The INITIATIVE

The Franco-American Women's Institute--A Publication

 

Volume 2 Number 1

Spring 1998


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List of Contents



JUST DIFFERENT

By Connie Magnan-Albrizio, Windsor, CT

Working Hands

By Deborah Ouellette Small, Old Town

THE BOAT RIDE

By Trudy Chambers Price, Brunswick

Dandelions & Zoe-Genevieve

By Joyce Fairbrother

¡Bienvendios!

By Bridget T. Robbins, Guilford

ONE OF MAMAN'S TEACHING ADVENTURES

By Amy Bouchard Morin, Old Town

A Franco-American Woman

By Lucille Gosselin, Orrington

What Effect Does Culture Have On Aging?

By Lanette Landry Petrie, Bradley

Chapter 45

By Rhea J. Côté Robbins, Brewer

LE BON JARDINIER ET LE BON DIEU

By Maureen Perry, Boston

Brewer Girl's Daring Feat Is Recalled

By Dick Shaw, Bangor Daily News Staff

Some Jewels of Maine: Jewish Maine Pioneers

A Review By Rhea J. Côté Robbins, Brewer

Collaborative Culture Writing

My Grandfather - a memory

By Paulette M. Barry, San Francisco, CA

Seneca Falls, 150 Years Later--A Reading

By Rhea Cote Robbins and others, Charleston Correctional Facility, Charleston

Nauset Beach, Daybreak

By Libby Soifer, Bangor

Women's Culture

By Melissa MacCrae, Brewer

Letters/lettres

News/Nouvelles

Advertisements/Petites Annonces

Also A review of Wednesday's Child

By Gérard Robichaud



Working Hands

By Deborah Ouellette Small, Old Town


As long as I can remember, I thought my mama old. She didn't smell bad like the pepe who sat in the last pew at church. It was her face that gave it away. Around her blueberry eyes she wore tiny worry lines. Every time mama would come close to me, I would play in her face. It became my secret adventure. Soon she turned into an object, like a worn out road map, both tired and frayed around the edges.

As long as I can remember, my mama's hands would always bleed and crack. Especially when hanging wash effortlessly outside in the dead of winter. For sure, mama's working hands were not like the ones attached to the ladies I used to cut out from the Sears and Roebuck catalog. Theirs were soft, delicate, and shapely formed.

As long as I can remember, my mama had no silver boxes with red satin ribbons. Instead, she possed an old rusty ironing board. Behind the bathroom door and under a naked light bulb, she would stand for hours in nonsupportive shoes pressing clothes to perfection. Her playful spirit dampened, like the wet cotton cloth she used to press creases in my brother's church pants.

As long as I can remember, my mama had no time for foolishness. She never wore the exquisite Christmas bathrobe that still hangs in her closet today. It was a gift from papa many decades ago. "My kitchen is a functional kitchen and not a showcase for pretty things." She lamented.

As long as I can remember, mama mastered in the art of family devotion. Like all the saints, she was a true sacrificial giver. As long as I can remember, she gave and gave and gave. As long as I can remember . . . as long as I can remember.

All Contents are Copyright©Deborah Ouellette Small, 1998

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What Effect Does Culture Have On Aging?

By Lanette Landry Petrie, Bradley


Culture is a set of values a group of people hold and the behaviors that stem from those values. Each of us is a composite of a number of cultural factors such as gender, economic situation, religion, rural vs urban, physical capacity, as well as ethnic origin. All of these factors help to shape our image of many things in our lives, including aging. Cultural perceptions of becoming old and being old have much to do with how we think about aging. Sokolonsky tells us in "Images of Aging," that variables such as degree of Family support, gender, or class position might alter the images associated with aging. I want to develop this idea further by focusing on women in general and, in particular, a group of elderly Franco-American nuns I interviewed.

Mythic images of the elderly were used in preindustrial societies to teach about the life cycle of a people. Folktales often included stories of glorified elders with powers for guiding, healing and protection. Old women were sometimes viewed as nurturing matriarchs or feared as evil witches. In many of these societies the role of women changed after their reproductive years and they became the holders of the family stories, held control over daughters-in-law, became peace makers, and were seen assuming greater authority.

In today's societies, "elderly women tend to have life circumstances quite differently from elderly men." (Taeuber, 56) The nation's oldest and fastest growing population today is unmarried women with increased impairment, living alone with economics problems. (Barer, 59) Barer continues to tells us that men have an advantage physically and economically while women have more extensive social networks.

In Cambodia old people are considered very important to their culture. The elderly continue to learn the practice of Buddhism and young people depend on the elders to teach the philosophies to them. (Lao, 52) In Nigeria aged people are not only respected, but well cared for either by their families or by the community as a whole. The elderly are seen as a blessing both to the family and the village and the young make a yearly contribution to their care. (Ugbaja, 63)

Family is the center of life for the Vietnamese. They believe that the old deserve the highest place in the family. Mary Meigs tells us her experience of aging as a lesbian has shown her that old age can free women to live new lives detached from patriarchy. These are only a few of the stories which tell us about the effect of family, gender and class position on the cultural image of aging.

Because of the importance of the Catholic Church in the lives of Franco-Americans, young women were given two choices for their lives - wife/mother or religious nun. Through my interviews with ten Franco-American elderly nuns, I came to believe that choosing the life of a religious provided women with opportunities which were not possible for wives/mothers and may have affected their aging.

Coming from families with as many as fifteen children with six being the fewest, these ten women chose the life of the convent as an alternative, in some cases, to the raising of more babies - their own. For some it was the only chance for an education. Most Franco-American families were not pro-education, particularly for girls. As farmers and mill workers there was little money for anything but the essentials. With their strong faith in God and the Catholic Church, life in the convent offered girls a respected way out. Nine of the sisters I interviewed were over eighty with one in her seventies. Included among them were six teachers, one pharmacist, one librarian, one in social work and one in business affairs. All are presently living in their Motherhouse where they are provided with nursing care, if and when they need it, and productive activities such as helping in the gift shop, playing the organ for Mass, helping in the mailroom, visiting the sick, making crafts to sell in the gift shop, and praying.

One of the general aspects of aging is the loss of meaning in life. These women have aged well in that regard. Some of the reasons may be their philosophy of life which includes the belief in the sanctity of all life. They have always had a purpose for their life. Even the value of prayer and suffering contribute to their acceptance of their position in the life cycle. Their lives have included planned vacations and time for reflection.

Another aspect of aging is the change in socio/economic position. The nuns financial needs have never been a worry. Although they often had little, it was not their worry as for a place to sleep or food to eat. The socio/economic condition for these nuns has never changed.

Loss of physical and mental ability is also seen as an aspect of aging. The sisters loss of physical ability has only changed their duties to incorporate what they were capable of. Health care and dental care have always been available to them. There is a sense of worldly innocence which has provided a level of stresslessness which may contribute to their good mental health.

In looking at the Franco-American culture of aging, four significant aspects arise. For the nuns they are as follows: 1) the loss of home language, French, 2) lack of decision making in the convent contrasted with major decision making in their professions, 3) frequent moving, and 4) loss of family.

1) Entering English language only religious communities meant losing their language for these French speaking women. Some were told not to speak French in their convents because it was perceived that they might be talking about someone behind their backs. In spite of that, several of these sisters still speak French today. Some were missioned to French speaking communities and so continued to speak French with parishioners. For some, their families continued to speak French with them when they visited.

2) As nuns, they took vows of obedience which meant that they would accept whatever they were told to do. Some of these sisters held positions with a lot of authority and made important decisions, but as private women were expected to be submissive, which they were. There are pros and cons to this behavior. Along with decision making often comes responsibility for other peoples lives which can create a lot of stress. One sister was Assistant Director of Mercy Hospital when mandatory retirement at sixty-five went into practice. So at sixty-five she felt compelled to comply with that rule and retired. This meant for her, opening a pharmacy in northern Maine and operating it for another eleven or twelve years. She retired again to parish work for another eight or nine years when it then became necessary for her to have a mastectomy, then by-pass surgery and is now helping in the Motherhouse gift shop and mailroom. Stress as we know can cause many physical illnesses.

3) Sisters were often transferred from one place to another to fill vacant positions in schools and to keep them from becoming too rooted in one place. They were asked to leave their family and friends over and over again. It was necessary for them to continue to make new friends and acquaintances. Some living arrangements were less than friendly. Sometime the local priest gave the sisters a hard time or there were personality clashes within the house. Each sister had little control over her living arrangements.

4) When these sisters left home to enter the convent they literally left home. The convent became their family. The rules were very strict about family involvement, or the lack of , in their lives. Many sisters were not allowed to attend family weddings or funerals or even be alone at home with their parents or siblings. For Franco-Americans this is a major loss. The family is central to the life of the Franco-American people. Not to be able to celebrate and grieve together was extremely difficult. Although they need not worry for their own financial needs, they were often torn by not being able to help their families financially as they saw them struggling. For one sister the decision became critical when her mother died leaving small children to be raised by a sister who was younger than she. Her father operated a bakery and she felt she was needed at home. Through prayer and discernment she remained in the convent but not without a great deal of soul searching.

In looking at the four cultural characteristics for Franco-American women who became wives and mothers, life was hard in its own way. Education was out of the question for them. They went to school until they were probably fourteen then helped at home or got married. Women married early, often to ease the burden at home, to men who needed someone to have their children and to take care of them. There was the need to have large families in order for the children to help work and support the family along with the Catholic Church's strong stand against birth control. There were few convenience and little money. The only medical help was from a town doctor and mid-wives. Many women lost babies at birth or through miscarriages. There were twenty-four losses of children in the families of the ten nuns I interviewed. Medical care was very rare and dental care practically non-existent for most. The economic conditions varied but for the most part, Franco-Americans in Maine were the working poor. They were farmers and mill workers with little education and large families to care for. There was seldom enough to meet present needs let alone plan for retirement. Old age was left to God, along with the whole of life. Life offered many hardships such as accidents and complications from childbirth.. The stress of life took its toll on their health. High blood pressure, diabetes, and heart ailments were typical.

1) French was spoken in early Franco-American homes and continues to this day in some. It provided a real sense of belonging. Most Maine communities had a French church were people could worship in French.

2) Franco-American women had little authority in their lives and had decision making ability only in as far as it concerned the children. In most families the father was the firm head of the household and controlled everything in it making all the "important" decisions. In the area of finance, women had little say over what little money there was. The men earned the living and the women took care of the house and children. Franco-American women were excellent managers with very little material goods. They found ways to feed multitudes of people with nothing and still provided harmony in the home.

3) Franco-American families often moved to find work. The usual pattern was for the man to go ahead and set up housekeeping, often with relatives, and then sent for the family. For

the most part, they stayed in place with their extended families.

4) Franco-American women were surrounded by their extended families which proved to be their greatest help. For these women life revolved around the Church. Most celebrations, deaths, social occasions, even dating took place at the local church.

As Franco-American women aged, they became respected for their ability to survive and were looked up to for their wisdom and faith. Their children, for the most part, took care of them in their old age. Today many live in elderly housing made available by state assistance. They worry about what will happen to them when they are no longer able to care for themselves. Nursing home care is very expensive and becoming more restrictive. Their children work outside the home and aren't able to care for them at home. They have very limited funds to provide for emergency situations. Their lives still depend on their faith in God. For many, they feel their life of usefulness is over and they wait to die. For others who have been able to benefit from a higher standard of living, they have found a freedom from hard work and are enjoying their last years watching their grandchildren and great-grandchildren grow up.

In looking at the data, we can see similarities in these two groups of Franco-American women. The French language was very important to both groups of Franco-American women. Neither group of women had decision making abilities where their lives were concerned. Both have a history of moving with a sense of rootedness - the Motherhouse for the sisters and family of origin for the wives/mothers. Both groups of women had a loss of identity as the nuns took saints names and the women who married took their husbands name. Their philosophy of life was and remains the same, "God will provide."

The differences show up mainly in the socio/economic structure. The nuns were held in high esteem, educated, with work positions of prestige. Financially the nuns were provided for with complete access to medical and dental care, all of which was beyond the reach for the wives/mothers.

Each group can learn something from the other. For religious communities to survive with fewer women entering convents, outreach to families will be critical. More involvement and communication with the outside world would bring in needed financial resources. The sisters physical and spiritual needs are met very well but psychological needs remain behind closed doors. More meaningful stimulation could be looked at as this group of aging women have lives of experience to share.

For the community women, "Women's ability to sustain community living in advanced old age would be enhanced by the greater availability of quality home care help." (Barer, 64) A return to the old family values of respect and care of the elderly by young parents would do a lot to assure their own care in old age. Promoting images of productive, useful elderly people would help to bring the generations closer together, to work, play, and pray. Including older people on church boards and civic committees; inviting them into the classroom to share life experiences; as volunteers in hospitals and ecology projects; as coaches for young mothers; etc.

For the most part, many of the needs of the elderly are more social than medical. The elderly generally experience lingering disability rather than disease but the system still treats care of the elderly through traditional means - doctors and hospitals. The three major sectors of social protection are Social Security, Medicare/Medicaid and private insurance. There are possible problems facing each system of reimbursement which could be helped by working together.

In conclusion, I believe that culture plays a major role in aging. The lives we were given have much to do with the choices we have. To be born a Franco-American, Catholic, working class, straight woman offered me the same two options as most Franco-American girls - marriage or convent. I considered a life in the convent very seriously, but could not leave my family to do so. I know today that I made the right decision to marry but accepted many of the same limitations as my mother, grandmother and great-grandmother before me. The major change has come in my aging. As a middle-aged woman I have found the freedom to be me. My husband and I have been fortunate enough to have work situations where we moved up in the economic scale and are better able to provide for our retirement, but as with the other women, I lost my language, took my husband's name, and still place my faith in God for the future.

Sources:

Ten Franco-American elderly nuns (Community asked for anonymity)

Barer, Barbara M., Men and Women Aging Differently. . Annual Editions, Aging, Eleventh Edition, Harold Cox. Dushkin Publishing Group/Brown & Benchmark Publishers, Guilford, CT. 1997

Lao, Ponloeu, Aging in My Culture. Fierce with Reality, Margaret Cruikshank. North Star Press of St. Cloud, Inc., St. Cloud, MN. 1995

Leonard, Fran, and Loeb, Laura. The Future of Older Women in America. Annual Editions, Aging, Eleventh Edition, Harold Cox. Dushkin Publishing Group/Brown & Benchmark Publishers, Guilford, CT. 1997

Meigs, Mary. Memory Is As Uncertain as Grace. North Star Press of St. Cloud, Inc., St. Cloud, MN. 1995

Meyer, Jack. Can We Afford Old Age. . . Annual Editions, Aging, Eleventh Edition, Harold Cox. Dushkin Publishing Group/Brown & Benchmark Publishers, Guilford, CT. 1997

Sokolovsky, Jay. Images of Aging: A Cross-Cultural Perspective. Generations Spring/Summer 1993

Taeuber, Cynthia M. Women in Our Aging Society. . . Annual Editions, Aging, Eleventh Edition, Harold Cox. Dushkin Publishing Group/Brown & Benchmark Publishers, Guilford, CT. 1997

Ugbaja, Franklin. Aging in Two Cultures. Fierce with Reality. Margaret Cruikshank. North Star Press of St. Cloud, Inc., St. Cloud, MN. 1995

All Contents are Copyright©Lanette Landry Petrie, 1998

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Daring Feat Is Recalled

By Dick Shaw, Bangor Daily News Staff


Brewer Girl's Daring Feat Is Recalled

Bangor Daily News, Bangor, Maine--circa 1970s

The petite 17-year-old blond from South Brewer didn't look the daredevil type, but one day in 1900 she astounded a crowd at the Eastern Fine Paper corp. in what the Bangor Daily News called a "daring feat of Brewer beauty."

She was Annie Polyot [Pouliotte], a French girl from Pennsylvania, and she surprised just about everyone in August 1900 by taking a dare. A five-dollar bill was offered to anyone who could muster up the bravoure to scale a 126-foot-high iron smokestack at Eastern's plant in South Brewer. Only on man, and no woman or girl, had ever done that.

"On Friday afternoon," the NEWS reported, "in company with some girl friends, she went to the mill and practiced a little at climbing the ladder. It seemed easy to her, and she declared that in the evening, when there would be fewer men around, she would to the top."

News go around, however, and when Annie later came tripping down between the wood piles, dressed in a short bicycle skirt, she was surprised to see a crowd of 100 men and a few women and girls clustered around the chimney.

"Without any ceremony or timidity," the NEWS stated, "she grasped the slander ladder and started for the top of the lofty stack, while the crowd stared in wonder and admiration."

"Without looking back she gained the top, seated herself on the cap of the chimney and swung her legs to and from as tough she were sitting in a hammock. The crowd gaped and wondered if she would fall, and the men cheered loudly.

"As she landed lightly on terra firma, she smiled saucily and held out her hand for the five dollars." Edward Blackman Jr. of Bangor, a son of Annie Polyot, recalled that his mother married shortly after the incident. "She used to go around as a midwife with doctors," Blackman said. He also remembered that Annie could play 20 to 25 bingo cards at a time, while he had his hands full with only five. Annie [Polyot] Blackman died in 1945 and the iron smokestack in South Brewer was demolished many years ago.

All Contents are Copyright©Dick Shaw, 1998

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¡Bienvendios!

By Bridget T. Robbins, Guilford

¡Bienvendios! Al instituto de mujeres franco-americanas. ¿Porqué el español? Porque el intercambio de las culturas se hace el movimiento contemporaneo del feminismo más fuerte. Necesitamos establicir un entendimiento entre las culturas; la religion, el idioma extranjero y la tradición de los franco-americanos tiene muchas semejanzas a la cultura hispánica. Lo que nos reunimos, el catolicismo, quizá pueda servir como un puente entre las mujeres latinas y franco-americanas. ¿Hay otra manera mejor para celebrar tu propia cultura que explorar y descubrir otra?

All Contents are Copyright©Bridget T. Robbins, 1998

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ONE OF MAMAN'S TEACHING ADVENTURES

By Amy Bouchard Morin, Old Town

Maman was a lay teacher at St. Joseph s School in Old Town from 1956 to 1969. Most of those years she taught kindergarten, and she had some funny adventures. The other day she was reminiscing and told about the year that she washed the walls and floor of the restroom every noon. The kindergarten room was made especially to teach little children. It was large, had a whole wall of windows that went from about three feet above the floor right to the ceiling, and its own little restroom with a toilet just the right height and a vanity just outside the restroom door which was also the perfect height for little five-year-old children to wash their hands. One year she had a little boy in the morning session who would go into the restroom, while she was busy helping the others get ready to go home, and pee on the walls and floor. He was pretty sneaky and try as she would she couldn't catch him. Now, every noon after the children went home maman would check the room over to see if any mittens, papers, etc. were left behind, set the desks in order, and check the restroom to prepare her classroom for the afternoon session. And every noon she was finding the restroom with its decoration that this little boy was leaving her. The school janitor went home for lunch, so Maman had to clean up the mess every day. Quite a few of the nuns took a shortcut through Mamans room after lunch to get back to their classrooms. One day Mother Superior came back from lunch and there was Maman on her hands and knees washing the floor (she had finished the walls) and she could hear Maman sputtering. She asked her what she was doing. Maman told her what was going on and said, I wish I was a surgeon. I m telling you I would fix that stinker so he had to SIT DOWN for the rest of his life! Well, this extra duty wore pretty thin after awhile, so Maman decided to keep everyone after school until whoever was doing this dirty deed confessed. She told the children what was going on and that all the children would have sit at their desks until the person who was doing this confessed. Well, they sat for quite awhile, and finally one little girl (who came from French Island) started crying and went up to her and confessed. I guess she really wanted to go home! At that point Maman had to let them go, because she had said when someone confessed they could go home. She came home that night laughing so hard she was almost in tears and told us how her plan had backfired. To this day, Maman tells the story and laughs, but she still doesn't know who was peeing on the walls and floor of the restroom.

All Contents are Copyright© Amy Bouchard Morin, 1998

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Some Jewels of Maine: Jewish Maine Pioneers

A Review By Rhea J. Côté Robbins, Brewer

Some Jewels of Maine: Jewish Maine Pioneers, by Celia C. Risen, Dorrance Publishing Co., Inc., 643 Smithfield St., Pittsburgh, PA., 15222, Telephone: 800-788-7654, ISBN#0-8059-4206-8, 178 pp., $14.00/$3.50 S/H.

Some Jewels of Maine: Jewish Maine Pioneers is Celia Risen's second book. Her first book, published in 1988, is entitled Yankee Fiddler: A Man Called Suss. Both books are about the Jewish families who came to settle in Maine. With her recent book, Some Jewels of Maine, Risen focuses in depth on the entire state of Maine and several of the immigrants and their families who came to settle here during the late 1800s, early 1900s and carries the story to modern times. The immigrants came from Russia and Eastern Europe to escape the pogroms, persecution and conscription into the Czar's army.
Risen, now retired from teaching, began her inquiry into the Jewish pioneers who came to Maine after conducting interviews with them and their descendants for the English as a Second Language (ESL) courses she was teaching. The stories sparked her interest so she decided to pursue the families' histories.
Some Jewels of Maine captures the lives of the Jewish pioneers and their struggles of living through the hardship of language, culture, religious barriers in a new, foreign land. What they left behind in the old country were even greater hardships. What they became in the new land was a distinct and unique people who prospered, for the most part, despite the barriers, and because of the barriers. The push to succeed and the hard working diligence of the Jewish people who came to settle in the state are a part of many Maine communities local legend and lore. From the beginning of their arrival, even without knowledge of English or without much capital, these Russian and Eastern European immigrants touched the lives of the people in the state.
"I wanted to show the ESL students what others were able to accomplish even though they came with no money, no skills and no knowledge of English," Risen states. What began as a way to illustrate to her ESL students the influence that these immigrants played, despite the barriers of language, etc., in the formation of the communities they settled in, Risen's book speaks to many of us about the valuable contribution these immigrants made to their culture and the economy of the state.
Interestingly, for me, the interweaving of other cultures with the Jewish immigrants is adeptly illustrated. I can add my own personal testimony, coming from the French Canadian [Franco-American] culture, about the interactions with many of these Jewish immigrants, or their descendants, which was a part of my upbringing. I was told, and it was held up as an example, of the way in which the Jewish people often aided their own to succeed in the world of commerce. The local paper would advertise the "Founder's Day Sale" of the local Jewish clothier. A peddler's wagon was featured in the ad because that was how the business had started. My mother worked for two such clothiers, hired because of her bilingual skills, as many others were also hired to work in the stores because of their bilingual abilities, which represents a prominent feature of the way these Jewish pioneers would learn to do business-in the language of their customers. Later on, as a family, we raised chickens for another Jewish business enterprise. My aunt would tell me stories of the Jewish peddler in No. Maine and what his interaction with the French community there was like. In reading Risen's book, my own life's history was revealed to me through the stories of the many Jewish families that effected the communities to which they came to work and live.
The Jewish pioneers came to Maine because the climate and landscape resembled the ones they had left behind. Immigrant followed immigrant as well. The economy in Maine was one which allowed for immigrants to learn a trade, peddle, apprentice, or become an independent worker. Many who started out as peddlers, prospered to become merchants, factory owners, chicken plant processors, distributors of goods and services as well as community leaders. Risen writes a catalog of accomplishments and achievements for the women and men whose families immigrated to Maine. Because education was a goal for all, both women and men, through the hard working efforts of others before them, were able to attain college education in the second and third generations to become doctors, lawyers, professors and entered other professions as well.
Religion played an important role in their lives. Maintaining kosher homes and Jewish religious observances were a part of their integration in the community. Synagogues were begun when there were enough Jewish families in that town to support it. When faced with anti-Semitism, they responded by creating fraternities, support networks, lending agencies and other organizations to counteract the prejudice they faced. Some communities were more accepting than others. Risen often points out that the Jews and the French often faced the same core of prejudice-that which was directed toward cultures other than "Yankee."
Risen writes in a style of "the pot of living" which is open ended and stirs in details through a cultural language that reflects Jewishness. She expounds on proverb, humor, philosophies of Jewish tradition, candidness of intercultural animosities, shochets, schonorrers, economics defined by histories, poverty, struggles in upward mobility, successes and failures of the families which read as a who's who of many Maine communities. Many will recognize family names such as Sterns, Bernstein, Povich, Berliawsky, Lown, Wolman, Lipman, Goldsmith, Cohen, Cutler, Etscovitz, Levine and many more whose enterprise touched the lives of thousands through the years. Each chapter interviews one family which leads to the next chapter like a string of pearls of influence. Each chapter also focuses on an issue or cause or concern close to the individuals featured. The language and ritual of Jewish living is explained historically for the dislocated immigrants who took up the hard work of recreating the support networks necessary to define a distinct people. In modern terms, taking into consideration the renewed interest in global economics, this book reveals the multicultural and international landscape which has is a legacy of the state. The historic proof of the tradition and ability to do business in the language of one's customers as well as a multicultural focus informing the communities in which these immigrants settled, is a strength to be drawn from in today's market place.
Risen began her connection to Maine in 1955 when she and her husband sent their children to the camps developed in the state for Jewish children, and later they began summering here on a tree farm in central Maine every year from June till September. Her intimate knowledge of the Jewish communities captures the flavors of each and reflects it back to the reader in detail and accuracy. Her book, Some Jewels of Maine: Jewish Maine Pioneers is an important book to add to the libraries, classrooms, curriculums and pleasure reading lists because of the inevitability of how these pioneers have touched our lives. As a reading public, we need to know their stories. As a multicultural, international historic community, we are enriched by our collective history told in this book.

Rhea J. Côté lives in Brewer with her family and is the author of Wednesday's Child, which won the 1997 Maine Writers and Publishers Alliance Chapbook Award.

All Contents are Copyright©Rhea J. Côté, 1998

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THE BOAT RIDE

By Trudy Chambers Price, Brunswick

It is early and the lake is smooth.
There are ten of us, so we make two trips.
My brother and I trade parents with our cousins
for the ride across in Grandfather's old boat,
the only way to get to his camp.

The apples are ripe; we fill burlap bags full.
We fish from the wharf and the boys
catch yellow perch. We girls are envious.
We picnic on the shore
and linger.

The air cools and the wind comes up.
Afternoon sky darkens too early.
The men decide to make just one trip back.
The boat sits low in the water. Grandfather,
with his hand on the lever of the purring,
5-horse Johnson, looks steadily ahead.
Uncle Romie sits on the bow, the only place
he can with his stiff leg. There are no lifejackets.
My father and brother are the only swimmers.

The waves grow higher, splashing over the sides
of the boat into our faces. Water pitches over the bow.
I am afraid Uncle Romie will fall in.
No one speaks except Grandmother, who quietly tells
us kids to sit very still and watch the other shore.
My hand is glued to her warm knee.
My new sneakers are full of water.
I don't look at my mother, I already know her fear.
She and Grandmother bail rhythmically with worm cans.

Grandfather tells my father to ease the bags of apples
overboard. They bob wildly in the storm.
Then he reaches under his seat with his free hand
and clutches the handle of his toolbox.
Still looking straight ahead,
he balances it on the side of the boat, blinks slowly,
then drops it into the water.

The rest of the way is a blur of wet and wind and dark
mixed with a belief that Grandfather knows the way and will hold
the little outboard steady against the giant waves.
Much later we finally arrive at the sheltered cove.
We secure the boat to the wharf and drive home in silence.

12-11-93

All Contents are Copyright©Trudy Chambers Price, 1998

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Poems By Joyce Fairbrother

Dandelions


Weeds with attitude,
Dandelions get in your face,
roar, refuse to go meekly
like lambs quarters or milkweed.
Virulent as burdock,
rampant as bamboo,
edgy and green,
they trumpet their too loud,
crass yellow ego explosions.
Dandelions exclaim,
colonizing a lawn
like vegetative evangelicals,
their fervor and bravado
punctuated by white
wild strawberry blossoms.
crouching obsequiously
at their feet.

Zoe-Genevieve



Tired,
Zoe cuddles up to me
and rests her head
along my breast.
Linking her arm
through my elbow,
she sucks her thumb
and talks to me
in angel mumbles
of inarticulate love.
Looking into my eyes,
she smiles silent trust.
Eyes closing,
she melts me
like chocolate clutched
in her small hand.

October 18, 1997

icon/graphy Index"> and also for more poetry from Joyce:

All Contents are Copyright©Joyce Fairbrother, 1998

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A Franco-American Woman

By Lucille Gosselin, Orrington

	As a teenager, I strongly admired my great-grandmother, Elise Landry Bosse,
for  the true pioneer she was. 'Grandmaman' was born at St. Andre de Kamouraska,
Que., on  April 30, 1867.  On September 19, 1886, she married Louis Bosse
from St. Arsene de  Temiscouata, Que.  They arrived in Lewiston, Me. about
two years later and were the first  to develop 'le petit Canada'.  Louis
built several large apartment buildings on River and  Oxford streets in
order to generate income and eventually help lodge his large family; as
 they married and established families of their own.  There were 14 children,
11 that  survived infancy.  Six sons and five daughters, most of whom married
and had large  families also.  The exception was my own 'Memere' Amanda,
who was widowed very  young and was left with three children, which included
my Mother.  But, that's another  story.

It was so intriguing to watch 'Grandmaman's' routine. Sometime, I would visit after school, and find her on her hands and knees, with a big brush and pail of water, scrubbing her kitchen floor. She made the lye soap with grease leftovers, lye and ammonia. Everything was immaculate in her house, a typical French Canadian characteristic. Daughters were taught at an early age to maintain a home by following their mother and helping her with the daily routine. Pride in personal appearance was also very important and each night of her life, 'Grandmaman' curled her hair by rolling it on pieces of toilet paper. The next morning, part of her grooming routine included brushing those tight curls into a stylish hairdo. Her day started at dawn and lasted into the evening hours, with never a lost minute; for inactivity was the 'le temps du diable'.

Meals were substantial and nourishing, with fresh produce in season; canned and preserved foods in the Winter. She did her own gardening, canning and preserves, as well as baking daily the breads, pies, cakes, cookies that we all enjoyed whenever we visited.

The washing of clothes was a day's rigorous affair. First a tub had to be filled with hot water, soap and bleach; in which the clothes were scrubbed on the washboard. Once they were wrung out, clothes went into another tub filled with bluing water. Once these were wrung out, many had to go to a third tub for starching. Finally all were hung to dry on the large porch, in all kinds of weather. Whenever the clothes froze before drying, they would be taken down and draped over any available surface, to finish drying. It was the washing of the curtains that fascinated me the most. After the starching process, she would stretch them on frames placed around the huge kitchen, in order for them to dry and hang properly. Is it any wonder that she was so enthusiastic when she got her first wringer washing machine?

Next came the day for ironing and mending. Ironing before electricity was a difficult, slow process. The iron consisted of two parts; a handle that could hook onto the flat part which was left on a hot stove to heat up. When hot, it was hooked to the handle part and then used to iron. It cooled quickly however, so the process had to be repeated with several iron flats on the stovetop. Lucky the woman who had many iron flats, but it was a process that still required lots of time and patience. Each starched item of clothing had been sprinkled and rolled in a towel and stuck in the icebox in order to keep damp. Everything got ironed , from underwear to sheets, pillowcases, towels and all the clothes the large family wore. Mending of clothes was a given. 'Waste not, want not' was not only a saying...it was a practice. 'A stitch in time saves nine' was also religiously adhered to.

There was always plenty of baking in the large ovens of the woodstove. I saw her bake six to eight breads first thing in the morning, as if it was the easiest thing to do. I guess when it is a daily routine, it does become effortless. Pies were not only for desserts, but also meals: Chicken, turkey,. salmon, and 'Tourtiere's' were staples. Cookies and cakes were also always available as well as fruit pies, cobblers, etc. Fresh eggs, milk, and produce were delivered to the door by farmers, and during the Summer months, many would walk the streets with their carts shouting their specials. Housewives would come out to buy everything from fresh produce to rags and secondhand wares, as well as to take time to socialize. Feeding three substantial meals daily to the family took many hours of labor. In these days of 'take out meals' I'm sure I must be an oddity because I still pre- pare some of her favorite recipes, handed down in my family. 'Tourtieres', 'crepes', 'cretons', 'tarte au salmon' 'amarinages' etc. Many of her recipes were folk medicines we still use today, because they work. For instance, blow smoke into the ear for an earache, or into the eye to break a sty. Mix water, vinegar and honey as a gargle for sore throat. Mix baking soda, and salt for toothpaste. One recipe for salted herbs is not only terrific to add to soups, stews and casseroles, but also is a medicine that heals a bad sprain quickly. To stop a coughing spell; swallow a tablespoons of molasses mixed with lots of pepper.

Of course a few of her methods I've voluntarily chosen to discard...although they sure worked. But no way will I wear a clove of garlic around my neck to avoid getting a cold, or take castor oil and cod liver oil for a monthly tonic.

Another chore for the housewife was that of knitting the family's mittens, scarves, sweaters and even stockings which were knit with 5 needles. For this, 'Grandmaman' had to dye and spool the yarn. She made the thread on her 'rouet', a small spinning wheel set in the corner of her workroom. Also placed in that room was a large weaving loom, on which she weaved 'catalognes', rugs and many useful items of clothing.

Cleaning the house was also a woman's duty. Weekly the house was swept, dusted and scrubbed. Fall and Spring cleaning were a must in a well run Franco-American household. Ceilings, walls and floors were scrubbed. Windows were washed inside- out, as well as the screens. Closets and drawers were re-organized. Furniture was polished; curtains washed and starched; rugs beaten and upholstered furniture was swept clean of dust. Each year, one or two rooms were designated for new paint and curtains.

Interspersed among all this work and activity, was 'Grandmaman's' involvement as an active member of her church, 'l'Eglise Ste. Marie'. She belonged to the ' Dames de Ste.Anne; Dames de Charite; Dames de l'Union St. Joseph et de l 'Union St. Jean Baptiste de l'Amerique'. Sundays were days set aside for God family and rest. Mass was followed by visiting other families, or enjoying company for a meal. Participating in a 'soiree' where lots of music and singing, and/or card playing such as Whist, was the norm. Special holidays had very significant rituals. Christmas always started with midnight mass, followed by a 'reveillons', which is a buffet served at the patriarch's home, after which the gifts are given, songs are sung and laughter abounds after each story told. The stockings with a very precious, at that time, orange was placed in the toe, and were given to the excited children. New Year's celebration started also with attendance at mass, after which a large meal was serveas Whist, was the norm. Special holidays had very significant rituals. Christmas always started with midnight mass, followed by a 'reveillons', which is a buffet served at the patriarch's home, after which the gifts are given, songs are sung and laughter abounds after each story told. The stockings with a very precious, at that time, orange was placed in the toe, and were given to the excited children. New Year's celebration started also with attendance at mass, after which a large meal was served and everyone wished each other health, happiness and good fortune for the year. Then 'Granpapa' Bosse, as the patriarch of the family, would bless each one. Easter mass was followed by a large ham dinner and an egg hunt, with a chocolate egg for each child. Independence Day celebrations consisted of parades and picnics. My favorite was the Labor Day ritual. Because we had no vehicle of transportation, it was so exciting to travel in Uncle Pierre's horse and wagon, singing our French songs all the way to Auburn "En avant la Cantiniere," "Au clair de la lune," "Au Canada," "Les boutons d'cullotte," "Comme qu'il y a des saintes au Canada" and more. To me the following cookout of fresh corn and garden produce was anti-climatic.

The Bosse's celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary in 1936. 'Grandmaman' was a widow at 76 as well as blind, when I arrived on the scene. Se remained very active and independent, living in her own apartment with two grown sons. At 88, a Dr. Tchao arrived in Lewiston, advocating a new surgery for cataracts. 'Grandmaman' was his first patient. Because of her courage and fait in God, to submit to this revolutionary surgery and defying the rumors that this doctor was "an oriental quack," she regained her sight. I remember her fascination with Television, once she could see again. She thanked God daily for the miracles she was experiencing, especially the "moving pictures that talked." She lived through so many changes: the first car, the icebox, electricity and all the appliance and conveniences that brought. The radio, telephone, telegraph, airplanes, TV and even witnessed Sputnik. She learned some English by watching TV, and always was interested in everything. Her mind remained sharp until her death.

When I was 21, as an engagement gift, 'Grandmaman' presented me with a 'catalogne' from her loom, which I still use today. She did this for every grandchild until she was into her 80s.

She was typical of the great demands placed on a Franco-American woman in the 20th and 21st centuries. Their lives were dedicated in the service to the family, the home and the church. They provided stability, love and happiness that developed a good foundation for the children, who learned from their example to be hard-working, honest, loving, caring and God-centered individuals. It was understood that the woman was the "heart of the family" and the man was the "head of the family." No matter how much we deny and disagree with this formula, we must admit it did give the nation solid law abiding citizens with an independent work ethic that built this nation to greatness. It certainly is too extreme for today's woman and society, but I believe with modifications, and women's as well as men's willingness to focus themselves on the well being of their family, we could create wonders in our modern world. To much emphasis on the 'me' can destroy the 'we' of family.

'Grandmaman' Bosse died at 91 years of age. She left eight children four sisters and a brother, 35 grandchildren and 60 great-grandchildren. The legacy she left was one of love, self-denial, service, hard work, cleanliness and pride in one's personal appearance and surrounding, no matter what age you are. her progeny, through her example, have learned her lessons very well. "Merci chere Grandmaman."


All Contents are Copyright©Lucille Gosselin, 1998

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Chapter 45



By Rhea J. Côté Robbins, Brewer


 Un mot au Sage!  
Le secret du succès dans les affaires repose dans le maintien d'une bonne réputation d'honnêteté. Tous ceux qui achètent de nous des Pardessus d'hiver sont prêts à nous rendre ce témoignage...Si vous avez conscience de votre intérêt vous n'acheterez pas un Pardessus ailleurs sans venir voir les bons marchés que nous offrons.
-L'Indépendant, 4ième année, No. 2 Foi, loyauté, progrès, Fall River, Mass, 13 janvier, 1888
D'une bonne réputation...Si vous avez conscience de votre intérêt

At least I think he understands. When we arrive at the cemetery, I notice the statue of Mary is headless. No head in sight. She has been repaired often. My brother had given her feet a bath of Portland cement when she became footless-broken off at the feet. Mary dissolved in a block of cement. Sure to sink if thrown into the water. I had epoxy glued her head back on one time when I discovered it was loose. Now, we find her headless. The Blessed Headless Virgin. The Silenced Woman. I think to myself, my father rages still. Still, he has the power to blast off tree branches and now, the heads of virgins. That reminds me of the restaurant-The Silent Woman. A headless woman standing there with a tray of food in the newspaper ad, circa 1970, which read:

A Silent Woman-how can that be?
Patient traveler do not scoff;
Drawn from the very life is she
and mute, because her head is off!
I remember the headless woman holding a serving tray on a carved sign in front of the restaurant on the major thoroughfare to the Belgrade Lakes region. She was there just off the highway exit.
I'm in the cemetery staring at a headless virgin-one who also served. I get afraid. I think maybe he's pissed because of the balloons. I'm defiant of my dead father. The Silenced Man. I tie the balloons to the bush anyway. We load the headless Mary, worn out by the weather, into the trunk of the car. It takes two of us to carry her, lift her into the trunk and slide her in. We take the headless virgin shopping with us to Portland. I put her in the wood pile when I get home. I remember taboos about how to burn flags when they are worn out, but what to do with religious, blessed by a priest, artifacts? What do you do with the body?
As women, of our own kind, sometimes we hold each other down so that our men, our own kind, can rape us. Character rape. A culture's inmates at war with each other. Across the gender lines battle lines are drawn. The alcoholic will not inspire any grass to grow over his tomb. Husband of my mother-in-law. She makes comment that it is all the alcohol rising to the top, killing off the grass. He was a perpetrator. Against himself and the women in his family. Secret told. What shame lies at the bottom of graves that we cannot tell them still. Was I ever a victim of silencing? First, when he beat my maman, when I was eight, I went to get the neighbors; they told me never to do that again, the family did. Don't ever go get the neighbors again. Second, he beat my maman again; I went to get the relatives, who were not the neighbors, but lived close by. Don't ever bring shame onto us like that again the family told me. Don't ever go get anyone again. Third, he was beating my maman in bed. I sent my pregnant eighteen year old sister-in-law down to break up the fight. She was staying in the house with us. She was hard to convince to take a walk...just take a walk downstairs, I pleaded with her...and he'll stop. He'll hear you walking around and he will stop hitting her. Every second counted. Big, fattened for the delivery date, she lumbered downstairs. I heard my maman lie. No, I'm OK. We were only talking. Fourth, I was sixteen and running from the crazed man. He is driving a car and looking for maman and me walking on the street in our neighborhood. He had taken the distributor cap off the engine one more time to keep us prisoners to his anger. I had planned an escape one more time. But he came after us. In front of all my friends sitting on a porch, I decide to cross the road going in their direction for cover and safety, when he sees me, he screeches on the brakes. My maman yells, "Watch out!" to me. Embarrassing me in front of my friends. He is dead drunk. I turn to her. "QUIET!" "I don't want my friends to know." I am desperate to get off the streets. We go home by another route again. Only to find the house trashed. He had gone berserk and emptied all the trash cans all over the house. I dial the phone and call the police. They arrive. One of the cops who arrive is the beat cop. The one we talked to when I hung out as a teenager at the fire station up the street. All the public services were localized in the neighborhoods. Beat cops kept time with the kids in the neighborhood. He recognized me and he knew me. He wanted my maman to leave. To take me out of there for my own good. For the rest of my life. They pick up the reddish stained paper towels, the ones dad made at the mill when he wasn't drinking, and smelled it. "Gasoline," they say. I smell it and tell them the truth: "Lysol." He drives in. With his dog. They see him driving drunk. They ask him for his keys. He tells them the dog was driving and he is serious. "What do you want us to do?" they ask my maman and me. "Get the keys so we can take the car," I whisper to maman. "We want the keys," she boldly says. "Keep him here," I tell my friend the cop. We need to get away from him. Once more, we are not killed. We drive off to normalcy somewhere. Try to act with wholeness in a shattered world. We are shell-shocked in our existences. Cracked and bleeding under the surface. We wander and drive around all night. I practice my night driving on my permit. She sleeps in the back seat. "Go home," she tells me. "Go home." It isn't four A. M. He hasn't fried his hot dogs and onions yet. I will practice driving some more. I go home at five A.M. We walk in. The trash is gone. Picked up. The next day, he has bought me a pair of ugly, dangling earrings and a card of sorrow. To make up. I hate presents of restitution.
I am seeking the truth like confession told in reverse. The Silent Woman no more. Was I ever silent? What of the shame visited on a people, secrets at the bottom of graves, told after the long-dead have died? To whose benefit? How many years of drunkenness brought on by anger at the lack of education, the torture of an invalidated existence, clinical depression, lost directions of how to be a man, culture run amuck, misogyny, the harrowing of the mill? Hollingsworth and Whitney Pulp Mills. Scott Paper Company.
Employee Number 307
Hired: February 10, 1935
Retired: (early) August 1, 1973
Seniority date: April 1, 1948
Maintenance Permanent Class 'AA' piper: December 1, 1958
Pipe Shop Permanent Class 'AAA' piper, promotion: May 30, 1960.
I counted seventeen medical Leaves of Absence. One when he was gassed by chlorine. Another electrocuted by 420 volt electricity. The man who visited the women of the men who were hurt at the mill drove into the yard and my maman flew out of the house. He wasn't out of his car yet. She met him in the driveway, apron hem wrapped in her hands. The sixth-grade educated man while on staging had laid hold of a pipe through which 420 voltage passed. He fainted. His partner climbed the ladder and they brought him down, into the ambulance, and to the hospital where he passed blood in his urine. After the electric shock treatments, he'd received for depression, I thought, a little more of his memory will be gone. He told us he let himself pass out or else he knew the last thing he ever did was that he'd be the ground of that voltage running through his body-dead. A piper, caught between the rail of the staging and the pipe conducting electricity. He survived. The mill sighed. They don't like to have accidents reported on their records. Safety First! Reads the board as the workers walk in each day. A record of injuries is kept. In his worker file I found no evidence of the danger of his job. No reporting of the gassing. Or of the electrocution. Clean. File. Dates. Cold hard non-committal dates. More silence. I am the bearer of the tales.
Previous employer: Wallace Simpson, Dairy Farm, Reason for leaving: written in my maman's handwriting, Betterment.
Changed mill seniority: February 10, 1935.
Jobs:
Snow Shoveler: January 2, 1935, hired
General: May 15, 1935, transferred
Yard: November 9, 1942, transferred
Truck Driver: April 23, 1945
C1B Pipers Helper: June 18, 1945
Yard Man: December 17, 1945
Truck Driver: March 10, 1946
Yard Man: November 13, 1946, displaced by Vets
C1'B' Pipers Helper: May 25, 1947
C1'A' Pipers Helper: June 1, 1947
C1 'D' Piper: April 1, 1948
C1 'C' Piper: December 20, 1948
C1 'D' Piper: February 21, 1949
Name change: From Raymond G. Côté to Gerald R. Côté, May 23, 1949
Their tombstone which he ordered after she died, with praying hands that she loved, depicted, pleasing her in death as he could never bring himself to in life, reads: Raymond and not Gerald, which he hated. My brother, his junior, when he read the tombstone, asked me why Raymond, and not his real first name Gerald was on the tombstone, and I told him. "Dad did that. He hates Gerald."
"I don't blame him," my older brother said. Stuck with re-run identities all of us. The oldest a junior. Mail and phone calls confused. The second named for the then fresh-dead pépère. The third, named in memory of a cousin who choked on corn flakes. Me, named for the twin of maman. The twin who had named her daughter the name of her twin. The legacy of multiple identities written on all of us as children and of the duality of cultures in negotiation for existence. The fight against foreign language living happening in English. French as the sword and shield. The apron a signal of fierce pride at home. Flour fingerprints, greased, left on the book of life, Better Homes and Garden Cookbook. The sustaining graces of home cooked meals from memory. Tourtière as ambrosia of the Franco-Americans.
C1'C' Piper: June 1, 1949
C1 'B' Piper: June 1, 1952
C1 'A' Piper: October, 27, 1952.
I read in my father's own handwriting: "Early retirement. I will receive a reduced amount of retirement annuity." Just so everyone would know. Retirement income $66.28 per month. $26.16 every 3 months, Hollingsworth and Whitney retirement. Social Security. Thirty-eight years worth of bought and paid for silence. For all of us.


All Contents are Copyright©Rhea J. Côté Robbins, 1997

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A review of Wednesday's Child by Gérard Robichaud, author of Papa Martel and Apple of His Eye

Wednesday's Child, 1997's choice for the Maine Writers and Publishers Alliance Chapbook Award, and deservedly so, is, in my opinion, after a slower, more careful re-reading, still a terrific opening for a writer's career that displays here the stuff of rare, solid promise of even greater things to come.

There are certain sections, many paragraphs, even single sentences that grip me, hold me, knock me out. You have a precise approach to a point you wish to make that surprises you, when it comes, for it immediate authenticity. To do this often and easily, with passion, I consider, a writer's special gift. (page 24) "I have the quilt."

Again, (page 18) "That was when I began to speak in code. That was the time of my knowing."

Reading this, I get an instant feeling of tremendous CHANGES, as important as any other in history books, except these point to landmarks in one's most intimate personal life. The simplicity of that prose has a dramatic punch of its own.

There is a continuum throughout of a well-orchestrated, well-remembered, carefully nurtured ANGST, the wellspring of all artists who have suffered much, the basic data of the various "times of their knowing" that henceforth will be the very stuff that when and if recorded, that is, WRITTEN, he or she will share with the world, all the better to enrich it. You have a way of remembering those dry, belly-laughter, Gallic incidents of days spent in Catholic schools of great WORLD WARS between the forces of insanity of the good nuns and the natural sanity of healthy, intelligent children.

I love the salty dialogue between you and your dad. (pages 53-58)

I was struck by the choices each ethnicity devises to admit proudly their self-perceived inferiorities. Barbra Striesand's nose, English stiff upper lip. Franco-American's bad feet. And on and on.

A small note: I notice you also, as I've done many times, write in English which is a pure translation of a French sentence. Page 50: "How do you play poker?" he demands to know. (Demande a savoir.)

Again I must return to: (page 17)

"I recall the incident well because it is the time and place where my conscious knowing began. It is the exact pinpoint of time where I woke from a deep, sheltering somnolence, the altered state of innocence in childhood came to a halt that day. I remembered it well because I felt the door shut on my childhood self and I felt my apprenticeship into the female begin."

"That was the time of my knowing."

As they used to say in the Village [Greenwich], "Sister Baby, that knocks me out!"

Throughout one feels, as I do, the authentic French-American-ness of it all the way , in a salty, savory manner.

To purchase a copy of Wednesday's Child see below.



JUST DIFFERENT

By Connie Magnan-Albrizio, CT

 CHARLEY MARTEAU'S NEWLY PURCHASED HOME AND HORSE FARM SITUATED DIRECTLY
BEHIND THE INFAMOUS LINEHOUSE WHICH STRADDLED THE CANADIAN / AMERICAN BORDER
DURING THE EARLY 1900'S.

We finished unloading the last of the household furnishings, and were taking a cool water break at the well. This new place of ours straddled the border, with barn and stables in Herménégilde on Canadian soil, and with house and garden in Beecher Falls, Vermont on American soil.
"1916 and we've moved three times this year," I whispered to my sister, Marie-Anne. "Every person I know has been in one home all of their life, so have their folks and grandfolks."
Marie-Anne shrugged.
Our father stood tall and straight, legs apart, feet solidly rooted, with thumbs hooked onto his suspenders at the waist as he surveyed his new property. I could smell the imported Bay Rum when I moved closer to him.
Poppa never used alcohol and talcum on his clean shaven face. He liked the good stuff. "What's so special about this place, Poppa?"
He looked me straight in the eye, and without removing his cigar clenched between polished teeth, said, "Just different." He was a horse-trader who planned to buy horses at auctions and horse shows on both sides of the line and to pay taxes in both countries so as not to get into trouble with Customs.
This was also my eleventh birthday. We'd been so busy moving, nobody but Marie-Anne had remembered. Before pulling away from our old place, in the Hereford Mountain Region, with this last load, she had thrust a small white paper bag filled with candy into my hand. "Everytime I went to the village store for seed, yardgoods, thread or such for Momma or ma tante Aurore, I bought a penny's worth. It took me all year to fill the bag. Don't show it to the others. This is just for you."
"You're not only my sister, you're my best friend," I said as I stuck the bag deep into my coverall pocket.
She beamed with pleasure. Nobody said nice things to her even though she was helpful and kind to each of us. I loved her best.
Poppa was almost in a trance admiring our new place, when he suddenly realized we were standing near him at the well. He spoke seriously to Marie-Anne because she was the oldest and to me because I was the only boy in the family, "You have to learn English fast," he said pointing the chewed end of his cigar in my direction. "And you," he said, directing his cigar end toward Marie-Anne, "learn from him. Your mother and aunt keep telling me how smart you are, well prove it."
Poppa put the cigar between his teeth, curled his lips around it, drew in deeply, took it out, then blew three perfect smoke rings before continuing, "I expect you both to teach us how to speak English and how to write our names."
"The children know how to write their names, Poppa."
A withering look from our father shut Marie-Anne up fast. We both knew that he was the only one who couldn't read or write.
"I need you to learn fast, Armand. We can't let ourselves be swindled by the English speakers. When you live and work in a foreign country, you've got to know the language. There's no other way."
The first Monday in our new place was crazy. At dawn, my father gypsied off to a horse auction in Coaticook; my mother busied herself, removing clean clothes and kitchen goods from the packed flour barrels; fourteen-year-old Marie-Anne had been yanked out of school in the third grade to help out on the farm. Her job at this new place was to take care of the horses and each of the stalls in the stables; and my job was to take my two younger sisters along to school.
"I hope they like us," six-year-old Jacqueline said, as we walked the dirt road to school. "I'm sticking near you," she said, slipping her hand into Evangeline's. "Everybody loves you."
"What about me? Do I have a wart on my nose or something?" I teased. The girls giggled, forgetting for a bit to be afraid.
We arrived before anyone else and I sensed trouble the moment
I set eyes on our new teacher. She looked like a skinny crow, with black shiny hair parted in the middle, pulled tight over her ears and knotted at the back of her head just below the skull where the head stops and the neck starts. She dressed in black from her skinny neck to her wrists and ankles, with not so much as a collar circling her garment. She lowered her head and her glasses slid halfway down her long pointy nose as she peered over them at us. Jacqueline whimpered, clinging tighter to Evangeline.
"Stop that foolishness," teacher barked.
Jacqueline broke out bawling and Evangeline stood straight and proud and scolded in French, "Don't talk to her like that. She's just a little one who's afraid to come to this new school."
"More Canadians," she snapped. "Does anyone speak English?"
"Me. I do. I'm Franco-American, Mam'selle, not full Canadian like my sisters here, because I was born in New Hampshire, USA when Momma was visiting friends while Poppa was gone to auctions -- "
"Make her stop," teacher interrupted, pointing to Jacqueline. "Tell her to let go the other one and to stand on her own."
I did and also warned the girls to take their cues from me.
"Why are you here alone without a grownup?" teacher asked. "School started eight weeks ago."
I heard, but didn't answer. I couldn't speak well enough to make her understand that nobody at home spoke English. My eyes locked with hers for an unblinking moment and I shrugged. She turned sharply and we followed her up the stairs in single file.
Standing behind her desk, pencil in hand, teacher asked, "How long have you been here?"
"One half of an hour," I answered.
"I mean in this country."
"We come from the Linehouse on the border..."
"You mean that dirty saloon?"
"No! No! The house in the back, half here, half over the line," I said, straddling an imaginary line. The kids crowding into the room and pushing into their seats guffawed at my gestures. I continued to look only at the teacher and to answer as best I could.
A reading and writing test put me in the third grade section with the babies. I could hardly stand the shame. Evangeline sat next to me even though she had not been tested, and Jacqueline was made to sit across the room totally separated from us.
When teacher showed an arithmetic problem on the chalk board, I jumped up with the answer even faster than the bigger kids. I wanted to show them all that I was smart. No matter how much she wanted me to, I couldn't explain how I came up with the right answer, I just did, that's all. Working alongside my father these past years had taught me to calculate fast in my head and that's all I knew about it. My speaking mistakes and bad pronunciation though tickled the students to side-splitting laughter.
At recess it wasn't much better: kids crushed around, locking us inside a tight circle, holding hands, chanting,
"Canuck, Canuck come to town, wearing nothing but a frown.
Canuck, Canuck come to town, dragging nothing but a log.
Canuck, Canuck come to town, eating nothing but a hog.
Canuck, Canuck come to town, wearing nothing but a frown."

"Don't cry!" I commanded my sisters. "Grab my belt and get ready!" They took hold on each side of my waist. "LET'S GO!"
We lunged, breaking through the cordon of shrieking kids with me at the point and my sisters trailing close behind. From the corner of my eye I caught Evangeline with her free hand, pinching her nose at the taunters. She always made everything worse. Far enough past the broken circle to be safe, we stopped and turned to face them. Evangeline pinched her nose again, did a quick turn, bent over and pointed to her butt. She ducked behind me when two kids rushed forward. I dropped them flat. No one bothered us for the rest of the day, but there was a lot of nose pinching, butt pointing and stuck out tongues passing back and forth between the girls and my sisters.
Anxious and on edge ready for anything that first week, we were relieved yet disappointed when nothing much happened. The girls exchanged smiles instead of ugly faces and began to mix in with a friendly bunch who seemed intent on making them feel welcome. However pleasant this was, Evangeline discovered a pair of sisters who were the best dressed in class, and who also lived in the biggest farmhouse she had ever seen, just a half mile southeast of us. These were the friendships she wanted to cultivate, supposing in her dream world that we were destined to become rich and famous horse traders.
One night after supper, I heard Jacqueline complain to Evangeline,"They don't look at us even when we walk home right behind them."
"Give it more time," Evangeline answered in the sing song voice I hated whenever she spoke to Jacqueline. "When they learn how precious you are, they'll snatch you from us for themselves."
"No they won't. You're just saying that."
"Dry your tears, sweet child, and watch me draw my numbers for homework. I know what. Ask Marie-Anne to draw your picture, she's so good at that," Evangeline cooed.
"Stop with the stories," I scolded when the little one was out of earshot. "Teach her to take care of herself, not to play make-believe. She'll get hurt and it'll be your fault," I said, fixing my twelve-year-old sister with a hard eyelock.
"You're so mean," Evangeline said. "Get away from me."
That night in our attic bedroom I heard them whispering. Evangeline had pulled Jacqueline's straw mattress across the floor, close up to her own, thinking I couldn't hear because mine was on the other side of the room next to the wall. It saddened me to hear them plot out ways to win over the neighbor girls.
Recess was always the worst time. Two big, tall guys kept watching me in a funny way. Sensing trouble, I avoided them as much as possible which was rather hard to do squeezed into a room with kids ranging from five to fifteen. I knew they'd get me. It was just a matter of time.
We got through another full week without anyone getting hurt and the third had just begun. I stepped out of the classroom at recess time and someone hiding under the porch reached up through the spaces between the stairs and grabbed my ankle. I stumbled down the steps with arms flailing, landing face down in the dirt with a thud. One of the big guys jumped on me, my arms jerked up to cover my head and I got pounded on both sides. I felt a yank at my waist by someone who snatched my pocket watch, ripping the chain from the suspender button hole. I sprung a violent hunch, flipping the kid off me, and scrambled to my feet, grabbing for my watch being dangled out of reach by the snatcher. Two more guys ganged up and never stopped punching until I fell to the ground, gagging on the blood pouring down my throat. Somebody screamed, "Go home where you belong, you dirty hillbilly canuck."
I ran home forgetting about my sisters who were probably on the girl's side of the schoolhouse, unaware of what was happening.
"There's no time for this stupid kid stuff," Poppa hollered when he caught me cleaning myself off at the outside pump. "Where are the girls?"
I shook my head and shrugged.
"Go back and get them," he yelled without letting me explain.
That night after supper he took me behind the stables and said, "This is only to protect yourself. You are not to pick fights! Hear?"
Poppa hated brawling. He figured there were no winners in this kind of tussle. Brawling, according to him, was a waste of time and energy that should be put to better use.
"Surprise is your best technique," my father said as we began fight training. We sparred every chance possible during the day and into the evening. He wouldn't let us go back to class until he was satisfied I could handle myself and was able to keep the girls from harm too. We stayed home all that third week while he and I continued my training between chores.
"Evangeline! Evangeline!" Jacqueline came home screaming that Saturday afternoon before we went back to class. The younger girls pulled Marie-Anne and me into their little huddle. "They let me play in their yard," she squealed, jumping up and down in the stable where we were busy helping Marie-Anne shovel out old straw.
"Didn't I tellya it'd work?" Evangeline screeched, jumping up and down nearly stomping on steaming fresh droppings.
"They asked me what your name was."
"How do you know that? You don't talk English," Marie-Anne asked.
"I can't explain how I knew, I just did and when I said Evangeline, they nodded and smiled."
We returned to class on Monday morning, the fourth week since registering at the school and I could tell by the looks of them that the big kids were planning to have more fun with me. I was ready. They came for me at recess again and I hit the closest one with a fast left to the stomach before he was ready and crossed with a good right to the chin and knocked him cold. The other guy jumped at me. I knocked him to the ground and plopped on top, pinning both his arms with my knees. With heavy quick punches to the face, I cut him up pretty good. I kept banging away at him until somebody yelled in French, "Stop it! You're gonna kill him."
I was wild and not ready to stop. "Gimme my watch," I hollered to the other guy as I continued to punch the one pinned under.
It landed on the ground near my leg. I yanked it up and gave the one pinned under two more for good measure then released him. Everybody scattered as I scampered to my feet. I followed the French talking kid to the far side of the yard.
It was surprising to find somebody who spoke my language, somebody who cared enough to be interested in me in this awful place, even if it could put him in trouble for it.
"They call me Armand," I said, reaching to shake his hand.
"Homer."
"Thanks, Homer."
"S'nothing," he said and shrugged, sticking his fists down deep into the side pockets of his knickers.
"What's the matter with that bunch anyway?"
"Stop playing the wiseguy," he told me in French. "That jumping up with the answers before the big kids, for chrissake, what doya expect? They're gonna like you for that?"
I shrugged, pulled a handkerchief from my back pocket and wiped my face, not understanding this logic at all.
"Folks here don't like what's different, especially somebody who thinks he's smarter'n them. It fears them."
I didn't argue with Homer, out of respect for his friendship. I sensed this was darker than fear. I had never experienced hatred before and it hung heavy on my spirit.
I watched over my younger sisters carefully, but without interfering, because even with a bunch of sisters I didn't know the ways of girls. Sometimes Evangeline's smiling face and waves worked well with our two neighbor girls; other times she cried because she felt that they poked fun at her and at the rest of us.
One day Evangeline ran to the horse stalls where Marie-Anne and I were finishing off the clean up. "Stop! Stop! Listen to me." I put down the wheelbarrow and Marie-Anne leaned the long-handled shovel against the post. Evangeline continued, excited and out of breath. "They invited Jacqueline and me to come over. They said they knew where their folks hid wine and wouldn't it be fun to taste it," she said hugging herself in glee.
That heaviness of spirit overtook me again something fierce, "Don't trust them."
"Armand!" she screamed. "I hate you for spoiling everything. Marie-Anne! Tell him to stop."
"Be careful. Please be careful," our oldest sister warned.
Evangeline grabbed Jacqueline's hand, "We're going and I hate you for spoiling everything all the time."
That night in the stable Evangeline wailed for almost an hour without relief. No matter what I said or did it made her carry on worse than before until she finally blurted out, "It was pee. It wasn't wine in the bottle. They told me I gulped down pee."
I turned to Marie-Anne who was a good problem-solver and between the two of us we convinced Momma and ma tante Aurore to help scheme our teacher and shoolmates into friendliness. Poppa was off again at a horse auction in Coaticook and I was especially happy he was at this time. I knew he wouldn't like this much.
The next morning I hitched Popper's prized Standardbred with the yellow-toned mane to his new Phaeton hardwood buggy with its brass oil-burning lamps and chrome fenders and drove to school. Enroute, we passed the smart-alec neighbor girls without stopping.
Before class I invited teacher to the house for tea on Saturday and asked permission to invite the whole classroom to bring their best animal to our pet-judging contest that same afternoon. At recess, I gave the teacher a snappy ride in the buggy and she stopped frowning at us the rest of the day. At dismissal I invited the neighbor girls to join us riding home. I even let each of them handle the reins a little distance, even though I couldn't stand being near them.
Momma baked her best apple-raisin pie for Saturday afternoon tea with our teacher; and ma tante had given Marie-Anne money to buy a jar of penny candy from the village store. Each kid who paraded in with a pet kitten, duck, dog, pig, goat, or pony could grab a treat from the jar.
Marie-Anne did a fast charcoal drawing of the contest winning pet and its master. Everybody clustered around watching, oooing and aaahing as the picture took shape, begging her to draw them too and she promised to draw a profile of the three-legged race winner. Momma and teacher brought platters of cookies and pitchers of fresh milk to the sweaty bunch of partyers before they headed home. The neighbor girls asked me to drive them home in the same buggy with the same horse and I begged off. I had had enough of their snooty ways for one day.
"We're different here." Marie-Anne said at the supper table that night. "And we have to use our heads to just get by, never mind fit in."
Poppa came in unexpectedly. Momma and ma tante scurried to set him a place at the head of the table. He sat, cigar between his teeth, eyes growing colder and face turning purple as everyone jabbered excitedly of the day's events. With a swiftness that made my head spin, he flung the cigar into the brass spittoon, which was always by his chair, and slammed both fists on the table to shut us up. With a hard eye on Momma, he started, "Are you crazy letting these idiots spend time and money on those people. You can't buy acceptance," he bellowed. "Who needs it anyway?" His eyes scanned each of us, then stopped for what seemed an especially long moment on Evangeline who sat rigid and stonefaced. Momma shrunk before our eyes. Ma tante stood open-mouthed, staring at her brother. Tears streamed from Jacqueline's eyes.
"Never, never buy friendship. It doesn't work. Hear?"
We nodded in unison.
He glared at Marie-Anne who, with Momma, always got the butt of his anger. "It was my idea," I squeaked out before he started on them. He swung in my direction, our eyes locked and with the strongest effort of my life I outflanked him for the first time. He banged the table again and a cup crashed to the floor.
"Clean this up," he shouted to his sister. You, Marie-Louise come with me."
Momma followed him outside while we all scurried to clear away the table and to get the dishes done. Marie-Anne pulled me aside, "We need to help her. It was our plan."
We ran to the stables yelling, "Poppa! Poppa!" Momma jerked the corner of her apron to her mouth to keep from crying out when she saw us running in. "Don't do this again," Poppa ordered between clenched teeth and crashed out of the stable, heading toward the house.
We threw our arms around Momma who didn't make a sound even though tears gushed from her tightly closed lids and a white hand print was welting on her scarlet cheek.
Later that night Marie-Anne eased her straw mattress across the attic floor, away from our snoring aunt Aurore, and closer to mine.
"We've got to be smarter," she said. "The English speakers aren't the only ones we have to guard against."
"I don't know how to protect the girls."
"We'll work on it little by little, Armand. I don't know any other way."
"Marie-Anne! I can't sleep."
"Say your rosary. That'll help you konk out."

All Contents are Copyright©Connie Magnan Albrizio, 1998

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LE BON JARDINIER ET LE BON DIEU

By Maureen Perry, Boston

"Je frémis et me sens comme la terre ouverte/ Toute grande aux pieds du semeur..."
--Marie Noël, Chant de Pâques
(Pris de La Neige Qui Brûle, par Raymond Escholier)*

Il faut de la lumière...La lumière du matin,
La lumière des yeux pleins de joie.

Il faut de la chaleur...La chaleur du soleil,
La chaleur d'un sourire

Il faut de l'eau...L'eau d'une douce pluie,
L'eau qui soulage une soif.

Il faut de la fraîcheur...La fraîcheur d'une brise,
La fraîcheur d'une parole d'espoir.

Il faut toutes ces choses...Pour faire pousser une fleur,
Pour faire pousser une âme.

Oui, il faut tous ces signes...Que le jardinier nous explique,
Que Le Bon Dieu nous donne.
*Paris: Librairie Arthème Fayard, 1957.


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Collaborative Culture Writing




My Grandfather - a memory

By Paulette M. Barry, San Francisco, CA

My Grandfather - a memory Dear Grandpa, Or is it Grandfather or some other fashion of the word? Do you or did you have a preference? Should my greeting be in Italian or are you bi-lingual now that you are in heaven. Heaven. I guess your daughter is there too, my mother, Ann Marie? And, I'll bet she updated you on what's happened to me since you died but I guess I wanted to speak with you myself. After all, it's about time - we never spoke when you were on earth, did we? By now you know that it's me, Paulette, your granddaughter. But, I wonder if I could kind of remenis with you and tell you what I recall about you and see if it's the same as your memory. I can see you, glimpse you, almost touch you in the mist of those early morning days in the early 1950's in Los Angeles. I can smell the dew and feel the promise of another summer day...that smell, that feeling so familiar, even now after all those years later. And I wonder sometimes, Grandpa, if my senses have stayed sharp because of the memories of you. I can still see you working with the vines. The grapevines. All the way up our hillside. And, you, working all day long, tending, tying, touching, evaluating, planting. Gently coaxing the vines to produce the grapes. I can see you keeping the vines from falling to the earth. The care you take, the focus, the dedication. I see you kneeling for hours, all day, day after day, doing you work. But, you never see me. Or at least I don't think so. I do not recall a single time that you spoke to me. Not once. I realize now that you spoke no English. How isolated that must have made you feel. It must have only been through the vines that you could find expression, camaraderie, solidarity, kinship. Such silence surrounding you, enclosing you every day. As a child I never knew that the language was a barrier. I don't know what I assumed, just that you never spoke to me. It might have signaled the beginning of spending a lifetime not questioning what seemed different - for me a lifetime habit of continuing to assume that there are always reasons for things that I cannot understand - and that those reasons are not always apparent to me. What I did know of you I learned from mother. She always told me stories about you and such stories of you, Grandpa, Salvatore. You know mother - always one for elaborate stories, stories that, I learned much later in life, were not always true, or rather hearts of stories were true, but real life to mother was clearly not enough - stories were always better. And, so, stories of you. She said that you had lived in Pensacola, Florida for a time and that you were the person who invented the glass-bottom boat. Or, how about the story that you had lived in Chicago and that you were a highly successful architect? How wonderful, what a successful and creative man. But, Grandpa, if you could speak no English, how could all of those things have been so? Is what I saw of you the truth? Is what my mother told me the truth? Are both true? Could it have been that, later in life, relocated to Los Angeles and the unfamiliar, living in your daughter's house that you spoke your original tongue to mama and to grandma? I don't know. But, I do remember what I saw. I was about seven or eight years old and you were tall, very tall with a broad chest. Or, were you tall because I was so small, Grandpa? I saw you always with brown gabardine pants, baggy style. I saw you with a brown gabardine shirt, buttoned up to the top, even on the hottest of days, with the sleeves rolled to your elbows. I saw you in the broad rimmed fedora hat, also brown. I can hear Grandma calling you into the house for lunch and you're stopping your work to eat and then return to the vines. I can remember that one day I didn't see you in the vines and I remember going to your Rosary. I remember that you died when I was very young, not much past eight. I remember mama mourning, closing off the house, drawing all the drapes so that the house was dark and still. I remember her sitting in the big chair with one of her cats and crying, sobbing. I remember, years later, but still a child, coming across a picture of you, Grandpa, in mother's bottom bureau drawer. The picture was about 11"x 14", it was black and white and it was a professionally taken photograph of you, dead, in your casket, flowers all surrounding you. That photograph scared me to death. I never told my mother that I had found it, after all I was in a place that I shouldn't have been - her bureau. But I couldn't sleep for the longest time without seeing that picture in my mind's eye - I can still see it, even now, as clearly as I could that day I opened the drawer. To this day, I never open drawers of others or even drawers that may have items in them that I am not privy to. So, dear Grandfather, my memories of you are my mothers stories, my horror at seeing that picture of you, my own self watching you, following you along, silently as you worked your vines. So many years have past. So much unexplained. So much to be left that way. But, I can still see you, Grandpa, tending the vines with such care and love. So quiet, so focused, so isolated with someone so close by, watching you�but�forever silent. Love, Paulette


All Contents are Copyright©Paulette M. Barry, 1997

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Seneca Falls, 150 Years Later--A Reading

By Rhea Cote Robbins and others, Charleston Correctional Facility, Charleston, Maine

In July 1998, the nation will celebrate the 150th anniversary of an event which changed the world--the first Women's Rights Convention was held at Seneca Falls, NY in 1848. At that time, women were not allowed the freedoms assigned to men in the eyes of the law, the church or the government. Women could not vote, hold office, attend college or earn a living. If married, they could not make legal contracts, divorce an abusive husband, or gain custody of their children. Then, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, a Seneca Falls housewife and mother of three sons, sat down with a small group of Quaker and abolitionist women, and decided that these wrongs should be made into rights. They called for a Convention, open to the public, to be held in Seneca Falls at the Wesleyan Methodist Chapel, July 19th and 20th, 1848. There they presented a Declaration of Sentiments, based on the language and content of the Declaration of Independence. Stating that all men and women are created equal, they demanded equal rights for women, including--a radical idea--the right to vote. Over 300 people attended the Convention; the document was ratified and was signed by 68 women and 32 men. Seventy-two years later the 19th Amendment was passed in 1920. Women had the vote and other rights granted to them. On April 15th, 1998, at Charleston Correctional Facility seven women reenacted the Seneca Falls Convention commemorating the 150th anniversary observation of this momentous event in the history of the United States. The event was attended by inmates and staff. The women read, "Seneca Falls 1848: All Man and Women Are Created Equal," a dramatization by Elizabeth C. Shultis. As part of the Seneca Falls Maine celebration, the women at Charleston Correctional Facility are taking part in the yearlong statewide observance of the 150th anniversary through the readings of the dramatization. Readings will be taking place in several other educational institutions throughout the state of Maine, and there will be a gathering of those who have taken part in the readings sometime in the summer of 1998. The women who read took the parts of historic figures such as Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Henry Stanton, Jane Hunt, Mary Ann McClintock, Lucretia Mott, Martha Wright, Frederick Douglass and many others. Brochures of the Women's Rights National Historical Park in New York were distributed as well as other materials pertaining to the event. Cake was served and a discussion followed the reading on the rights of women, the history that had never been taught, now learned, as well as many other points that the reading made evident. As a follow-up activity, and as a way to participate in the Seneca Falls Maine event, the women wrote about their experience, their impressions and their own views on women's rights which follow below, and will be sent to be read at the Seneca Falls Maine summer gathering. For more information on the Seneca Falls Maine events, or for copies of the dramatization, contact Margaret Muir at Freeport High School. Also planned for the end of May is a reading of the 'Somebody Else Was Us,' the story of the beginning of Spruce Run as an organization and shelter for battered women written by Celeste Deroche and the Feminist Oral History Project out of the Women in the Curriculum department at the University of Maine. * Mary: As 1998 is the year to celebrate and acknowledge 150 years of the Women's Right's Movement, I would like to share my feelings with your readers regarding a wondrous experience I had "reading" a reenactment of Seneca Falls--Women's Suffrage Movement of 1848. I have always felt strongly about the disparity of being a woman living in a "man's world" in the 20th century. I have always been drawn to history, and have known about the inequality between the sexes, and in my small sphere of influence have done what I could to bridge the inequity to our mothers, daughters, aunts, and to all females in our society. Taking part in the reading of Seneca Falls Movement reminded me that in the grind of daily living, I have taken women's issues for granted. Perhaps I could have done more as a member in a woman's political group--one more voice for the cause. But nothing and no one can take away my fierce desire to see fairness, justice, and decency dominate this world at last. I do not believe that I will see dramatic changes in my generations collective conscienceness, but I have hopes for my childern's era. I have attempted to raise my three sons to understand and appreciate the unique differences of females as well as the profound sameness we all share as part of the human race. With my husband's help, I have tried to instil in my son's minds and hearts the ideals of fairness, equality, honesty and justice for all. I have made it clear that there is no such thing as "womans job,"nor "womans place," and by doing many jobs in the home as well as outside the home, that they associate with their father's, "manly thing." I am heartened to say that my husband tries very hard not to discriminate in any way against the sexes, especially in front of our children. At the same time, he is not ashamed or shy about washing dishes, cooking our meals, doing laundry, ironing clothes and he vaccums beautifully. With my husband and I as role models, and if all families could teach their sons and daughters that they are equals, is there any question that the 21st century would be a better world to live in. --Mary as Elizabeth Cady Stanton *Bridget: I must confess that I was not fully aware of the depth and breadth of the history of the women's rights movement. One always thinks of particular women associated with the suffrage fight, however, it is easy to overlook the fact that such a large part of their lives was dedicated to the struggle for equality. I am impressed anew at the vision, awareness, tenacity, and passion with which they fought. Reading the dramatization of the Seneca Falls Convention gave me a feeling of support, of not being alone, of shared feelings reaching across the years. I am grateful for the courage shown there. What would the men and women of Seneca Falls say to us today? I think they would feel as we do. They would feel awed by the fire that has grown from their spark. They would feel pride for those who continue to fight for an end to oppression everywhere. They would see that the road ahead is very long and very wide. They would see that there is room for all to travel forward, side-by-side. --Bridget Mailey *Gail: As a reader of the Seneca Falls Convention I found myself in the midst of a very oppressed group of women who were strong minded and strong willed. Therefore, the women's movement was formed. As this was read, my feelings and emotions ran high, from anger to compassion, dread, fear, hope, then elation. The women of this movement far exceeded the boundaries of their day. In looking at my situation today, and reflecting on those who started the movement--Lucretia Mott, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Jane Hunt, their oppression they felt is not unlike mine, whereas, I am incarcerated in a state that is far behind the times, and in a prison that has only dealt with men. Therefore, my needs as a woman are often unmet and unwarranted. When I see men still having the options that I am denied, I still feel much frustration because of my situation, although I take it as a learning experience and this reading has brought to light many memories of my own childhood and the difference in my family between the boys and girls. My mother, coming from "the old country of Italy," thought it was her "duty" to serve her husband and her sons, which she did. At the same time, instilling in us girls that "men" needed to be cared for. Not a bad thing for the men in my life. I now have two sons of my own. However, my husband and I share the household duties. The plus of being strong minded myself. The women that founded this movement were forced to live in a society that men made and ruled. With no regard to their welfare or feelings. It is so fantastic to see the progress we've made as women with so much more we have to look forward to because a handful of women 150 years ago had enough courage to pursue the matter. I am proud to be a woman and will always strive for the continuation for rights and a proper place in society. Even in my situation at the moment I find solace and a connection with the women of Seneca Falls. We most definitely "Have Come A Long Ways." --Gail Craft-Moore *Diane: March being Women's History Month, we began celebrating women. The play "Seneca Falls" was suggested to us. A few female inmates here at Charleston Correctional Facility read it, and were overwhelmed to learn how oppressed women were in 1848. Studying this further, I had a rude awakening to learn that even in 1969 in some countries women still couldn't vote. I found that to be incredible! I am a thirty-six year old woman and have taken my voting rights for granted until now. They mean so much more to me now, and so does being a woman. I found myself full of emotion, a little of which was anger. My anger subsided to the pride I felt for what we women have accomplished getting to where we are today, and for what women have done throughout our history. Reflecting on my lie, I am fortunate to have been taught, raised and to have experience equality in most aspects. However, I do see in my mother's generation that it was pretty much a man's world. She patiently and lovingly cared for her mother after a stroke had left her mom paralyzed. When her mother passed away, she went on to marry and raise four children. Being a mother and a wife was a full time job; without any government benefits or support for all her efforts. She is now receiving on hundred and thirty-four dollars a month at the golden age of seventy for a lifetime of dedicated and hard work. It is still a man's world, but we women are and can make a difference. --Diane Marie Bickford-Payzant *Doris: As part of the audience of the Seneca Falls reading at C.C.F., I found it to be educational as well as fantastic. As a 53 year old woman, I guess I took it all for granted about Women's Rights. After listening to the reading, I was appalled at what the women and young girls had to go through before the movement. After listening to the reading, I wonder if men still think they are still the "number one" gender. I believe they do. a lot of men still think they have to dominate. if they don't get their own way they pout, and make a big scene to get what they want. The male gender is still favored. For instance, here at C.C.F., the men have 3 hours of recreation; the women have 2 hours. The men eat firs; the women eat last. The men can be on the Fire Department, whereas, the women cannot. The men have three places to go for Work Release with 14 months left of their sentence. The women have one place to go for Work Release with 8 months of their sentence left. These are just a few examples of how the men are favored. Growing up on a dairy farm with three sisters, it was taken for granted we all pulled our weight. As a result, we were all treated the same. Supper time we all discussed the events of the day, and if there was a big decision to make, it was done as a family. Not by just the men. We all had a voice in it. My husband and I have brought up our children the same way. The "man of the house" does not make the decision by himself. We are all equal--as it should be! If these women did not stand up for what they believed in back in 1848, who knows what life would be like today for us women. Now we have the right to vote, work in places where only men were allowed before, join the armed forces, go to college. I can still remember the days the men had to pay a pole tax. When some of these rights for women came about, it didn't take long for that law to be done with! To the Ladies of Seneca Falls, I applaud you! --Doris Reed


All Contents are Copyright©Authors, 1998

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Women's Culture

By Melissa MacCrae, Brewer

 


Culture represents a certain group's shared values, customs and norms. American- Franco - American-Native American-Australian-German-Polish- Russian... and on and on... No matter. Women's culture rests on communication.World women know the same secrets. Women's moon cycle guides our destiny. Women's words may be silenced, hurled against us, but together we can succeed: the cycle of the moon guides our intuition. Women are everywhere, but despite our defining strengths, we are still silent.

The dominant white male hierarchy that established this country's culture intentionally omitted women as citizens worthy of the list of inalienable rights they reserved for themselves. Enter Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, Lucretia Mott, Martha Wright, Mary Ann McClintock, Carrie Chapman Catt, Jane Hunt and others, who uttered their outrage against the status of women in a country that was ostensibly one of liberty and justice for all. These first feminists -- supported by some men, who also railed against these inequities -- rewrote the established women's culture of subservience and obedience, yet they continued to bear and care for others. Susan B. Anthony, herself, cared for Elizabeth Cady Stanton's children, while Elizabeth spread the suffrage message. The suffrage movement lasted for more than 70 years, gathering strength along the way. Though their efforts revolutionized American society, none of the founding feminists lived to mark her first ballot.

The time it took American women to gain the rights that men have historically taken for granted is virtually identical to the time that has passed since then. Despite that stunning victoriy nonviolently won in the political arena, the percentage of women's representation still pales against our majority status. Almost a century and a half later, women have set but a fleeting footprint on our future. Men make the rules, because we women do not speak our minds, even if it means losing control of our bodies. Feminist Gloria Steinem once wrote in part, "... the characteristics of the powerful...are thought to be better than the characteristics of the powerless .. and logic has nothing to do with it." We women have yet to realize the power we possess. No other group in the world can claim such a bloodless and lasting victory. But we remain silent. Even Margaret Chase Smith, whose stellar political career spanned three decades of service in both the U.S. Congress and Senate, bemoaned the dearth of feminine support at the polls.

Some women have nevertheless harnessed a collective feminine creativity hoping to share it among us to strengthen us all. Cloaked in the legacy left by the early suffragists, they spread the word: "We will teach you to run for office and win. Just come." We did not come when the League of Women Voters called Maine women this spring. This country continues to be run mostly by men elected by men -- and by women, who have yet to invoke the power of our 51 percent majority to challenge the status quo. We have allowed the minority to rule us, to circumscribe us. To secure their power, they must limit ours. Control our bodies. Keep us in our place. Shame us for our biology. Our native zest has been civilized, homogenized, so we don't recognize ourselves. We sacrifice autonomy for acceptance and support.

The culture we inherited from our mothers holds that women must defer to men. That women are the weaker sex. That women have no sense. Some older women still take comfort in the quilt of life that claimed them; they keep the peace. See no evil--hear no evil-- speak no evil. Some not-so-older women cover their ears so they won't hear how they could think differently -- the way they dreamed their lives could be. No wonder they can't sleep!

Women's sense is women's wisdom. S/he should speak. Our moon culture defines us from birth. Women embody the seasons. We own the means of production. Cycles guide our path.We give birth to soldiers whom men send to die.We have no fear, but that which man has manufactured. We must refashion the laws, vigilantly protect ourselves, lest we fall prey to further misogynistic words and deeds. We must invoke our cyclical culture to guide us through the uncertain darkness into the light of consciousness of the stark inequities we face.

Women's culture is not for women only. Men who recognize and respect women's social, political and economic equality may be called feminist, but they are outnumbered by those who would perpetuate our subservience. New moon, quarter moon, harvest moon. Once we thrived through those elemental cycles of symbolic death and rebirth. Evidence of women's cycle has been used against us, has led us to be locked away for fear of our unbridled power -- their loss of control. No wonder they call us "lunatics" after our mother moon!

We have been coopted by night walkers who stalk and rape. Silent night...deadly night...into the darkness, and yet... women have survived millions of moon cycles. We hear inconsistent messages. We speak using others' words. We are confused. Our culture is fragmented. Like our feminist sisters from before, we must speak up -- speak out. We need no permission. How much longer do we wait? Our adversaries hide in layers of double-speak. Some women are convinced that we can't resist. Yet, some men share women's wish for an equal partner. Passion is our guiding light. We must communicate our message to girls and boys, women and men. Educate them to recognize, take for granted that women's time has come. We won the right to vote by a slender thread from which we must weave the fabric of our future.

Melissa MacCrae is a freelance writer who lives in Brewer. She founded Goddess Publications, a feminist press.

All Contents are Copyright© Melissa MacCrae, 1998

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Nauset Beach, Daybreak

By Libby Soifer, Bangor

 

Lone snail wends its way,
Summer sun slowly rising,
On wet exposed sand.


All Contents are Copyright© Libby Soifer, 1998

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Letters/lettres



Who Am I?



I teach French and Women's Studies, am active in community affairs dealing with Franco-Americans' issues in particular, and I'm raising two Franco-American daughters and a son.
Mary Rice DeFosse
Lewiston

I am a young Franco-American woman attending the University of Maine in Orono. I am a senior majoring in Communication Disorders and Human Development/Family Studies. Next year, I am hoping to begin my Master's Degree in Communication Disorders.
I was born in Lewiston, Maine and am one of six children of Pauline and Robert Morissette, Now of Auburn. I attended St. Peter's Parochial Grammar School and graduated in 1994 from St. Dominic Regional High School. My parents were both born in Lewiston, but all of my grandparents were born in various parts of Canada.
The French culture is very important in my family. My parents speak French fluently and occasionally we will attend French mass. I understand the French language, but am not a fluent speaker of it. We eat a lot of Franco-American foods like salt port, crêpes, boudin, cretons, etc.
My attention to FAWI is in part because of a class I am taking at the University with Kristin Langellier. For the class, we had to read Rhea Cote Robbins' book <em> Wednesday's Child</em>. I could make so many connections to the book because of my heritage and the way I was brought up. Listening to Lanette Landry Petrie speak in another one of my classes of her life as a Franco-American also had an impact on me. For these reasons, I chose become a member of the Franco-American Women's Institute.

Nicole P. Morissette
Old Town and Auburn



News/Nouvelles




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Advertisements/Petites Annonces



Wednesday's Child

By Rhea J. Côté Robbins


1997 Maine Writers and Publishers Alliance Chapbook Award winner for creative nonfiction!
Available from:

Maine Writers and Publishers Alliance
12 Pleasant St.
Brunswick, Maine 04011
Send $13.34, tax, postage and handling for your copy today.
If you live outside the state of Maine, pay no tax, send $12.74.
For more information on Maine Writers and Publishers Alliance:

Maine Writers and Publishers Alliance


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Old Women's Wisdom

A wonderful book about the life experiences of women with 80 plus years of living life to the fullest. Their stories of culture: Franco-American, Acadian, Native American, Sweedish, and English language as well as isolation and economics are sure to intrigue and enlighten. The Women of this book are from Aroostook County, Maine and they give a genuine portrayal of the way life used to be for women growing up in "the County".

Read the women from these pages and learn why there has been much support for an important project like this. A book project supported by the Maine Women's Fund and developed by the Aroostook Area Agency on Aging, Presque Isle, Maine, USA.

$10.95 per book or audio cassette plus shipping & handling.

Shipping & Handling:
  • 1 book or audio $ 2.50
  • 1-3 books or audios $ 3.25
  • 3-6 books or audios $ 6.50
  • 6-9 books or audios $ 9.75
  • 9-12 books or audios $13.00
To order (Visa and Mastercard only), please phone (207) 764-3396 or Maine Toll Free 1-800-439-1789 or arooage@ainop.com.

By snail mail, please write to:
Aroostook Area Agency on Aging
ATTN: Old Women's Wisdom
33 Davis Street
Presque Isle, ME 04769
All Contents are Copyright©AAAA, 1997

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Nos Histoires de l'Ile livre de cuisine

A Collection of Recipes from French Isalnd in Old Town, Maine

The above collection of approximately 150 recipes from French Island in Old Town, Maine is now available at for $7.50 (hand delivered) or $10.00 (which covers postage and handling). This collection is a compilation of recipes used in the late 1800s and the early-to-mid 1900s.

Many of these recipes have stories that go with them. You can find a recipe to make soap - (that's right, soap to clean), as well as soup to eat. There are recipes for boudin, corton, root beer, mincemeat, white perch chowder and rabbit pie, as well as delicious cakes, cookies, pies, and much more. All this in a spiral bound format on antique white paper with "old" pictures on the cover and section dividers.

The proceeds from this cookbook will go towards the cost of producing another book (in process) with stories taken from oral interviews with people who resided on French Island during this same time frame, at least 200 pictures, maps and U.S. Census, as well as a history of the Island, and more.

Nos Histoires de l'Ile is a non-profit group working to preserve the oral, living-history of these Franco-Americans.

To order or for more information contact Amy Morin at: Tel. 207/581-4220

You can contact Amy at her email address: Amy_Morin@voyager.umeres.maine.edu

mailing address:
Canadian-American Center
154 College Avenue
Orono, ME 04473



La Femme Franco-Américine/The Franco-American Woman

Sous la direction de/Under the direction of Claire Quintal
Institut Français
500 Salisbury Street
P.O. Box 15005
Worcester, Ma 01615-0005

This book contains the stories of individual lives and studies of Franco-American women as a group. You will learn about les filles du roi, who left France in the 17th century to become wives and mothers in the New World of an untamed continent, and about farmers' daughters who left Canada in the 19th century to become workers in the new world of the Industrial Revolution.

Behind each story, there is a face, that of yesteryear and that of today. Each account bears the imprint of courage and perseverance against great odds. Each face bears witness tothe endurance and abnegation which characterized these women, generation after generation.

To order: Send $14.95/US and $3 postage/handling to:
Institut Français
500 Salisbury Street
P.O.Box 15005
Worcester, Ma 01615-0005



'Women of Aroostook' honored for their achievements

By Kristine A Harger, Star Herald, Presque Isle, Maine



Presque Isle-Twelve Aroostook County women will grace the pages of the 1999 Celebrating Women of Aroostook calendar. These women were chosen based on their contributions to family and community.
The calendar, sponsored by Maine Centers for Women, Work and Community, was unveiled Saturday at a ceremony at NMTC as part of a celebration of National Women's History Month.
This the calendar project's third year. The women chosen for the calendar are nominated by their peers and chosen by a selection committee. The Women of Aroostook are: Agnes Porter, Darylen Cote, Edna Hartley, Ruth Anderson, Natalia Bragg, Susan Lougee, Frances Banks, Ida Roy, Marcella Belanger Violette, Leoria St. Peter, and Geraldine Chasse. Calendars may be purchased at various locations in northern Maine at through Maine Centers for Women, Work and Community.

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You can E-MAIL FAWI here: rjean.cote@gmail.com

Go to Home Page: The Franco-American Women's Institute

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COPYRIGHT NOTICE This publication is copyrighted and all rights are reserved by the writers. No part of this publication may be sold, copied, reproduced, transmitted, transcribed, stored in a retrieval system or translated into any language or computer language, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, magnetic, optical, chemical, manual or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the writers. For back issues or For more information, comments or help, please write For comments or help, webmaster: rjean.cote@gmail.com

Last updated June 23, 1998
contact updated 11-18-2023