Maine Song and Story Sampler Artists

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  Joseph Pagett

  Joseph Pagett

  Joseph Pagett was a native and life-long resident of New Brunswick. He worked as a woodsman, river driver, and farmer, and through the years he learned many songs. He was a featured informant for Sandy Ives’ book Joe Scott: The Woodsman-Songmaker.

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  Joseph Walsh

  Joseph Walsh

  Joseph Walsh, as a young man, worked in the woods for many years all around the Northeast. He worked in Maine (and within Maine he covered a fair share of the state from Gilead to Millinocket), New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia. He learned many songs in the woods, but also from friends in his home province of Prince Edward Island. Later, owned a farm in Morrell Rear, on the east end of PEI. Walsh sang a number of songs for Ives, including some about the lumberwoods, sea songs, and local compositions by Lawrence Doyle, a woods balladeer from PEI. Joseph Walsh passed away in a house fire in 1975.

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  Lawrence and Lucille Parent

  Lawrence Parent and Lucille Parent

  Lawrence Parent, originally from Quebec, was the leading citizen of Lille, ME. He ran the general store and post office and also sang in the choir with two other tenors in the Notre-Dame-du-Mont-Carmel church in Lille.

  Lucille Cormier Parent, an Acadian, was the church organist for over seventy years.

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  Lindsey Smallidge

  Robert Lindsey Smallidge

  Robert Lindsey Smallidge was an important source for Richard Lunt’s research on Jones Tracy, a tall-tale teller from MDI, published as volume ten of Northeast Folklore in 1968. Smallidge was a skilled craftsman, and his favorite hobby was the making of half-round ship models. As of the 1963 interview with Lunt, Smallidge had run a dry cleaning business in Northeast Harbor for over forty years. He also worked as a ship carpenter at times. He never knew Jones Tracy, but heard stories from his mother.

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  Linwood Brown

  Linwood Brown

  Linwood Brown was born in 1923 in Vanceboro, Maine. He spent most of his life in the woods and on drives where he learned his songs. He also worked as a locomotive engineer during the summers.

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  Lydia Franz

  Lydia Franz

  Lydia Franz was a native of Chicago, Illinois. As a child she played piano and cello, eventually graduating from Illinois Wesleyan University with a degree in music in 1944. This date was two years earlier than originally planned, as she accelerated her studies to volunteer for the Army. She joined the Women’s Army Corp in July 1944 and was assigned to Arlington Hall, Virginia as a cryptanalyst. After Japan surrendered she was stationed in Shang Hai, China, where she spent a year before returning home. Following her service, Lydia received a Master’s Degree in Piano Performance from Northwestern University in 1949, got married, and started a career in real estate. She moved to Owl’s Head, Maine in 1999 where she was known as “Bear.” Lydia was a member of American Mensa for 56 years, and had a life-long passion for word games, riddles, number puzzles and memory games. She was also a formidable blackjack player. Read more about Lydia Franz.

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  Mabel Worcester

  Mabel Worcester

  Mabel Worcester lived in the Hanover, ME area for her entire life. She knew many old songs from the woods tradition, which she learned from her father. Her father had worked in the woods around Rumford as cook for several years in the late-nineteenth century.

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  Margaret Hallett

  Margaret Hallett

  The singer, Margaret Hallett, lived in Gloucester when she was young and later moved to Lubec, where she remained for most of her life. She was 83 at the time “The Schooner E.A. Horton” song was collected. Her father composed a number of songs, including that one.

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  Michael Corbin

  Michael Corbin

  Michael Corbin was raised in Grand Isle, Maine, a small town about ten miles southeast of Madawaska, where he moved in 1987 and has lived ever since. For many years, Corbin, a well-regarded chef who specializes in Acadian cooking, owned and operated a cafe in Madawaska called Cafe de la Place. Corbin learned to cook from his grandmother and mother. He authored a cookbook, Recipes from Cafe de la Place.

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  Mort Mather

  Mort Mather

  Morton Mather was born in Manhattan, raised on a farm in New Jersey, tossed about in the North Atlantic on a Coast Guard weather cutter for three years, was graduate in theater from the University of Wisconsin, stage managed professional theater when there were stars, managed a nightclub, farmed, was president of the Maine Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association in its early years, founder of two successful non-profits, fund raiser, consultant, philosopher, writer, speaker, restaurateur, and organic farmer.

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  Mrs. Earle J. Dickson

  Mrs. Earle J. Dickson

  Mrs. Earle J. Dickson sang “The Sailor Boy” at the Miramichi Folksong Festival in August 1962. At the same festival, she sang “The Man Behind the Plough.” Mrs. Dickson also performed at the festival in 1963 and 1972. She lived in New Brunswick.

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  Mrs. Elwood Nickerson

  Mrs. Elwood Nickerson

  Unfortunately, we do mot have much information on Mrs. Nickerson. The only available information is what Sister Poulin noted in her research, which was limited because Mrs. Nickerson was not one of her major informants. Mrs. Nickerson was originally from the Miramichi, New Brunswick area and she had a large collection of notebooks in which she copied down the many old songs she knew.

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  Natalia Bragg

  Natalia Bragg

  Natalia Bragg is a practicing Herbalist with more than forty years of experience, teaching her craft on and off the Knot II Bragg Farm for the past 15 years, and carrying on the herbal culture and traditions of six generations of healing women. She is a founding member of the Aroostook County Herb Association. Born and raised in Aroostook County as a direct descendant of the Lords and Ladies of the Randall Estate in London (who provided medicinal products and soaps for the Queen of England), Natalia comes from a long line of women born well before their time. Acknowledged for her wisdom and strong-willed character, Natalia was accepted as a Shaman by the Native American tribes at Spruce Haven, and honored to become an Elder of the Native people in Fort Kent, Maine. In 1998, the Maine Center for Women, Work and Community recognized her as an inspiration for her many contributions to the community and The County. Over the years, Natalia has been featured on the WABI Bangor program “Hiddin in Plain Site,” on WCVB in Boston on the program “Back Roads in Aroostook County,” featured on MPBN’s “Made in Maine.” Her work has been highlighted in numerous publications including Yankee Magazine; People, Places, and Plants; and Grit Magazine. In her spare time, Natalia enjoys carving interesting works of art, traveling and meeting new and interesting people from all walks of life. This biography courtesy of “Meet The County.” Also visit here for a profile by the USDA.

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  Omer McKenna

  Omer McKenna

  Omer McKenna, 72 years old at time of this interview, was a native of Waterford, Prince Edward Island. He moved to Rumford in 1910 at the age of 17. In Maine, he worked in the woods, in a mill, and even went out west twice to work the harvest. In addition to singing songs written by others, McKenna wrote poems and songs of his own.

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  Philip Walsh

  Philip Walsh

  Philip Walsh was a lumberman and mill worker from New Brunswick. He knew several Joe Scott songs, including “Guy Reed,” “Howard Carey,” and “The White Café,” and other woods songs, many of which he sang for Sandy Ives through the years. He learned all of these songs while working in the Miramichi region. Although Joe Scott and Phil Walsh were both natives of New Brunswick, the events described in “Guy Reed” took place in western Maine (and Guy Reed himself lived his entire life in that area). The events, however, were universal among woodsmen in Maine, the Maritimes, and beyond.

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  Raymond Mace

  Raymond Mace

  Raymond Mace learned many songs from father, Alden Mace, a lumberman who worked near Osborn, ME. Mace lived in SW Harbor since 1910 and worked as a carpenter for most of his adult life. His father sang a few songs for Fannie H. Eckstorm that appeared in British Ballads from Maine.

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  Reid Hand

  Reid Hand

  Reid Hand was born 1907 and grew up in Houlton. He moved to the Carmel in his teens and then to Bangor when he was twenty-five. He was a musician, band leader, emcee, traveling salesman, dance hall owner, dance caller, and radio personality on WLBZ and WABI for many years. As a performer, he was part of a very active country music scene in Maine during the mid-twentieth century. He traveled and performed all over Maine and as a regular featured performer at the Auto Rest Park in Carmel.

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  Richard Davies

  Richard Davies

  Richard Davies earned both B.A. and M.A. degrees in History from the University of Maine, and was awarded a Ford Foundation Fellowship, serving as Staff Historian for the Ford Foundation’s interdisciplinary investigation into the environmental degradation of the Penobscot River in Maine. While in graduate school, he was elected to the first of four terms in the Maine House of Representatives, representing the town of Orono. In 1982 Davies left the Legislature to become Legislative Director for Governor Joseph Brennan. After Governor Brennan’s departure from office in 1987, Davies has worked for the Maine State Housing Authority, founded Public Policy Associates, Inc., worked as a Senior Policy Advisor for Governor John E. Baldacci, and is currently the state’s Public Advocate, representing the interests of consumers of utility services in proceedings before the Maine Public Utilities Commission.

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  Robert French

  Robert French

  Robert French was one of Sister Poulin’s main sources of folksongs. He learned a large portion (if not all) of the songs he knew from his grandfather, a lumberman and singer from the glory days of the Maine woods, as a teenager. Like his grandfather, Robert French went to work in the woods, but due to some sort of injury he was forced to retire early from woods work.

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  Stanley Finnemore

  Stanley Finnemore

  Stanley Finnemore was a long time resident of Bridgewater, Maine. He was was working on the railroad in 1962. He, and his sister Dorothy, learned songs from their father, Charles Finnemore. Charles Finnemore was an informant for Helen Hartness Flanders and Marguerite Olney and his version of “Sir Neil and Glengyle” is in the Flanders collection.

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  Stanley MacDonald

  Stanley MacDonald

  Stanley MacDonald was from Black River Bridge, New Brunswick. He was the brother in law of Wilmot MacDonald and was a regular at the Miramichi Folksong Festival in the 1960s.

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  Sunny Stutzman

  Sunny Stutzman

  Sunny Stutzman grew up on his parents’ farm in Sangerville, Maine. Sunny’s father, Sid, was also a musician and song-writer, and the pair formed the “Doughty Hill Band,” which still performs and records. The band also features Sunny’s wife, Tracy, and Brian Smith. Sunny, though he carries on his parents’ love of farm life and music, did not follow in their footsteps and become a farmer. Instead, after completing a BA at the University of Maine-Farmington, he earned a graduate degree in Industrial Design from the Art Institute of Pittsburgh. He returned to Maine, worked in product development for Dexter Shoe and Moosehead Manufacturing before establishing Sunny Skies Design, which he currently owns. A more complete history of the Stutzman family is available at www.mainehighlandsfarmers.com/Stutzman

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  Teresa Sappier

  Teresa Sappier

  Teresa Sappier, a Penobscot Indian originally from Indian Island, sings and has recorded many songs passed down by her mother, Madeline Sappier. Teresa and her sister Dolores were the primary (and sometimes only) singers for the usually annual Penobscot Indian pageants from 1965-1972. Though she stopped performing at these pageants, Teresa took pride in knowing the Penobscot songs and hoped that by passing along these songs, she could help keep Penobscot culture alive.

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  Thomas Cleghorn

  Thomas Cleghorn

  There is only limited information available about Thomas Cleghorn, who was 86 years old at the time of the recording on August 22, 1964. He worked in lumbercamps in Maine and learned several songs there, as well as from a cousin who worked in New Hampshire, but exactly where or for how long is not clear.

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  Viola Solomon and Henrietta Black

  Viola Solomon and Henrietta Black

  Viola Solomon and her daughter Henrietta Black were the primary sources for Geraldine Hegeman, Dolores Daigle, and Marilyn Daigle’s class project in the Fall of 1962. Mrs. Black recalled several Kluskap stories as told by her mother, and Mrs. Solomon was able to remember even more. Though both women spent considerable portions of their adult lives away from the Maliseet reservation in New Brunswick, they had both been born, raised, and educated on the reservation in Maliseet, New Brunswick. Mrs. Solomon preferred to tell the stories in Maliseet, as she felt telling them in English lost much of their flavor and humor. For most of the stories, Mrs. Black thus acted as interpreter.