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Welcome to the Harpswell Anchor

Welcome to the Harpswell Anchor. Here you can find information on our unique community whether it be local events, historical vignettes, and profiles of some of our unique individual residents.

Anchor Publishing also publishes books, maps and other materials which are on display here.

Click on your computer's "refresh" button to see more images. Enjoy your virtual trip through Harpswell!

The Anchor Staff

Harpswell's Pinewood Derby Print

Written by Rosemarie Mello | 14 May 2010


On the 27th of March, Harpswell's Cub Scout pack 642 held its Annual Pine Wood Derby at West Harpswell School. A day filled with anticipation, excitement and pride delivered a winner in a successful scouting event; an event that has taken place in Boy Scouts of America since 1953.
Standard rules developed by the Boy Scouts of America are recommended for all scout packs to implement. Rules include that the car must be built by the scout in the year of the current race and that the car must meet weigh-in requirements to be eligible to race.
Each scout needed an imagination and few tools to design and create a racecar of his own. Weeks in advance each Cub Scout was given a kit. The kit included a block of wood, nails for axles and a set of plastic wheels. The Scout could only use the parts included in the kit to build a car.
On race day, to participate in the Derby each Cub Scout needed to present his car for weigh-in between 9:00-11:00am. Upon weight approval, the car was registered and numbered.

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You might be a Harpswellite if.. Print

Written by Nelson Barter | 14 May 2010

With special thanks to Gunner Roy Knight of the Harpswell Militia
You can remember the locations of the fire sirens
You still do your grocery shopping at "Cottle's"
You wonder what it was you were doing and where you really were before your new neighbor "discovered" Harpswell.
You know the CMP outage number by heart, but have to look up your mother's
You've ever fished for sea gulls
Your truck's lumber rack requires a passenger to hold the wood
You straighten out bent nails for future use.

Red Tide On The Move Print

Written by Amber Skinner | 03 May 2010


With summer close at hand, the annual threat of red tide is on the minds of many local shellfish harvesters, especially because this year's outbreak is predicted to rival the devastation experienced in 2005.
The Maine Department of Marine Resources (DMR) issued its first red tide warning of 2010 in March, a month earlier than usual. At that time, the harvesting of mussels and surf clams was banned from Harpswell south to the Maine/New Hampshire border.
As of April 15, no one was allowed to "dig, take or possess" carnivorous snails or mussels, because of red tide, according to the DMR's website (www.maine.gov/dmr).
In mid-April, Harpswell Shellfish Warden George Lee Bradbury was asked by the DMR to procure 12 clams from five Harpswell coves for red tide testing. Those results were unavailable at the time of printing.
According to the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI), an "abundant seed population in bottom sediments" has laid the groundwork for a substantial bloom of the toxic alga Alexandrium fundyense. The algae rise to the water's surface in February and March and, depending on a combination of sunlight, nutrients in the water and water temperature, "divide again and again to form a ‘bloom' or red tide." The algae also produce dormant cells, often called cysts, that drift to the ocean floor as these blooms wane.

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