(upbeat music) (light music) - My name is Marshall Dodge.

Though I am a native and resident of the city of New York, the state of Maine is closer to my heart.

It was 15 years ago that I started delving into Maine humor.

Since that time, I have worked to put out six records of Downeast stories, and have performed them from Maine to Texas.

I'm going to tell you some Maine stories.

Some of them have been told to me, some I have come upon in books, and some I have made up myself.

All of the stories reflect the spirit of old Maine, and all are stories, not jokes.

(water sloshing) They end gently with a poke rather than a punch, and most have a message that lives on through many tellings.

You said it was kinda muddy walking.

Well, it is muddy, but it's nothing compared to the mud that we had back in the spring of '24.

Now in them days, we had mud.

Of course, then was the days before they'd tarred the roads.

Well, I was sitting on the front porch as I recollect one spring day, and I noticed outta the corner of my eye, a dark object making its way down the middle of the road.

Well, I dropped my copy of the "Bangor Daily News" and really gave it a good look.

And it seemed to me that it might be a cat.

But then again, I saw it had no tail, and it weren't a bobtail cat, 'cause there are none of them in town.

And I thought then it might be a woodchuck, but them animals run from one stonewall the other, never down the middle of the road like whatever it was was doing.

Well, by this time it had worked its way right down in front of the porch where I was sitting, and I could see that it was a gray felt hat with a brown smut on the starboard side.

In fact, it looked just like Will Frete's gray fedora hat.

Well, I looked down under the brim, and sure enough, there was Will.

I could see him almost down to his mouth.

His ugly old beak was sticking out above the waves and the mud.

And I leaned real close to his good ear, and I said, "Kinda muddy walking, ain't it, Will?"

And he said, "Heck, I ain't afoot, I'ma horseback."

Kenneth Fowler had had an awful season.

Fire destroyed his blueberry barrens, termites ate up his ice house, and on top of all that, a stray cat drowned in his well.

So he lost a lot of time and didn't have any opportunity to make provisions for the winter.

So he struck off into the woods with his 44-40 over his shoulder to see if he could bag some game.

Well, he hunted all day without spying so much as the furry tail of a rabbit.

And he was about to break into his clearing in the evening with nothing to show for himself, when a little fox popped his head up about three rods distant.

So he brought his 44-40 to his shoulder and was about to squeeze off a round that little fellow when another little fox popped his head up about two yards to the right of the first.

Well, he didn't know which one to shoot at, so he fired somewhere in-between.

The bullet struck a rock, split it in two, and killed both foxes.

The kick of the gun was such as to knock him into the stream behind.

And when he come to, his right hand was on an otter's head, his left on a beaver's tail, and his trouser pockets were so full of trout that a button popped off his fly and killed a partridge.

(fire crackling) You know, I was down to Roy Allen's garage the other day, and he was telling me a story about a fella who lived out to Colorado, one of them Washington states, and he was raising cattle for a living, and he was losing a head or two of them cattle every week, it seemed.

So he decided to see what it was that was getting 'em.

He went up over the rise by the big Nile tree and staked out a trap, went back down, and inside a week, there was no more cattle being lost.

He went back up over the rise, and he saw that whatever it was, he'd got it.

And he come a little closer and he saw it was a great, tremendous tiger.

And it weren't but a few minutes before that tiger get loose.

(fire crackling) And just at that time, there was an awful howling over in the woods, and there was a pack of wolves headed out to him over the snow.

"Well," he said, "What I shall do is I shall build me a stockade."

And he no sooner got that stockade built, but, well, gosh, the wolves was on him.

So the tiger looked the man and the man looked at the tiger, and they decided they'd take the wolves on first.

Well, there was a great fight right there in the snow, and inside of 15, 20 minutes, all them wolves was killed, and a few did sneak off back into the woods.

Well, the tiger looked at the man and the man looked at the tiger, and they figured that whatever their differences was, they was over.

The tiger turned and went back up on the hill and the man turned and went back down to his farm.

"Well," I said, "Roy Allen, where did you ever hear a story like that?"

He said, "I read it in 'True' magazine."

(fire crackling) Harry Burgess and me was up the side the mountain last winter, cutting wood.

And inside of 20 minutes, old Harry collapsed in the snow, holding of his stomach.

I said, "What ails you, Harry?"

He says, "I got the cholera moblies or the tizic.

I took too much hen oil this morning, and now I'ma done for."

Well, I says "Harry, for heaven's sakes, your stomach's swole up the size of a shaving bowl.

Ease your belt."

Well, he did.

And he said, "I'm still done for, I know it.

I want you to go down the side of the mountain and tell the folks just how it was."

I said, "Harry, there's one thing I should like to do for you before you go."

He said, "What is it?"

Well, I said, "You stay right here."

And I went up the side the mountain and went into a saw mill, and into the kitchen, and there was a jar of mustard and a tumbler, and I mixed up half water, half mustard, and I brung it back to Harry and poured it down his throat, and it come right back up green all over the snow.

Inside of five minutes, he was cutting wood just as good as new.

I said, "You know, Harry, if they'd done that for President Harding, he'd have been with us today."

(wheels clacking) (Marshall sighing) There's a bit of folk poetry that we today miss in the state of Maine because there are no passenger trains.

But if you were to have traveled many years ago on the Maine Central line between Bucksport and Vanceboro, you might have heard the conductor cry out, "Train for Chipman's, Bucksport Center, North Bucksport, Hink's Landing, South Orrington, Orrington, Pierce's, North Orrington, South Brewer, Brewer Junction, Bangor, Exchange Street, Veazie, Basin Mills, Orono, Webster, Great Works, Old Town, Milford, Costigan, Greenbush, Olamon, Passadumkeag, Enflied, South Lincoln, Lincoln, Lincoln Center, Winn, Mattawamkeag, Kingman, Wytopitlock, Bancroft, Danforth, Eaton, Forest, Tomah, Lambert Lake, and Vanceboro, board."

(metal clanging) (wind blowing) (wheels clacking) (light music) (light music) Camden Pierce, who lives out to Mechanic Falls, Maine, was rocking in his parlor one afternoon listening to the radio set, when the telephone started in a jangling.

He picked it up.

It was the radio station calling.

"Hello, this Camden Pierce?"

He said, "Ayuh."

"Well, what's the name of that tune we're playing?"

Camden knew it, "Silver Threads Among the Gold."

"You just won a two weeks trip to New York City, Mr.

Pierce."

Course, Camden had never been outta the state.

Only been to Bangor once, and that was the time the bull moose wandered into town and was chased into the hardware store by the school children.

Camden went to the station to buy a round trip ticket.

The man at the window asked Camden where he was going to.

"Right back here," Camden replied.

The train he took was a Huckleberry.

It stopped even when there was no station to stop at.

"Why has the train stopped?," asked Camden.

"There's some cows on the track," replied the conductor.

A little while later they stopped again and again.

Camden asked why.

"We've caught up with them cows," replied the conductor.

"Well, I'd say this train is moving so slow, you'd better take that cow catcher off the front and put it on the rear to protect us from the cows that are following us."

(light music) Camden made sure he got on an express for his return trip.

It was so fast that a man who leaned out to kiss his wife goodbye in Boston station kissed another man's wife in Kittery.

When Camden changed trains in Portland, a stray dog followed him and sat beside him on a seat.

The conductor told Camden that mutts were not allowed to travel.

"That ain't no mutt," said Camden.

"Anyway, he can run behind.

He doesn't need a ride."

"We'll lose him the first mile," said the conductor.

"No, we won't," said Camden.

"See them shoulders he's got?

That shows he's a runner."

Sure enough, one mile beyond the yard, the dog was loping along behind just as easy you please.

But at the other side of Auburn, the dog had disappeared.

"Where's your dog now?," asked the conductor.

"Probably up ahead," said Camden.

Just as the conductor leaned out to look up the line, the train slowed and come to a shuttering halt.

There was the dog, 200 yards ahead of the locomotive, standing on the very edge of a washout, holding a red flag in his teeth.

"There, you see Mr.

Conductor?," said Camden.

"I told you that that dog could run."

When the train pulled into Mechanic Falls, Mayor Johnson had thought it'd fit him to have a reception, band and all, for Camden.

"How'd you like New York?," asked the Mayor.

"There was so much going on at the depot," said Camden, "I didn't get a chance to see the village."

(light music) There's a story of a dude who went out on a deer hunt with a group of companions from New York City, but he refused to go off deer hunting with them 'cause he said he was a bear hunter.

They couldn't induce him to go off bear hunting until the last day.

They sat around the campfire, and he went off with his gun.

And he encountered a bear within the first- (gun clicking) 100 yards.

He turned on his heels, ran back into the camp, through the door into the main room where the other hunters sat.

The bear, following close on his heels, tripped on the sill, and rolled into the center of the floor.

The bear hunter turned, ran out the door, and said, "There's your bear.

You skin him out and I'm going out for more."

There was another wonderful story about another dude at a similar camp.

He was asked by his host to go out and fetch some water at the spring.

Well, he got to the spring, and there was a bear right up to his shoulders, standing in the water.

Well, the dude ran back into the camp and plumped the pail down on the table, empty of course.

And the host said, "Well, what happened?"

The dude said, "I encountered a bear and he was standing in the spring."

"Well," said the owner of the camp, "You know, that bear was probably just as afraid of you as you were of him."

"Well, in that case," said the dude, "That water wouldn't have been fit to drink in any case."

(gun clicking) (water sloshing) I am the world champion moose caller.

When I was born in a little cabin in the Maine woods, I let out a holler that brung three moose to the door.

When I reached the age of 12, people in the woods said I was an instant prodigy.

I got so famous the state of Maine hired me to do a moose census for them.

I climb up up to the top of Mount Katahdin, let out a few moose hollers, and one hour later, them moose was already gathering around the base of the mountain.

A short time later, I had to climb to a higher peak in order to avoid being stampeded to death.

From the height of that mountain, I counted 6,533 moose.

Not counting the six or seven Canadian moose with black feet they got from crossing the black border between Maine and Canada.

When I retired last year, a group of sports in New York City gave me a big dinner down there and a place the size of an armory.

After the main course of moose steak, they got me to give a moose holler.

Well, sir, it weren't but a few moments 'fore there was a clatter of hoofs outside in the hall, and the doors flew open, and in come first a moose's nose, then rack of horns, and finally, the whole beast himself, as big as life, pawing up the red plush carpet and snorting at the guests.

One of them sports ran out to grab a gun, but I quieted the moose down with a gentle moose holler, and in the morning, brung that moose back on the train with me to Maine.

When I let him off, I noticed he walked stiff-legged, and I thought I saw a stream of sawdust come outta one ear.

Sure enough, two days later I received a clipping from "The New York Times" reporting the mysterious disappearance of a moose from a glass case at the Museum of Natural History.

Did I ever tell you the funny thing that happened to me last summer?

I'd been up on the lake fishing when it began to rain real hard.

So I paddled ashore, got under a spruce near the head of the cove, nigh were a little brook come into the lake and sat down and filled my pipe for a smoke, By and by, I saw a trout rising towards the mouth of the brook, so I set my rod and put on a couple of flies, a silver doctor, and for the dropper, a new one that I'd invented and tied myself.

The fish weren't much for size, most of them half pounders, but a few was bigger.

As soon as I took them off the hook, I threw them into the stern.

But when I stood up and started to shove off, I saw there weren't a single fish in the canoe.

Not a one.

I was stumped for sure.

Where in tofort had them trout gone?

It bothered me, for they weren't big enough to flop over the side by themselves.

And anyways, I coulda heard them if they had.

So when I throwed the next trout, I turned 'round a little so I could see what was going on, and what do you suppose I saw?

I saw a brown head with a little shiny eyes and bristly whiskers come up over the side of the canoe.

It were a mink.

When he saw me, he dodged back quick.

In less than a minute, Mr. Mink's head popped up again, then come his neck and shoulders, and before you could say scat, he picked up a trout in his mouth and was off like a flash.

I saw he went to a rotten birch dump under some trees, where he had dug out a hole in which were eight, nice trout lying side by side, the big ones underneath, the little ones on top, as neat is my old woman would lay them on a dish.

Just as I was about to step back into the boat, I noticed there was a little trout lying right on the ground that I almost stepped on.

The mink must have tried to hide him when he saw how small he was.

Do you suppose maybe that mink thought I was the game warden?

(pigs squealing) Virgil Bliss was the dirtiest man in Piscataquis County.

He was so dirty that in the wintertime, steam would come out from between his sheets like steam rises off of a manure pit.

When Virgie got married, people wondered how he did it.

"Duh, downwind," Virgie said, "Duh, downwind."

On their wedding night, when Heddy removed one of Virgie's shoes, she said, "Virgie, that is the dirtiest foot I have ever seen."

"Duh, don't jump to conclusions," said Virgie.

"Yeah, you just wait 'til you take off that other shoe."

Heddy tried to clean Virgie up, but failed.

Finally, she had him brought before a judge.

"Virgie," said the judge, "Have ever combed your hair?"

"Ah, I did once, Judge, well, but it almost killed me."

"How often do you change your shirt?"

"Huh, how often do you change yours, Judge?"

"I change mine once a day, and sometimes twice when it's hot."

"Well, how can you call me dirty when you soil 365 shirts to my one?"

"Did you ever wash your hands, Virgie?"

"Yes, once I was cleaning a transmission in a pail of gasoline.

I dissolved three layers of dirt off my hands.

And you know, I come down to a pair of mittens I had been missing for over three winters."

Well, that was that.

The judge sentenced Virgie to a bath.

But it didn't take Virgie long to get back to normal.

Two months later, Virgie was pulling in trout on Beaver Pond when a trout pulled him instead.

Virgie sunk straight way to the bottom and never did come up.

People say that the dirt just drug him down.

(pigs squealing) (audience laughing) You know, the stoves that you get nowadays ain't worth a darn.

(audience laughing) They don't give off no heat on account of they ain't got no draft.

(audience laughing) So I decided that, by gosh, I was gonna design me a stove to give me a draft and give me a good deal of heat.

I went down to the Bangor foundry and had him design me a stove with good draft, bring it up to my cabin in the woods, and decided to invite a whole group of my friends over for the trial run, so to speak.

(audience member laughing) Well, they come over, and I went outside to the wood shed to fetch a couple of sticks of hard wood that burns real slow and easy.

You don't wanna start with a bang, as it were.

(audience laughing) So when I come back into the cabin, there was the most awful roaring sound you ever heard.

(exhaling) Well, I knew what had happened, one of my fool guests had thrown a couple of sticks of soft wood in, some pine or spruce, and it was going too strong.

And I tried to shout above the roar.

(exhaling) "Who put the soft wood in?

It's going too strong."

(audience laughing) Well, there's nothing of course that I could do.

There was a kind of a terrible thump.

(blowing) And one, two, three, first the lid lifter, then the shovel, and then the stoker were sucked right in through the draft hole.

(audience laughing) That stove began to lift up off the floor, and banged on the ceiling trying to get out.

(Marshall blowing and exhaling) Well, next thing I knew, there was a terrible wrenching sound.

(groaning) And the cabin just lifted right up off its foundations.

(audience laughing) I looked outside and I could see a pine tree going by.

Well, I jumped up quick on top of a chair, and I grabbed the damper handle, and I twisted it just a little bit, not 360 degrees all at once, but with the greatest presence of mine, I turned it ever so slightly, eased that stove back down to the cabin floor, and the cabin back down to its foundation.

(blowing) And when the roar had subsided, (blowing) one of my guests said, probably the one, in fact, who'd put that soft wood in, he said, "You know, Virgie, you shoulda had a governor on that stove."

(audience laughing) I said, "Governor, heck.

You put soft wood in that stove, and not even the President of the United States could hold that stove down."

(audience laughing) (light music) (footsteps thumping) (wood thudding) (footsteps thumping) (wood thudding) (upbeat music)