THE SPECTACULAR PENOBSCOT RIVER Part 2

 

I recently presented a program to fifth grade students in my granddaughter’s reading class, which had been reading The Sign of the Beaver. I picked the book up when she was visiting, and discovered its setting was on the west side of the Penobscot River. My research has been mostly on the east side of the river, but I had viewed the river from the Penobscot Narrows Observatory in September, and, using the pictures and the results of much of my research, I believed I had something valuable to share with the class.

PENOBSCOT RIVER in MAINE

     The Penobscot River and bay area is rich in Native American history. In former times the region was part of the traditional homeland of the Wabanaki Confederacy, one tribe of which was the Penobscot tribe. The Confederacy at one time, thousands of years before the arrival of the white man, controlled much of New England. Ancient remains of their campsites have been found on the bay’s shores and islands, where they hunted, fished, gathered clams and ate other food in the bay area of the Penobscot River watershed. Today, they believe they are the caretakers of the Penobscot River and its watershed, with carries a sacred duty to protect the river and its surrounding region.

     The spelling of Penobscot was a difficult matter for the French…a Dr. Ballard discovered nearly sixty different ways the French people spelled it…the English did better, catching the sound, Penobscot.The word “Penobscot” originates from a mispronunciation of their name “Penawapskewi.” The word means “rocky part” or “descending ledges. The Tribe has adopted the name “Penobscot Nation.”

The late Dr. Frank Siebert, whose death was in recent years, actually lived among the Penobscot Indians. He was the last white man who fluently spoke the Penobscot language, and at the time of his death he was compiling a dictionary, in an attempt to keep the language alive. Much of his artifact collection is at the Abbey Museum in Bar Harbor.

     Mr. Treat and his family, who settled in this area in 1759, are considered the first permanent European settlers on the Penobscot River. His oldest son, Joshua Treat, Jr. (1756-1826), built the first log house, saw mill, and vessel in (Frankfort), near Castine, about nine miles up the Penobscot River from Fort Point.

     With the exception of the wetlands, mountain tops, a few barren and burned areas, the Penobscot river basins were forested with (to continue reading click on: http://carolyncholland.wordpress.com/2009/01/13/the-spectacular-penobscot-river-a-natural-wonder-in-maine-part-2/

Logging in Maine & on the Peru-Brazilian Border

 

Through the years, the logging industry has played a major role. Below are four scenerios, from the Peru-Brazilian border; Sullivan, Maine; the Penobscot Million lands in Hancock/Washington counties, Massachusetts (Maine) in the 1790s, and Maine’s unorganized territory in 2008.

SCENERIO 1

The amazing pictures were beamed around the globe: a handful of warriors from an ‘undiscovered tribe’ in the rainforest on the Brazilian-Peruvian border brandishing bows and arrows at the aircraft that photographed them. These photographs were published to make a political point, to perhaps reduce the tribe’s danger of their losing the habitat in which they have flourished for hundreds of years. The publicity from the photographs will hopefully lift the threat of logging to the tribe’s existance.

José Carlos Meirelles, 61, a sertanista (expert on indigenous tribes) working for the Brazilian Indian Protection Agency, Funai, took the photographs.

Survival International, the organisation that released the pictures, and Funai, which is dedicated to searching out remote tribes and protecting them, conceded that they’ve known about this nomadic tribe for around two decades. Former Funai president Sydney Possuelo agreed that the invasion of the tribe’s privacy was necessary to prove that ‘uncontacted,’ isolated, tribes still existing in the area, are endangered by the menace of the logging industry. Loggers, closing in on the Indians’ homeland, are threatening their isolation. Peru’s logging has sent many Indians fleeing into Brazil, according to Meirelles.

International media attention forced neighbouring Peru to re-examine its logging policy in the border area where the tribe lives. Funai has shut down 28 illegal sawmills in Acre state, where these tribes are located.

As yet, there is no logging on Brazillian side of the border.

Building paved roads also creates tree cutting. A new road is being paved from Peru into Acre, which will likely introduce hordes of poor settlers to the area. Other Amazon roads have led to 30 miles of rain forest being cut down on each side, according to scientists.

SCENERIO 2

LOGGING TRUCK IN EXETER, MAINE

Sullivan, Maine, already has “logging,” or “tree cutting,” regulations, to protect the value of its ocean-side properties. Thus, when William Badyna, of Brooklyn, clear-cut his 1.2 acre, heavily wooded seaside lot (legally owned by his wife, Angelique) on Flanders Bay he blamed it on a “misunderstanding” and the hiring of local workers who did not (to continue reading, click on LOGGING IN MAINE AND ON THE PERU-BRAZILIAN BORDER )

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ADDITIONAL READING:

IN NEW ENGLAND, HISTORY CONFLICTS WITH PROGRESS

YOU MEAN THIS NEW ENGLANDER IS A WESTSYLVANIAN?

Blogging: Does it Have Value? Part 1

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Moose, Goose, Deer

When Madame Rosalie de Leval arrived in what is now Hancock County, Maine, she she was thrilled to observe the many wild animals. Below is a poem I penned in the car while traveling the Maine roads, where I saw many of the pictured warning signs. 

Definitely it was not a goose!           

MAINE MOOSE WARNING

This beast was massive,
Certainly not passive.
While racing high speed ahead
It saw me and it stopped dead.

His eyes, locked into mine, seemed to screecher,
“You certainly are such a strange creature.
Did you ever star in a horror movie feature?”

Intimidated, into my skin I cowered.
He smiled and said his name was Howard.
This creature is nocturnal,
Perhaps too, it is paternal.

If the plural of mouse is mice,
Is the plural of moose to be