Only a week to go before Summerfest, the official town celebration of community.

Many years ago, the annual event was called Old Home Days, as it still is in smaller towns throughout Maine. Old Home Days bore little resemblance to today’s event, except for the most important element: community involvement.

Here was an opportunity for citizens to set aside their political differences, and get together (before the summer people arrived) and enjoy their surroundings. I remember the year the first “motorized” piece of equipment was introduced.

The Town Council (or selectmen) that year worried and fretted about the possible future implications of introducing a “ride” at the traditional celebration. For several years to come, this piece of equipment was carefully sheltered through the winter, to be brought out at the next Old Home Days.

Old Home Days was more like a gigantic picnic, with firemen having water fights and bicycle parades and softball games. There were no commercially manufactured games or rides, but there were sack races, contests for high and broad jumping and plenty of time to visit before the hard work of summer began. Women would exchange recipes for the newest method of making jam and the men, well I don’t know what they discussed because kids in those days didn’t listen in or participate in adult conversations.

In those days, in the farming town of Windham, almost all families had a frantic busy summer ahead. Acres of gardens to be plowed and cultivated; row upon row to plant; fields to mow and hay to be baled and put away high up in the barns; vegetables to be picked and preserved for the winter to come; wood to be cut, dried, chopped and piled. Old Home Days was a reprieve and for some, a chance to visit with neighbors before the Fair days began at harvest time.

Since those long ago days, Windham has evolved from a primarily farming community and the population has quadrupled. Most of the residents have lived here less than 15 years; in the time of Old Home Days, most of the residents had their roots here and were descendants of founding families. The event was a perfect fit for the times.

Summerfest offers more than Old Home Days ever did – many kinds of foods are available, games and rides, and music to satisfy any ear; local nonprofit groups will be able to earn money to help fund all the good deeds their group provides. One old Windham family’s descendants, the McGoldricks, donate the fireworks that everyone anticipates. The main ingredient is still community involvement.

Summerfest is Saturday, June 21, at the high school grounds in Windham Center. Be sure to save this day and find the Windham spirit alive and well, as it has been for more than 270 years!

See you next week.