Dover-Foxcroft Select Board recommends naming new bridge for Merrill brothers

DOVER-FOXCROFT — Years from now when the new East Main Street bridge carries vehicle and pedestrian traffic over the Piscataquis River it likely will have been named in honor of a pair of Dover-Foxcroft brothers who both died in service of their country in a World War II prisoner of war camp.

The Dover-Foxcroft Select Board recommended naming the forthcoming bridge for Pvt. Willard D. Merrill and Pvt. Barton G. Merrill Jr. during a Monday evening meeting. Bridge naming is done by the Maine Legislature after input from the Maine Department of Transportation but first approval is needed by the local town government. 

“I don’t think you can find two people more deserving of this and I am 100 percent on board with this,” Selectperson Kevin Sargent said.

“I’m more than happy to say yes, I just want to make sure there aren’t four in front of them who have been waiting for 20 years,” Selectperson Emery Cox said about any other possible candidates to have the bridge named after them.

To be sure, a public hearing on the naming of the bridge will be part of the next select board meeting on Monday, July 28 (the board will hold just one regular meeting in the upcoming two summer months).

“You won’t find anything more horrific than that war,” said Barton Merrill, nephew of the two.

Earlier in the month a funeral service was held at the Vaughn Road cemetery as Willard Merrill was laid to rest.

Merrill, who was 21 when he died, was among the U.S. and Filipino soldiers captured by the Japanese Imperial Army after the surrender of the Bataan Peninsula on April 9, 1942.

After his capture Merrill was one of 78,000 prisoners who endured the 65-mile Bataan Death March, which began the next day. Thousands of prisoners died during the march.

Merrill was held at the Cabanatuan POW camp, where he died on Nov. 14, 1942, and was buried in a common grave, the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency said.

Despite several efforts over the years, his remains were not identified until recently. They were flown back to Logan Airport in Boston where a three-state police escort to Dover-Foxcroft began.

The Merrill family had three brothers go to war and only one returned. Willard and Barton Merrill Jr. joined the U.S. Army Air Corps together, fought side by side, survived the Bataan Death March in the spring of 1942 and died a day apart in a Japanese POW camp later that year. Barton Merrill Jr.’s remains were identified and he is buried in Manilla.

The family is hoping Barton Merrill Jr. can also be brought home to join his brothers.

“This is very important and we’re all on board,” Select Chair Steve Grammont said. “We just want everyone to feel they were included in the decision-making process.”

Bridge replacement is in the very beginning stages, said MDOT Bridge Program Senior Project Manager Michael Wight. Engineering studies will start soon and survey work will take place later in the year. 

A new bridge would be in place in three or four years at the earliest.

Construction would need to be coordinated with removal of the nearby Mayo Mill Dam. “Right now there are a lot more questions than answers, so we are talking years out,” Wight said.

Further down the river the Essex Street bridge replacement project is underway, and plans are being developed to have the overpass honor all veterans. Work is well into the final design phase, which should be done in late August.

The exact number of lights for the bridge is to be determined, but the select board opted for conventional lights at a $220,715 cost rather than have the town pay an additional $45,000 for each ornamental light.

The current Essex Street bridge currently has no lights and Selectperson Cindy Freeman Cyr wondered if fixtures on the new structure would be necessary.

Engineers are recommending lights due to safety concerns, especially with a crosswalk to be located near the Vaughn Road intersection, Wight said.

Select board members will think about the number of lights that may be needed and will discuss this on July 28.

In other business, the existing Mayo Mill Dam Committee was formally dissolved.

On the June 10 referendum residents voted down authorizing the select board to borrow up to $9 million for the retention and repair of the dam via a 659-297 count.

The $9 million price tag would have been spread out across 25 years, with a 5 percent interest rate, putting the project cost at $14,107,600, including the $5,107,600 in interest. The projected annual cost would be $664,000.

The committee has done its job, Grammont, who chaired this group, said. A new committee may be needed in the future if different options come forward.

Leaving the dam as it is was not an option. The structure was obtained by the town after a mill closure in 2007 and it hasn’t complied with federal regulations for over a decade. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission cited multiple structural deficiencies in a recent study.

Ideas of retrofitting the dam and using it for hydroelectric power were deemed too expensive.

The town will work with the Nature Conservancy and Atlantic Salmon Federation to start planning the demolition, Town Manager Alsina Brenenstuhl said. The organizations are helping the town write grants and receive funding for the demolition.

A start date for the demolition has not been set, but it will not begin this year. The first step of the process is removing a v-shaped notch from the dam to allow more water to flow and prepare the banks and vegetation for the demolition.

The demolition process will take two years.

“From a public input standpoint there’s nothing to discuss for at least a year,” Grammont said.

The board held its annual organization meeting with Grammont elected as chair for the next fiscal year – he was the vice chair – and Jane Conroy will serve as vice chair.

A new finance committee was approved, to be made up of board members Freeman Cyr, Joel Vail and Tracy Redmond.

The committee “will make sure the budget is on track and for any other issues,” Freeman Cyr said, as well as letting the rest of the select board know about areas of overspending and underspending.

The BDN’s Wendy Watkins and Kasey Turman contributed to this story.