Mascoma Valley High School and Indian River Middle School
West Canaan, NH (April 23-24)

Wow, what a great start to our 2008 tour! Chris Morse, a super-enthusiastic art teacher at the high school, has worked for several years on developing an interdisciplinary Environment and Arts Week, which culminates in a weekend festival open to the public. It started as an unusual partnership between the art and science departments, and Chris has since gotten other departments in on the game. He has developed it to the point where he's gearing up to apply for a prestigious grant from the National Endowment for the Arts to fund the festival – good luck on that, Chris.

The schools are perched high on a hill, and we had a prime spot in a courtyard between them. The students we saw varied from a group of second-graders from Canaan Elementary School to high schoolers who were roam the exhibit at their own pace, to a dozen students who traveled from the private Cardigan Mountain School to experience Ways of the Woods. About 435 students, teachers, and other passersby got a chance to tour Ways of the Woods, and almost  everyone in both schools got a chance to see the exhibit when they ran back and forth to the bus and lunch. One of my favorite quotes from our comment book was from a fifth-grader who wrote, "In the woods you don't have to live up to anything. You can just be yourself.”

We had the company of Dustin Coates, an incredibly skilled wood turner who demonstrated his work to the students. His work included bowls and goblets turned from burls, tops and knick-knacks made from lilac wood, and tiny rattles smaller than a dime. We heard his booming laugh echoing in the courtyard as he engaged kids and adults of all ages. Hopefully we'll be seeing him again.

It was nice a great opening event for 2008, and we look forward to visiting schools from Madrid, NY to Dover-Foxcroft, Maine in the coming weeks.

—Jessie

Did you visit Ways of the Woods in Lancaster? Please

Discover Wild New Hampshire Day
Concord,  NH (April 26)

Wow—who knew that our first public event of the season would be our busiest day ever?  The combination of gorgeous weather and an ideal location within a great event resulted in more than 2,600 people touring Ways of the Woods in only five hours.  For much of the day, we had a line 30-50 deep just to get inside the trailer!

Discover Wild New Hampshire Day is hosted by the state Department of Fish and Game each spring to get people excited about upcoming fishing and hunting seasons.  Nearly every exhibitor had some kind of neat hands-on activity designed to get kids to participate, so we saw lots of families coming through Ways of the Woods. You could also practice fly casting, check out aquariums full of fish from a hatchery, visit any number of conservation organizations, try out a hunting simulator, pick up your licenses, and lots more. It’s great to see these traditions being passed on.

In between frantically refilling brochure racks and trying to keep track of everyone, we had a chance to talk to some great people.  Concord is slightly south of the Northern Forest, but we heard lots of stories of camping and traveling and hunting and fishing through the region—once we explained to people exactly where we’re talking about. The Northern Forest is a special place, and that’s why connections can run deep even for people who don’t live there year-round.

—Jessie

Foxcroft  Academy
Dover-Foxcroft,  ME (May 1-2)

Imagine our surprise when we checked into Nelson’s Guest Rooms in Dover-Foxcroft and Lois, the proprietor, asked us, “are you from the same Northern Forest Center that wrote this book?” She held up a copy of At Home in the Northern Forest, which the Center published in 2001.  It turns out that her husband Bob was interviewed and photographed for the book—and here we were staying at their home all these years later.  It’s a small world after all.

Foxcroft Academy is one of Maine’s “town academies.” These are technically private schools, but most of their students come from nearby towns that pay tuition because they don’t have their own high schools.  Because they’re not subject to the same rules and expectations as traditional public school, private schools often do things you wouldn’t expect to see in small Maine communities.  Foxcroft, for example, is breaking ground on a new dormitory so it can increase the number of boarding students admitted. While we were there, we met kids from Russia, Korea, China and elsewhere who were there to learn English and live small-town, New England life. It’s a great opportunity for them, of course, but it’s also a chance for the Maine kids to be introduced to lots of different cultures that they otherwise might not get to know.

We were thrilled to be joined in Dover-Foxcroft by basket maker Gabriel Frey, who also demonstrated with us last year in Calais and Skowhegan, Maine. He rounded out our presentation by showing the kids how he turns a log into a basket—pounding and the log until the rings peel apart, then peeling, splitting and cutting the strips into whatever sized splints he needs to make a particular basket. The students loved this, peppering him with questions and jumping at the chance to try out his tools.  A couple of boys from one class were so enthralled that they brought another teacher out to show him around later in the day. When they left, they were dead serious about hunting down a perfect brown ash tree so they could make some baskets.

During every class at Foxcroft, kids wrote things in the comment book such as, “This was the highlight of my day,” “One of the funnest things we’ve ever done in art,” or, my personal favorite, “I think Ways of the Woods is a very inspirational idea.”

Thanks to the students, teachers, and assistant Head of School Mrs. Postlewaite for showing us a great time at your great school.

—Jessie

Northeast Forest Products Equipment Expo
Essex Junction, VT (May 9-10)

One of the great things about Ways of the Woods is that it can work at so many different kinds of events.  Sure, we do lots of schools, festivals and fairs, but we also get down to the nitty-gritty at events like the Northeast Forest Products Equipment Expo.  People come from all over to take a look at the latest machines and tools to keep their sawmills or logging operations going, and to just catch up with other folks in the business. Where else can you test-drive a log loader or a grapple skidder?

After two days of conversations, a couple of things are notable to me about this event’s patrons.  Logging is probably one of the few professions that still tends to run in the family, which is evident from the multi-generational groups walking around together.  Also, they are darned proud of it.  Many of those groups arrive decked out in matching tee-shirts, hats, or jackets proclaiming the name of their businesses, like members of a sports team. It seems that logging is more than just a job to most people who do it. I don’t think I’ve ever talked to a logger whose father wasn’t also a logger. The old-timers like to talk about how there are certain plots of land they’ve harvested several times in their careers, taking pride in a job done well and with respect for the land. I hope the number of young people at the event indicates that this work has a future as well.

Plenty of people came back to see us multiple times during the Expo, and we even got a comment that Ways of the Woods was “the most important display of the show.” We saw more than 1,100 people in two days, including several directors of the big fair that’s held every year there at the Champlain Valley Expo grounds. They all indicated they’d love to have us there for their event too. Sounds like fun to me!

—Jessie

Telstar  High School
Bethel,  Maine (May 15-16)

There’s no place like home.  Our hometown Bethel friends have heard lots of stories over the years about developing and touring with Ways of the Woods.  For the most part, though, they have only actually seen it all packed up parked in the lot next to the movie theater, awaiting its next voyage. To correct that problem, we decided to drive down to the high school to share the exhibit with local students and host a reception for our neighbors. 

We saw mostly high schoolers, plus a few middle schoolers, and were very impressed with their interest and attention.  I think we impressed them too.  One boy told us Ways of the Woods reminded him of a class trip to a museum in Boston.  Gabe also overheard a classic exchange between two kids:

Girl, to boy: “Why do you want to watch this video?  You can’t even finish your English project.”
Boy: “Yeah, but I’m interested in this.”

And you know there’s hope for the world when a 9th grader writes something like this on a leaf for the message board: “I love the outdoors and I hope my kids do too.”

Our reception was a grand time, with food, friends, a rainbow, and music from fiddler Patrick Ross–who joined us despite his broken knee.  Watch for him in the upcoming Hollywood adaptation of Jack London’s classic wilderness adventure tale Call of the Wild. 

Our Bethel stop was all we could have asked for. We are glad to call this town home, and hey, it’s always nice to sleep in our own beds!

—Jessie

Hazen Union School & Spring Fest
Hardwick, VT (May 21-24)

It became clear that the Northern Forest Center has already made its mark on Hardwick when we noticed that there were copies of HandMade in the Northern Forest in every room at our Hardwick home-away-from, the Kimball House B&B.  Many of the students and teachers at the Hazen Union School also told us they were neighbors or relatives of Joanne Foster or the Levinsky family, whose photos are blown up beyond life-size on the inside walls of the trailer.  Ways of the Woods hits home for people pretty easily when they see their friends in the exhibit.

The Hazen Union School is the second school we’ve visited this year that has its own Tree Farm (the first was Foxcroft Academy). The school has a forestry technology program that has produced championship woodsmen’s teams for something like 11 years in a row. One student wrote in our comment book, “I’m glad to see stuff like this around schools.  Maybe more people my age will consider jobs in this industry.” It’s interesting to meet a high school kid who is concerned that not enough people from his generation will want to take over for the aging workforce in the forest products industry, because that’s certainly something we hear from older folks quite a bit. My other favorite quote was from a young man who called the Rings of Time an “iTree.”

We wrapped up the week with the Spring Fest, a Memorial Day tradition in Hardwick.
There, almost 400 people toured Ways of the Woods. We saw many students again, this time with families and friends in tow.  Given the enthusiasm shown by many visitors, I think it’s safe to say we’ve left our mark on Hardwick yet again.

 

—Jessie

School Visits
Milan and North Stratford, NH (May 27-28)

We headed up to northern New Hampshire and saw two whole schools’ worth of students in two days.  It was a test of endurance, but it was also a treat to visit two schools that are truly … truly what?

We decided to play a new game with the students at the Milan (MY-lan) Village School, which is home to grades K-6. We got them to find as many photos or other references as they could to nearby Berlin or the White Mountains.  From a bib that belonged to a competitor at the old ski jump that still stands on the town line, to photos of the Brown Company paper mill, to local sawmill owner Barry Kelly’s video in which he discusses what made Berlin what it is, Ways of the Woods contains a great deal of content from the area. The kids loved to see things that they recognized in the exhibit, and I think the task we gave them really helped them “get it.” When I asked the students what they had found, one second-grade girl said she had heard Barry Kelly “compare new things to old things.” In a nutshell, that’s pretty much what we try to get the kids to understand.  What we have here today is built upon the rich and interesting history of the region. It has never been easy to live here, but if we remind ourselves what brought people here in the first place to live, work, and play, we just may figure out the keys to a bright future.

—Jessie

Saranac Lake High School
Saranac Lake, NY (June 4-5)

“Land of Retreat and Renewal” is one of our six kiosks that illustrate themes of life in the Northern Forest. It shows photos and paintings from across the region that demonstrate how and why people have been coming here for generations to connect with nature and revive their spirits.  In Saranac Lake, Dr. Edward Livingston Trudeau* took “retreat and renewal” to the extreme. Having become ill with tuberculosis in New York City, he withdrew to Paul Smiths, NY as a last-ditch effort to get well.  What happened seemed almost too good to be true: after several months of doing little more than breathing the clean air, drinking the clean water, and just living the life of the Adirondacks, he was cured of his terrible disease.  Subsequently, he moved to Saranac Lake and built a “sanatorium” where other city people suffering from TB could come and be cured. Many older homes in the “little city in the Adirondacks” still have second-floor sleeping porches, which local residents built so their boarders from the city could breathe the magical air all day and night.

We’ve been trying make Ways of the Woods hit home with students by challenging them to find a reference to their own area in the exhibit. When we’re wrapping up, we tie that reference into our overall message. I found this technique particularly powerful in Saranac Lake.  A bunch of really sick city people went there and did nothing but hang out for a few months and they were cured! I mean, is this place great or what? Of course, I’m sure most people in Saranac Lake are aware of the history of Dr. Trudeau to the point where it seems commonplace. But we reminded them how exceptional that history really is, and pointed out that many of the same factors that drew Trudeau there were still true. When we got the kids worked up about living in such a great place, and reminded them they get to be surrounded by it all the time unlike those unfortunate city people, that’s when they broke out in spontaneous rounds of applause.

*Cool fact: according to Wikipedia, Dr. Trudeau is the great-grandfather of Garry Trudeau, creator of the comic strip Doonesbury.

—Jessie

St. Lawrence Power and Equipment Festival & School Visit
Madrid, NY (June 11-15)

Madrid (pronounced MAD-rid, please), with its rolling farm fields near the St. Lawrence river, was a great place to wrap up our school visits and move right on to the summer fair and festival season.  Chuck Goolden, one of the many tireless volunteers involved with the St. Lawrence Power & Equipment Museum, saw Ways of the Woods in nearby Canton in October 2006 and has been persistently trying to get us to come to their semi-annual festival ever since. This year’s festival, which included displays of antique tractors, cars and trucks, steam engines, saw mills, and the like, was particularly momentous for the Museum because it was the first time it was held at the farm the Museum recently purchased from Chuck’s brother.  The army of volunteers was very proud of their new grounds and they’ve got big plans to turn it into a working village that will display different eras of farming history. Given the extraordinary energy and cohesiveness of the group involved, I’m sure they’ll achieve their goals in no time.

The grand total of K-12 students we saw this spring stands at almost 1700.  Many of the kids we saw in Madrid brought their parents and grandparents back to see us at the festival. That was great for both us and the event, because the Power & Equipment crew is trying to expose more young people to their effort to keep history alive. Most of the Museum’s volunteers came to see Ways of the Woods and expressed their great thanks for us being there.  In fact, they were so intent on getting us back for future festivals that they bribed us with free meals all weekend. Yum!

 

—Jessie

Canoe Hullabaloo
Old Town, ME (June 21)

We greeted the first day of summer in Old Town, Maine, which lends it name to the famous canoes. Beautiful weather made for a fun day with vendors and kids’ games at Waterfront Park.

People responded very well to Ways of the Woods, with many spending the better part of an hour studying the content. The “Working the Land” kiosk, with its photos of log drives and a display of the old spiked boots loggers used to wear, drew the most attention of the outside exhibits. That’s not surprising because we were within sight of a major river where those log drives took place, and around the corner from the mill where they used to end up. Plenty of people told us they remember the drives – one woman even told us she learned to swim by clinging to a 4-foot pulp log. Altogether we saw about 460 people in Old Town, and many told us that they’d like to see us back next year.

Read more about Ways of the Woods at the Canoe Hullabaloo in Toni-Lynn Robins’s article in the Bangor Daily News. http://bangornews.com/

 

—Jessie

Ways of the Woods Day
Lincoln, NH (July 12)

We’ve been working together for several months with Rick Russack at the Upper Pemigewasset Historical Society to develop a celebration of local heritage.  We were flattered to find out that they named the whole day after us!

The one-day festival took place in front of the Lincoln Village Shops. I have been driving through the village of Lincoln for years (it’s at one end of the Kancamagus Highway, one of those great winding mountain roads), but never realized that those shops are on the site of an old paper mill. In fact, the mall itself is constructed with pieces of the mill and decorated with mill memorabilia.  Gigantic timbers frame the building, and restored clocks, scales, and photographs adorn the walls. All the benches in the mall and in the surrounding park are built with huge gears from mill machinery with wide wooden planks secured between them.  Part of the original mill was converted into the aptly named Papermill Theatre, which has been home to a successful summer theater company for over 20 years. Even though the mill’s heyday has passed, the history lives on in a modern setting.

Ways of the Woods Day (I like the sound of that) included chainsaw carving by Mark Fontaine, great bluegrass music from the Blake Mountain Band, a basket maker, a demonstration from a local high school woodmen’s team, food from a nearby restaurant, and displays from the Forest Service and local historical groups.  All that action plus nice weather led to over 500 locals and tourists visiting Ways of the Woods, with favorable comments coming from both groups. All in all it turned out to be an excellent day – thanks to the Upper Pemigewasset Historical Society for inviting us and putting it all together!

—Jessie

This year’s tour sponsored in part by TransCanada Corporation. Additional support for Ways of the Woods Day in Lincoln was provided by Loon Mountain, and the Center for Rural Partnerships at Plymouth State University.

Saratoga County Fair
Ballston Spa, NY (July 15-20)

The first fair of the year for Gabe and me (Mike and Carolyn went to Houlton) produced a new Greatest Comment of All Time in the comment book:

“I am so excited to see an exhibit showing all of the aspects of a forest – environmental, economical, familial…I’m happy to see an exhibit looking at the whole picture. The only way to preserve a landscape is to see and love the entire landscape.  Keep it up; I look forward to seeing the growth and changes.” – Sandee, Saratoga, NY

Every once in awhile we meet someone who can sum up the Ways of the Woods experience even better than we can, it seems. Thanks for your kind words, Sandee.  We look forward to seeing you again too.

—Jessie


This year’s tour sponsored in part by Transcanada Corporation.

Acadian Festival
Madawaska,  ME (June 27-29)

Madawaska is way up on the tippy-top of Maine, which makes it the most northeastern town in the United States.  It is more than four hours north of Bangor, which surprises even Mainers, who often forget just how big Maine really is. The culture of the St. John Valley is unlike anywhere else – people go about their daily business with little regard for the fact that the river is politically a division of two countries, often speaking uniquely accented French and English in the same sentence.

Cultural and family roots run deep here, which explains the most interesting part of the Acadian Festival: it’s actually an incredibly elaborate week-long family reunion.  Each year, a different family of descendents of the original Acadian settlers gathers for historical re-enactments, ceremonies, music, food, dancing, and getting to know long lost relatives.  This year, over 1000 Guerettes and La Tulippes made the voyage to Madawaska. Our comment book showed signatures from Connecticut, New York, California, and several places in Canada, to name a few – all people with ties to this culturally significant part of the Northern Forest.

 

—Jessie

This year’s tour sponsored in part by TransCanada Corporation.  Maine stops also sponsored in part by Maine Humanities Council.

Keene Bicentennial Jubilee
Keene, NY (July 26-27)

Marcy Field in Keene Valley is firmly in the running for the title of Most Gorgeous Location we’ve ever set up in. It’s right in the heart of the High Peaks, the Adirondacks’ 46 mountains taller than 4,000 feet. All year, this active little community has been throwing itself a 200th birthday party, and they invited us for their summer Jubilee.

Some communities have a special magic that draws people to them, and Keene definitely falls in that category.  How else do you explain us seeing over 900 people in a weekend when there are only just over 1000 year-round residents in the whole town? The Jubilee hosted an impressive array of craftspeople, community groups, music and games. It was as much fun to be a visitor as it was to be an exhibitor.

Sunday was all about the farmers’ market. We had heard about how huge it was, but we were still unprepared for the size! Apparently, lots of tourists stop there on their way out of town on Sundays, so it has grown tremendously as people become more aware of the importance of buying local food and crafts.

 

—Jessie

This year’s tour sponsored in part by TransCanada Corporation. Additional support for our visit to Keene Valley was provided by the Adirondack Council, Association for the Protection of the Adirondacks, Residents Committee to Protect the Adirondacks, and the Adirondack Chapter of The Nature Conservancy.

Warren County Youth Fair
Warrensburg, NY (August 2)

After a relaxing week in the High Peaks of the Adirondacks, we headed south to Warrensburg, near Lake George. The Cornell Cooperative Extension organizes the Fair to show off the work of kids in 4-H programs across the county. Children of all ages came to show off the craft projects they’ve been working on and animals they’ve been raising all year. The organizers and participants were very proud to have us there to join in on the fun.

Laurel Gailor, the natural resources educator for the Extension, spent a good deal of time with us.  She’s a forester, but she wasn’t the only one who pointed out to us that Warren County is 95% forested and has long been heavily involved in the forest products industry. She also told us she uses the Center’s Northern Forest Wealth Index in presentations she gives all over the U.S. and internationally.

Our stop in Warrensburg catapulted this season’s visitor total over 15,000. And we’re just coming up on the busy season!  Look for us at a fair near you soon.

 

—Jessie


This year’s tour sponsored in part by TransCanada Corporation.

Forest Heritage Days
Greenville, ME (August 8-9)

Greenville has the distinction of being one of only two towns that we’ve been to twice (the other being Lancaster, NH.) Last year we went for a school visit and everyone said, “You’ve got to come back for Forest Heritage Days!” So we did. 

They take their forest heritage very seriously here.  Greenville is located on the southern end of Moosehead Lake – the largest lake located within the borders of a single state east of the Mississippi.  Back when logs used to reach the mills via river instead of truck, this huge body of water used to be covered with logs awaiting the spring thaw. While the Kennebec River saw its last log drive in 1976, the forest products industry still has a strong presence in the economy and culture of the region.

The relentless rain was no match for our innovative drainage ditches, expansive awning, or the 200 people that came out for the first afternoon. The Colby Woodmen’s Team gave a demonstration, including some impressive cookie-stacking, fire-building, and axe-throwing. On Saturday, the event took over the school grounds.   A craft fair filled the gym while Soren Eriksson’s Game of Logging carried on in the playing fields. This isn’t your average woodsmen’s meet – the “game” was designed to create incentives for loggers to develop their skills with the utmost safety and accuracy. Competitions are held throughout the country.

We saw another 700 people on Saturday as the sun came and went. The organizers of the event welcomed us back anytime – how could Ways of the Woods not be perfect for an event called Forest Heritage Days?

—Jessie

New York State Woodsmen’s Field Days
Booneville, NY (August 15-17)

Ways of the Woods and the New York State Woodsmen’s Field Days were a match made in heaven. We’ve been trying to go there and they’ve been trying to get us since we hit the road in 2006, so it was a great triumph to actually make it happen.  As the granddaddy of all Eastern woodsmen’s days, it’s like a fair, forest products and equipment expo, and logging competition all wrapped up into one. 

Several of the directors of the event came through to thank us for being there and to invite us back for future years. They also announced us over the loudspeaker almost constantly, which sent over 2700 people our way over the course of three days.  Woodmen’s days in general provide a great audience for Ways of the Woods – they engage with the exhibit, they get it, they like it, and they walk away smiling.

Caledonia County Fair
Lyndonville, VT (August 20-24)

We haven’t been to the Northeast Kingdom since May, and it was great to go back. Dick Lawrence, President of the Fair, worked with us to create a special area to show off the forest and forest product of the region. The result was a lovely little courtyard flanked by a tent full of displays of locally-made wood products, a clever log cabin that could be delivered on a trailer, and Ways of the Woods.

In the shadow of Burke Mountain, we saw nearly 2000 people in five days.  Saturday we enjoyed perfect sunny weather and fiddle music by our friend Patrick Ross.  Patrick is well-known in the Kingdom, so people flocked to his sets.  He ran into a friend of his who joined in with his guitar for a set.  What a treat!

Our comment book was peppered with sentiments such as “This is great stuff, very informative, nice variety of info, thanks!”, “Very interesting insights into how life should be,” and “Had to come back for a second look!” We had a great time coming back to northeastern Vermont, and now we’re heading down to Rutland for our first 10-day fair.

—Jessie


Thanks to TransCanada Corporation for sponsoring this year’s tour, and thanks to the Vermont Humanities Council for additional support for our Vermont events.

Vermont State Fair
Rutland, VT (August 29 - September 7)

You just never know who your neighbors are going to be at a fair.  This time we got a petting zoo full of camels, yaks, monkeys, parrots, and one animal that looked like a cross between a horse and a cow.  We never did figure out what that one was.

We found more proof that it’s a small world after all when we met Gordon Merrill. It didn’t take too long into the conversation to realize that Gordon was a student of my father, a professor of forestry at the University of Maine.  After telling an embarrassing story or two about my dad, Gordon told us his own life story. He grew up in a small town in Vermont before going to UM, where he spent several years working his way through school.  By the time he finally graduated, he was the “old man” in his class, but he was a woodsman for life.  After winning several precision tree-felling competitions, master woodsman Soren Eriksson told Gordon that he should just start teaching the skill.  Now he travels all over the place teaching chainsaw skills and safety.  He also moved back to the same small town in which he grew up, and was the first person with a four-year college degree to do so in as long as anyone could remember.  I always enjoy hearing stories of other young people who intentionally move back home because there’s just no place like it, especially when it means having to come up with a creative way to make a living. As long as there are people like that, there is hope for the future of the Northern Forest.

Rochester Fair
Rochester, NH (September 12-21)

Our Ways of the Woods safari continued in Rochester, where we were stationed next to a cage full of actual lions and tigers.  There was also a full-blown circus in the biggest tent I’ve ever seen. On my way to the shower one morning before anything was open, I noticed that I was being watched by a giraffe sticking its head out of a gap between the wall and the roof of the tent.  Just another day on the road.

In Rochester, we began our experiment with surveying some of our visitors to see what they’re getting out of the exhibit and to inform future changes.  Thad Guldbrandsen and his team of student surveyors from the Center for Rural Partnerships at Plymouth State University helped us out by asking people questions before and after they checked out Ways of the Woods.  We noticed that people who were being surveyed went inside determined to learn something by the time they came out.  Ways of the Woods is often people’s first encounter with the phrase “Northern Forest” and the concept of the four-state region.  But that doesn’t mean they don’t already have an association with it.  Upon exiting the exhibit, one couple told a surveyor that “when we found out where it was, we realized we used it more than we thought we did” when the surveyor first asked them if they knew what the Northern Forest was. It seems like we really are doing something to build the brand identity of the Northern Forest.  It will be interesting to see the survey results.

Fryeburg Fair
Fryeburg, ME (September 28 - October 5)

Gabe and I couldn’t have been more excited to take Ways of the Woods to the Fryeburg Fair, aka THE Fair.  We both grew up going there with our grandparents, and resumed the tradition together as adults. We tried to bring Ways of the Woods to Fryeburg in 2007, but organizers told us that due to our size, we would probably never be able to come.  This year, after having some land donated to the Fairgrounds, they changed their tune considerably.  Not only were we given a primo spot next to the new fire tower by the Natural Resource Center, we were also given the Larry Kiesman award for being the best educational exhibit at the Fair and hearty encouragement to come back in the future. That’s not a bad turnaround.

The Fryeburg Fair works hard to preserve agricultural traditions, so you won’t find any camels or tigers here, but you will find the largest assembly of oxen in the world.  You’ll also find more free entertainment than at any other fair in the world, with over 200 performers scheduled throughout the week. We created lots of our own superlatives, too.  We shattered our previous single-day attendance record by seeing 3700 people on Saturday, clobbered our event attendance record with 14,000 people in eight days (almost three times the next highest record of 5300 from last year’s Sandwich Fair, and despite seeing rain for five days!), and annihilated last year’s seasonal total by reaching 40,000 by the end of the event. Throughout it all, we felt we maintained a high quality of visitor interaction.

I could go on and on about the stories, positive comments, and what a great experience we had at THE Fair. My favorite challenge, though, was when 70 eighth-graders from the Bruce M. Whittier School in Poland, ME came through on a class trip.  They were given a little time to check out the exhibit, then were instructed by their teachers to come up with any question they wanted to ask Gabe and me.  The questions varied from “What is the ecological footprint of this exhibit?” to “Is this what you wanted to do when you were a kid?” to “What’s the most inspiring place you’ve ever been?”  Their insightful and rapid-fire questions created a wave of emotions for us.  They made us think about where we’ve been, what we’re doing, and -  more than numbers-  what it has amounted to.  That’s really what keeps us going.

—Jessie


Ways of the Woods’ 2008 Tour is sponsored by TransCanada Corporation.  Additional support for our stops in Maine is provided by the Maine Humanities Council.

School Visit and Apple Fest
South Hero, VT (October 11-12)

Fair season is over in the Northeast, but we’ve got a few more festivals to go before hunkering down for the winter. When Pam Allen of Allenholm Farm told us the sleepy little town of South Hero, VT, located on picturesque Grand Isle in the middle of Lake Champlain, can muster 15,000 people for its Apple Fest on Columbus Day weekend, we couldn’t turn it down. 

We arrived a day early to give us a chance to visit with the island school kids.  The school is so small that we saw all 100 or so K-8 students by noon.  It was fun to put our school-group game faces on again.  We didn’t realize it until later, but one of those kids was the 80,000th visitor to see Ways of the Woods in its three seasons on the road.

Harvest Fest
Waterville, ME (October 19)

Waterville is a dynamic Central Maine town that holds the distinction of being a Main Street Community.  The Main Street program is administered by the National Trust for Historic Preservation.  It’s a way to bolster local economies, and in the process, get some positive vibes going about local businesses, arts, and activities.  It seemed to be working for Waterville on this sunny fall Sunday, with over 700 people riding ponies, playing games, eating candy apples, and visiting local vendors in Castonguay Square.

We received a couple of comments from a different-than-usual perspective.  A woman from Brooklyn, NY wrote: “The videos make me think about how different I live in the city.  It really makes you appreciate the choices people make.” The videos that we have inside the truck are great snapshots of people’s lives – interviews of an owner of a lumber company, a forester/minister, Native Americans developing a dictionary of their language, a young woman who grew up in a French-speaking community in northern Maine, a rustic furniture maker, and many other contributed by community groups and schools.  I have always appreciated them for their diversity, knowing that these are the people who live all around me.  But seeing that they helped a city-dweller step into Northern Forest shoes for a few minutes – that’s just an example of yet another power we couldn’t have predicted that Ways of the Woods would have.

—Jessie


Ways of the Woods’ 2008 tour is sponsored by TransCanada Corporation. Additional support for stops in Maine is provided by the Maine Humanities Council.

Plymouth State University
Plymouth, NH (October 31 to November 1)

Our trip to Plymouth was multi-fold.  The New England/ St. Lawrence Valley Geographical Society held a conference on campus and sent many geographers our way.  Also, Thad Guldbrandsen with PSU’s Center for Rural Partnerships has been assisting us with figuring out what to do next with Ways of the Woods.  PSU faculty and staff from several different departments came by to observe and take notes with the intent of participating in a focus group.  We also reunited with our surveyors from Fryeburg and Rochester, this time on their turf.  I can’t wait to hear everyone’s new ideas about how to move forward.

The added bonus of the trip was that we actually got to meet many college students.  A few professors even made it mandatory for their students to visit and report back on their discoveries.  College students have been an untapped demographic for us because we’ve been targeting students K-12 during the school year and spend most of our time on the road when school isn’t in session.  We had some really inspiring conversations with them.  Thinking back to not so long ago when I was in college, I realized that these students are at a point in their lives when one spark of something can set them off on their adult paths. One major concern about the future of the Northern Forest is that there don’t seem to be enough young people who want to live and work in the region, a common problem in rural areas.  It got me wondering about the impact we could have if we made an effort to visit more colleges with the intent of showing students why the Northern Forest lifestyle can be viable and worthwhile.  After talking with some of these PSU students, I think making connections with young people in the region who are about to make some big choices could make a difference.

On that note, I want to recognize our student surveyors and thank them for all their help.  It was great getting to know Abby, Jamie, Olivia, and Mandy, and we wish them all the luck in the world.

—Jessie

Summit for the Northern Forest: The Balsams
Dixville Notch, NH (November 2008)

There’s nothing like a night at The Balsams to loosen you up after spending the summer in a camper – I swear the bed in our corner suite was about the same size as our whole camper.  But hey, variety is the spice of life.

The Summit was the culmination of a two-year study called the Sustainable Economy Initiative, which the Northern Forest Center has been conducting with a steering committee appointed by the governors of our four states.  About 125 people came together at this luxury hotel in the middle of the woods to engage in a dialogue about the future of the economy of the Northern Forest.  Different working groups discussed energy, higher education, investment, tourism, forest products, and how to work together across the region to strengthen our collective future.  While the Summit represented the end of the study, it is just the beginning of what we expect to be a long and thorough process of the Northern Forest Center leading the way toward economic resurgence and vitality in the region.

 
—Jessie