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I’ve been intrigued by Concord, Maine for some time. The problem is there is precious little information about the town on the internet. The Wikipedia description is limited:
Concord, Maine is a township in Somerset County, Maine, United States. Concord, along with the township of Lexington, is located in the unorganized territory, Central Somerset. The population of Central Somerset was 336 as of the 2000 census.[1] Concord was the only municipality in the United States to cast a majority of its votes for Ron Paul in the 2012 Presidential Election. Paul did not appear on the ballot but took enough write-in votes in Concord to finish ahead of all listed candidates, including Barack Obama and Mitt Romney. |
There are no businesses listed in town, and since the township is “Unorganized” there are no local services of town government. I always like to have a contact in a Concord that I’m visiting, but despite numerous efforts, I couldn’t find an email or phone number for anyone who lived in Concord. So I had the idea of printing up some postcards to drop off in mailboxes in Concord, Maine. On the cover was a picture of a reenactment of the battle at the North Bridge, and on the back, I wrote up a description of my project that ended in a request to contact me. The following morning I woke at 5:30 and zoomed the 250 miles up to Concord, Maine.
According to Google maps, there were two roads in Concord and both took me on a loop up of either side of Fletcher Mountain. Rather ominously, both roads were posted as dead ends. There were plenty of “No Trespassing” and “Private Property” signs but undaunted, I followed the dirt road up.
As I was getting ready to start distributing my Concord MA – “call me”postcards, a rusty red tractor chugged toward me. It was one of those moments that only happens because I’m forced to be aggressively sociable. There is no way I would normally stop to talk with a guy with no shirt with a white beard that flowed midway down his chest on a seemingly deserted dirt road, but I slowed to a halt and rolled down my window. I sense this is pretty much par for the course whenever you meet someone going in the opposite direction in Concord, Maine. The tractor slowed, and I asked the driver. “Is this Concord, Maine?” It was a legitimate question since my GPS was going haywire, and I was way, way outside cell service range.
“Sure is” came the reply.
I explained my quest, and Stephen turned off the tractor so we could chat. It turns out he used to work in Concord MA when he was a builder and roofer living in Hancock. He used to come up to Concord Maine to hunt when he was a young man. I lost the story about how he acquired the property in 1993, but he was treated with suspicion as the outsider.
Dozens of deerflies buzzed around Stephen as he told me a bit about his life in the woods. “Deerflies tried to eat the headlights off the tracta.” It had been a wet summer, so he had difficulty driving back into the woods to cut his lumber. Anything but a lightweight truck left deep grooves in the dirt trails that served as access to his property. “Price of firewood gonna be high this year. Nobody can get into the woods – too wet.” Stephen lived in an old farmhouse that he says “hadn’t been occupied for over a hundred years when I moved in.” He had no electricity; “I’ve got one cold water pipe going in, and it’s a little warmer going out.” (It took me a while to get the joke.) In the winter, he’s the only one on the mountain. He had seven feet of snow last year – 12 feet a couple of years ago. He passes the winter by burning wood, hunting, and reading. “I love history.” He knew quite a bit about the written and oral history of Concord. “When I first moved up here, the old-timers said that the land used to be clear-cut, and farmers raised sheep.” The first settlers came up after the Revolutionary War to hunt and to trade with the Native Americans. The Kennebec River offered transportation and power for Concord’s two sawmills and a grist mill. The earliest written history I could find of the town was from 1860. Major John Heald whose family were amongst the original settlers of Concord MA was raised in Temple New Hampshire, but he maintained close ties with Concord MA. He was married in Concord MA to Sarah Conant of another old Concordian family. They moved north from Temple NH, up the Kennebec River to be the first settlers of the area to be known after Maine split off from Massachusetts in 1820 as Concord, Maine. Major Heald’s story follows, but getting back to Stephen, he makes regular trips down to the library to get his fill of local and world history.
Stephen spends a good amount of time hunting. There are plenty of deer, raccoons, and rabbits. “The only thing I haven’t seen is wolverine.” “There’s a moose that comes up and down this road every night – tearing it up.” In the winter, he cooks up mostly porcupines and raccoons. “I was out here skinning out a porcupine on the tailgate of my F450, and this family comes along on sleds with two little kids. I say, ‘Want some lunch?’ Well, you get a little blood on snow, and it looks like you killed 50 people.” The family silently shook their heads –no. “Hey, but it’s good!” According to Stephen, porcupine tastes a bit like beef and raccoon is more like lamb, and bear fat is disgusting. “It’s only good for rubbing on your boots.”
I asked him my two standard questions – “What’s the best part about living in Concord?” and “How has it changed?” The best part was “Living out at the end of the road. I’m the last one out there.” The list of changes was a bit longer: “All the old guys are dead. The old hunters are gone. The kids that didn’t earn it, own it now. I used to be the young one; now I’m the old one.
I asked him my two standard questions – “What’s the best part about living in Concord?” and “How has it changed?” The best part was “Living out at the end of the road. I’m the last one out there.” The list of changes was a bit longer: “All the old guys are dead. The old hunters are gone. The kids that didn’t earn it, own it now. I used to be the young one; now I’m the old one.
As we prepared to part, I asked if I could walk down to his property which was about 3 miles away. “Sure, if you see anyone just tell ‘em Stephen said you could use the road. It’s the last house down on the right. Stop at the red house. Whatever you do, don’t go further. I’ve been robbed three times. This area is heavily welfare, heavily drugs, heavily pot. When I deliver my firewood, nine out of ten houses have pot plants growing.” I gave him one of my “I came. I saw. I Concord.” tee shirts and headed further down the road.
I parked my car at a locked gate, and the deer flies immediately swarmed, but it felt good to walk after five hours in the car. I climbed the gate and headed down the dirt road past bullet-hole pocked “No hunting” and “Private Property” signs. Massive moose hoof-prints were dug deep into the softer center strip between the wheel grooves. Stone walls, tumbled-down barns, and rusted out tractors, signs of Concord’s agrarian past, were losing a battle against the encroaching forest.
Despite the heat and humidity, I meandered. A recently blazed trail led me down to a tranquil stream that beavers had dammed. The shacks of the “old hunters” were still standing.Wild flowers ran riot in an abandoned hay field. I had a long search for a cemetery that Stephen said was just off the road and a few steps into the woods, but the underbrush was so heavy that I left with nothing but seven ticks that found their way inside my blue jeans.
Stephen’s house was worth the effort.
The house sat on a hill that overlooked the valley and the river below. Outside an American flag, and a “Don’t Tread On Me” flag flew over a orange truck and yellow rider-mower parked in the front yard. It had once been a proud homestead to an affluent farm, but for much of its existence, it had become a hunters’ retreat, so it had not been occupied year round for close to 100 years when Stephen moved in. Stephen was a builder, so the roof and siding were all in good shape. At one point not that long ago, the house had a white-wash finish, but now it sported a coat of bright red that was pealing in a rather spectacular fashion, so that bright highlights of white flashed under the red.
Further up the hill behind the house under a tree stood a single lawn chair facing out to the west.
Despite the bitter winter cold, the summer heat, the isolation, and the effort it took to eke out a living, I could see the sweetness of Stephen’s lifestyle. He earned his six-pack abs not at the gym, but by hauling logs. He was on the original “Keto” or “Caveman” diet. If he didn’t shoot something, he went hungry for a while. Like me, Stephen was 59 and had grown up in Massachusetts. Our lives had taken such different paths, but somehow, we met for a memorable half-hour in Concord, Maine.
The Founding of Concord, Maine
Concord - midway up in blue. Note that Lexington is the town to the west.
While this story is I hope interesting, please remember it was written in 1860 and it illustrates the racist attitudes towards Native Americans that were prevalent during that time period.
From Blood’s History of Temple NH. 1860 (pp. 332-333)
In 1791, Major Heald left Temple on a merchant’s and trapper’s expedition to a place (now Concord) on the Kennebec. He carried with him rum, molasses, calico, etc. to sell to the Indians. We have heretofore written of the Penobscots, a comparatively good and well-meaning tribe, - but we have now to relate what befell the Major from one Susop, who, with his brother John Hart and father Sabbie, was a cold-country Indian from far north and very savage. This Susup came to the Major, one day, for some rum; Mr. Heald refused him, as he had had some not long before. A gill was the Indian’s dram, but Sussup would have more. Becoming more and more angered, he at last seized his drinking-cup and thre it across the camp. He caught the Major by the hair of his head and twisting it one wayand the other, hoarsely whispered, “Me machiney you, good time” (i.e. I will kill you when I have the opportunity.) By help of the other Indians, Mr. Heald released himself, and Susup went sulky away.
Not long after, Susup’s good squaw came to the Major, and whispered, confidentially “Susup machiney you to-night; don’t let Susup know me tell you.”
From Blood’s History of Temple NH. 1860 (pp. 332-333)
In 1791, Major Heald left Temple on a merchant’s and trapper’s expedition to a place (now Concord) on the Kennebec. He carried with him rum, molasses, calico, etc. to sell to the Indians. We have heretofore written of the Penobscots, a comparatively good and well-meaning tribe, - but we have now to relate what befell the Major from one Susop, who, with his brother John Hart and father Sabbie, was a cold-country Indian from far north and very savage. This Susup came to the Major, one day, for some rum; Mr. Heald refused him, as he had had some not long before. A gill was the Indian’s dram, but Sussup would have more. Becoming more and more angered, he at last seized his drinking-cup and thre it across the camp. He caught the Major by the hair of his head and twisting it one wayand the other, hoarsely whispered, “Me machiney you, good time” (i.e. I will kill you when I have the opportunity.) By help of the other Indians, Mr. Heald released himself, and Susup went sulky away.
Not long after, Susup’s good squaw came to the Major, and whispered, confidentially “Susup machiney you to-night; don’t let Susup know me tell you.”
The Indians being advised of his intentions, his all the guns, tomhawks, etc. in order that he might not be enabled to carry out his threat against the Major. But Susup was not diverted from his object. Betaking himself to the brook, he chose out a smooth round pebble about the size of a man;s fist, and returned to the camp. The camp was built of logs; the door of 2-inch plank. Part way up the door, and on each side, was a hollow log’ in the hollows of the two logs a stake was made to run and serve as a fastener.
Through this door Susup endeavored to force himself. The Major went to the door and told him, calmly, that if he persisted in his attempts to break in, he would shoot him dead upon the threshold. But Susup kept at work, having more “occupy” or rum on board, probably , than he had caution. He was very strong, and finally succeeded in loosening one end of the stake so it came out of the hollow log, and allowed him just room enough to squeeze in sidewise. The Major now fired. The charge took effect in his shoulder, but the wound was not very serious, and accordingly Susup pressed on. The Major then attacked him with the breech of his gun. This soon shivered to pieces, and now having only the barrel left, he so pounded and pommeled poor Susup that he cried out, “You have killed me, Major!” and Mr. Heald believing that he really had killed him, or at any rate dissembled him to carry out any of his “machiney-ing” propensities, dragged him out and replaced the fastener in the hollow logs. Susup crawled off to his companions, and the Major retired to his bear-skin couch.
Next day, Mr. Heald and others visited the Indian camp. Where they found Susup was alive though barely able to speak for the pommeling he had received. Sabbie said to the Major, “John Hart and I will drink your heart’s blood within six months!” Mr. Heald leveled his piece at him, on the instant, but concluded almost as soon that he would not fire upon him, and so lowered his gun. Sabbie laughing in his face said,”Me got very great heart Major!” but no doubt, secretly felt great respect for him.”
Susup plotted his revenge for years and followed Major Heald’s son for three days while he was tending his winter trapping lines, but he was unable to “execute his design of killing him.” Three years later, Susup either drank himself to death or was poisoned by a river boat captain in Bangor, Maine. His companions accepted four gallons of rum as compensation for the death of a “bad Indian.”
Through this door Susup endeavored to force himself. The Major went to the door and told him, calmly, that if he persisted in his attempts to break in, he would shoot him dead upon the threshold. But Susup kept at work, having more “occupy” or rum on board, probably , than he had caution. He was very strong, and finally succeeded in loosening one end of the stake so it came out of the hollow log, and allowed him just room enough to squeeze in sidewise. The Major now fired. The charge took effect in his shoulder, but the wound was not very serious, and accordingly Susup pressed on. The Major then attacked him with the breech of his gun. This soon shivered to pieces, and now having only the barrel left, he so pounded and pommeled poor Susup that he cried out, “You have killed me, Major!” and Mr. Heald believing that he really had killed him, or at any rate dissembled him to carry out any of his “machiney-ing” propensities, dragged him out and replaced the fastener in the hollow logs. Susup crawled off to his companions, and the Major retired to his bear-skin couch.
Next day, Mr. Heald and others visited the Indian camp. Where they found Susup was alive though barely able to speak for the pommeling he had received. Sabbie said to the Major, “John Hart and I will drink your heart’s blood within six months!” Mr. Heald leveled his piece at him, on the instant, but concluded almost as soon that he would not fire upon him, and so lowered his gun. Sabbie laughing in his face said,”Me got very great heart Major!” but no doubt, secretly felt great respect for him.”
Susup plotted his revenge for years and followed Major Heald’s son for three days while he was tending his winter trapping lines, but he was unable to “execute his design of killing him.” Three years later, Susup either drank himself to death or was poisoned by a river boat captain in Bangor, Maine. His companions accepted four gallons of rum as compensation for the death of a “bad Indian.”
Stephen stories
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