Scarborough Community Services recently announced the long-awaited return of in-person senior (55+) programs, put to a halt for over a year due to the Covid-19 pandemic. July and August programs include weekly senior lunches, a walking club, morning drop-ins to socialize, and social outings to visit Maine attractions or enjoy group activities. One program that […]
Courier Opinion
Posted inBiddeford-Saco-OOB Courier, Southern Maine Weeklies
A Ruralist’s Lament: Ship to Citadel
For the last several decades we’ve grown corn on this place. It’s long been traditional in this part of the Northeast. When Samuel de Champlain dropped anchor in the nearby Saco (“Chouaco”) River in 1604, and “encountered” the locals he was careful to describe them as a settled people: “They plant their corn in May […]
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Posted inBiddeford-Saco-OOB Courier, Southern Maine Weeklies
Books, books and more books for sale at Dyer Library’s book sale in Saco
Books, books, books. As I’m sure you must recall it’s time for the Giant Annual Book Sale at the Dyer Library in Saco. If you are an eager beaver, it starts at 9:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. on Saturday, July 24, and continues until around the beginning of September. This is a very important fundraiser […]
Posted inBiddeford-Saco-OOB Courier, Southern Maine Weeklies
Ruralist Lament: (Still) In the Land o’ Cotton
Production agriculture is energy-intensive. Turning energy embedded in sunlight into food and fiber has long been a process exploited by humans. But until the late 1800s most of the work of farming was done by human or draft animal muscle. On a small homestead that could work, but for large acreage set up to feed […]
Posted inBiddeford-Saco-OOB Courier, Southern Maine Weeklies
What’s in a leaf? Everything!
As though it happened overnight, our world is green again. Dense lawns and rolling fields, lush treetops and thick shrubbery, all throw their own unique and individual values across the canvas as summer once again draws nigh. My flower beds have gone from tentative and hesitant to tall and bursting in just a matter of […]
Posted inBiddeford-Saco-OOB Courier, Southern Maine Weeklies
Financial management for single seniors
Facts of life: most retirees will be single for some period of time, and most of those singles will be women. Throughout the life cycle, financial planning for singles differs from planning for couples. Obviously, there is only a single set of assets to work with, and no surviving spouse to plan for. Less obviously, […]
Posted inBiddeford-Saco-OOB Courier, Southern Maine Weeklies
So what exactly is a chamber of commerce?
That’s the question I asked when I first considered working here a few years ago. The words “Chamber of Commerce” make it sound like a smoke-filled back room where private business deals are cut. Like many people, I’d heard of the organization, but had never been a member of one before. Even though they’ve been […]
Posted inBiddeford-Saco-OOB Courier, Southern Maine Weeklies
Events return, rekindle sense of community in Saco, OOB and Hollis
It’s been a long year and a half. We’ve had to hunker down in quarantine, learn to wear masks everywhere we go, and keep our distance from loved ones. Aside from those we lost during the pandemic, we also lost our sense of connectivity and community with one another. Local, family focused events prior to […]
Posted inBiddeford-Saco-OOB Courier, Southern Maine Weeklies
Ruralist Lament: It’s alive
We’ve been farming this plot of land for going on half a century. The fields lay between the ledges and the glacial erratics, and we’re only the most recent tillers since “Robert Cole, Yeoman” established a homestead here in 1769. The farm buildings Cole erected were obliterated in a great fire that burned much of […]
Posted inBiddeford-Saco-OOB Courier, Southern Maine Weeklies
Bernier the Lumberjack
A couple of times in the past, I’ve mentioned “Bernier the Lumberjack “ to you. Over the recent years, we at the Saco Museum have purchased a few of his smaller woodcarvings but his very best pieces, tour-de-force works of folk art, were always beyond our means. And yet, this local man very much deserved […]