Katahdin Lodge and Camps of Patten, Maine In 1969

Look at all that front lawn I had to mow down there at Katahdin Lodge and Camps, in the summer of 1969.

Anytime Finley Clarke's Nephew, that'd be me, David Robert Crews, was living and working at Finley's Katahdin Lodge and Camps, I was happy to be the Lodge's sole grass cutter and weed whacker.

I wouldn't have it any other way.

And my Uncle Finley and his wife, my Aunt Martha, both completely agreed with me.

In November of 1968, I moved, from where I grew up in Dundalk, Maryland, a Baltimore County suburb of Baltimore City, to Katahdin Lodge of Patten, Maine, to begin living and working at the Lodge. In effect exchanging the crowded, industrialized sights, sounds and smells of suburban sprawl for the quiet, sometimes gentle/sometimes harsh, natural beauty and fresh air of the heavily forested, sparsely populated Katahdin Valley.

The very first time I had entered that wide, rolling, deep green, mountain and valley landscape, was during summer vacation of 1966. I was a 16 year old passenger in my father's car. Dad, my mother, younger sister, cousin Nelson and I were on our way, up from Maryland, to spend a week at the hunting lodge my Uncle Finley, my mother's younger brother and my father's best friend, had bought the year before. We were driving about 6 miles south of the Lodge, when I was blessed with my first full, sweeping look from the northern Appalachian Mountains to our left, then back across Rural Route 11 and out across the wide, rolling Katahdin Valley to our right.

I felt the very soul of me expand -- powerfully -- outwards in all directions around our moving car -- with such secure, natural warmth that I can not fully express. Something previously unknown to me, from deep inside of my living spirit, reached out and embraced the countryside. It instantly mingled all in amongst the multitudes of tall, healthy green trees. Then slid back inside of me.

For the first time in my life, it felt like I had finally arrived at home.

I had found my most comfortable place on earth. I was destined to love that sweet, rough section of God's Country more than anyplace else I have ever been.

Which is why, at the end of Thanksgiving Day Week of November 1968, after my father and I had spent that week at the Lodge, I accepted my Uncle Fin and Aunt Marty's request that I stay there at Katahdin Lodge to live with and work for them, instead of going back home to Baltimore to join the US Merchant Marines, as I had told everyone in my family that I was planning on doing.

I graduated from Dundalk High School on June 5, 1968, and had planned on joining the Merchant Marines before my official Army draft notice came. That way, I could not be drafted into the US Army, trained as an infantryman and sent to die in Vietnam. At that time in our nation's history, most young Americans thought that all military draftees were sent to Vietnam as infantrymen. And that few ever returned home fully alive.

In November of '68, I figured that I had about another year before my draft notice arrived in the mail. So I stayed at Katahdin Lodge, and my father drove back home to the Baltimore suburbs alone.

And I experienced my first wintertime in northern Maine.

Eventually, after a great winter spent at Katahdin Lodge, with my Uncle Fin and Aunt Marty, a few paying lodge guests, along with plenty enough of the finest kind of Mainers, especially the country girls, and after doing a whole lotta' snowmobile riding, but mostly doing a whole lotta' hard, often dangerous physical labor, I became a Registered Maine Guide--who specialized in guiding bear hunters.

I was the right man for the job.

Especially when it came time for keeping the Lodge's roofs, walkways, parking areas and large horseshoe shaped driveway shoveled or plowed free from the record snowfall of the winter of 1968-69 and for keeping the Lodge's substantial, rocky lawns mowed and looking good.

All through my teenage years, while still living in Dundalk, I had shoveled neighborhood sidewalks and driveways, and had mowed and trimmed neighborhood lawns for money.

My way of viewing doing that work was similar to how some other young men view being on an organized football team.

Participating whole heartedly in football practice and playing football games is a very physically, mentally and emotionally demanding challenge. And in order to be, and feel, successful, and to win any games, football players must love 'tackling' those multiple layers of challenges. They must also learn to understand and respect their opponents.

You already know that mowing lawns or shoveling snow can also be a very physically, mentally and emotionally demanding challenge. Many teens, especially today's computer dependent teens, do not want to mow any lawns or shovel anything at all around their house, or anybody else's. Other teens love working out in gyms and being on sports teams. The average kid thinks of lawn mowing and snow shoveling as being a serious, frustrating hassle. But I approached it from a different angle.

I thought of it all as, "How can I understand the varying challenges of each individual mowing or shoveling job, in order to do each job the easiest and most efficient way, while setting and maintaining a steady pace at working that neither drains my energy and strength too quickly, nor takes me too long? And I want to evenly exercise and strengthen my body as much as possible. But, I must respect my own abilities and limitations, and weigh them against the various degrees of difficulty that each job possesses."

When lawn mowing, I started each lawn by first looking the yard all over, and figuring out how to make the most of the terrain along with the layout of typical yard objects like a swimming pool and a birdbath. It was the challenge of creating a geometric mowing pattern that allowed me to git-'er-done right. A pattern to be used every time I mowed that lawn. I always wanted to make as many passes as possible with the mower facing in the same direction, with the cut grass blowing out from under the mower only one time--to avoid building up too much cut grass under the mower. That meant pulling the mower backwards almost as many times as pushing it forwards. Which also exercised my body more evenly. I have never seen any other old or young mowing pro doing this. I guarantee you that most power lawn mowers cut the same going in either direction. You can use that technique on the fussiest of folk's lawns, and it will look just fine.

But it also means having the common sense to realize that bagging cut grass and putting it out for the trash man to collect is asinine. Because you are taking natural fertilizer away and wasting it. I ask you, so what if a little bit of cut grass gets dragged into your house? It won't kill you or cause cancer in your offspring, but the chemical fertilizers you may use on your lawns can kill by causing cancerous type medical conditions.

For shoveling snow, first I see if the walk or driveway is lower at one end. I always start at the lower end, no matter how slight the angle of the grade is, because it allows for you to not have to reach as far as in reaching downhill with the shovel, and each shovelful will be lifted up a slightly shorter distance. Each snowfall is either dry and light, or wet and heavy, to varying degrees, so I find out how heavy each shovelful of snow feels. I scoop up the same basic amount of snow in each shovelful and set a pace and rhythm that is akin to the rhythm of old time field hand laborers' work songs.

Everything I did to mow or shovel like I have told you counts towards a better outcome, like shaving fractions of ounces off of football players', heavy, protective gear by using lighter, space age materials when making the helmets and padding. The lighter the gear, the faster and further the players can run. And by coming up with separate strategies, 'running different patterns', for each mowing or shoveling situation, it was even more like playing a football game against each and every shaggy lawn or snow covered sidewalk and driveway job that I 'tackled'.

Ya' see what I mean by comparing playing football to mowing and shoveling? It is similar. Unfortunately, mowing and shoveling don't earn ya' any cheers from a crowd of spectators, no scholarships are awarded, and there's no ego boosting or busting attention from the media. But mowing or shovelling still isn't the terrible and unpleasant chore that most kids think it is. It is all about how you view the challenges and overcome them.

After a good snow in Dundalk, when you walked down the street I grew up on, Dunmanway, you could usually tell which sidewalks I had shoveled. My shoveling jobs were almost always wider and straighter than any other sidewalks on the block. When I finished up mowing and trimming a lawn, it looked neat and tidy. I couldn't stand the sight of any blades of grass sticking up above the rest. It all had to be cut and trimmed to a reasonably even level.

It simply makes good sense to me to do the job right. And that personal maxim made me a good employee of my Uncle Finley's, because Fin fully personified that work ethic--every working day of his life.

While I was growing up, my parents had provided me with plenty enough clothing, other necessities of life, toys, model car kits, and then, as I passed age 14, Rock and Roll record albums became my preferred Christmas and birthday presents. My father worked in steel mills most of his life, and my mother usually had a good part time job. My entire extended family lived quite well enough, just about right in the middle of the American middle class.

But I wanted to purchase certain items that my parents could not afford. So I started my own little lawn care and snow shoveling business.

The Baltimore area does not receive a lot of snowfall each winter, but it was enough for me to earn maybe a hundred to a hundred and twenty bucks a winter. That snow shoveling business of mine allowed me to afford plenty of model car building kits (AMT Three In One Kits), record albums and some clothes.

Then all through the spring, summer and into the fall, the money from my lawn care work flowed into my bank account mighty darned good and steadily. Sometimes it garnered me better average hourly wages than those of the Bethlehem Steel Mill and Chevrolet Plant employees whose lawns I mowed.

Using a power mower is one of my all time favorite forms of exercise and outdoors activities. I kid you not.

After my body had matured enough to be nearly through the personal trials and tribulations of passing through puberty, and my brain had begun to achieve some solid degree of common sense and job site safety sensibilities, and I had grown strong enough to mow my family's large 100 x 60 foot yard, with a gas powered lawn mower, my father never had to tell me when to mow the yard. I did it because I was naturally compelled to pitch in and help take care of our home, it's good exercise and it paid well.

From the time that I was 12 or 13, until I moved away from my childhood home, our lawn there on Dunmanway never went for more than a week and a half without me cutting and trimming it to near perfection. It felt so good. And dad paid fair wages too.

After our lawn was done, I went on and mowed and trimmed other neighborhood family's yards for more money.

I can't stand self-propelled mowers. They don't actually make the work any easier. And my well honed, sculptor-style technique of mowing requires unapposing, fully dexterous control of the mowing machine at all times.

My all-time favorite lawn mower was a gas powered Lawn Boy, with a 15-inch blade. That little buddy and I could git'er done. We worked well together, through most of my teen years.

Now, when using a 15 incher, the smallest sized power mower blade I have ever known of, you have to make more passes on a lawn. But anything with a blade over 18 inches wide is too big and bulky for my personal, particular mowing technique. I'd rather zip right along with a lighter 15 or 18 inch mower, but do more zigs and zags, then to push a heavier, lunky darn 20 to 24 incher along for fewer, but slower and much sweatier zigs and zags. It seems that everybody else in America believes that the wider the mower blade, the quicker and easier they can mow a lawn, but that just ain't so. I know, because I'm an old pro.

Never had a power lawn trimmer either, and I've rarely ever used one. I do most of the trimming with the mower. That's why I prefer smaller bladed, lighter mowers that are not self propelled. They're easier to maneuver up against fences, above ground swimming pools and buildings. For me, them old timey scissor lookin' hand clippers were the right tool for doing any small amounts of trimming that I couldn't get done with a mower.

But I was younger and much more supple at the time.

Today, ten minutes work with a pair of those hand clippers, and I'd end up hobbling towards my medicine cabinet, with a screamin' sacroiliac steadily reminding me that those manual tool lawn care days of mine ended when my lower back was operated on.

Yeah, I know, I'm older, overweight and I get in the way sometimes, of those Spanish dudes who do the lawn care work for this rental townhouse and apartment complex I live in.

But I'm still gonna' tell you that my personal motto, concerning lawn mowing, has always been that the job isn't done until the sidewalks and driveways are swept clean.

I hate everything about them thar' new fangled, ear splitting, lung burning, back breaking, heavy darned gas powered leaf blowing machines. It is much easier and more peaceful to use a simple ol' broom to sweep the grass clippings off sidewalks and driveways--if you'll accept my opinion of it.

In my younger days, I mowed a lot of grass in Maryland and in Maine. I actually enjoyed it. But there was one humongous difference between mowing lawns in Maryland and mowing lawns in Maine:

THAT FRIGGIN FOUR FOOT THICK CLOUD OF MAINE BLACKFLIES, MOSQUITOES AND NO-SEE-UMS STEADILY SWARMING ALL AROUND MY BUG BATTERED HEAD!!!!

All I can say here is, "Praise the Lord and pass the Old Woodsman Bug Dope".

See this website as a book, viewing it a page at a time. Turn the pages by clicking on that OLDER POST button below. 

Click on HOME under this to go to the first page.

There is a table of contents over in the right hand column at the bottom of every page- under BLOG ARCHIVE. 

Splittin' Wood and Workin' Hard

That's me, when I was finishing up with splitting 19 cords of hardwood, for firewood. I worked on that wood pile for 9 or 10 hours a day, for 10 weekdays, during 2 weeks in the late summer of 1969. My Uncle Finley bought the wood and had it delivered to Katahdin Lodge in full length tree sized sections. The Lodge only had wood stoves for heat, and 19 cords was enough to last through the entire upcoming winter. Gary Glidden (Finley's other bear hunting guide) did the chainsawing work to cut the tree length sections up into those short lengths. Then I split 'um up and stacked 'um up good and proper.

According to the way some photographers see it, this is a self portrait. I conceived the shot, directed a helper to stand on the exact spot I had chosen, told them to make sure they could see a certain background object at the left edge of my camera's view finder and also the top of my head in the viewfinder. Then I told them to squeeze the shutter when they heard my splittin' axe kachunck! into the wood -- and it turned out good.


Cleaning up after those two weeks of splitting wood. That's me with my back to you, Finley lookin' at you and two of our paying bear hunters who enjoyed pitching in to help out a little.

Heh, heh, yeah; those other three men were helping me clean up the little wood chips and scraps that were scattered on the ground at the end of my 90-some man hours of wood splitting and stacking; but nobody at all ever got between me and the splittin' axes, mauls and wedges when I was steadily swingin' heavy steel and making small chunks of firewood from great big tree trunks.

Do you see that 1967 or maybe '68 Chevy pickup truck back there, in the photo?

That was my favorite vehicle of all times to drive.

It had: four wheel drive; large sized, heavy duty, all seasons-mud-snow super gripping tires; a flat head type of 290 cubic inch straight six-cylinder engine; a four-speed standard transmission with a "granny gear"; and a stick shifter on the floor.

The granny gear was first gear. It was there to drive real slow with through mud and snow, or to get the truck slowly moving when it had an extra heavy load to haul. We Katahdin Lodge drivers normally used that four speed as a three speed, never employing first gear till the going got really rough--like in a wheel swallowing, mucky, oozing ol' quagmire.

Driving with a standard transmission gives a driver much more control of the vehicle's precise speed. It runs tighter on both the acceleration and deceleration. The deceleration effect also helps slow the vehicle down for curves or going down hills. I knew and had always made good use of the basics of those facts but was actually given a very worthwhile tip for developing better, standard transmission, driving skills by one of the Lodge's paying bear hunters from Massachusetts. The tip was to shift gears less frequently and at slightly higher RPMs than when most people shift. That allows a driver much better control of the vehicle, it is easier to change gears and with much smoother riding--if you do it right. I always had an open mind for learning such things.

The truck had neither power brakes nor power steering. That lack of power assist was best for the way that we had to drive up there in northern Maine in order to get our daily business taken care of. Or when I was just driving around enjoying the wild and wonderful Maine countryside with a girlfriend or other friends.

Having no power assist on the steering makes it much harder to turn the steering wheel, because it gives a lot of resistance to a driver's manipulations of the front wheels. That forces wheel handling efforts to steer the vehicle much more precisely, which was better for driving at higher than posted speeds on Maine's wild and woolly, twisty-turny, hump and downy, two lane tar-topped, gravel or dirt country roads. We always averaged 5 to 15 MPH over the speed limit.

No power brakes made it much less likely that we Katahdin Lodge drivers would brake too hard and fast and bash some passenger's face or head against the dashboard or something. Like when we were carefully traversing the rough old, washed out, rocky, mud puddley logging roads, old overgrown farm fields and such in the back-in-the-woods places where we used to drive when bear baiting. We were constantly, gently applying the brakes in those rough situations. And we definitely did not want to brake too hard and fast and go out of control if a wild animal, domestic pet, pedestrian, stalled vehicle, slow moving piece of humongous farm machinery or maybe a whole herd of milk cows 'suddenly appeared' in the road in front of one of us.

On one late winter, Saturday evening in Maine, just after a cold, quiet darkness had eased on down over Rural Route 11, between the Lodge and the Town of Patten, I was on my way into town for a Saturday night date with my girlfriend, when a whole herd of cows did 'suddenly appear' in front me all across the freezing, friggin road.

To my discredit, this happened at a clearly marked cattle crossing. Cows have the absolute right away at cattle crossings. Cows who have full, uncomfortably expanding udders, and whom are heading for the milking barn, make way for neither man, beast nor fast moving motor vehicle.

Oh jeeze! The plump and pretty little dairy farmer's wife was standing there in the middle of Rt. 11 next to her herd of crossing cows and she was all-a-jumping up and down, frantically waving her arms up in the air and forcefully holding out a tightly gripped, lit kerosene lantern at me.

Fortunately, I knew how to tap brakes like them ABS brake systems do for most of you.

Consequently, instead of plowing into the farmer's wife and a half a dozen or so udder swollen milk cows, I slid sideways and over into the snowbank a bit--whilst skillfully tapping down on the brakes till the truck came to a safe stop.

That was my fought. I was thinking about where my girlfriend and I could go 'parking', after going to see a movie, instead of paying my usual full attention to the road.

If we don't respect the farmer's rights, how in the hell are we gonna' eat?

Man o' day! I was embarrassed and ashamed at making that nearly tragic mistake!

One mistake like that, and I'd have been sent packing back down to my parents' house in Dundalk, Maryland. I'd probably have never seen Patten, Maine again.

But nothing like that ever happened.

Anyways, the point is that I prefer the precise handing capabilities of a standard-shift-it-yourself transmission and no power steering or brakes for when I really wanna' Rock n' Roll out on some good old country roads.

But, then, come to think of it now, for most of you's ("you's" is my Baltimore accent showing through), you's had best stick to power everything and ABS brakes for your vehicles. You may own a big-ass SUV with four-wheel drive and all that lot, but ya' gotta' be able to drive Northern Mainer style to do it how we Katahdin Lodge drivers done it.

That's a well earned bit of braggadocio for sure.


Those barely visible, nice and neatly stacked, piles of firewood over in the woodshed there to the right are just the 'tip of the iceberg' from all that firewood that I split and stacked in the late summertime of 1969. I loved doing it.

And you see those piles of wood there that are not covered? Well they got covered with tarps later that day. I can't stand seeing firewood being stored uncovered. Leaving a firewood supply go uncovered wastes the wood by allowing it to get wet from rain and snow and to rot. That makes it very difficult to get a home heating fire burning good with the moist, partially rotted wood.

There were two things at Finley's lodge that were never left out in the yard uncovered.

One was firewood, the other was tools.

Fin stored his rakes, shovels, mauls, picks, mattocks and other garden type tools in a building or tucked up under a building's eave and hanging from some nails--in order to keep rain and snow off the wooden handles and metal heads. Finley K. Clarke never in his life owned a wooden handled garden tool that had any rust or rot on it.

I appreciate that. Makes sense to me to take care of the equipment right. You never know when you're really gonna' need it.

I believe that splitting wood is better exercise than pumping iron--lifting free weights. Like when using the weight lifting equipment that was set up in the weight room down in the basement of the old YMCA, in my home town of Dundalk, Maryland. During my early teenage years, I lifted weights "at the Y" several times a week.

Neither of those two physical endeavours, though, weight lifting or wood splitting, are as good exercise as swimming.

During four summers of my youth, from 1961 to '64, I attended Red Cross swimming courses, including a life saving course, and swam many laps every summer at Baltimore County's Merritt Beach, in Dundalk. The beach was right down the street from the home that I grew up in. I was still swimming there regularly in 1965, when Baltimore County closed the beach to swimmers; it was closed due to water pollution from Bethlehem Steel Mill in Sparrows Point, Maryland.

Those Red Cross water safety and swimming qualifications made me somewhat more valuable as a professional outdoorsman, a Maine Guide; because I had the ability to save drowning fishermen or fisherwomen, canoeists, boaters, swimmers or somebody who accidentally fell into some deep water.

As a teenager, I also used to get plenty of exercise while being paid to mow and trim lawns in the summer, and to shovel snow from sidewalks and driveways during the winter.

So ya' see, that 1969 wood spitting and stacking experience was my type of preferred exercise. And that "wood chopping" (a quote from my city kid days) work, like the swimming, mowing and snow shoveling, was all done outside, where I enjoy spending my time the most.

Before I started that wood splitting and stacking job each day: I had to water seven hound dogs, two Bobcats and one ornery horse; and I had to help Fin and Gary load some 250 to 450 pound 55 gallon drums full of rotting, stenching, maggot covered bear bait onto Katahdin Lodge trucks.

Then Fin and Gary went out riding 'round the beautiful Maine countryside bear baiting. While I worked steady at the hard labor task of splitting and stacking firewood.

Later, during each evening: I had to feed and water the animals; and like every other evening during bear season, I had to go out and gather up a few of our paying bear hunters from the woods; I had to track any bears that our hunters had shot at--sometimes with Finley and/or Gary and sometimes by myself; even through the deep, dark woods at nighttime, but always unarmed; if any of our hunters killed a bear, we had to carry it out of the woods to the truck; then we guides had some bear skinning to do, when we finally made it back to the Lodge.

Fortunately, during those two weeks, when I was working on that 19 cords of firewood, Monday thru Friday, Fin and Marty only made me mow the lawn and trim the weeds, on their large piece of cleared ground around the Lodge, on Saturday or Sunday.

And I was responsible for cleaning up the dog crap. About twice a week, I had to shovel up what the five hound dogs who were chained to five individual dog houses dropped on the ground. About twice a month or so, I had to scrub out the wooden floored dog pen where two Beagles lived.

The Bobcat pen got cleaned out about twice a month too. It's a dirty job, but someone had to do it. Animals who rely on human care deserve that kind of good treatment.

Except for during those 10 days of building up those humongous stacks of firewood, I performed all of the afore mentioned morning, evening and weekend tasks plus went out bear baiting and guiding bear hunters 6 days a week. Just like Gary and Finley did. I had a lot of fun while doing it all, too.

During the entire time that I worked for my Aunt Martha and Uncle Finley, at their Katahdin Lodge and Camps of Patten, Maine, I never worked less than 9 hours a day, 6 days a week.

In fact, at the beginning of bear season, in June of 1969, I worked no less than 14-15 hours a day, for 2 and 1/2 weeks straight. Without a break at all.

And that 14-15 hours a day is what it figures up to after deducting meal times.

Working at the Lodge was quite a broad based challenge to take on and do well at. I was, and still am, proud to have accomplished what I had at Katahdin Lodge.


See this website as a book, viewing it a page at a time. Turn the pages by clicking on that OLDER POST button below. 

Click on HOME under this to go to the first page.

There is a table of contents over in the right hand column at the bottom of every page - under BLOG ARCHIVE. 

A Guide To My Short Stories About Living In Northern Maine

Here is a guide to my short stories about being a Maine bear hunting guide and country girl's delight, up in Patten, Maine at Katahdin Lodge and Camps. I will provide links to each of these stories, where they are published on a Maine web site. Some stories are on several web sites.

Just keep in mind that I need a little bit of professional editing help. I also need to do some other 'sprucing up' of the stories, in order for me to be completely satisfied with these written works.

But the stories sure are interesting, entertaining, a tad bit educational, they contain some cool history and are (according to thousands of readers so far) easy and enjoyable to read.

I hope that you enjoy reading one or all of them.

The House Fire is a nice, but scary one (it scared me when it happened, that's for certain). This story is good reading for gentle and not so gentle folks of all ages.

The Day I Fell In Love With Patten Maine ain't nuthin' like you will expect, and it could be a mind blower. It's a real, small town, soap opera scene and a teenagers' thrill a second experience.

An Italian Nice Guy is a good bear hunting story that is really a chipmunk story. It is actually good for kids to read. No bears are even shot at in it. It is fictionalized a bit, but mostly true. I expanded on what I knew about Tony and his family, but they had to be real nice people.

Here also are copies of emails exchanged between myself and the Italian Nice Guy's family, confirming that I wrote his story well.

The Rocket Scientist is a crazy trip about a genuine Washington, DC Rocket Scientist. It is about one of a hunting guide's worst fears and dangers.

Jungle Dirt is something which stands on its own. It was my first attempt at fictionalizing a true story. It is about a Vietnam Veteran's experience, when he went bear hunting in Maine just three days after coming home from fighting hard for a full year 'Nam. It is a good story for all of us Vietnam Era Veterans and others who care about us, and how we were treated in America during and after the Vietnam War. Just about the only fictional parts have to do with the me making some descriptive guesses about the Nam Vet's mother and a small amount was expanded on to the guy's stepfather's description. Boss Hog on the Dukes of Hazard did look exactly like that friggin' jackass of a stepfather though.

Easiest Way To Carry A Dead Bear or My Uncle Finley Couldn't Handle It is a nutty piece, but it does give a darn good hunting tip. It gets right loony, ain't no doubt about it.

Bananastien is about young adults testing the limits in 1969 Patten, ME. Part of it gets real wild on those wild and woolly Maine country roads, when there is a true life high speed police chase.

Driving Northern Mainer Style is a basic "how to guide" on driving on those wild and woolly, climbin' and droppin', twisty and hard turning country and backwoods roads up there in Maine. And also how not to drive them roads. Within that written piece, there is also a story about how I nearly 'bought the farm' early one morning up on the Washburn Road, where it goes into the small city of Caribou, Maine. Ya' better tighten up y'ur seat belts for this one.

My VW Bug Trip To Maine has a hilarious bear hunting scene in it,. It's a hoot! And the rest of it is a wild, funny and very, very happy story. It was about a trip of mine back up to Maine, while I was on leave from the Army, just after I had graduated from US Army Photographic Laboratory Technician School, and before I was assigned to overseas duty on Okinawa. This story goes from Patten, ME down to Dundalk, MD and through a bunch of quite memorable experiences.

Then They Own You takes place in 1979, when I tried to work for my Aunt Martha and Uncle Finley Clarke in Maine one more time. This one comes down heavy (in a bad way), as the Hippies used to say.


See this website as a book, viewing it a page at a time. Turn the pages by clicking on that OLDER POST button below. 

Click on HOME under this to go to the first page.

There is a table of contents over in the right hand column at the bottom of every page - under BLOG ARCHIVE. 

Guiding Bear Hunters and Driving The Backroads of Maine

I have ta' warn ya', there's photos of dead bears in this one.

I was a Registered Maine Hunting and Fishing Guide, who specialized in guiding Black Bear hunters.

The only hunting or fishing guide services that I have ever been fully qualified to provide was for bear hunting. I have never represented myself to be any kind of a deer, moose, bird, or any other kind of hunting guide, or a fishing guide, either.

When I was younger, and before my degenerative back injuries and severe depression progressed to the point where I had to accept a meager disability pension, I was also quite qualified to lead groups of people on camping trips, outdoors and wildlife photography tours, on day or overnight hikes, and so on.

But my experiences as a professional Maine Guide are strictly limited to Black Bear hunting.

That is pretty-darn wild and crazy, though, don't ya' think, for a kid who grew up in the Baltimore City suburbs of Dundalk, Maryland to become a bear hunting guide in Maine.

And the first time I worked as a bear hunting guide, the hunting lodge I worked for, Katahdin Lodge and Camps, had the highest number of bears killed in the State of Maine. In 1969, information from the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife stated that there were 104 known bear kills in all of Maine that year, and 56 of them were killed by paying hunters at Katahdin Lodge. That info came to me in a letter from my Uncle Finley and Aunt Martha, when I was in U.S. Army basic training at Ft. Dix New Jersey.

Which means that I most definitely was a successful bear hunting guide.

Compared to more recent State of Maine bear harvest numbers of several thousand a year, the total number of bears killed in 1969 was very low. This is due to the facts that there were very few hunting lodges in Maine who included bear hunting services in their business back then. And most native Mainers did not eat bear meat, so they never killed any bears. Why Mainers rarely ever ate bear meat, I don't know. Maybe it was due to a fear of diseases that bears can carry, or it was just that the Mainers didn't like the way that bear meat cooks up. I have eaten bear meat several times and liked it, but I have never ever seen nor heard of a native Northern Mainer eating bear meat.

As a Black Bear hunting guide, I had to go into the woods and track wounded bears for sportsmen who had paid to bear hunt at Katahdin Lodge for a week. It was normal for me to follow the blood trails of wounded bears by myself, after dark and unarmed. Ain't nuthin’ to it, because Wild Maine Black Bears usually run from humans. Besides that, having a firearm along would have violated laws that prohibit night hunting. And that would get me into trouble with the local game wardens.

Ya’ wouldn’t want some big, mean, snarlin’ game warden to get me would ya’?

I also had to carry any bears that the hunters had killed out of the woods with the help of one or more of the paying hunters and/or other guides. Then the other guides and I gutted and skinned those dead bears.

While I was a bear hunting guide, I became enamored with Wild Northern Maine Black Bears.

I am fascinated by: how intelligent and crafty Black Bears are; the way they skillfully, usually silently, move through the forest; the dazzling way sunlight glistens off of the tips of their fur.

It amazed me to see sunlight glistening, sparkling off a Black Bear's fur. Like when a big fat Black Bear, who was sitting and peacefully sunning itself in the middle of a woods road, bolted at first sight of my quickly approaching pickup truck. As soon as I rounded a tight curve, at top speed for that rough, dirt road, the bear quickly got up from sitting there in the middle of the backwoods road, up off its wide, muscular haunches, and bolted away on all fours. It ran, doing close to 35 MPH, on into the woods.

That bear sparkled magnificently.

On a beautiful, sun-shiny summer day.

I also adore the glint of life in a Black Bear's eyes.

I understand Black Bears quite well, and relate to them in several ways.

Bears and I both love being the woods, especially for taking long walks. We each respect the balance of nature. We like relaxing in the warm sunshine. We enjoy eating fresh fruits, Blue Berries, and most other berries too. Bears and I eat fresh fish most anytime we can--though my Uncle Finley declared that the bears in Katahdin Lodge's hunting areas did not eat fish. Bears and I each get into eating meat from wild game animals: like deer, moose, elk, etc..

But the hungry bears can keep any rotting wild animal carcasses that they can get their powerful paws and mighty jaws clamped down upon for themselves.

Neither a Black Bear nor I will hurt anyone or anything, unless there is no other way out of a bad situation. And for me, that includes when the well being of my country is dangerously compromised.

Bears willingly place their family's safety above their own. They love and adore their younger family members. Yes, I know that only female bears take care of their own family. But we humans have evolved upon a wider base of natural responsibilities to our families, than bears have. Therefore, a good man possesses some of the positive traits of both male and female Black Bears.

The mere, fleeting glimpse of any bears in the wild, and also of any of the other wild animals in Maine, especially them big ol’ Moosies, thrills me to no end.

The hunting business is far better for a natural environment than the likes of the Bethlehem Steel Mill near where I grew up in Maryland. That mill had thoroughly polluted the backwaters of the Chesapeake Bay that lay suffering and dying right down the street from my boyhood home. When I was growing up, I swam and fished down the street there; until the water became too polluted, too cancerous to swim in; until the Snapping Turtles that I love to catch and release, the fish, crabs, and other aquatic life are mostly either dead or diseased.

To my way of seeing the world, the people who live in Maine, or in any heavily wooded geographical area, have to make a living. A well regulated hunting industry is far more agreeable to Mother Nature then any high-pollutin' mill or factory is.


The usual great bunch of guys on a one week bear hunting trip to Katahdin Lodge and Camps in Patten, Maine.


In 1969, this was the only time that our hunters killed four bears in one day. That's nineteen-year-old me on the left, and Gary, one of the best workmates I ever had, on the right.

Those two 55 gallon drums behind Gary and I are bear bait barrels. The bait we used was very nasty, stinky, greasy beaver carcasses and slaughterhouse left overs--like cow guts and heads, and pig heads. Full barrels held between 250 to 450 pounds of bear bait. The bait often had a big, thick, steaming pile of wiggling maggots on top of it. And this was during the summer. Ahh, the sweet memories of maggot steam rising up from rotting cow guts, on bright, hot summer days, like a weird fog rolling up from a warm, heavily polluted, small, round patch of earth.

Black Bears love a couple of nice, giant paw-scoops-full of maggots at meal times. They actually would go into a bear bait, which was mostly a pile of rotting cow guts placed in a strategic location out in the woods, and if there were plenty of maggots on the top of the pile already eating that greasy, stinky stuff themselves, the bears would scoop out paws full of the fresh, live maggots, instead of chowing down on the rotting stuff. Makes sense to me. There are probably more calories and there is definitely better nutrition to be had from eating live maggots than from eating rotting, dead cow innards.

In 1969, the bear hunting season in Maine went from June 1st to December 31st--six full months

Many times, I went out bear baiting with the bed of that truck crammed full of 55 gallon drums crammed full of super stenchin' steaming bear bait.

It stunk us guides up somethin' terrible. We called it "Leave Me Alone Cologne", because nobody wanted to be near us when we had just been working with bait.

Today's bear baiters in Maine use stale doughnuts and other sweats to lure in bears. But my Uncle Finley, who was born without a sense of smell, swore that honey and baked sweets would not work on Maine Black Bears. Fin got royally pissed off one time when one of our bear hunters dumped a big jar of honey all over a tree stump next to the hunter's assigned, rotten cow guts, bear bait that day. Fin and Gary Glidden both said that using honey as bait would not work.

One time a Katahdin Lodge bear hunter caught some nice salmon, and other fresh fish, then placed them on his assigned bear bait that day. Fin also swore that northern Maine Black Bears do not ever eat fish. My Aunt Martha was so incensed by what she saw as a waste of good fish, that she guesstimated how much that good, freshly caught salmon would cost in a grocery store; and then she complained about the level of unnecessary waste that it was for the hunter to place fish on his bait; good, fresh fish that he should have frozen and taken home to feed his family with.

Time changes things. In 2008, according to what I have read in recent years, bear hunting guides, and bear hunters who set up their own personal use bear baits, in Maine use both sweets and fish for bear bait.

I bet ya' that if ol' Finley K. Clarke had been born with a sense of smell, he'd have tried using the stale sweets method of bear baiting himself.


This was the largest bear killed during the time that I guided hunters at Katahdin Lodge. It weighed 410 LBs. The white stuff on the hunter's face is a homemade remedy that one of the mature Maine women working in the Lodge made up for the guy, when he got chewed up somethin' fierce by them infamous Maine Blackflies.


Gary and Finley skinning that big b'ar, while a hunter watches and Pistol Pup sniffs around. I took two quick snapshots, then had to jump right in there and do some skinning too.

During the past thirty-some years, whenever I’m telling anyone my stories about my Maine adventures, they always think that tracking wounded bears at night without taking a firearm along with me was the most dangerous part of those experiences. That is not so.

The driving was absolutely the most dangerous part of the job.

We Katahdin Lodge hunting guides drove over the speed limit ninety-some percent of the time. I usually drove more than 70 miles each day; including on my days off from work, when I was just a happy teenager running around the country side with other happy teenagers.

My Uncle Finley, Gary Glidden, Wayne Birmingham, Putt Gerow, and a few other highly skilled Maine drivers taught me how to drive very safely up there.

When I was in the pilot’s seat of one of the Lodge’s trucks, I felt perfectly comfortable averaging 5-15 MPH over the posted speed limit. But if my uncle was riding with me, I had to fly along those country roads at 15-20 MPH over the limit, most of the time. That extra 5-10 MPH meant that I couldn’t hardly ever relax at all during the driving, because I wasn’t as highly skilled at it as Finley was.

Those Maine-iac drivers had taught me well though, I assure you that I was very safe to ride with most of the time--nobody's perfect.

But my safe driving sure scared the livin' daylights out of a few paying bear hunters each week, when they were my passengers in one of the Lodge's pickup trucks. Before they hadn't yet gotten to know that I could definitely handle driving a truck on them roads at those speeds.

But, then, sometimes a couple of fun loving, thrill seeking, city guys, who were at the Lodge on a bear hunt, would egg me on to git-it-on at top speeds, when I was just tooling along conversing with them nice and relaxed like, while driving at mere high speeds. Then the roller coaster ride got real wild, and a lot more fun.

I always enjoyed the challenges and satisfactions of making it from point A to point B to point Z all day long without having a mishap; while using those finely honed driving skills of mine to be that safe at such high speeds on those rough roads.

Check out my story about Driving Northern Mainer Style that is published on four web sites up in Maine. Read that published article and you will understand why the driving was the most dangerous part of the job.


P.S.

I am a disabled veteran who is barely surviving on a small, Department of Veterans Affairs non-service connected disability pension. Which is for a bad back and a good dose of depression. My monthly, DVA pension check equals about what a minimum wage earner would receive for take home pay.

I inform everyone whom I can about the terms of my Department of Veterans Affairs pension, because there are many other American military veterans who also qualify for one, desperately need one, but who have never learned of them.

I have written and published articles, which are on Magic City News, about veterans health care issues. I advocate for veterans rights.

About a year ago, the DVA was ordered (I Believe it was by Congress) to educate more veterans about their non-service connected pension benefits. So I know for certain that many vets don't know of these earned benefits.

Here is the official DVA web site's text on this pension:

"Veterans with low incomes who are permanently and totally disabled may be eligible for monetary support if they have 90 days or more of active military service, at least one day of which was during a period of war. The discharge from active duty must have been under conditions other than dishonorable. The permanent and total disability must be for reasons other than the veteran's own willful misconduct. Payments are made to qualified veterans to bring their total income, including other retirement or Social Security income to a level set by Congress. Unreimbursed medical expenses may reduce countable income. Veterans of a period of war who are age 65 or older and meet service and income requirements are also eligible to receive a pension, regardless of current physical condition."

I can't find that text on the DVA web site again, because they have a new web page for pensions. This is the link to the new page.

My disabilities are partly service connected, but the Department of Veterans Affairs refuses to acknowledge this fact. I have earned a service connected disability for severe depression, but must make do with a lesser paying non-service connected pension. The story of my battles against the DVA for full service connected disability benefits is titled: Lieutenant T. Gordan Barber and The Stolen Marine Corps Property.

I have much more time, talent, and self motivation than money. I am never paid for any of my writing or photography.

I cannot work at any boss's dictated pace. I cannot accept newspaper or magazine photo assignments, or take a chance at photographing any weddings, etc.. My degenerative back disease dictates that I must work at my own pace, or it's back into the hospital and wheelchair again.

Any photo assignment could easily end up being like a certain Firesign Theatre skit, "He's no fun, he fell right over."

I possess a powerful desire to work my way out of this relative poverty, out of this low income apartment/town house complex I live in, and hopefully off this meager pension. I have built up a nice selection of stock photography type photos. I shoot all I can, when I can. I write and write and create blogs/poor man's websites and post my work onto the World Wide Web, wherever I can.

The entire body of my Internet published work is all linked together and easily accessible from each of my blogs.

If you are either are a veteran, the close relative or friend of any low or no income vet, a vet's social worker or caretaker, please make note of those available benefits.

And good luck. You may need it.

The Department of Veterans Affairs does not like paying out all that they owe to veterans.

I am, though, grateful for the financial and medical benefits that the Department of Veterans Affairs does pay me.


See this website as a book, viewing it a page at a time. Turn the pages by clicking on that OLDER POST button below. 

Click on HOME under this to go to the first page.

There is a table of contents over in the right hand column at the bottom of every page - under BLOG ARCHIVE.