SPRING PLANTING
The Isolation Blues;
reflections during covid-19
As long as I can remember I have heard about population migration away from northern Maine due to lack of economic opportunities. It became readily apparent during the 1970s as many of our small rural towns struggled to maintain their downtown commerce. Apparently this is nothing new (though we usually think it is). My father used to tell me about how many of the local farmers during the late 1930s and early 1940s used to migrate to Connecticut during the winter looking for work after their crops were harvested. Groups of men from the town would go or sometimes they would take their wife or the entire family. My father and several of his brothers were part of this work-trend to keep the cash flow steady and find a way to make it to the next growing season.
My father first went to Connecticut in the winter of 1940 along with his wife Ella. They found an apartment and jobs in Seymour just north of Milford. My Dad’s first job was at a woodworking factory in the carpenters department. His boss asked him if he had any training and my Dad said, “I can do it.” Dad used to say, “Always say ‘yes’ to a job, you can figure it out as you go along.” Dad said it didn’t take his boss long to figure out he was no carpenter (he wasted a lot of wood his first week on the job), but like he said, he caught on soon enough and found a way to earn his paycheck. The next year he worked at a munitions factory driving a forklift and Ella found a job in a Defense factory making parachutes. His supervisor asked Dad if he had ever driven a forklift and he replied, “I can do it.” He knocked over several pallets on his first day at work but stayed late after his shift practicing for several days (while his supervisor watched) and soon got the hang of it. He recalled he was walking along Summer street that December when they announced the bombing of Pearl Harbor on a public speaker.
Each spring when my father was planning to return to northern Maine to put in the crop his boss always tried to talk him out of it. “Why do you go back to the farm when you can earn better money right here?” his boss inquired. My father always came back. Two of his brothers and countless other men and women from the county decided to stay in Connecticut and seek better opportunities, but the pull to the land, potatoes and family kept my father coming back. By the time my father purchased the family farm in 1944 (where I am now) he stayed put. As the farmers are planting crops mid-May around the county I always recall my father’s story.
In the woods,
Dave
May 19, 2021