An Apple Cider Tradition

The cold temperatures of late have got me thinking of warmer days to come. After the sugar house is closed-up for the year and the snow has melted away, the apple trees will blossom and begin making the apples that will be enjoyed throughout the year. As with so many things on the farm, the apple crop is dependent on the grace of God's hand to deliver a bountiful harvest.

This picture taken around 1930 shows the old cider mill that once stood on the Wagg Homestead here in Bowdoin, Maine.

The old Wagg Homestead, as we call it, was originally built by the Grover family, probably around the 1770's or 1780's. My grandmother grew up here, during the 1920's and 30's. By this time the farm and its buildings were in decline, like so much of rural Maine during this period. Bowdoin's population had peaked near 1600 in the 1860's, but by the 1930's was less than 500. The few families that stayed on the old homesteads were of the sturdiest New England stock. I am proud to say that I come from combination of several such families.

The cider mill shown here sat just south of the old stagecoach road that ran through the farm. Never much more than a pair of wheel ruts, the road was the lifeline that brought visitors and business to the farm and lead to the markets in Lisbon Falls or Litchfield and beyond. I have imagined a cool morning in early October when a heavy laden wagon, hauled by a pair of Durham oxen, would make its way across the gristmill stream bridge and grind its way to a stop in front of the cider mill. Mr. Grover had been in the mill for more than an hour preparing the mill for the days work. The mill's blades must be carefully honed, to assure a fine chop of the apples. The belts must be checked and tightened if the need be. The press blankets and forms must be readied for service.

After a hearty handshake and greeting, the men would unload the baskets of apples into the end of the cider mill. Care had been taken to keep the apples clean and free of debris that would taint the precious cider. Apples that were rotted would be kept and cooked for the hogs. I have speculated that this cider mill was run by a horse walking on a treadmill. Later versions would use steam power to run the mill, but that seems unlikely here.

Bushel by bushel the apples would be run through the chopper, and were reduced to a finely ground "pummy". Cider would begin to run almost immediately, and it was all caught and sent down the sluice into the waiting barrel. After the grinding was complete, the pummy would be pressed under extreme pressure, forcing the juice out, leaving a dry tasteless pulp. This old pummy would be cooked and fed to the livestock, nothing was wasted.

The golden cider poured out of the pummy and into the wooden barrel. When the pressing was over a wooden bung was pounded into the barrel and it was loaded onto the wagon for the trip home. Some of the cider would be enjoyed fresh, some made to vinegar. Most farmhouses also kept a small barrel hidden under the cellar steps. This barrel was cared for by the man of the house and samples were offered to special visitors. Many local folks, including my family were known to possess some "hard cider" from time to time. Just another way to provide for their own needs. On this day, the business was completed by bartering. The Grover's would keep a portion of the cider as payment for their labors.

This farm, like the few that remained in Bowdoin in this time, was a subsistence farm where subsistence was not guaranteed. A late frost or wet season meant near disaster for these back country families. When I write about "providing for ourselves" I am almost ashamed that we are so DEPENDENT when my forefathers were so INDEPENDENT.

Images of the sugarhouse

I wanted to share some more pictures of our sugarhouse with you all. At the center of it is the evaporator. We have a 2'x4' flat pan that works well for us while it's much smaller than those used in the big sugarhouses.

Here I'm finishing bricking the arch, to protect the steel frame from the heat of the fire.



The beauty of this little evaporator is that it is quite kid friendly and the mystery of sugar making is revealed to even the smallest helpers. Our kids are used to wood stoves in the house, so the intense heat of the arch is carefully avoided. I've had one little girl check with her finger to see if it was hot. Yup it was.



We burn fine split pine, fir and hemlock in our evaporator. We've found that most of this pulp wood would have been left to rot in the woods, so it makes good sense to use it for sugaring instead. We've got a 6" stack that carries the smoke up and outside.




When the snow is deep, these snowshoes will be used by the kids to help collect the sap. This year we've had lots of snow so the snowshoes will be used a lot.



We still collect our sap in buckets, the old fashioned way. Its hard work but it is also lots of fun.



Here is a picture of the whole setup. We'll make some changes this year, but overall we're ready for the sap to run.



Remember we'll be open on March 27th, 2011 for Maine Maple Sunday, so plan to stop by if you get a chance.

the legend of the maple sky

An original short story by Reuben J. Wheeler

One frosty March night I stood in the doorway of the sugarhouse and watched the steam rise from the boiling sap. Like a ghost, illuminated by the glow of the late winter moon, it rose, danced and vanished into the night sky.

I looked north, over the silhouette of the barn, the sleeping barn, the animals fed and bedded for the night. In the sky I saw a multitude of stars, as far as I could see. Some were peeking through the pine grove at the back of the pasture. Some stars were bright in the cold night sky, and some were so faint I wasn't sure they were there at all. One set of stars stood bold and familiar, high in the speckled sky.

Since the earliest years of my life I remember the nightly walk that I shared with my Father, back from the barn, up the worn path across the lawn and into the comfort of the old farm house.
Every cloudless night we would stand, looking up with the hope of catching a glimpse of a shooting star. Father would point to the Big Dipper and trace its shape with his finger. The bent handle, the cup, pointing the way to the North Star. "The North Star never moves", he would say. I learned early that our northern sky rotates on the North Star, guiding the hunter, the fisherman and the explorer alike. The North Star begins the handle for the little dipper, the other vessel gracing our northern sky.

But this March night something was different. The Big Dipper hung high in the heavens, tipped, pouring its contents onto the countryside below. I imagined the Big Dipper draining its sweet hold down into the dark forest. The oaks and ash were still sleeping, waiting for the coming season of growth, their buds tucked tightly away, their roots dormant, their trunks cold and hard. The pines and hemlocks were bunched so closely together not even the March moon could pierce their darkness.



Some special trees in the woods were awake, looking skyward, longing for the warming days to come. These were the maples. Sugar, red and white, all different, but the same. Their limbs reaching toward the Big Dipper, catching the sweetness it offered. The sugar maples with their long limbs and spreading crown could catch the sweetest nectar and store it for the days to come. The reds and white were left to catch what the sugar maple had missed. Happy with what they had received, the maple trees would need to share their bounty.

Long before the white man set his sights on this new world, the native man had found the spring sweetness of the maples. At first just as a treat, the sugar in the maples soon became a tradition marking the changing of the seasons, from the slumber of winter to the rebirth of spring. Through the generations the natives and pioneers alike would notch the maples in the last days of winter and catch the sweet sap.

On our farm, for generations we have tapped the maples, to save this glimpse of sweetness. Collected by the children and carried to the kitchen, every pot and pan would be employed to hold and boil the sap away.
The limbwood stored in the woodshed would run a hot fire in the old cookstove to chase the water up and out the windows. At last, after days of adding wood and sap the maple syrup would remain. Carefully the thick syrup would be poured hot into a glass jar, cover tightened and stored on the shelf in the cellar stairway.

I know the pride that a child feels when, on a cold night in the fall, his mother asks him to fetch a jar of maple syrup. At that moment, as he reaches for the jar, he remembers it all. The walk through the deep snow to each tree, the old bit stock drill, the cast iron tap, the galvanized bucket and cover. He remembers the excitement of each visit to the biggest sugar maple. The buckets, nearly overflowing, waiting through the cold night only to begin again tomorrow, one drip at a time. Yes, there is much work to make even a cup of maple syrup, but like those before, the boy knows it is worth it.


That boy has grown now and has children of his own. The family farm remains intact, from the pine grove, the barn, the old house with the cookstove and the sugar maples. Hiding deep in the weathered trunk is the evidence of generations past, one tap at a time. Looking over it all, the Big Dipper tips slowly each late winter night and pours its sweetness onto the outstretched maples below.

copyright 2011