Collections
MF 026 “Islands and Bridges:
Communities of Memory in Old Town, Maine.”
Number of
Interviews: 31
Dates when interviews were conducted: 1993-1994
Time period covered: 1890s-1990s
Principal interviewers: Amy Bouchard Morin, James Bishop,
Adeline (Connie) St. Louis, Carol Nichols, Alan Comeau, Albert
Michaud, Genie Wollstadt, and Barbara Ouellette
Finding Aides: transcripts
Access Restrictions: none
Description: A 1992 community-based oral history project
co-sponsored by the Maine Folklife Center and the Franco-American
Center at the University of Maine generated a series of 35
interviews focusing on the French Canadian immigrant community
located on French Island, Old Town, Maine. The interviews focused on
many subjects including French Island culture and history, family
history, neighborhood relationships, and childhood experiences. This
project led to the book, Nos Histoires de l’Ile: History and
Memories of French Island, Old Town, Maine.
2431 Rosalie (Rose) Bosse Flanagan and Flora Bosse,
interviewed by Adeline (Connie) St. Louis, Yvonne Ouellette, and
Betty Maderos, November 22, 1993, in Old Town, Maine. 34 page
transcript. The two sisters talk about growing up on French Island
in Old Town; family history; emigration from Canada; neighbors;
swimming; ball games; food shopping on the Island; ice and milk
delivery; parents’ work; Great Depression; changes on the Island;
vegetable gardens; keeping pigs and chickens; Christmas
celebrations; French food; St. Joseph School; speaking French at
home and school; buying and making clothes; funeral customs and
wakes; bootlegging and homebrew; tobacco use; present-day use of
French, and extent to which their children’s generation speak
French. Tape: C1481
2759 Benoit Bouchard, interviewed by Amy Bouchard Morin, May
24, 1993, at his home in Old Town, Maine. 15 page transcript.
Bouchard talks about family history; emigration from Canada to Old
Town; businesses on French Island and work opportunities off the
Island; his father’s ice cream parlor and confectionery store; Forth
of July celebrations; baseball and other games; growing up with, and
recovering from, polio paralysis; speaking French at home and
English at school; houses on the Island; cutting and storing ice;
electricity on the Island; work and recreation on the Penobscot
River. Tape: C1482
2760 Benoit Bouchard, interviewed by James J. Bishop and Amy
Bouchard Morin, August 19, 1993, at his home in Old Town, Maine. 29
page transcript. Bouchard discusses the use of French on French
Island, 1914-1920; starting school and learning to speak English;
music; operation that allowed him to walk; World War Two ration
stamps; interior layout of the school; having to speak English in
school; effect of language barrier on educational opportunities;
Helen Hunt school; playing violin in a traveling orchestra, at
dances in the area; introduction of radio to the area in 1920s; Old
Town High School and Machias Normal School; prejudice against
Catholics; St. Joseph’s church; teaching at Herbert Gray school in
Old Town; flu epidemic of 1918; changes on the Island after World
War Two. Tape: C1483 - C1484
2761 Benoit Bouchard, Bernard (Bing) Bouchard, Albert (Bert)
Morin, Walter Nadeau, and Beatrice Morin, interviewed by Amy
Bouchard Morin, February 18, 1994, at Albert and Amy Morin’s home in
Old Town, Maine. 45 page transcript. The group reminisces about life
on French Island, including: family relationships; where specific
families lived; stores; carpenter work; Great Depression; prices;
homebrew, bootlegging, and Prohibition; nicknames; music and dances;
cutting and storing ice from the river; coal and grain from the
railroad; cellar flooding; property ownership and land use on the
island; drainage and sewers; food packaging, barrels and boxes of
pickles, crackers, molasses, etc.; buying gasoline; driving in the
1920s; stretching candy; smoking; buying houses in the 1940s and
1950s; fishing; delivering mail; nosy neighbors; funerals; helpful
neighbors; college students. Tape: C1485 - C1486
2762 John Bouchard and Benoit Bouchard, interviewed by Amy
Bouchard Morin, October 19, 1993, at Benoit’s home in Old Town,
Maine. 28 page transcript. The Bouchard brothers talk about French
Island: neighbors; businesses; school on the Island and teacher’s
names; interior layout of the school; schoolyard games; recipe for
home-made lemon, onion, and honey cough medicine; family
relationships and mother’s death; watching fights between Orono and
French Island young men; boxing; children’s work and play;
relationships with neighbors; John’s brush with tuberculosis; time
at Maine Maritime Academy and joining the Coast Guard. Tape:
C1487 - C1488
2763 Norman Brilliant, interviewed by Amy Bouchard Morin,
August 25, 1993, at his home in Old Town, Maine. Also present,
Benoit Bouchard. 18 page transcript. Brilliant discusses life on
French Island; father’s work; neighbors; businesses; swimming in the
Penobscot River; St. Joseph’s school and coming home for lunch;
food; Christmas; children’s and adult’s entertainment; Fourth of
July; Helen Hunt school; English and French at home and school;
World War Two in the Pacific; outhouses; weddings on Mondays;
funerals; LaBree’s bakery. Tape: C1489
2764 Lucienne Cloutier, interviewed by Carol Nichols and
Adeline (Connie) St. Louis, August 2, 1993, in Old Town, Maine. 12
page transcript. Cloutier talks about living on French Island;
neighbors; animals; stores; meeting her husband and moving onto
French Island; emigration from Canada to the Lewiston mills, then to
a farm in Old Town; Great Depression; names; Pea Cove school; woolen
mill in Old Town; children’s entertainment; peddlers; holidays;
traditional foods; boxing and baseball games; changes on the Island.
Tape: C1490
2765 Eva Collins, interviewed by Carol Nichols and Adeline
(Connie) St. Louis, November 22, 1993, in Old Town, Maine. 15 page
transcript. Collins discusses moving to French Island after her
marriage; LaBree’s bakery; other stores and businesses; speaking
French; neighbors; adult’s and children’s entertainment; holidays;
blood sausages (boudin); boxing; Great Depression; Prohibition and
homebrew; changes on the Island. Tape: C1491
2766 Patrick Crowley, interviewed by Alan Comeau, September
21, & October 20, 1993, at the Shuffle Inn in Old Town, Maine. 28
page transcript. Crowley talks about life on French Island; family
reunions and geneology; businesses on the Island; St. Joseph’s
school; crossing the ice; swimming and the booms on the Penobscot
river; changes in winter weather; children’s work and recreation;
neighborhood relationships; getting married; Christmas; mother’s
divorce; feelings about his religion; working at the University;
Saturday baths; Father John’s tonic; lighting a candle to pray; bars
on French Island. Tapes: C1492 - C1493
2767 Yvonne Shorette Currier, interviewed by Carol Nichols
and Adeline (Connie) St. Louis, November 22, 1993, at her home in
Old Town, Maine. 25 page transcript. Currier was born on French
Island in 1908, and she discusses St. Joseph’s school and the Island
school; friends and family; children’s games; French at home and
English at school; parent’s work; traditional foods; Silver Slipper
dance hall; changes on the Island; Christmas; family names of French
Islanders; movie theaters; peddlers, including the ice man;
nicknames; homebrew and bootlegging. Tape: C1494
2768 Albert Michaud, Walter Simon, Rand Trembly, and
Ernest Dubay, interviewed by James Bishop, February 25, 1994, in
Old Town, Maine. The group talks about their experiences and
memories of growing up on French Island. Topics include: sports and
games, especially softball, boxing (the fights); scrounging donuts
under the Milford bridge; swimming in the Penobscot River; conflict
between St. Joseph’s school children and the Island school children
and between Islanders and Old Town; religious curriculum at St.
Joseph’s school; basketball; nicknames; Helen Hunt Junior High;
newspapers; stores and taverns on the Island; work & factory jobs;
food in the Great Depression; funerals, floods, and neighborliness;
holidays, esp. Fourth of July and Mardi Gras; milk delivery; getting
a driver’s license; speaking French. Tapes: C1495 - C1496
2769 Clayton Landry, interviewed by Albert Michaud, October
6, 1993, at his home in Old Town, Maine. 20 page transcript. Landry
discusses moving to French Island; boxing matches; neighbors; the
Shuffle Inn; grocery stores; cutting ice from the Penobscot River;
entertainment and children’s games; changing French names to
English; St. Joseph’s school; children’s economic activities;
community garbage disposal; pulp-wood river drives; heating (or not)
with wood stoves; holidays; Catholic Order of Foresters; Ku Klux
Klan; and his service in World War Two. Tape: C1497
2770 Patrick (Leo) Lagasse, interviewed by Carol Nichols,
June 4 or 6, 1993, at his home in Westbrook, Maine. 15 page partial
transcript. Lagasse talks about his memories of French Island in Old
Town; nicknames; French and the French Island school; factory and
mill work; Great Depression; dairy farming and milk as part of the
daily diet; cutting ice from the Penobscot River; lumberyard on
Hildreth Street; polio; Benoit Bouchard and Herbert Gray School;
children’s and adult’s entertainment; grocery stores; Great
Depression and WPA work; Old Town airport; Monday wash day; boxing
matches; plumbing and the first bathtub on French Island;
automobiles; Prohibition, homebrew, and bootleggers; shining shoes
at the University of Maine; and World War Two. Tapes: C1498 -
C1499
2771 Albert Michaud and Rita England Michaud, interviewed by
Carol Nichols, July 27, 1993, at their home in Old Town, Maine. 18
page transcript. The Michauds discuss early memories of French
Island; children’s entertainment and games; why French Island was
once called Skin Island; city dump; Shuffle Inn; softball; boxers;
schools; meals; gardens; Mardi Gras and Lent; community and
neighboring; Great Depression; 1936 flood; bootlegging; hunting,
raising, selling, and eating rabbits and deer; and stores on the
Island. Tape: C1500
2772 Albert and Bernice Morin, interviewed by Amy Bouchard
Morin, August 27, 1993, at their home in Old Town, Maine. Also
present, Benoit Bouchard. 23 page transcript. The Morins talk about
family history; parent’s immigration from Canada to French Island;
schools; neighbors; children’s entertainment; holidays; work, at
lumber mill, and factories; Great Depression and WPA work; funerals
and weddings; boxing and softball; LaBree’s bakery and other French
Island businesses; World War Two; automobiles and roads; women’s
textile crafts; arrival of electricity; prices; clothing; peddlers;
and the 1918 flu epidemic. Tape: C1501
2773 Rachel Hortense Morin, interviewed by Amy Bouchard
Morin, July 29, 1993, in Orono, Maine. Also present, Benoit
Bouchard. 21 page transcript. Rachel Morin reminisces about living
on French Island in Old Town. Interviewee frequently lapses into
French. Topics include: family history; neighbors; games and
entertainment; businesses; nicknames; meals; Christmas; family
relationships and economic activities; learning English in school;
St. Joseph’s School and the nuns; and nuns and priests from French
Island. Tape: C1502
2774 Bella Nadeau, interviewed by Carol Nichols, 1993, at her
home in Old Town, Maine. 16 page transcript. Nadeau talks about
growing up on French Island in Old Town, including: movie theaters
and music; St. Joseph’s school; sawmill; stores and restaurants;
LaBree’s bakery; playmates and children’s games; night school for
adults; dangers of trains; delivering milk to the neighborhood;
mourning customs; saw mills and woolen mill; wash day; and plumbing.
Tape: C1503
2775 Gloria Thornton and Doris Nadeau, interviewed by Albert
Michaud, November 1993, at the Thornton’s home in Milford, Maine. 18
page transcripts. The two sisters reminisce with their younger
brother, Albert Michaud, about growing up on French Island in Old
Town. Topics include: schools; swimming and boating on the Penobscot
river; bathing suits; Fourth of July; river drives of logs and
pulpwood; New Year’s celebration; businesses on the Island;
Prohibition and bootlegging; nicknames; prejudice against the
French; ice skating and sledding; Lent and saying the rosary; sewing
circles; taking in boarders; neighborhood relationships; changing
French names to English; and the Shuffle Inn. Tape: C1504
2776 Walter Nadeau, interviewed by Genie Wollstadt, December
9, 1993, at his home in Old Town, Maine. 21 page transcript. Nadeau
talks about growing up on French Island in Old Town; parent’s work;
schools; children’s games; father’s grocery store; community
telephone; transportation and transition to automobiles; businesses
on the Island; 1934 flood; neighbors; funerals and weddings;
medicine and doctors; sewing circles; 4th of July; employment
opportunities in the Old Town area; and the Great Depression. Tape:
C1505
2777 Meledore Ouellette, interviewed by Barbara Ouellette,
1994, at her home on French Island in Old Town, Maine. 10 page
transcript. Ouellette discusses her memories of French Island.
Topics include: the locations of houses and businesses; LaBree’s
bakery; stores on the Island; funerals; neighborhood relationships;
keeping animals for food; jobs; food; boxing; Shuffle Inn; baseball
games; and swimming. Tape: C1506
2778 Melvina Paradis, interviewed by Amy Bouchard Morin, June
11, 1993, at her home on French Island in Old Town, Maine. 11 page
transcript. Also present, Benoit Bouchard and Velma Paradis. Melvina
Paradis discusses her experiences on French Island; family history;
her parent’s work; schools on the Island and off; World War One;
getting teeth pulled before dentists; cooking, growing, and
preserving food; sewing circle; Catholic churches in town; arrival
of electricity and running water; neighborhood relationships; and
weddings. Tape: C1507
2779 Cecile Pietrowski, interviewed by Carol Nichols and
Adeline (Connie) St. Louis, August 14, 1993, in Old Town, Maine. 16
page partial transcript. Pietrowski talks about her experiences
living on French Island in Old Town, Maine. Topics include: short
cuts; building patterns; bootlegging and home brew; Great Depression
and food; women’s baseball; boxing; nicknames; children’s
entertainment; holidays and traditional food; changes on the Island;
women working outside the home; Shuffle Inn; why it was once called
Skin Island; LaBree’s bakery; churches and schools; father’s work as
a policeman. Tape: C1508
2780 Joseph C. "Spike" Richard, interviewed by Amy Bouchard
Morin and Benoit Morin, July 29, 1994, at his home in Bradley,
Maine. 19 page transcript. Richard talks about growing up on French
Island in Old Town; and his involvement in the boxing matches held
on the Island. Other topics include: schools; family relationships;
his time in the CCC; children’s entertainment; parent’s work;
traditional food; electricity; homebrew; and World War Two, with the
National Guard in Florida and New Zealand. Tapes: C1509 - C1510
2781 Rebecca St. Louis Paul, interviewed by Carol Nichols and
Adeline (Connie) St. Louis, June, 1993, about French Island, Old
Town, Maine. 12 page transcript. Paul discusses schools; children’s
entertainment; neighborhood relationships; holidays, including Lent,
Halloween, Christmas; camping; food traditions; stores; and changes
on the Island. Tape: C1511
2782 Estelle Voter and Henrietta Taylor, interviewed by
Albert Michaud, December 3, 1993, in Eddington, Maine. 16 page
transcript. The two sisters discuss life on French Island in Old
Town, Maine. Topics include: family relationships and history;
children’s entertainment; childbirth; schools; 1936 flood; funerals
and mourning customs; holidays, especially New Year’s Eve,
Christmas, Mardi Gras, dating customs; Skin Island; woolen mill;
boxing; and blood stoppers. Tape: C1512
2783 Betty Thibodeau Medieros, interviewed by Carol
Nichols and Adeline (Connie) St. Louis, November 17, 1993, at her
home in Old Town, Maine. 17 page transcript. Medieros reminisces
about growing up on French Island. Topics include: neighborhood
relationships; family history; holidays; children’s entertainment;
nicknames; Shuffle Inn and stores on the Island; religious
observances; Christmas; traditional foods; mother’s work for wages;
downtown Old Town; end of World War Two; and changes on the Island.
Tape: C1513
2784 Marion Guay and Gloria Thornton, interviewed by Albert
Michaud, May 12, 1994, at Guay’s home in Old Town, Maine. 13 page
transcript. Guay and Thornton talk about French Island; schools;
children’s work; neighborhood and family relationships; women’s work
for wages; Great Depression; and blood stoppers. Tape: C1514
2785 Bernice Morin, Betty Labretton, Flora Bosse, and Pauline
Baillargeon, interviewed by Carol Nichols and Adeline (Connie)
St. Louis, March 2, 1994, in Old Town, Maine. Also present, Albert
Morin. 38 page transcript. The group of women discuss life on French
Island; traditional foods; Great Depression; nicknames; stores;
movie theaters; schools; baseball; boxing; childbirth; Christmas;
neighborhood relationships; children’s and adult’s entertainment;
and changing French names to English. Tapes: C1515 - C1516
2786 Letter from Christina Bouchard Duplissa to her
cousin Amy Bouchard Morin, December 15, 1994. This letter contains
reminiscences about Duplissa’s early years on French Island in Old
Town, Maine, between 1939 and 1950. She recalls children’s games and
other entertainment; and neighborhood relationships.
2787 Combination of excerpts from several letters written by
Van Geroux to Leona Taylor (March 12, 1991), and Lelia
Richards (several during 1994-1995). In these excerpts, Geroux
reminisces about life on French Island in Old Town, Maine. Topics
include: the Shuffle Inn; baseball; children’s entertainment;
boxing; grocery stores; French Island characters; an extensive list
of nicknames; taverns, barbershops, lumber yard, and railroad;
street cleaners; movie theaters; priests; horses; feeding and
butchering pigs; skiing; pickling and canning food; and bean-hole
beans.
2788 Eugene Beaulieu, interviewed by Albert Michaud, November
16, 1994, at his home in Milford, Maine. 15 page transcript.
Beaulieu remembers growing up on French Island in Old Town,
including family history; schools; neighborhood relationships;
softball; speaking French; children’s entertainment; parent’s work;
changing French names to English; and placement of houses on French
Island. Tape: C1521
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