SOUTHWEST HARBOR — A two-masted schooner sits fetched up during low tide at Parker Wharf in Manset, in an old photo taken in the late 1800s. Its sails are furled, the name Fred C. Holden inscribed on its stern planking.

The photograph, a sepia-tinged morsel of Southwest Harbor history, has been in the collection of the Southwest Harbor Public Library for decades, and piqued the interest of Charlotte Morrill and Meredith Hutchins in the midst of their epic undertaking to scan, research and catalogue all 6,000 or so images in the library’s archives.

“And I said, ‘So why was this schooner named the Fred C. Holden?’ And Ralph Stanley said, ‘Oh, Fred C. Holden was a doctor and he grew up in Tremont.’ So we started doing research on him,’” said Ms. Morrill in a recent interview with the Islander.

The Southwest Harbor sleuths unearthed clues – Fred’s father, Simeon Amasa Holden, sent his son to school in New York where he became an obstetrician –and those tidbits led them to others; eventually they found Fred’s granddaughter, a woman in her 80s now living in California.

“She talked to me for quite a long time about how much her grandparents loved the Tremont area,” Ms. Morrill said. “And she sent a book about Simeon’s exploits in the Civil War as a Union soldier … and a wonderful photo of Fred for our archives. It’s an incredible story. That’s the kind of thing that happens from a simple picture.”

All that information, plus the photo of Fred, pictures of Simeon’s house and more photos of the schooner are cross-referenced in the database, which will officially be opened to the public on Sunday, June 27 in a celebration beginning at 3 p.m. that is tied to the 10th anniversary of an addition to the library building.

“Oh my word, it’s amazing,” said Candy Emlen, director of the Southwest Harbor Public Library. “Eventually all our historic photographs will be scanned into this computer and from there you’ll be able to search them and they’ll be referenced and there’s a lot of history that goes along with the history.”

The project was a labor of love for Ms. Morrill and Ms. Hutchins, who started working on it about three years ago, often spending 40 or more hours a week, scouring sources throughout the state and further away.

“They were unbelievably thorough,” said Ms. Emlen. “They’ve put a tremendous amount of work in.”

All the work was done on a volunteer basis, often with help from lifelong Southwest Harbor resident Ralph Stanley.

“There’s another two to three years’ work left,” said Ms. Morrill. “We’ve scanned 4,000 or so, so far. We’re adding to it every week … It’s just been enormous fun.”

The originals have been retained in their present condition and will continue to be archived at the library. But all the photos and research associated with them will now be available to anyone from a computer terminal at the library that is not connected to the Internet, though the database might someday be available online.

High-quality copies of the photos, up to 11x14 size, will be available for $25 each, and all the research associated with each photo is available, too.

“I just can’t wait to get this thing going,” said Ms. Emlen.

Sunday’s event will feature lemonade and cookies made from “a recipe that dates way back,” said Ms. Emlen, along with a demonstration of the new database and a question-and-answer session.

“This is history,” said Ms. Morrill. “It’s going to be lost if we don’t preserve it.”

For more arts & entertainment news, pick up a copy of the Mount Desert Islander.

Comments (0)