Page 6. MAINE COASTAL NEWS November 2012 Buying Lobsters on the Coast of Maine By Arthur S. Woodward


Can you tell me about the business of buying lobsters years ago, and how it used to be? Thatʼs a question someone could ask me if they knew something of my background. Iʼd probably reply, “Yes, I can, and, Iʼll be glad to give you a lot of information”. The lobster buyer, or lobster dealer as they are also called, is the fi rst point of contact by most lobster fi shermenin landing the lobsters they have caught. The buyer or dealer then does the initial wholesaling of the lobsters in the lobster industry. The fi rst wholesaling can take various paths, all leading to the fi nal step of a lobster serving as a delicious main part of a meal in some part of the world. There are buyers/dealers at various stages of transporting lobsters through the wholesaling process in the in- dustry. Many lobsters fi nally pass into the hands of individual consumers who get them from lobster retailers, stores, or restaurants, at which point they may be alive or cooked. Lobsters are also sold preserved by cooking and freezing or canning.


This article has to do primarily with the local lobster dealers, the ones who buy directly from the lobster fi shermen. More directly, this treatise provides insight into the local lobster business as it was from c.1930 to the mid1970s. This traces the trajectory of a local lobster business and compares and contrasts that business with others in the locality. That is the period I am very familiar with because it was our family business. In the 1920s my parents graduated from


Washington State Normal School in Ma- chias, having completed the then two year course of study to become teachers. Upon graduation they went back home to Beals and taught school.


My mother, Thelma B. Simmons, daughter of Capt. Ladwic (Lad) H. and An- nie L. (Beal) Simmons, taught grades 4, 5, and 6. My father, Vernal O. Woodward, son of Capt. Lewis C. and Rose B. (Alley) Wood- ward, taught grades 7 and 8. They married in 1929 and settled there on the Island. After a few years of teaching Dad said he couldnʼt stand all that money he was making teaching ($17/week), so he decided to leave teaching and go into the lobster business. Mom taught a while longer. I was born in 1932. (Side Note: I attended WSNS in Machias for two years and then transferred to the University of Maine in Orono to complete my Bache- lor of Science degree. Then I went home to Beals and taught six different subjects per day in Beals High School, the same building in which Dad had been in the fi rst BHS grad- uating class and my parents had taught, and where Iʼd attended school grades 1-12. After I returned home from the Army I resumed teaching in BHS for the remainder of that year.)


The going into the lobster business was not a long jump for Dad in that he had worked for a dealer in town, buying lobsters from fi shermen while they were hauling traps “Down the Bay” in a small (maybe 25 foot) powered double ender boat with a small well in the stern. He had also been crewman with Grampie Lewis in two sail well smacks he had, the Etta M. Burns and the Princeps, in which he transported lob- sters in bulk. He had also crewed with my other grandfather, Lad (Papa) in his well smacks. Papa had the sail smack Annie Lou- ise built and subsequently had the powered well smacks Thelma and Aerolite built. In these smacks he carried lobsters in bulk. Papa bought lobsters directly from fi sher-


men, too, sometimes also going “Down the Bay” to buy from the fi sherman. He bought from other dealers in Maine and in Grand Manan, New Brunswick, and in Nova Sco- tia, Canada. So when they entered the lobster business Dad and Mom were quite familiar with what that entailed.


Grampie Lewis had a nice shore priv- ilege just below the home in which he and Grammie Rose lived on the norʼwest point of Beals Island. Grampie had also been a lobster fi sherman. Dad and Grampie went into the lobster business together. They had a wharf that had tidal access in Barneyʼs Cove and they built a building at the head of the wharf. That building became commonly known as “The Building” or “The Shop”. Soon they bought a lobster smack and that enabled them to transport the lobsters they bought from fi shermen, from other dealers, lobster pound keepers, and dealers in Grand Manan and Nova Scotia to dealers/shippers on up the marketing chain, as far as Portland. The powered well smack they bought


was the Flora Belle, then driven by two gasoline engines. Sheʼd make about 8 knots, which was quite typical of the speed of other smacks. She was 45 feet long, some 11 feet beam, and draft of 5 – 6 feet. Sheʼd carry about 5,000 pounds of live lobsters in bulk. She had the characteristic ketch rig that was typical of smacks of that era, with the well midships, and the pilothouse built right on deck. The one variation on her rig was a single boom permanently rigged about 2/3 the way up the foremast with no fo’csʼle. She did have a jib and mainsʼl for auxiliary use. Early in the 1930s the lobster landings were comparatively small. A number of the men were rowboat fi shermen, and some others had small power boats, while others had the bigger faster Jonesport model boats with bigger engines that allowed them to fi sh


A view from the lobster car and looking out over Barney's Cove.


off shore and farther outside in the winter. Most fi shermen fi shed single traps (wooden in those days). Some of the bigger fi shermen fi shed pairs of traps in some places (“bull trawls” - a pair of traps on a single warp and buoy).


Markets had to be developed and then maintained by new buyers so they could continue to buy on a daily basis and sell their product to wholesalers next in the continu- um. Dad had markets over time in Boston, Portland, Rockland, Stonington, Deer Isle, Hancock, Winter Harbor, Steuben, Addison, Jonesport, Beals, and other places along the Maine coast. He even sold a load of lobsters in Montauk, Long Island, New York. He delivered them in the Flora Belle. I donʼt remember a time that he had to close and not buy from the fi shermen. He either had enough temporary storage capacity and/ or suffi cient market to be able to continue buying. He did say that during the Depres- sion he took lobsters in his automobile and peddled them door to door. He and another local dealer owned a lobster pound in West Jonesport for a while.


After Grampie died in 1940 Dadʼs next younger brother, Erroll (“Uncle Shirt”) joined in the business. He and Dad worked together for many years. His son, Erroll George, and I were good buddies and as boys


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