October News

Pumpkins!

A big thanks to Roxy and Terry of Cross Patch Farm for the wonderful pumpkins. Be sure to visit their farm stand just a mile and a half south of PMM on Rt. 1.

Volunteer Opportunity

Photo Archives News

New Old Collection Online!

The Peg Grindall Collection is now available in our online database. Marjorie "Peg" Grindall was an antique dealer and collector with a passion for maritime history. She brought in her small collection of glass plate negatives and lantern slides to the museum to be digitized way back in 2008. She was not ready to part with them at the time but said that one day they would come to PMM. Peg

passed away last year and sure enough the plates came here along with some other maritime collectibles thanks to the help of Gordan Stanley and her son Ben. While the collection is small, it has many never before seen views of Mount Dessert Rock lighthouse as well as steamboats and the usual cats and dogs. One photo that has peaked our curiosity is of boat shop. Can anyone help us identify it?

New Towns "Adopted"

Our " Adopt-a-Town" program continues to chug along. We started this program nearly 10 years ago to raise the money to acquire thousands of Eastern Illustrating negatives that were in private hands. A few towns negatives have recently been adopted and we are excited to share these new old views. Postcard collector and dealer, Greg Skillman, generously adopted the towns of Oquossoc, Richmond and Gardiner. Barbara Tomblin adopted Kennebunk Beach where her family had a cottage for generations. Kenny Bassett adopted a few of the Ogunquit negatives and we suspect he will adopt some more as he diligently works on his postcard book of Ogunquit. Thank you Greg, Barbara and Kenny! There are still some towns available!

Maine Marine Fare Speaker Series

6:00 p.m.

PMM Old Vestry, 2 Church Street

$8/$5 members

Thursday, October 3

Anne Hayden, Senior Fisheries Program Manager at Manomet, will share a presentation including what fisheries in Maine used to look like, where things stand today, why the lobster fishery is thriving but the groundfishery isn't, and an outlook on the future. In addition to developing a market for green crabs, this presentation also covers other projects Manomet is working on including shellfish aquaculture and river herring restoration.

Thursday, October 10

Bill Anderson will discuss groundfishing out of Tenant's Harbor from 1949 to 2000.

Thursday, October 17

Dr. George Jacobson, University of Maine Professor Emeritus of Biology, Ecology, and Climate Change and former Maine State Climatologist will speak about long-term climate change. His work provides perspective on natural variability in the Earth's climate system (everything from repeated ice ages to human intervention in the system) and ways that climate dynamics influence Gulf of Maine fisheries.

Pre-Fling Into Fall &

Model Pumpkin Boat Competition

Saturday, October 5th

Included with Museum Admission

11:30am-Noon -Yard in the Yard Demonstration Help furl the square sails on our Downeaster mast in the yard.

Noon - Presentation & Book Signing John Anderson will discuss his new book Borne on the Wind: the Life and Journals of Captain Anders Anderson . A Swedish immigrant, Captain Anderson sailed schooners out of Stonington, Camden, and Rockland in the late 1800s and early 1900s.

1pm - Model Pumpkin Boat Competition II Bring your model pumpkin boat to compete in our second annual competition. $5 registration fee, free museum admission with model pumpkin boat entry.

See details below.

2pm-5pm - Scarecrow Vignette Building Help museum staff & volunteers create this year's Fling Into Fall scarecrow vignette to be entered into the scarecrow competition on October 12th.

Model Pumpkin Boat Competition II Details:
In the second year of this event, we challenge you to make a model boat out of a Pumpkin! Bring your model pumpkin boat to the Penobscot Marine Museum on Saturday October 6th to compete. PMM staff will judge entries using a point system based on size, composition, creative use of pumpkin, overall look, ability to float, and speed. The winner will receive 50% of the proceeds and the other 50% will go to the Penobscot Marine Museum to help support programming like this!

Rules & Regulations
* A member of the gourd family (pumpkin, squash, cucumber, zucchini, melon, etc.) must be a key component of the model boat
* Must float
* Must be able to move from A to B without human contact (all boats will be timed to travel across our small pool)
* Must be under 12" tall by 12" wide by 12" deep
* All boats must arrive before 1pm on Saturday, October 5th. Judging begins at 1pm.

To register, call 207-548-2529 or email jganskop@pmm-maine.org.

Last Night at the Museum

Saturday, October 19

5:00 pm - 7:00 pm

Tickets $5 adults, $3 children, $12 families

Join the Nightwatch as they put the Museum to bed for the season and the portraits come alive to tell their stories. Family-friendly and all in good "spirit". Tours leave every 15 minutes and last half an hour. For more information call 207-548-2529 ext. 213.

Inspired by PMM Paintings

Trip to Elbe River

by Cipperly Good, Curator

Ship PREMIER Henrich Andrea Petersen and Peter Christian Holm, signed, 1874. Oil on canvas. Gift of the Estate of John Allen, #2000.2

In researching the painting of ship PREMIER of Bangor off Cuxhaven, Germany for our Where in the World? exhibit this past spring, I became inspired to see how the working waterfront and navigational aids have evolved since 1874 when Heinrich Andrea Petersen and Peter Christian Holm painted the scene. When my sister and I planned a trip to Germany this fall, I had the perfect chance to stop by Cuxhaven. Cuxhaven sits on the southwest side of the mouth of the River Elbe, which leads to Hamburg, the principal commercial city and seaport of Germany in 1869, and still a major port today. The mouth of the River Elbe cuts a channel through the Wadden Sea, an inland sea delineated from the North Sea by the string of Frisian Islands stretching from The Netherlands to Denmark. At low tide, it is possible to walk on the Wadden Sea floor from mainland Europe to the Frisian Islands; for example, the island of Neuwerk lies 8 miles from Cuxhaven's nearby seaside resorts of Dose and Dohen.

General Chart of the North Sea John Purdy,1846 Gift of Captain Wellington Barbour, #80

In our library collection, James Imray & Sons' 1880 Sailing Directions to accompany the Chart of North Sea, cannot overemphasize the need for engaging a pilot to navigate the channels cutting through the sands of the Wadden Sea, as well as providing navigational landmarks to guide the ship in safely. In the detail of the painting:

We see the Alte Liebe lighthouse, built 1805 by Hamburg commercial interests and only recently decommissioned, and the semaphore for communicating between land and ship. Today the semaphore looks different, but Alte Liebe remains the same.

Further out, on the Bosch Head, sits Kuglebake, a daymark that shows the edge of the sands along the channel. Like in 1874, shipping continues, although today the ships are container ships, tankers, ferries, and tugboats moving at top speed to fight the currents of the Elbe to Hamburg.

Rather than walk the 8 miles to Neuwerk, my sister and I took the ferry at high tide. It was amazing to wind our way along the tidal creeks and channels with only sticks topped with brooms to mark the channel.

On Neuwerk, is another lighthouse to guide sailors from the North Sea through the channels to the Elbe. Built in 1814, it saw 200 years of services, making it one of the oldest worldwide still standing.

The Ostbake (East Beacon) on Neuwerk provides another daymark showing the northeast side of the island.

Using these marks, the Sailing Directions state: "Vessels should approach the mouth of the river into 12 fathoms, with the lighthouses and beacons on Neuwerk distinctly visible; then by bringing the [Kuglebake] to bear SE by S, and nearly in one with the high lighthouse on Neuwerk...they will be in 10 or 11 fathoms of water."

At the next low tide, my sister and I wander the Wadden Sea, able to look back on the seashore off Cuxhaven and out to Neuwerk with an appreciation for the navigational skills of Maine 1870's mariners and the dedication of the Port of Hamburg to install and maintain the aids to navigation to keep shipping moving.