The Council Room

[David Bentley]

Well, here it is Labor day Weekend in Wolfeboro, and people are gearing up to leave Town and head back to their rest-of-the-year homes. Last evening there was a very well attended concert in the dockside Cate Park featuring a return visit by a Beattles sound-a-like group playing for more than two hours and keeping people dancing the entire time.

The merchants are all catching their collective breath, but looking forward to the somewhat less hectic pace of the fall bus tours and leaf peepers. By the end of October the 'tourist' season will be over, and Wolfeboro will enjoy some weekend visitors and family visitors through the holiday season.

Come January 1st a lot of people will be gone to warmer climes, and the winter life-style of Wolfeboro will have set in for those of us remaining. Then, magically, mud season will be over, black fly season will give way to mosquito season, and people will start returning to Wolfeboro and the cycle will repeat.

Such is the way of a seasonal tourist Town. However, as time marches on, Wolfeboro is evolving from simply a summer town to a year round town, with fall camping and day hiking, pedal biking around the area, winter activities of skiing and snowmobiling, and spring kayaking in the snow-melt fed rivers.

But, even with change, Wolfeboro still has remained the same for many people. I would guess that any of you who might visit Wolfeboro today, some 37 years after the last summer of Camp, would find familiar landmarks to remind you of the past...the Mount Washington coming into Wolfeboro docks to pick up and drop off passengers, Dockside restaurant, Black's Paper Store, local restaurants who are the same and some who have changed their names and decors, and some new restaurants in old places. Forest Road is still just as long as ever, but now has a lot of houses on both sides. The hill from the Carry Beach to Camp is still just as steep, and still no sidewalk. The airplanes are gone from the airport, but the airport is now open space awaiting homes in the future. Johnson's Cove is still a favorite destination boat ride, but today these boats are fiberglass with 200+ hp engines, not green canoes with '2-camper' hp. Old's Beach doesn't belong to Old's anymore (actually, it NEVER did), and there is an up to date bath house (Pines for us linguists) at the Carry Beach.

So, if the spirit moves, visit Wolfeboro, I think you'll like it.

Meanwhile, move forward in your own family lives and make the best of what you have. And remember, "Courage and Loyalty" will serve you well all your life.
_________________
C-1 49 J-7 52 S-3 55 J-10 58
C-7 50 J-7 53 S-2 56 J-8 59
C-8 51 J-4 54 S-7 57 (JA) J-8 60 - 64
1965 - 1968 Military service
Pine Cone 68 - 75 (with wife,Sherry,
and daughter Tracey)
Wolfeboro - full-time since 1997

[DavidAyars]

Great post, David.

The interesting thing to me is going to be how Wolfeboro may change if Romney is elected. On the one hand, I think it could well inject and even supercharge tourism dollar infusion. Wolfeboro could see a new real estate boom. But on the other hand, some of the small-town summer resort qualities could fade away.

I think of how other presidential hometowns were affected. Many old-time Cape Codders would say the Cape and Hyannisport specifically was adversely affected by JFK being elected, though some of it may have happened in the 1960s and 1970s anyway because of the Cape's proximity to Boston. Kurt Vonnegut wrote a funny short story about how Hyannisport changed. Plains Georgia saw more tourism and change as well though it remained a small town. Not sure about some of the others such as Bush, Clinton, and Reagan towns.

It doesn't have to change. It just could. A lot of it might depend on whether the media descends every summer.
_________________
Camper: J-8 1965 (Kevin Ryan), J-8 1966 (Mike Freeland), S-6 1967 (Russ Hatch), S-3 1968 (Jeremy Cripps), and JA-2 1969 (Dan Mannis).
JC: J-2 1970 (Bill Bettison) and J-3 1971 (Gene Comella). Councilor 1972, J-5 1973, and JA-1 1974 & 1975

[David Bentley]

The question of Romney as President is clearly a topic being discussed all over Wolfeboro, as was the topic when Bob Dole ran for president. That would have been a very interesting situation for us simply because at that time we were living at what was Melanson's Beach and Bob Dole was very, very good friends with our immediately adjacent neighbor and the supposition was that Dole would be visiting his friend often. Nothing came of it, so, to date, Wolfeboro has no history to draw on, except when then-President Sarkozy (now 'ex') spent a month in Wolfeboro a few summers ago.

My personal take on Romney is that he isn't personally interested in all the trappings of high security and the entourage that go with the presidency, but he may have no say in the matter if he actually is the President.

Our daughter works not far from his residence and he frequently rode his bike on the same road she used to get to work. When that road was undergoing routine maintenance, and some pipes were also being installed, the road was torn up with only one lane of paved surface available. She used to meet him on the road early in the morning and she would stop so he could continue biking on the paved surface. One day he stopped and asked her "where are you going so early?" and she told him to the nursing home around the corner. From that day forward any time they met he would wave her through rather than hold her up on her way to work. Seems like small potatoes in the scheme of presidential campaigning, but that is the way he is, truly. He likes to slip into the local Ace Hardware and do his own poking around. He is humble.

Now, should he be elected, the security might be a by-product of the Office over which he really can't make any changes.

Wolfeboro would certainly be a destination trip for boaters. His lakefront home is quite nice, and I am sure the NH Marine Patrol and US Coast Guard would be very vigilent with respect to curious and gawking boaters. His driveway is quite long, and easily controlled, so that probably wouldn't be a problem.

I'm sure the local police department, county sheriff, and NH state police all have plans on the shelf if this all comes to pass.

The restaurants and retail merchants would be swamped with visitors, but I am sure no one would complain about the economic infusion, albeit, at the expense of traffic control.

At least, if he is elected, the little town of Wolfeboro will be experiencing winter for a few months so I wouldn't expect too much activity - a little honeymoon period to get used to it before the summer onslaught. Would be interesting.
_________________
C-1 49 J-7 52 S-3 55 J-10 58
C-7 50 J-7 53 S-2 56 J-8 59
C-8 51 J-4 54 S-7 57 (JA) J-8 60 - 64
1965 - 1968 Military service
Pine Cone 68 - 75 (with wife,Sherry,
and daughter Tracey)
Wolfeboro - full-time since 1997