I went to a meeting of the Chebeague Island Historical Society the other night, the topic being "Reminiscences of the Chebeague School." I thought that the agenda would be fairly straight-forward, with people offering their memories of bygone days. But when librarian Martha Hamilton came in with her collection of yearbooks and class photos and dumped them on the table, all pre-conceived notions vanished as the eight or ten people in the Parish House pored over the pictures and shared the recollections thus generated.
The first thing I noticed was a picture including my great-uncles, John Hill and Harry Hill (who I think looks like my daughter Kay-Kay), taken in 1899, when there were more children going to school on Chebeague than there were in mainland Cumberland. John was a member of the first graduating class (1905) of the Chebeague High School. In those days, Chebeague had more children because the Island was a society based upon fishing, farming, and seafaring. Families were younger then, and larger. The old photograph showed a crowd of more than 50 children standing in front of the school house at the intersection of the North and South Roads, then popularly known as the "Green A". The building still stands, without the belfry and with an extra wing, added when Cumberland began using the structure as the Town Garage. Last year, the Town built a new Town Garage, so the building is currently vacant.
More than two hours were spent identifying parents, grandparents, and other assorted friends and relatives, sometimes resurrecting the maiden names not immediately linked to those taken in marriage. Family resemblances were often commented upon, as were the changing physical dimensions of kids who later grew up and grew out. And isn't it amazing how everybody has aged, present company excepted, of course.
The Chebeague High School closed in 1956 with the graduation of its one senior (she was valedictorian!), recently retired postmaster Betsy Ross. Many at that time thought that the Chebeague Island community was dying. Chebeague sent its few high school students to Portland High School for a time after that, and then to Greely Institute (now Greely High School), via Portland. The kids actually rode the Casco Bay Lines into Portland and then rode a bus back out to Cumberland. Talk about a long commute. But around 1960, with the link to Cousins Island emerging as the logically direct route between Chebeague and the mainland, students began to commute from the Stone Wharf, a practice which continues to this day.
Since the population low-point of the fifties, the improving access to Chebeague has brought younger families back to the Island and today about fifteen junior and senior high school students attend school on the mainland. About twenty-five younger students prepare for their off-island educational adventures in grades K through 6 on Chebeague. I saw pictures from the year I attended the Chebeague Island School, when there were seven, yes, seven Stevens in the class. Roughly a third of the class was named Steven. Oddly enough, I don't remember that it bothered our teacher, Stella Hamilton. I think she had seven ways of saying "Steven," to which each would respond appropriately. All the young faces staring from the pages in the forced pose of one acutely aware of the photographer who, in many cases, was Martha Hamilton. Many will not be seen in person again, victims of various tragedies, painful but necessary to recall.
But what I found to be particularly intriguing about our school photo session was the fact that, generally, the students in the pictures, whether in knee pants or in color shots wearing baseball caps, are either still around or not far away. As my wife Nancy is fond of saying, there are still lemonade stands on Chebeague they're just run by the kids of the kids who used to run them. I suppose this is true of any small community. But I know that when I look at my class yearbook I have no idea where anybody is, other than myself. But then I went to high school in the Washington, DC area, where practically everybody was either an army brat or subject to the ebb and flow of political tides.
So is continuity unique to Chebeague? Probably not, but it sure is good to find a place where practically everybody has a shared history. And those who don't share the old history are building on it by joining in and creating new history.
David R. Hill is president of the Chebeague Island Historical Society and Administrative Director of the Chebeague Transportation Company
Go to the Chebeague Anchor Page