(upbeat music) (projector clicking) - Have you ever wondered where the television signal you're watching is coming from?

♪ I love to go a wanderin' (projector clicking) ♪ along the mountain track - Welcome to True North.

(upbeat music) (mysterious music) - Good evening and welcome to Mainewatch (upbeat music) (projector clicking) Welcome to From The Vault, a celebration of 60 years of Maine Public Television.

From August of 1997 through February of 1998, Maine Public production teams spent time in several communities throughout the state.

Four hour-long documentaries were the result.

The series "Our Stories" took an in-depth look at the families, issues, heritage and challenges in four different areas of Maine.

From a dairy farm family in Bethel to a lobster fishing family on Islesford, a Native American family in Indian Township and a potato farming family in Fort Kent, which is tonight's episode.

We go inside the lives of the Bouchard family and their challenges in keeping the family farm and Acadian traditions alive.

Now, in the 24 years since this documentary first aired several of the area's family farms have been lost.

But, the Bouchard's found success by bringing traditional Acadian food to the mainstream.

I'm sure you're familiar with their distinctive ployes mix found in stores and if you haven't made yourself some with butter or jam or maple syrup or chocolate or just about anything, you are missing out.

Check out their online shop for ployes mix and more at ployes.com.

The Bouchard's themselves are doing fine.

Alban and Rita, the patriarch and matriarch you will get to know, are doing well in their nineties.

And their son Joe and their grandson Philip, who you will see as a two year old in this show, are busy keeping the family farm going.

This is our final episode of "From The Vault" as we wrap up our yearlong celebration of serving the people of Maine and Canada for the past 60 years.

We hope you've enjoyed looking back at just some of the programs we have produced over seven decades.

All the episodes are on Maine Public Passport or at YouTube.com/mainepublic.

Thank you for the comments and especially the memories you have shared with us.

And of course, thank you for watching and supporting Maine Public.

You ensure that Maine stories will continue to be told and available for future generations.

Now let's head up to the Valley as we go back to 1998 for "Our Stories: Harvest of Hope".

(lively music continues) (lively music continues) (lively music continues) (lively music continues) (lively music continues) (lively music) (lively music continues) (lively music continues) (lively music continues) (somber music) (somber music continues) (somber music continues) - It's hard to tell you exactly how they came here.

That dates way back when the as far as we can tell, is when the Indians were here and these people came in from, a lot of them were deported out of Nova Scotia and they settled along to St. John River.

The first deed that I have in hand is dates way back in 19...1843 when the Commonwealth of Massachusetts gave them a deed to the land that they were on.

Since then, it has been passed on from generation to generation up until up until today.

And the Bouchard name is still on the, on these on these properties that were back then.

I'm sure that way back in the 1800s, there was not the crops that we grow now on these, on these land.

Cause it was all wooded land and they had to clear that line much to their sweat of brow that they did that.

It was a pretty rough job doing it and what I remember doing is was doing that with horses.

It was a big job because you take a big stump of tree the size of maybe foot and a half it would take a day, just pull that stump out.

You know with pick ax and shovels and team of horses to chain the stumps and pull 'em out root by root.

And that's the way that they cleared the land.

That was not a day that he was sick in his life.

That I remember.

And I think the year that he died I think he was 83 when he died.

And that summer he pitched hay with a pitch fork.

So you know, you worked then until you are dying days, if you were not didn't have cancer or whatever you, you died of.

And that's is what the type of grandfather that I remember.

(whimsical music) Well, my father was a hardworking man.

Being a farmer, you have to be a hardworking man.

I think that he was more or less like my, my grandfather I farm with my father up until 1958 I think when he retired.

And then I was on my own.

(whimsical music) (tractor grumbling) - [Joe] I remember...

I think 10 years old was my first year on the harvester.

I don't know if it was a full day and stuff, but I was I started when I was 10, 9, 10.

And since then, you know, when I was younger and growing up in grammar school and stuff, I was always I was always with my father on the on the tractor or, you know, just with him.

And, and I always set up until I got outta high that I'd never be a farmer.

But I just fell into it and not, it's not so bad after all, I guess.

Let me close it a little bit.

- I think your spreading it (indistinct) spread as far you.. - [Joe] No, well that's starting lot slower (indistinct) I went to college for agriculture in planning on coming back and farming.

When I got out.

It was more or less my decision to actually farm.

And you got, I got looking around at other operations and seeing what they had and what they were working with throughout the county here, more in the valley.

I, it, I couldn't really let it go.

Hey, Phil spread this one out.

(speaking Acadian French) - All of Joe's family are away.

He's the only one that stayed because he's the only boy.

He's the baby of the family and he...

I think in a way he felt like he had to take over the farm.

- And when Joe was still a young man, we sent him to college.

He went to college, went to University of Maine.

These, they, these years were bad, really bad in farming.

We had great big competition from the west and our Canadian counterpart came in pretty strong and we could not compete with them.

So the year he went outta college, that was the year, that was a real disaster.

That wasn't the year of 1985, I remember very well.

And that year alone, I lost $168,000 in, in farming.

- [Joe] Well, Green X asked you - Why did they seem damp a little on top?

- [Joe] Well, I shut my fan off three years ago then when it was cold.

I'm just putting my fans on.

- When he came out of, of college, I tried to convince him not to do it, to do something else.

I mean, he was smart young man and he could do anything.

He had the college education and he could do anything that he wanted to do it.

He says Dad, he says, I'd like to farm.

He says, I really would like to farm.

Well, you got a few little holes.

- [Joe] Well that, that has to be fixed.

I know that.

- And I know (speaking Acadian French) - [Joe] (speaking Acadian French) - (speaking Acadian French) - [Joe] (speaking Acadian French) - I said, Joe, I said, If you want a farm I'll do anything I can to help you.

And this is what I've been doing since he's taken over.

And much of my surprise, he's done very well.

- [Joe] That was, it was always an option I had.

And if it, if I wanted to, it was there.

If I didn't wanna, well, hey, no big deal there.

But it was a decision that was made on my own.

(whimsical music) - If Joe would win a million dollars tomorrow he would farm.

That's just what he likes to do.

It's too bad that most, most of the years there's not too much money to be made in it.

But he still takes a lot of bad years to get somebody to get out of it when it's in them.

And it's kinda like gambling also.

You're kind of waiting for that good year and and trying to hang into it.

And I think this is the fourth generation of farmers and he doesn't wanna be the one to lose it.

(airy music) - [Joe] He's been at it for many years, for 40, 40 some years and he didn't get to where he is by making mistakes.

I'm always asking him for advice more often than I'd like, because, you know, I'd like to you always want to be self you know self-sufficient or whatever.

But it's, he, he, he plays a big role.

- I don't think that any young man going out of farming on his own really can, can do it unless he has some advice from people who has been there, who's been through what farming is all about.

And I give him as much advice as I can.

Some of my advice he takes and some he leaves aside.

Those that he leaves aside, he goes on his own.

He does better than what I would've done.

(machine wiring) (metal clanging) Where is the, the agonal - [Joe] Right there?

- No, right.

Put it over there so you can - [Joe] It's going that way.

- You sure?

- [Joe] Positive - Yeah.

Okay.

- [Joe] Yes.

We, we start off on a low key and then when we end up, when it's time to time to quit you know if there would be a fly on the wall they'd think we'd be yelling at each other.

Well, that's one there.

(speaking Acadian French) - That's all you need.

- [Joe] Well, you get, you get the sweep, you get the sweep and you have the other auger to run there (speaking Acadian French) - But you still need one to go right in the tank Joe.

- [Joe] (speaking Acadian French) Is that a (indistinct) ah Christ, unplug it.

Unplug it Dad, no.

Unplug the other one too.

- Farming is a struggle.

I know.

I've had, I've farm for 50 years, so - [Narrator] How old are you now?

- Going on 71.

Oh, so I've, I've seen the good and the bad.

- It's a good life though.

Nothing I like more to get on that thing and drive that thing till nine o'clock at night.

Hurts me to get up in the morning now.

But it never used to.

(chuckles) (whimsical music) Farming is a is a funny business.

You can grow a crop but you cannot predict the price that you're going to get for these potatoes.

I remember one year in 19, in the, in 1950 in the fall the potatoes were five 50 field run out, out of the field.

I remember my father sold half of the crop then and the other half we kept him till spring because we thought more or less, that was more or less my, my doing I'm sorry to, to this day.

I'm still sorry that I did it.

But you know, I was fine with my father then as partnership.

And my father said, Well, he said we're doing a good job here making money.

I think maybe we should sell the whole thing.

I said, Dad, I says if potatoes sell in the fall at five 50 we might get 10 by by May.

Well in June I hauled the rest of the crop.

I hauled them to a starch factory for 35 cents a barrel.

- You think you're gonna get a price for those potatoes this year (indistinct) - Well these potatoes are more or less all contracted so.

- Okay, but the ones that are not.

- Well, I understand, what I heard that the price started at $1 30 10 and they dropped it to between 90 and a dollar now.

- Oh, because there's... - Because the potatoes are coming out of the field.

- Yeah, they're there's plenty coming up.

- Yes, yes.

- See that's what they want.

They want potatoes year round, you know.

- Well, if we want if we have to stick with the market it's not like it's used to be 20 years ago.

When you and I were farming.

- No - We have to give them what they want 12 months out of the year.

- Yeah.

- If we wanna stay in business - That's why we're better off to be out of that.

I'm glad I'm out of it.

- Well, don't forget that a lot of people are getting out and lot of people have gotten out.

- Yeah, and that's not good, you know?

- No, it's not good.

- It's not good.

- Well, in my early days of farming we've had in the area itself in the Fort Kent area itself we had nine tractor dealers.

Today you don't have one machinery dealer.

We don't have one repair shop.

So we have to do all our own repairs.

If something breaks down on our machinery that we need a new piece we have to drive 50 to 60 miles to one way to get that piece of machinery.

So that is quite a, a burden on us.

(whimsical music) We had maybe, I would say maybe in the 14th area we had anywheres between a hundred and 120 farmers.

Today we stand at 11.

(whimsical music) You cannot live alone.

You cannot farm alone.

You have to have some neighbors to farm with.

You have to have people to depend on, you help them and they help you.

- [Joe } It's been, it's been difficult.

We've had pressure from the Canadians we've had weather problems which cause breakdown in storage.

So there's been quite a few reasons that we've been having a hard time in the valley here anyway.

And we are far, far from the market.

Other areas seem to be growing potatoes much cheaper than we can.

So it's, it's been tough.

It's been tough.

If it's, if it's not the weather, it's it's the buyer of the product or it's a seller of the supplies you need.

So you always seem to be at somebody's mercy which is kind of hard to digest sometimes.

But that's, if you wouldn't like the job you wouldn't be in it.

So that's just part of the game, I guess.

- Are you putting a lot of money in the ground in the in the spring you try to put every piece of thing that you've grown back in storage.

Hopefully you can sell it during the winter and make a living.

We haven't done that in the past 10 years.

- The farming is too big a business.

It's too big a business.

The family farm I'm afraid is, is is going down the drain.

We don't like it.

I don't like it.

I'm seeing that the farmers in maybe very short 20 years from now you might have even fewer farmers than this.

But we will have to pay much more for whatever we buy to put on the table.

So it's not helping you, it's not helping the economy and it's not helping the farmers.

It takes only one bad year.

One bad year can wipe you out.

And, and I've seen that.

I've seen it happen to so many people that it scares me.

(indistinct babbling) (jaunty music) ♪ (Acadian French) (jaunty music) ♪ (Acadian French) - Phillip is two.

He's a, he's a typical boy typical two year old into things.

Phillip, what kinda hands do you have?

What kind of hands?

- [Phillip] Meme - Meme hands?

Is it pepe hands.

- Pepe, can you say pepe hands?

- [Phillip] No.

- Let me see your pepe hands.

Can I see your pepe hands, oh look how wrinkly pepe hands, huh?

- [Philip] Yeah - And (indistinct) has meme hands?

- Yep.

- He's pretty easy going and not too cranky and goes to bed like a charm.

Very easy.

Unless he's not feeling good.

But overall pretty easy.

The future farmer of America.

I don't know if I want that qut he's was born saying (imitating car noise) So he'll probably eventually be riding tractors and doing the whole nine yards just like Joe did.

- Philip come here.

Come warm me up.

- (indistinct) - [Phillip] Hi.

- [Joe] Hi.

What's in your mouth?

What is that?

Oh no Take that out here.

(Unintelligible) - What is it?

- [Joe] It's a bead that's around his tooth Phillip's wide open.

He's two years old and he's all over the place.

I don't see him much during the day.

I'm gone before he gets up and a lot of times I don't see him for six, seven o'clock.

So I can't, I can't avoid him at that time.

He's all over me.

But he's just starting to talk there and he's he's fun right now until he get in trouble.

- [Pastor] Father, you (indistinct) and all creation (indistinct) by which you praise.

All life, all hopes comes from you through your son, Jesus Christ, our Lord.

- [Joe] I'd like to see him, you know take this over.

But you know, that's, that's a way it's down the road, you know, if, if everything is going right you don't wanna let him take this over when you're in the hole or when you're struggling, you know you don't wanna see that happen.

(leaves rustling) - Aw look, oh baby one.

It's a cute one for your collection.

- (indistinct) - Yep.

- Julie, Julie's five, she's going to kindergarten.

Well make sure you don't trip on anything.

(water rushing) Look at all the stuff you got.

What you gon' do with all this?

- Keep 'em.

- Keep 'em?

All ready for school?

New haircut - And a new bath.

- A new what?

- A new bath but you, you got me wet.

- Oh, I got you wet, sorry.

- (chuckles) - She's, she's a good kid too.

She's got her moments.

She's an overall good kid.

She's just starting to just starting to figure out what her interests are.

She does baton.

She likes to be in parades.

And she's a singer too.

She was a very early talker.

She was talking sentences at one and singing songs at two.

She's, she's pretty smart too.

She's the smart girl.

(pencil scribbling) - Oh grass.

(pencil scribbling) Have dreams about horses.

I think of riding it down the back road that we have probably a quarter horse 'cause they're the fastest horses in the world.

Can't really draw me on top of it 'cause I don't draw people.

(chuckles) (players yelling) I like soccer a lot.

That's my favorite sport.

(players yelling) (whistling blaring) We have a team in Fort Kent Warriors.

We have four teams actually, but I'm on the on the Warriors team and we haven't lost a game yet except we tied one - Warriors!

- Good show.

- [Joe] Well, Kelsey, the oldest one, oldest girl.

She loves the outdoors, like all of them.

(chattering in background) - [Joe] It's either centiliter or milliliter.

I'm not sure.

The length of the school been 90 meters.

Wow.

Let me see your, your conversion table.

She's just started in seventh grade.

It's hard to juggle sports and studies but if she can do it this year she should be all set for, for a while I guess.

- She's, she's a little entrepreneur.

She likes to make money so she's always looking for ways to make money.

She's making these little beaded necklaces right now.

- I like it when the leaves turn color 'cause all the red and orange and green and yellow stuff (chuckles) all mixed together.

(whimsical music) (violin music) (woman singing in French) - [Female 1] Harvests only last a week and a half to two weeks if everything goes good, but it seems like three months.

(upbeat folk music) - [Male 1] Well, there's not too much peace of mind that comes in the actual harvest.

It's kind of a hectic time of the year.

Here, anyway.

You know, you work all summer and if, if harvest doesn't go well, or something happens... you almost worked all summer for nothing.

(upbeat folk music continues) It all accumulates in that two, three week period throughout in the year.

(upbeat folk music continues) (tractor rumbles) (loading conveyor rattles) - [Female 1] Harvest was a little on the rough side this year, I found.

Very stressful, um, a lot of breakdowns, the weather wasn't really that great.

First week, we had a lot of rain and they dug anyway.

Not all the time, but when they could, they would.

And we had some frost in the morning so they had to start a couple hours later.

And on the nice days where they could have gone from six to eight, they had a lot of breakdowns.

They'd work a couple hours, breakdown a couple hours.

Not fun.

Joe was stressed out, which stresses me out, which stresses the kids out.

(tractor engine stalling) - [Farmer 2] Is it broke right out?

(indistinct) - [Farmer 1] No, it burnt right out.

(men chattering) - [Farmer 1] Well, hey, let's take a half hour.

I'm gonna go into town and get two belts.

Turn my tractor off.

- Ah.

I'll be down in about 10 minutes.

I need to, a belt a, a B belt.

I got the old one, I got no idea what the length is.

Okay, thank you.

Bye.

(phone hanging up) (tapping metal) - I wanna make it turn before tightening 'em up.

I'm gonna snug 'em up.

What you got?

- [Male 3] Just a washer And other than that, I got some more washers here.

- [Male 1] Just a hair more, just a hair.

(metal clanging) - [Farmer 1] HUP!

(tools tinkering) (metal clanging) - Oh!

Crud, you guys!

(machine whirring) (upbeat folk music) (tractor rumbles past) - [Farmer 2] Must have hit a rock somewheres and uh, (tractor engine stalling) well here there was a, a rod that goes in and holds this thing down here.

But when you hit a rock that snapped this bolt, and it broke this rod.

Which connects to this arm here.

This arm holds this down.

Well now he went to weld that rod back on.

(blowtorch hissing) (tractor engine stalls) (sparks fly) (engine stalls) - [Male 2] Where's your tape?

- [Male 1] Tape!

Tape.

- [Male 3] Top of the arm!

- [Male 1] Top of the arm.

- Pliers.

- [Male 1] The pliers are in the bottom.

- Plier grips.

- [Male 4] I think that's tight now.

- [Male 1] Make sure those are tight.

Where's the big adjustable in the case?

- [Male 3] Where's the adjustable?

I think I had it pretty tight, there.

- [Male 1] Tight the bottom one too, there.

Okay, let's go!

(machinery squealing) (folk music) - [Female 1] How'd it go?

- (exhales) - [Female 1] Don't ask?

- [Farmer 1] It came and went.

Didn't go good tonight, though.

- [Female 1] You done that field, anyway?

- No.

- [Female 1] Finally got that belt working forever?

- The belt was no, the belt wasn't a big deal.

I hit a piece of ledging, broke the bottom off the harvester.

- [Female 1] That's not good.

- No.

- When it's bad on Joe, it's bad on me.

And he had a, he had a few bad days.

Well, yeah, a few really bad days.

And when you get bad days, just takes one day one bad, good bad day to ruin your week.

I mean, he is not one of these farmers that would come home and say, "This is going wrong, and this is going wrong.

Get outta my way."

He's not like that, which I'm glad, could be worse.

But he doesn't say anything.

It's like, I don't exist.

Comes in, does his thing, walks out.

Bye.

That's it.

- [Farmer 1] She always asks me how things are going and I don't wanna tell her because it seems like an omen.

Whenever you say that you're almost done or you have so much left, you know, things seem to not go so well after that.

(machinery clamoring) It's hard on, hard on everybody.

Then again, it all depends how it goes in the field.

If everything goes well, you don't have a problem.

The weather's on your side, you know the, uh the tension isn't there.

But when the weather's not on your side and you have other problems, you see Fall moving right along and the weather's not getting any better.

So you kind of tend to get, it all tends to stop.

(fiddle music) - [Male 2] We've started a week already and we haven't pulled- put in a full day's work yet.

A little frost and a little rain.

And, so... (fiddle music continues) (tractor engine rumbling) - [Farmer 2] We're playing with Mother Nature and she's the boss.

And she always has been, and she always will be.

(machinery clattering) - [Male 1] You get disgusted, but you know, the next day it's a... the sun comes up and it's a different... You still remember- you still remember what happened the night before though.

But you know, it's just, you forget, You forget easy.

And you just go along, hoping it'll be better the next day.

(Organ playing) (church choir singing) - [Female 1] Around here, most, most of the people are Catholics.

Though, you have a lot of people that are getting outta the Catholic church, and going to different religions, for whatever reason.

I dunno.

But, around here it's mostly Catholics.

What's nice about the Catholic religion and maybe all religions, I don't know about them too much, but they really look up to the farmers a little bit.

- [Priest] God, our creator, who never ceases to bestow your bounteous fruits from the rains of the heavens and the riches of the soil.

We thank your loving majesty for this year's harvest.

Through these blessings of your generosity, you had filled, fulfilled the hopes of your children.

- [Farmer 1] Well, you always gotta have faith, I guess no matter what you're doing.

But uh, again, you gotta pray.

Pray you're gonna get the weather for it because 90% of what goes on boils down to the weather.

If you don't get the weather, you don't get the quality crop that you, you hope - [Church Congregation] For our sake, he was crucified under Pontius Pilate.

(child babbling) he suffered, died and was buried.

On the third day, he rose again.

Fulfillment of the scriptures, he ascended into Heaven, and is seated on the right hand of the Father.

And his kingdom will have no end.

We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from Father to Son, with the Father and the Son he's worshiping glorify.

He has spoken through the prophets.

- [Female 1] It's all faith, it's all, Sometimes I don't think I pray enough.

And sometimes I don't think Joe prays enough.

When things go bad, it's like, well, are you praying?!

But, yeah, I mean, everything you do, if you don't have faith in what you're doing and you don't trust in God, you need, you need a lot of faith.

'Cuz, a lot of times, things go bad, and it would be easy to say, give up on God, or... but we know it's not God.

Joe blames it on Mother Nature.

(laughs) (lively fiddle music) - [Farmer 2] Every farmer seeds a little piece of grain and he wants to harvest it.

He sees it grow to maturity.

And if he loses it, that's part of his life that's gone.

(fiddle music continues) (tractor roars) We're lucky we have this buckwheat.

This buckwheat is more or less a little lifesaver for us.

What we're doing with it.

- [Female 2] The ploye's been around for, for many, many years.

The ployes were ah, was a traditional, it was a staple food.

It was a, it was a flat bread eaten at every meal.

(fiddle music intensifies) - [Female 3] They would make them on top of the wood stove every day we had ployes with butter and rolled, or, and whatever was leftover, we would put, uh, maple syrup, jam jellies, whatever you had.

And this was our dessert.

A lot of times.

- [Female 2] It was something that we have all, uh grown up with.

We've had, we had them, you know, three times, uh, three times a day.

(customers laugh) - [Vendor] This is not a new food item!

- [Female 2] My sister went to New Orleans and purchased a box of beignet mix one year actually, that was how we got the idea of making ployes.

- [Female 3] There had never been premix for ployes.

Everybody made ployes, but all from scratch.

- [Female 2] So we decided to just, yeah do a little research and find out, you know, why?

Had anybody ever tried it, and and why wasn't it being done?

And could it be done?

Um, and we just thought that, yeah this is something that we should, we should give a try.

- [Female 3] And got a brown paper bag and a label printed and we went to our local stores.

We started with our local stores.

And people were very impressed with this, you know.

- [Farmer 2] And gee, it went so well, that we had to y'know, increase our, increase our production to today.

Well we, we sell some of these stores, a hundred cases at a time.

- [Female 1] They're made with buckwheat flour, wheat flour, baking powder, and some salt.

All you do is add water to the premix.

A great protein food.

They're full of carbohydrates.

There's no fat, there's no eggs, there's no milk.

There's no oil.

You don't even have to grease your griddle.

So they're totally fat free.

- [Female 2] We don't really know where it came from.

We don't know if it was brought from the Acadians as they were deported from Nova Scotia or if it trickled down here from the West, or the Eastern part of Canada.

The French speaking people in the, you know the Quebec region of Canada.

But ployes are only eaten by a very, it's a very regional, ethnic food.

They were only eaten in the northern part of the state of Maine, the St. John Valley in the southern part of, uh southwestern part of New Brunswick.

(machinery revving) - [Farmer 1] Right now we have to go to Grand Falls whenever we need some buckwheat milled.

So it's kind of a hassle.

And we'd go there in the morning, we leave probably around 5:30 with 80 barrels.

(truck engine sputters) (machinery whirring) - There's always something different and new at the, at the border.

Every time you cross, you don't know what to expect.

The way customs are and the way the borders are.

You never know when they might stop us for good.

Luckily we've been able to, uh, talk to the right people and have, you know, this, this buck wheat changed around so we can cross it.

But one of these days, I'm afraid it might, that might be put to halt, and no more crossing at all.

(machinery jitters) (buzzsaw wizzing) - This is a, well, we hope to utilize it one day as a grain processing building.

Hopefully we'll be able to put a buckwheat mill in here down the road.

(hammering) So if we can have everything under one roof, without having to run around to get our grain milled and brought, uh, our grain milled anyway.

Well, rather have it home, than running around for it.

(fiddle music) (children babbling) - [Female 1] Phil, do you wanna eat?

(cutlery clattering) Is that good Jillian?

Can you show me if you can eat a carrot too?

- [Child 1] Yeah.

(food slurping) (clinking cutlery) - [Female 1] In the past 20 years, we saw parts of our culture just disappear.

First with the French in the schools.

You know, children were discouraged from speaking French so the language was being forgotten.

With the, um, advent of the quick foods people just weren't cooking anymore.

So that, that was something that just really wasn't being eaten.

(lonely fiddle music) (wind blowing) (Woman singing in French) - [Farmer 2] I think that the St. John Valley will always be the St. John Valley.

It is unique.

The St. John Valley itself is French.

And I think it'll always be French.

I mean, we are trying to preserve our heritage, and our heritage is French.

- [Female 4] Hi!

- [Female 5] Hi, bonjour.

- Comment ça va?

- Ça va bien si, merci.

- Ah, mon dou.

- Mon dou - Tu gardes ben.

- Ah, thank you.

- Tu prends bien soin de toi.

- Ah, oui.

- Good, good.

- That's all I have to do.

- Ah, ben, c'est ça.

(women continue speaking in French) (folk music) (woman sings in French) (crowd murmuring) - [Farmer 2] I was raised speaking French.

I've learned a little English in school.

Enough to get me by.

- [Male 1] Trop accoutumé à travailler.

- [Male 2] Trop accoutumé à travailler, pis moi la je veux dire je vais (unintelligible) (men continue speaking in French) - [Farmer 1] Most people, most people can communicate either in French or in English.

Some little better than others, but I think it's a big plus 'cuz a lot of the business up here, you know, is done either with Amer- uh people along the border here, that can only speak French or with Canadians.

- [Farmer 2] Joe had a rougher time when he started farming, because he had to communicate in, in French, practically all the time.

- My sisters grew up speaking French, my older sisters.

But when me and my other sisters almost same age, we grew up speaking English.

And this is something that I learned through working with employees that were working for my father who spoke French.

And I would, you know, I picked it up that way.

Which is a little more difficult than learning it when you were young - [Female 2] I remember us being punished for speaking French in school.

They wanted us to become much like the rest of the country.

And the United States of America was English.

I think within our, with our generation because when we started going to school, it was, um, discouraged.

You know, we were discouraged from speaking French and we didn't really understand why.

So we associated something wrong with, you know speaking French was wrong.

And now you're seeing a flip flop.

You're seeing the people trying to, to preserve and, and resurrect the, the, the culture and the language.

- [Farmer 2] I'm proud of my French and I hope that it stays around in the valley for a long, long time.

Long, long time.

(lonely fiddle music) - [Farmer 2] I cannot see how a family farm can survive unless he diversifies.

And diversifying is, is limited up here because of the fact that we do have only 90 to 95 growing days of whatever crop that we want to, that we want to grow.

We're limited on the crops that we can grow.

(birds chirping) I've been farming a long time and I, I find it hard to believe, although I've never said die and I'm still fighting.

I think that the young farmer is, today in Maine, in Aroostook county, has got a lot of water to thread If he wants to make it.

(lonely fiddle music intensifies) - [Farmer 1] It doesn't look good as far as what the potatoes go, as far as, you know, if we were just potatoes, it doesn't look good for any future generations taking over.

But like I'm saying if we can get this grain business going, this buckwheat business, and with other grain processing that we can do, I think, I hope we can make a go forward anyway.

- [Female 1] To Joe, it's his life.

I mean, it's in his blood.

I can't see him doing anything else, and he can't see him doing anything else.

I don't know what else we would do.

- [Female 2] I don't worry about Joe because he has prepared himself for whatever should happen in the future.

He's gotten himself a college education, and he has a wonderful gift, Janice.

She's so creative and she's she's got such an incredible business mind.

I think that if the farm should fold up, I think for them they would turn that adversity into opportunity and move on.

- [Female 3] It's sad to see anybody go because, you know I know they feel the way we do.

It's your livelihood.

It's your, it's your home, it's your people, It's your it's your land, it's your country.

- [Farmer 2] If it wouldn't have been for the children maybe we'd had to let go of the farm.

All of your children would help on the farm.

It was a, a family thing.

As soon as the child could do any little chore on the farm, he would do it.

So they, they were extreme help to the, to the family.

(sentimental fiddle music) We've developed the market with the this buck wheat that we're we're growing, and we're doing extremely well with that.

So that helps the farm.

That helps us son out.

And I really think that, I got hope that we will survive and he will survive too, and raise his family on a farm like I did.

And all my ancestors before me did.

(sentimental fiddle music continues) - I really can't complain.

I mean, I, we've raised a good family and we've raised that on farming.

If it were to start over again I think maybe I'd do the same thing.

I'd do the same thing.

(sentimental fiddle music continues) - Maine public television's production of Our Stories is made possible through a television demonstration grant from rural development.

Part of the U.S.D.A.

(lively fiddle music)