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Introduction to
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In addition to my own
thoughts, the following incorporates information from Gary
Cobb's The History of Pierce Pond Camps and Stephen
Cole's manuscript Maine Sporting Camps.
There is a grand tradition
that has become an integral part of Maine's heritage: Unique to
the state, and over 140 years old, it is called the Maine
sporting camp. Some people think of these camps as "hunting and
fishing lodges." They are that, but they are also much more.
Nearly all sporting camps are on a lake or river, generally in a
remote area of forested land. Most have buildings made of peeled
and chinked logs with porches looking over the water. The guest
sleeping cabins are clustered near the shore around a central
dining lodge. Plumbing was (and often still is) "out back."
Primitive, and in harmony with their surroundings, sporting
camps have the appearance of having grown out of the ground. New
Hampshire and Vermont have private hunting and fishing clubs and
game preserves. New York, in the Adirondacks, has private camps
and rustic estates. But Maine sporting camps are open to paying
customers and are a cultural and entrepreneurial resource
distinctive to the state.
Several factors came
together to produce the Maine sporting camps. The post-Civil War
transition into the Victorian era saw tremendous industrial and
economic expansion and the development of technologies such as
the internal-combustion engine and electricity. The iron and
steel industries flourished, and the railroads entered their
golden age. The high economic growth rate in the Victorian era
created a substantial upper-middle class. At the same time,
intellectuals and writers such as Henry David Thoreau decried
what they saw as society's growing alienation from nature and
expressed general uneasiness about the direction of American
culture. Life in polluted eastern cities during the Industrial
Revolution was felt to be "undermining character, taste,
morality, and the health and welfare of individuals and family."
As a result, those who could sought escape from the questionable
influences and pollution of the cities, as well as from the
summer heat. (Ironically, Many who "took the airs" were the
families of magnates and managers whose factories were causing
the pollution they were escaping.)
Recreational sailing and
canoeing are lasting legacies of the Victorian era. Hunting,
fishing, and hiking took on a certain cachet as sporting
pursuits instead of merely functional activities. Not only did
people have motives for escape (aesthetics, expendable income,
leisure time, status, health concerns), they also had the means.
It is no coincidence that the heyday of fishing and hunting in
Maine was also the golden age of lumbering and railroading. The
very rail lines that were bringing trainloads of Maine timber to
fuel factory burners also carried trainloads of vacationers
fleeing back to the source of all that smog! With the growth of
a national rail transportation network, an extended family
vacation at one of the much-publicized public sporting camps in
the Maine wilderness became possible and desirable. The Bangor,
the Aroostook, and the Central Maine Railroads all offered
direct service to Brownville in 1881, to Presque Isle in 1882,
to Katahdin Iron Works in 1883, and reached Moosehead Lake in
1884. The Somerset Railroad came to Bingham in 1890; the narrow-
gauge trains got to Rangeley and Carrabassett by 1895; and the
Katahdin, Allagash, and Fish River areas were opened by 1900.
Before Henry Ford put his first automobile on the road, place-
names such as Sysladobsis, Oquossoc, Nesowadnehunk, and
Munsungan were part of the vocabulary of hunters, angles, and
vacationers from Boston to Philadelphia.
In 1904 there were at least
300 sporting camps in operation in Maine. In 1997, there were
few more than the 78 herein recorded. After World War II,
Americans could no longer spend the time or money on a monthlong
vacation at a Maine sporting camp. The railroads were in decline
and automobiles and "motor coaches" were on the increase. The
road system in Maine was poor and people stayed close to the
tarmac, where motels and motor-coach campgrounds were now the
rage. And finally, air transportation took travelers out of New
England altogether. Over the years, many camps burned, some
became resorts, some sold as condominiums or individual
cottages, and others simply rotted away to become part of the
forest.
But good things die hard.
In spite of these changes and setbacks, tucked away here and
there stand sporting camps whose owners proudly struggle to
maintain a tradition that may very well be the only stabilizing
factor in the Maine woods. Fortunately, these few hardy souls
have held on long enough to witness a renewed interest in Maine
sporting camps. We have come full circle. We need what sporting
camps have to offer, now more than ever. There are precious few
places where we can feel the fundamental connections with nature
and with one another. Sporting camps still provide solace for
urban refugees (meaning most of us), and a wilderness playground
for those who love the outdoors. Most of all, they still provide
a much-needed "port in the storm," far from the fractured,
mobile, frenetic, and alienating forces that impose on our
humanity.
Reprinted by permission of the author
and The
Countryman Press, Woodstock, Vermont.
