Growing up in Dover-Foxcroft: Part II

By Rhonda Hanson Weaver
FA Class of 1967

    Back then, your teachers had the last word, and a call home was something to be worried about. While the basics were most important, there was time for holiday festivities. We would draw our versions of the first Thanksgiving, have Christmas trees in the classrooms, draw names for gift giving, and make elaborate boxes for our St. Valentine cards. There were sing-a-longs, talent shows at Central Hall, long recesses where you played outside no matter how cold, and a long lunch hour as many of us would walk home for lunch to avoid paying for the meal tickets. Learning the times tables, long division, the U.S. states, and reading and writing fluently were the primary education goals. There were no endless Maine Assessment tests (which I had to give to my students each year when I was teaching) or state standards, except the high standards that the local teachers and parents imposed. I’m not saying that’s better, but it sure made childhood a lot less stressful.

    Once in school, many of us girls joined Brownies, then Girl Scouts. My group was especially lucky to have two wonderful scout leaders, Margaret Webber and Evelyn Clukey Higgins for eight years. There were always active Boy Scout Troops as well.
    Each year, before the gyms were built, we would walk down to Central Hall to use the stage for talent shows, plays, Christmas activities and music programs. It was always exciting when us Pleasant Street School kids met up with North Street School kids, as the two schools seemed so far apart! We really didn’t get to know each other (unless you were a relative) until Grammar School.
    Friday nights were exciting, as there were high school dances at Central Hall in the evening. I don’t remember how much it cost to get in (do you remember?), but it was affordable and probably the fee covered paying the chaperones, who were usually high school teachers. The guys would hang out on the left side of the floor, and the girls would be on the other side. There was lots of drama when a boy finally got up the courage to walk all the way across the room to ask some girl to dance, and you can be sure the chaperones, usually teachers, monitored how close you were dancing together.
    And, whether you wanted to dance with that boy or not, you couldn’t say no as it wasn’t polite. Despite the awkward moments, though, we learned to navigate through the social norms and mostly managed to have fun.
    Most of our dads worked on Saturdays. For us kids, Saturdays meant doing chores around the house – house cleaning, helping with the weekly wash, babysitting, sewing and cooking if you were a girl, tinkering with engines, yard work and delivering newspapers if you were a boy. Saturday afternoons were reserved for matinees at Center Theater. (Does anyone remember ticket prices?) The first thing we would do, after paying, was to head to the candy display and agonize over whether we should buy candy or popcorn. On our way to the seats, we would pause at the wall divider that separated the lobby from the movie area in order to locate where our friends were seated. It was always a thrill when the lights dimmed and the preview started.
    Or, if we didn’t like the movie selection or didn’t have enough money, we’d head over to Central Hall and spend 25 cents an hour to play basketball. I remember the boys usually played for a few hours, then later in the day us girls would rent an hour or so. And could we have had a better guardian at Central Hall than Johnny Ronco? I can’t remember him ever getting visibly annoyed with us kids, although we gave him lots of chances to try. I never heard Johnny raise his voice at us kids even when we deserved it. Without complaint, he listened to our woes, our worries and our silly jokes in a way that made us feel a part of something bigger. Most of all, Johnny made us feel safe and welcomed. For many of us, he was like a foster father.
    On Sundays, the stores were closed due to the “blue law”. This made Sundays a special family day, as there were few distractions. Sundays were the days where you’d go to church and then you’d visit relatives, or in the summer pack up the car and go on some day adventure. Picnics on Sebec beach, Auto Rest Park, Acadia National Park, Moosehead Lake, Fort Knox and Perry’s Nut House were delightful adventures for my family and many other Mainers. If there wasn’t enough gas money to someplace, we’d rally the neighborhood kids to play baseball, tag, Giant Steps, and other simple games, or try our luck fishing in nearby streams. Sometimes, on summer nights, we would lie on the grass and look up at the amazing beautiful sky and wonder if there were people who lived on those planets. And, of course, catching fireflies/lightning bugs was a summer ritual.
    Simple summer fun, like pea shooters, playing giant step, hide and seek, hopscotch, catching fire flies, climbing trees and playing tag kept us busy. We made our own fun and certainly didn’t expect our parents to supervise. The art of compromise was learned at an early age if you wanted to be a part of the gang. Most everyone in town would know whose kid you were and where you lived. If word got back to your parents that you misbehaved, you’d likely have a consequence.
    Rhonda Hanson Weaver lives in Harpswell. Her family camp is at Sebec, right by the narrows. Her three-part retrospective column concludes next week.