By John Nolan
All columns strictly Copyright - John Nolan
Now on sale: The collected poems and songs of Farmington Corner. See details below
As with other industrial spasms, a few people got rich and most folks stayed poor. Wages were low (except on piecework) and unions were almost non-existent thanks to a useful immigration policy which ensured a ready supply of workers from Quebec. The backlash to this influx of Catholic migrant workers, was the flourishing of Ku Klux Klan chapters in Farmington and neighboring Rochester, peaking in the 1920s.
This, too, has passed, and today the area is as free of religious bigotry as it is of old trees and farms. With the last shoe-shop closing in the 1980s and now demolished, most of the town's population of 6,000 heads south out of the scrubby forest each morning on the Spaulding Turnpike to office and factory jobs further down the Cocheco valley. A fairly easy commute, even in snowstorms, from a town where early breakfasts are an echo of the farming past, basketball rivals MTV in popularity, and of an evening, Budweiser is the refreshment of choice.
Years roll by; people, real and occasionally fictional, weave in and out of the columns. Folks age and die ... too soon in three or four sorely missed instances, and this quirky history is dedicated to them, and to their sparkles of fun amid the grit of daily life. J.N.
006 Dog Officer - Who's It Gonna Bbe?
027 Winter Carnival Slides Closer
030 Hanging Out With More Flags
031 U.S. VP Henry Wilson Winter Carnival
032 Woman's Club Dissemination of facts
040 Stones, Stumps, Structures
045 Doctor Spooner I Presume, Typesetter
PART 2 FC 51 - FC100
PART 3 FC101 - FC150
PART 4 FC151 - FC200
PART 5 FC201 - FC312
FC Gallery No. 1 - Henry Wilson
FC Gallery No. 2 - Who's Who, What's What
If you enjoy Farmington Corner, make sure you have this companion guide with indispensable notes that only the passage of time has made possible.
Ramgunshoch Press presents The Poems and Songs of Farmington Corner. This is the book with everything a reader could possibly want - an inside title page, a preface (thanks to Alasdair Gray for that idea), a table of contents, a glossary, copious notes, and an index. But wait, there's more. As a bonus, this book also contains 60 poems gleaned from Farmington Corner, including Hiawatha's Mudding, The Battle of Chevy Chase, the Hackett's Crevasse Elegies, Peacock Poems 1-5 and much, much more.
You need even more? There is even more .. a dozen unique illustrations by our favorite cartoonist, Stephanie Piro.
With a strong, yet tasteful, spiral binding, and a protective clear plastic cover, this genuine Made in Farmington book is available for the remarkably low price of $6.95 plus $2 shipping (U.S. and Canada) - actual postage cost elsewhere in the world.
Call or fax (603) 755-2925, or e-mail piro@worldpath.net
Note: $1 from the sale of each book is donated to Farmington Historical Society.