Owl's Head Transportation Museum

Just a couple of miles from Jim and Mary's new home is the Owls Head Transportation Museum, which we had not been to before, and which is quite an amazing place. It is open every day except four major holidays. It contains hundreds of antique cars, airplanes and motorcycles, and a few other things as well, like an old circus wagon. Anyone who loves old cars or planes would love this place. I'm not exactly an aficionado of these things, but I do enjoy seeing them. Here is a little sample of what is there - three early automobiles, each using a different source of power: gasoline, electricity and steam.

This is a replica of the 1886 Benz Patent Motorwagen, said to be the first automobile propelled by an internal combustion engine. About 25 were built.

This shows the engine for the Benz. Pretty simple, though it utilized several new inventions. If you want details, go to Wiki.

This is the 1912 Woods Electric Brougham. Before 1908, electric vehicles were in the majority. By 1912, gas-powered engines were becoming more popular. This car cost $3000. The Model T was $350. Therein lies the problem, still true today.

This is a model of the famous Stanley Steamer - the 1904 Model B Runabout. Ironically, it relied for its viability on the existence of numerous water troughs alongside the road - for horses to drink from - because it had to make frequent stops for more water. Thus it was dependent on a technology it was helping to make obsolete.

This is a steam-driven motorcycle! The 1868 Roper Steam Velocipede. Not sure what it was like having that steam engine right under your seat!! It was fired with charcoal fed into the bottom of a copper boiler. The seat doubled as a water tank.

When we first went to this museum, I was confusing it with the Seashore Trolley Museum in Kennebunkport, ME, which I had visited decades ago. I thought I would find there in Owls Head a sample of the street car I used to ride in Minneapolis, MN, when I was a boy, which I had remembered seeing years ago in a Maine Museum, and I was excited by that prospect. Wrong Museum. That thrill will have to wait for another time.

The newly shingled house

Jim and Mary's house in Owl's Head, ME, was just recently given it's outside shingles. We think it is quite handsome.

Front of the house

This really probably should be called the "front" but it is the side facing away from the road

Enjoying the living room

Opening up

Over the years, a number of white pines have grown up in front of our house. They are like a weed, and they were pretty at first, but they became giants and eventually blocked our view of our more distant hills. Here is a before photo (taken a few years ago, so everything was bigger now):

View from the deck - before opening up

Cleared out and burning brush

 

 

I'll do some more photos when we get home. 

Northern Roots

Saturday we went to the northern roots music festival in Brattleboro - a celebration of traditional music, especially with an Irish, Scottish influence. There were fiddlers, flutists, guitarists, singers, even a pipes player. The pipes player made his own instrument. One of the singers was our friend Robin Davis.

 

                      Robin Davis, Amanda Witman and Mia Bertelli

 

                        Dan Restivo on flute and Becky Tracy, fiddle

                                       Intermission

Eric McDonald and Will Woodson

Finale

Ellen had gone to Northern Roots all day, to workshops and a pub sing. I stayed home to keep an eye on the work Zac was doing outside while I started a major project - cleaning, weeding out stuff and re-organizing "downstairs," i. e., my study, what we call the workroom, the laundry area, the downstairs bathroom and the "sauna" which is a walk-in closet off the bathroom that was originally built to be a sauna, and is insulated and wired for a sauna heater, but was never finished off and completed as such. There is a lot of "stuff" crammed in there at present. There are two other closets downstairs. Both very full. It's all coming out, a lot of it is going to be disposed of. That will not get done till we get back from Boulder in March, but that's my plan. On Saturday I cleaned the north wall of my study -  which is mostly window, and started taking books off of shelves to sort into "keep" and "get rid off," and clean the shelves. Everything was covered with accumulated soot from the wood stove. It's a big job. I also cleared out the workroom floor so now you can actually walk into it! Yay! 

Sunday we drove over to Owl's Head, Maine, to visit Jim and Mary, in their new home, stopping at Bob's Clam Hut and When Pigs Fly Bakery as usual. Both were as crowded with tourists as we've ever seen them, even in summer! 

This Monday morning is sunny and mild. Today is Iowa Caucuses day! Go Bernie! And tonight the NC Tarheels play Louisville on the road. Louisville will be out for revenge for previous losses on their home court, and they are a very talented team. But UNC is #1 or #2 nationally (depending on what poll you consult), is undefeated in their conference (the ACC), and on a 12-game winning-streak. It should be quite a game! Go Heels! 

A quiet week

This past week has been one of the quietest we've had in some time, in terms of an absence of scheduled activity. A welcome situation after a very full weekend. No scheduled rehearsals, for example. Ellen read and knitted quite a bit. I got to the pool, spent some time on the fitness machines in addition to swimming, started doing a major clean out in my study, things like that.

The week was not without incident, however. Rob called and asked if we could come out to Boulder and provide some respite, especially for Katie, but also for him. So we'll be leaving Feb. 10th, driving again, and we'll be gone about a month. More on that later as it unfolds.  

Meanwhile, last evening we had a Hallowell sing for a lovely man in the Brooks House - newly refurbished after a fire a few years ago. Beautiful apartments we had been curious to get a glimpse of. 

Today we went to Tamar's school and heard her and Mimi sing in a variety show the school puts on now and then. Mimi had written the song and accompanied on the ukulele. That was fun. Then we had lunch with Katie and Savanna. 

Now it has turned colder after a milder day, the wind has come up, and we are hunkering down. 

                                    At Tamar's school 

More photos from the past weekend

Andy, Larry and Daniel at the Guilford Community Church

Ellen and Larry after the concert Saturday Evening

Andy, Aunt Hazel and Daniel at Hazel's facility

The whole group at the restaurant in New London, NH

Ellen, Larry, John, Daniel, Andy and Cynthia at Panda North restaurant

Good, full, weekend

Well, this past weekend came off pretty well. Dan and Andy, flying in from Chicago, were very fortunate to miss the big east coast storm, we had a lovely time at lunch with them and with 107-year-old Aunt Hazel and her son and daughter-in-law, Bob and Nancy, at a restaurant in New London, NH.

                               At MacKenna's Restaurant

                               The amazing Hazel Nilson, a young 107. 

Then we came home and got ready for our concert. D&A went to a Thai restaurant in Brattleboro and despite slow service made it in the nick of time to the concert, which was a success with the audience ("The best thing you have ever done," said one), even if we felt we could have done better. 

                            Waiting in the parlor for the concert to begin

We chatted afterward at home, then got a bit of sleep before Sunday morning breakfast and church, where D&S joined us for the choir, led by a charismatic African-American couple, Kim and Reggie, singers and preachers extra-ordinary. 

 

                           Reggie speaking with a member of the congregation

Then we high-tailed it to Panda North where we met John and Cynthia for dinner - very nice for the cousins (Dan and John)  to be together a bit - and then Ellen and I dashed to our second performance, which was also quite well-received (but again, we could have done better) and then we came home (D&A having in the meantime gone back to Boston) and I got a bite to eat (literally) and went to a rehearsal (YES!!) of Carmina Burana. A glutton of sorts, I guess. Ellen stayed home of course and watched Downton Abbey. I'll watch a rebroadcast tonight. Today we really took it easy. After a weekend like that, I guess we are entitled. While we were doing all that, our neighbor, Zac, got busy taking down some white pines and opening up our view - sort of restoring the way it was when we built the house 43 years ago ( emphasis on sort of), and all part of the larger plan of making the house ready to put on the market (someday, not tomorrow). Still a lot to to inside and outside, but progress is being made!