retired driver Ellie Lessard has returned to work as a substitute, and, Director of Finance Paula Pooler added, a four-week driving course attracted 12 students.
Pooler said Vassalboro has one new bus on the road and three more expected in December, purchased with Covid-19 money. Paperwork for the federal grants is keeping the business office “right out straight,” she said, but so far grants have provided enough money so that the school budget “has not been hit yet” by adaptations to the virus.
Trask’s report described some of the many steps that were needed to implement remote learning, especially buying technological equipment for students and staff. All students and staff members now have computers, he said. There are still a few students who do not have adequate cellphone or internet access to make distance learning easy.
Trask told board members additional equipment, technical support and money to maintain and repair the greater number of devices will be needed. He thanked Pfeiffer, Allen, Hughes and multi-school technical coordinator Will Backman for supporting his requests in March. As a result, he said, VCS was ready for remote learning the day school re-opened.
Backman told Trask, “You embody Vassalboro’s can-do attitude.” School Board Chairman Kevin Levasseur agreed.
In other business, board members accepted with regret Amy Benham’s resignation as special education director for Vassalboro and Winslow. Pfeiffer said the two school departments had advertised for a shared position and had no responses; now he and Winslow Superintendent Peter Thiboutot are advertising separately.
The next Vassalboro School Board meeting will be at 6 p.m., Tuesday, Dec. 15. It is almost certain to be a virtual meeting.
by Mary GrowVassalboro Planning Board members approved one of three applications on their Nov. 10 agenda, in the course of a four-hour meeting under often-frustrating conditions.
To accommodate the expected audience, which numbered more than two dozen at one point, board members held the meeting in St. Bridget’s Center, in North Vassalboro. The attractive former church is large enough to allow for social distancing, but with distancing, masks and difficult acoustics in the high-ceilinged room, audience members repeatedly had to ask board members what they were discussing.
The evening’s agenda called for two public hearings, on two separate applications from Leo Barnett for buildings in which to have marijuana-growing operations at two locations; review of each application; and review of Jeremy Soucy’s application for a used-car business. After the hearings and Barnett’s first application took more than two and a half hours, Soucy agreed to the board’s postponing his application to the December meeting.
The first hearing was on Barnett’s application to build two more marijuana growing buildings and a small storage building on his property on Old Meadow Lane, which runs east off Riverside Drive (Route 201) a little north of the Cushnoc Road intersection. There were few comments.
The second hearing was on Barnett’s application to build two marijuana growing buildings and a small storage building on Andrew Barnett’s property at the east end of Sherwood Lane, which also runs east off Riverside Drive, north of the Burleigh Road intersection. A dozen residents of the Sherwood Lane subdivision expressed objections, some bringing pages of prepared material.
Their major concerns were that the quiet residential area would see increased traffic, unwelcome odors, increased drainage problems and perhaps attempted theft or other crimes. They raised legal questions about the right-of-way by which Barnett accesses his property and about state and local marijuana laws and ordinances, and questioned the accuracy of the map that was a required part of the application.
After board Chairman Virginia Brackett closed the second hearing, board members determined that Barnett’s Old Meadow Lane application was complete. They then approved it on a 3-1 vote, with board member Douglas Phillips opposed.
Phillips said he believed the application needed to be clarified to separate construction of the buildings from proposed use of the buildings. He did not find adequate information to act on the proposed use.
In response to comments from near-by resident Candy Manocchio and volunteer fire department member Michael Vashon, board members attached two conditions to the permit. Barnett is to make sure there is access for emergency vehicles to the existing buildings and to the new ones; and if there are odor complaints, he is to install appropriate odor-control measures.
Discussion of whether the Sherwood Lane application was complete took almost an hour, with questions (and calls of “We can’t hear you!”) from the audience. At the end of the review, a motion to find the application complete failed to get a second, and a motion to find it incomplete failed on a 2-2 tie. The reason board members gave for incompleteness was that the map was not drawn to scale and was therefore inadequate.
By then Barnett had pointed out that Vassalboro’s ordinance says the planning board is first to find that an application is complete and, after that decision, is to schedule a public hearing on the application, if board members think a hearing is needed. Since the evening’s proceedings had reversed the process, he said a decision on whether the application was complete would be contrary to the ordinance.
Board members adjourned with the understanding they will entertain a new application for Barnett’s Sherwood Lane project, with a map that meets their requirements, at their December 1 meeting.
STUDENT WRITERS PROGRAMby Olivia Bourque of Vassalboro, Maine
Erskine Academy Junior
It is truly paradoxical that a generation has been raised to be enthralled by inventions detrimental to their mental health and wellbeing. A Netflix documentary, The Social Dilemma, addresses the evolution of and dangers of social media, an enigma and issue growing exponentially along with the minds of young adults. Simply stated, exposure to harsh and unfiltered content on social media harms teens’ self esteem, while captivating them with unlimited information tailored to their wants and interests. Software smarter than anyone and worth millions of dollars generates a feed of suggested content to keep everyone mindlessly engrossed, though this software was never created to improve the mental state of the person behind the screen, but rather to make some people an enormous amounts of money.
An embellished version of this enchantment is demonstrated with a teenage boy, a standard social media app, and a fictional group of people controlling his suggested feed (replacing the job of designated software for this purpose). At the beginning of the documentary, this group of people keeping the teenage boy actively swiping seems innovative, although the boy’s family and friends blatantly express their concern and frustration with his obsession. Any parent of a child with a smartphone would likely wholeheartedly confirm this aggravation, as these apps truly are addicting. This is expected, however, especially with the knowledge that machines present users with content hand-selected for their amusement.
As the film continues, the people controlling the teenage boy’s suggested feed and notifications slowly come to the epiphany that their job is not in the best interest of the user whom they’re supposed to keep engaged. Though this was a satisfying ending, it is unrealistic, as these groups of people are actually machines, incapable of understanding human emotions, actually observing how its work affects their users, and finally does not have the power to discontinue their work. With this, society does not have anyone to rely on to contain this mass craze, and therefore we must come to this revelation on our own.
In a smaller part of The Social Dilemma, a teenage girl represents a massive demographic of those whose mental health and self esteem is at jeopardy; she is also spending far too much time scrolling through content tailored to her, and along the way she begins to compare herself to others, instilling unrealistic expectations for herself. Like this girl, many young adults question their worth once they see what the ideal woman or man should look like through a series of heavily edited pictures.
This can often lead to numerous mental health issues, such as depression, anxiety, and eating disorders. Instead of taking away social media’s power to contort self-image, the girl responds to this insecurity by fixing her hair, makeup, and lighting, finding the perfect filter, and posting a picture of herself attempting to conform with current beauty standards.
This backfires on her when she receives mean comments online about her ears. From this, her self-esteem plummets, and she does everything in her power to cover her ears. Not only does this teenager unknowingly succumb to temptation of handpicked material online, but she also alters her emotional state as a result. This enforces the idea that a generation of self-destructive slaves to the internet are being created, and it’s almost unavoidable.
Student Writer’s Program: What Is It?
The Town Line has published the first in what we hope will be many articles from local students under the heading of the “Student Writer’s Program.” While it may seem plainly evident why The Town Line would pursue this program with local schools and students, we think it’s worth the time to highlight the reasons why we enthusiastically support this endeavor.
Up front, the program is meant to offer students who have a love of writing a venue where they can be published and read in their community. We have specifically not provided topics for the students to write on or about, and we have left the editing largely up to their teachers. From our perspective this is a free form space provided to students.
From the perspective of the community, what is the benefit? When considering any piece that should or could be published, this is a question we often ask ourselves at The Town Line. The benefit is that we as community are given a glimpse into how our students see the world, what concerns them, and, maybe even possible solutions to our pressing problems. Our fundamental mission at the paper is to help us all better understand and appreciate our community, our state, and our nation through journalism and print.
We hope you will read these articles with as much interest and enjoyment as we do. The students are giving us a rare opportunity to hear them out, to peer into their world, and see how they are processing this world we, as adults, are giving them.
To include your high school, contact The Town Line, townline@townline.org.
From left to right, Vassalboro selectmen John Melrose, Barbara Redmond and Rob Browne listen as fire department member Mike Vashon, right, describes the functions of one of the town’s fire trucks during a recent tour of the town’s two fire stations. (photo courtesy of Mary Sabins)
The Vassalboro Business Association is sponsoring a Light Up The Season in Vassalboro outdoor holiday display contest, for and in Vassalboro.
To enter simply call or text your name and the address of the display site to 631-3303 or email the information to lindatitus@hotmail.com, before December 15. It is free.
Prizes will be awarded in two categories, Best in Town, and Most Creative. The prizes will range from $50 – $150 and the winners will be announced on December 19.
The sites will be judged between December 16 and 18. It is asked to have your lights on from 5:30 – 9 p.m. Only addresses – no names – of the participants will be published online so the community may drive by to appreciate all your hard work.
We all have bad days. Maybe your cat got run over or maybe the jelly in your PB and J sandwich made the bread way too soggy for the desired taste of the sandwich, or maybe you’ve had your head in your screen all day. I find myself having days where I ponder life more than others, where I come up with incredibly insane situations that I would never be in, and then I find myself having days where it kills me to tear my eyes away from my screen for two seconds. Social media is a disease that is being spread upon the youth. Many teens are struggling to find motivation and purpose. Very engaging and authentic opening paragraph, with a clear thesis!
The day I was handed my iPhone was the day my life changed. I stopped being the carefree child that didn’t have a care in the world. I was consumed with dark thoughts. I now had voices in my head making me second guess if my picture was pretty enough, if someone would say something about my imperfections, and if I needed to lose a little extra weight because I didn’t look like the supermodels that would pop up in my ads. My care-free spirit suddenly started to care. That’s what’s happening to our youth. If you hand your child a smartphone, it’s not a matter of if they will become consumed with darkness, it’s the matter of when. Wow!
Growing up a girl, all eyes are now on you and how you mature. I personally hear it all the time, “ oh wow Hannah, it looks like you have lost weight.” or “ Hannah, you look so different”, as if they are looking for these things the second I arrive in their presence, but for a few minutes you have the gladdening thought of the comment. Social media, however, can take this comment too far; all of a sudden the need for compliments takes over and you find yourself googling how to lose weight or how to be prettier. No girl should have to go through the expectations that society puts out for us. All of this could be avoided if the unfair comparison between teenagers and supermodels stopped. 72% of all teens use Instagram daily. This data is scary because that is 72% of the youth being brainwashed everyday.
Sixty-nine percent of children have their own devices by the age of 12, which was a 41% increase from 2015. The problem keeps growing and won’t stop. Smartphones were introduced in 2007 and from 2010 to 2015 visits to doctors regarding depression jumped nearly 30%. Now, I know it is hard to believe that social media causes depression. It is not a direct cause, however, it is a major contribution.
Technology is killing kids’ sense of adventure and their creative wavelengths. Sure, you may think that your kid has it under control because they still get active. For example, they will walk your dog (yay, exercise) but soon enough the whole world knows that your little Susie took old sparky for a walk. Parents now observe children with their eyes gleaned (Glued?) to a screen instead of drawing a picture or playing with friends.
Social media is causing kids’ minds to alter completely. Thirty years ago the biggest worry in parents’ minds was if their kids were going to eat a worm at recess; today the biggest worry in a parents mind is if their child will be a victim of this darkness that consumes young teens. Social media causes so much hate and discontent that we can’t experience the joys of walking alone at night or leaving the house in the morning and making it back just in time for dinner. This is a problem that will become out of hand if we do not take action today.
Student Writer’s Program: What Is It?
The Town Line has published the first in what we hope will be many articles from local students under the heading of the “Student Writer’s Program.” While it may seem plainly evident why The Town Line would pursue this program with local schools and students, I think it’s worth the time to highlight the reasons why we enthusiastically support this endeavor.
Up front, the program is meant to offer students who have a love of writing a venue where they can be published and read in their community. We have specifically not provided topics for the students to write on or about, and we have left the editing largely up to their teachers. From our perspective this is a free form space provided to students.
From the perspective of the community, what is the benefit? When considering any piece that should or could be published, this is a question we often ask ourselves at The Town Line. The benefit is that we as community are given a glimpse into how our students see the world, what concerns them, and, maybe even possible solutions to our pressing problems. Our fundamental mission at the paper is to help us all better understand and appreciate our community, our state, and our nation through journalism and print.
We hope you will read these articles with as much interest and enjoyment as we do. The students are giving us a rare opportunity to hear them out, to peer into their world, and see how they are processing this world we, as adults, are giving them.
To include your high school, contact The Town Line, townline@townline.org.