By Karen Donato
Staff Writer
HOULTON, Maine — As guests arrived at 66 Main St. in Houlton last Friday evening they were met with a bit of nostalgia. Parked in front of Visions was a 1948 John Deere tractor hauling a one-row digger, originally used for the Houlton High School agricultural program and a 1940 Chevrolet farm truck, owned by Barry Campbell of Littleton that made plenty of trips up and down the potato fields decades ago.
Members of both the Southern Aroostook Agricultural Museum in Littleton and the Southern Aroostook Cultural Arts program were hosting a reception, ‘Art of the Harvest,’ focusing on the local potato harvest. The display, complete with fresh potatoes from the field, set the scene of the familiar fields during September and October when dozens of local farmers, school kids and families brought in the harvest.
Adults and children of all ages worked in the fields, hand picking potatoes, riding or driving the trucks, loading barrels, riding the digger and working in the potato house. Everyone worked. Work began as the sun was coming up and ended as it was going down. Farmers’ wives, if they were not in the field, ran after parts or were busy at home, cooking meals for the family and sometimes even the crew and counting hundreds of tickets each night. The tally was important for the workers that were eagerly awaiting the Saturday night check.
Large families were common back then and every penny that was earned helped buy the winter wardrobe for many or put a little in a savings account for future purchases.
SACAP’s President Bob Cowperthwaite said Friday’s gathering was the largest reception for this organization, estimating that there were close to 200 visitors stopping in to see the displays between 5 and 7 p.m.
Both SACAP and SAAM members dressed for the occasion in their jeans, overalls, red bandanas and a pair of work gloves stuck in the their pocket. Dot Fitzpatrick wore a housedress belonging to her late mother-in-law, Mary and complimented by a hand-made apron Fitzpatrick had given to her in the 1960s embroidered with her grandson’s names on the pockets.
Several refreshments offered to those attending included potato as the main ingredient.
A couple visiting the Northeast from Brussels, Belgium stopped by on their way to dinner and took in the display. They grow potatoes in their area, but harvest the new potatoes in April and the more mature in mid-summer.
No matter who you talk to about harvest, it seems to be the same. No one ever forgets those early mornings, some that were warm and others that were cold and wet. The days were long and one was so tired, you had only enough energy to eat a good meal, soak in a hot tub and climb the stairs to bed. Morning came all too soon and it was back to the field to fill those barrels that garnered the picker 25 cents each. Comments recorded by guests included, “I remember wondering how many rows of potatoes the farmer would let me get behind; how could we sabotage the digger; who ran over my lunch; riding to the field with my grandfather; ordering new clothes from the Sears and Roebuck catalogue; rolling barrels and playing in the barn during lunch break; hoping for rain or a late start in the morning.”
Gloria Jewell, a retired nurse whose husband farmed in Monticello recalled harvest as being special. “Everyone worked together and it was a family time,” she said.
Jewell remembered picking potatoes in the 1940s for Harrison Ames and earning enough money to buy her uniforms for nurse’s training. Her two daughters, Sharon and Liz who both live away, still recall their childhood days in the fields and miss the harvest.
No matter how hard the work was, most everyone seems to remember good times and still have a yearning to get back out there for old time’s sake.
SACAP’s newly hired Executive Director Barbara Sutton was pleased with the event and very grateful for all of the work the volunteers and board members had put into the display and reception.
The ‘Art of the Harvest’ will continue until October 25, followed by local fine arts illustrator, Rebecca Hickman and the Ink the Faith presentation from October 30 through December 5.
Visions is open Tuesday through Friday from noon until 5 p.m. and Saturdays from 10 a.m. until 2 p.m. For more information call 532-2119.
