Transportation Museum

Owl's Head has its own museum - the Owl's Head Transportation Museum. It is an unusual museum, and a very nice one. It is primarily historical: old cars, old airplanes, old bicycles, etc. They are arranged in different ways - some trace the development of a particular mode of transportation, and some have an accompanying video that gives you a narrative. The museum has a pretty fabulous collection of beautifully preserved/restored vehicles, planes, bikes, motorbikes, fire engines, etc. A lot of its holdings go back to the 1930's when I was born and a lot was happening in the development of transportation. There is an element of nostalgia - seeing things that I remember from childhood. Ellen and I went there Wednesday morning, and spent a couple of hours there. They had wheelchairs, and Ellen pushed me, so I did not get exhausted. Another nice experience in Maine.

A very early electric car.

The shell used in Boys in the Boat film about Yale crew that won Olympics gold medal.

Early "food truck."

1886 Benz.

Packard Touring Sedan.

Wright Brothers. ***************************** Wednesday evening, we went to Archer's Restaurant on the penninsula in Rockland harbor, and once again, I had steamed mussels. Yum! It was a lovely evening, but just breezy enough that we opted to eat indoors. It was very nice. After coming home, we had a game of Scrabble, and gosh, I won. about 135 points, I think. Mary was second, just 6 points behind me. I was lucky to have gotten an "X", a "Z", and a "K", and was able to play them on triple or double-letter squares. After we went to bed, I watched the second half of Drive My Car, a Japanese movie Mary had rented, but everyone else lost interest in it. i liked it.

From left, Hidetoshi Nishijima and Toko Miura in “Drive My Car,” directed by Ryusuke Hamaguchi.

A strawberry-rhubarb pie Mary made while we were there -- all grown in her garden.

With Phil at the Farnsworth Museum

Yesterday, Tuesday, we got up fairly late, had a leisurly breakfast and met Phil McKean at the Farnsworth Museum, something I have done many times before. Phil is an old friend, going back to 1964 in Providence, R.I., when I was a Chaplain at Brown University and working on my PhD dissertation, and Phil was Assistant Minister at Central Congregational Church, one of the churches that sponsored my chaplaincy and where I had an office. Phil's wife, Deborah, died a year or so ago after a long illness, and he spends summmers in Maine and winters in Claremont, CA. He moved back to Maine from CA a week or so ago. He brought with him his housemate from Claremont, John Dunham, whom he moved in with after Deborah died. John is 93 years old! He's in better physical shape than I am. We met the two of them at our favorite museum in New England, the Farnsworth, in nearby Rockland, ME. There were two new exhibits of particular interest: Penobscot basketry and Andrew Wyeth's abstract art (who knew?). The basketry exhibit featured a family, the Shay's, who made baskets in the late 19th century and early twentieth century and sold them to tourists in nearby Linconville, ME. They were carrying on ancient traditions of basket-weaving used by the Passamaquoddy peoples. Their primary material was sweetgrass, which grows in abundance in salt marshes in this area. They also used brown ash woodsplints. The exhibit included an amazing diversity of baskets: styles, sizes, purposes, etc. There was also a great deal of explanation and background information on the cultural, social, economic and religious dimensions of the baskets. I took a lot of pictures, but they are on my phone, and my phone is charging right now. I was in a wheelchair and Phil pushed me around - just as we did the last time we came together to the Farnsworth. It made it easy for me. Phil also used his membership to get us all passes. A good time!

Guilford Community Church Small Groups

Our church is once again in an interim period - Allyson Platt is an interim minister - and one of the features of this period is the creation of small groups of about 10-12 people who are meeting either at the church or in people's homes. Everyone in the congregation was invited to sign up for a group, and there are about eight groups in all, I think. Ours met last Thursday, in the home of Lee and Carolyn Moore. Lee is a retired UCC minister whose primary ministry was not in a local church, but in denominational leadership of Christian Education work, mostly with teenagers, I think. He did a lot camps, retreats, trips, etc., with teens. He did have at least one parish ministry experience, early in his career, in Pinedale, Wyoming - a church Ellen and I have visited because it is the closest UCC Church to Alpine, WY, where Ellen's son, Paul, lives, though it is at least 80 miles from Alpine, so not very convenient. But we did worship there one Sunday a few years ago. Lee is also a regular member of the retired clergy group that I meet with once a month at the Dummerston Church (right now we are meeting twice a month and reading/discussing a book about Aging with Grace). There is a format for these small group meetings: we think about a question, write notes, and then share our thoughts. The questions have to do with our experience of the church and our feelings about it. I think all of this will eventually be boiled down into a "church profile" which will be used to attract a new permanent minister. People are encouraged to share both joyful and painful experiences and feelings. Right now, there is a positive feeling in the congregation - Allyson is well-liked and people are coming back who had left during Elisa Lucozzi's tenure. But it was not difficult to find painful experiences in the past. Most of our group was composed of people we know well, but there was a younger couple with a little boy in our group who started coming only this year. I didn't even know their names, but now I do. We had a good session, I think.

L. to r.: Nan Tierra, Ellen Crockett, Marilyn Moore, Kathy Lovell, Jeremy Ebersole, Rachel Ebersole, Walton Ebersole, Allyson Platt.

Standing: Lee Moore; Seated: Larry Crockett

Much to report

A great deal has been happening! i'll start with the present and move back in time. At the moment, I am in the living-room of Jim and Mary's house in Owls Head, Maine. Supper is being prepared. We just arrived. Today is Memorial Day, of course, and the southbound traffic was incredible. People headed back to Boston after a holiday weekend. Fortunately, we were going north. No delays for us. I did something I've never done before coming to Maine - I sat in the back seat sideways so I could stretch out my legs straight. My knees ache these days when I sit for a length of time with knees bent. Today was much more comfortable. I was still able to read aloud to Ellen. I read the Introduction and Chapter One of The Far Distant Oxus by two adolescent girls, Katherine Hull and Pamela Whitlock, writing back in the 1930's. They sent the completed manuscript (handwritten) to Arthur Ransome, of Swallows and Amazons and he helped them to get it published.

I'm a big fan of Swallows and Amazons, and John thought I would like this book, which is the same genre, so he gave it to me. LATER. We had a lovely supper of lamb stew with Anadama bread bought at the When Pigs Fly bread store (mobbed with people and almost totally sold out) on our way up from Kittery, ME today. Now Ellen and Mary are watching The Good Doctor on the TV. I talked with Phil McKean earlier - we'll meet him tomorrow afternoon at the Farnsworth Museum. YESTERDAY In the morning, we had a Union Service of five UCC churches at the Guilford Church - a full, vital service. We sang in the choir. Afterward, some Morris dancers came (Memorial Day weekend is a big Morris Dance time in our area). They performed under the pavillion - a wonderful setting for them. It was a beautiful, warm, sunny day. Perfect for Morris Dancing.

Morris dancers under the pavillion.

Emma Davis in her pig costume. Emma loves pigs. Her parents, Andy & Robin, made the costume, amd she loves it.************** After that we went directly to Newfane, VT for the ordination of Matthew Dean. Ellen dropped me off - she had to go home and prepare food for later when we would be joined by Katie and Brendon. Matt Dean went to Union Theological Seminary in NYC and while there he did an internship at Judson Memorial Church, a very arts-related, progressive church. The senior minister there, Micah Bucey, was at the ordination and gave a charismatic sermon. We don't often hear preaching like that. Matt is a very interesting person - he grew up in a Pentecostal Church in Georgia, left that behind for a more progressive faith, but is still influenced by it, I think. His MDiv. thesis is along the lines of my son John's Contemplative Ecology work.

Micah Bucey, Judson Memorial Church Senior pastor.

Scott Couper (left), Moderator of the Windham-Union Association, presiding over the ordination of Matt Dean (right).

The congregation after the "Laying on of Hands" ritual at Matt's ordination.

Matt Dean at the reception following tne ordination service. ' Lee and Carolyn Moore took care of me after the service and during the reception. Then they set me up for what came next, which was more Morris Dancing - the final extravaganza (called an "Ale") involving all the teams- maybe 18-20 in all, two from England. It is amazing, and the setting - the village of Newfane - is architecturally stunning, with the Windham County Court House and the Congregational Church providing the primary backdrop. There is a lot of variety among the teams and it is all delightful. Lee and Carolyn lent me a folding chair and I staked out a spot in the shade, and then before I knew it, Ellen and Katie and Brendon showed up. What a great time!

Scenes from the Newfane Morris "Ale."

Older slides

The slides I've shared thus far have been from 1984, but I have much older slides going back to 1954. I've been going through a case of these older slides, and have pulled out a selection - two from both my and Shirley's college graduation (1954), a group from Chicago, when I was in seminary (1954-1957), and a few just a bit later - as late as 1968 or so. I am not thrilled with the quality of these reproductions, but it seems to be the best I can do with my method (taking a picture with my phone of a slide being backlit on top of my desk lamp). The main problem is with definition - I have to really enlarge the picture I take. But there are issues with the color as well. But they are not too bad. Here they are in rough chronological order: College graduation:

Shirley at Wellesley College, Wellesley, MA, 1954.

Larry at Drury College, Springfield, MO, 1954. Chicago:

1) The Chicago Theological Seminary tower, and Graham Taylor Hall; (2) Shirley, Easter Sunday, 1957, with Rockefellar Chapel behind; (3) Me standing outside where we lived, showing off my new, blue, double-breasted suit.************ OUR NEIGHBORHOOD:

Frank Lloyd Wright's Robie House, with Shirley and our Chevrolet. Robie House was just across the street from the seminary to the east, and in the 1950's was owned by the seminary.

Another angle on Robie House.

Rockefeller Chapel, which was also across the street from the seminary, to the south. This was the University of Chicago chapel. The tower contained a carillon, and there were carillon concerts every Sunday.

Schloss Leopoldskron and the Ragles

The latter part of our trip to Switzerland, we went to Zurich where we met Tom and Nancy Ragle, did some things there, and then we went with them to Salzburg, Austria. At that time -1984 - Tom was Director of the Salzburg Seminar, which I guess you could say was a kind of "think tank" - it brought together various leaders and intellectuals to discuss vital issues of the day. In Salzburg it was housed in the Schloss Leopoldskron, which is a palace, or at least a very fancy chateau. That is where Tom and Nancy lived, and where meetings were held. It had been made famous by the movie The Sound of Music, which was filmed in part at the Schloss. So we got to stay there for a few days and we made some day trips out of Salzburg with the Ragles. This was a delightful feature of our trip.

The Schloss and gardens.

Eating with Tom and Nancy in the dining hall of the Schloss. Fancy!

Shirley with Nancy and Tom.

Eating at a lakeside restaurant near Salzburg

Promotional photo of the Schloss.

Various slides from Switzerland

Here various scenes and portraits:

Shirley with Wisteria.

Shirley, John and Mary.

Mimicing a statue on the train.

Shirley mimicing a statue in the station.

A Swiss Chocolate shop and bakery.

Mother's Day cakes and goodies.