Vintage Ink
This column offers a look back at the history of the Midcoast mined from the pages of back copies of The Courier-Gazette and even the Lime Rock Gazette, which started in 1846. It also explores newspaper culture, including the strange terms heard only in old-school newsrooms. Come here for this week in history, famous quotes, and any other delightful tidbits that may be found in our records.
Daniel Dunkle is editor of The Courier-Gazette. He lives in Rockland with his wife, Christine, two children, and two cats. He started his newspaper career as a cub reporter with The Courier-Gazette in 1998.
We want to hear from you, so tell us what you think! Send in your responses, stories, photos and memories via email at: ddunkle@villagesoup.com; or snail mail to: 91 Camden St., Suite 403, Rockland, ME 04841. Hand-written notes are welcome and appreciated.
Additional Column Posts (1 - 20 of 20)
Manhunt on for pinko smelt war shooter in Warren woods
By Daniel Dunkle - Apr 20If you like westerns, you could do worse than the story of a shootout at a smelt-fishing camp that was followed by a massive manhunt in the woods ...
-
Patrolman slain walking his beat
By Daniel Dunkle - Feb 15On Wednesday, Feb. 16, 1938, Harry B. Hall was on a mission. The 60-year-old arrived at his home at 38 State St. in Rockland at about 3 o'clock ...
Speakeasy under siege
By Daniel Dunkle - Feb 01The rough streets and the smart-aleck newswriting of the Depression era keep calling me back. This week I was captivated by two stories from The ...
The harbor on rewind
By Daniel Dunkle - Jan 18I apologize for the gap in the appearance of this column. The deep-freeze jammed up the controls on my borrowed H.G. Wells time machine, and the ...
The big one
By Daniel Dunkle - Dec 14Continuing my journeys on H.G. Wells' time machine, I arrive in the vicinity of Park and Main streets in Rockland Dec. 11, 1952. Looking around, I ...
Strange creature in the basement
By Daniel Dunkle - Nov 30My H.G. Wells' Time Machine takes me back this week to November 1977, where I immediately hit the nearest newsstand. The Nov. 26 edition of The ...
Knights of beauty contest brawling
By Daniel Dunkle - Nov 17This week I'm borrowing Mr. H.G. Wells' time machine, pulling the little jeweled lever back and watching the cars downtown first turn boxy, then ...
Lost choppers at the airshow
By Daniel Dunkle - Nov 02I've been spending a lot of time pawing through old newspaper clippings from the 1930s. Partly this is because I have, on loan, the scrapbooks of ...
Ghosts of South Thomaston
By Daniel Dunkle - Oct 19When I started writing this column a few weeks ago, I mentioned to my wife that it might be interesting to write about a few of the alleged local ...
Radio Rockland
By Daniel Dunkle - Oct 05“It's amazing that the amount of news that happens in the world every day always just exactly fits the newspaper.” ― Jerry Seinfeld Got a call ...
Artifacts in the Bird house
By Daniel Dunkle - Feb 22These old Victorian houses on Rockland's streets have stories to tell, as one city couple recently found out. Ian Emmott and Emily Gentile moved ...
Love letter limit looses loud lament from the languishing
By Daniel Dunkle - Feb 09March 1931, The Courier-Gazette runs the headline: "Mild Riot At The Prison." "Inmates of the state prison went on a rampage Saturday night and ...
Students, educators stunned by loss of shuttle
By Daniel Dunkle - Jan 25National news often affects us at a local level. This was true Jan. 28, 1986, when the Space Shuttle Challenger exploded a little more than a ...
-
A POW’s Christmas
By Daniel Dunkle - Dec 21“The Germans had the most beautiful horses,” Walter Rich of Union once told me. “We ate a lot of them.” "God Bless America" While the storm ...
-
Day of infamy
By Daniel Dunkle - Dec 07Once again I find myself seated in H.G. Wells' Time Machine, pulling the lever back in time and watching the world around me change. The cars go ...
A pervasive sense of mystery
By Daniel Dunkle - Nov 22“Content makes poor men rich; discontent makes rich men poor.” ― Benjamin Franklin, Poor Richard's Almanack *** Ms. Joan E. Cavanaugh of Mystic, ...
The sweet science of the ring
By Daniel Dunkle - Nov 09The 64-year-old man sitting across from my desk brings his fists up, swivels his body and, with a snap so fast I hear it cut the air, brings one ...
A hair-raising Halloween
By Daniel Dunkle - Oct 26My dad worked for several years as a groundskeeper for a cemetery in Pennsylvania. During that time, it seems he developed a bit of gallows humor, ...
The death of Lucy Farnsworth
By Daniel Dunkle - Oct 13Still at the wheel of Doc Brown's DeLorean time machine, I arrive on Elm Street in October 1935. It's a blustery gray autumn day and the car ...
Notes from the morgue: A look back at the Lime Rock Gazette
By Daniel Dunkle - Sep 28"The fact that a man is a newspaper reporter is evidence of some flaw of character." -- Lyndon Johnson (1908-1973) Imagine yourself a cub reporter ...
