Review by John N. Cole
Book Review
Sunday, May 5th, 2002
The Apples of Maine.
By George A. Stilphen.
Stilphen's Crooked River Farm, Otisfield, ME.
Although its title might lead you to believe this to be a book about a distinguished family, say the Peabodys of Salem or the Beauregards of Charleston, it is indeed a book about the apples of Maine, surely the only volume of its kind. Which, in the arcane ways of the collector, should make it worth the interest of those of you so inclined. But it's worth your notice and affection for several more reasons, all of them good.
Start at the beginning: it's a handsome book to hold. Mr. Stilphen will tell you he is a perfectionist when it comes to self-publishing, a claim this book verifies. Impressively bound (hard cover, of course) and flawlessly printed on 60-pound stock, Apples is glowing testament to the art of publishing, the attention to quality and detail so pervasively missing from most of today's mass-produced books.
And then there are the apples, more than 1200 varieties of them, their history, their legends, their romance and their names. Oh, those names. Songs could be written, poetry composed and novels animated with the names of these apples that once were cultivated here in Maine. "Sweet" you say? Try the Sweet Bellflower, Sweet Bough, Sweet Harvey, Janet or June, and the Sweet Vandevere. Then there are the names of the pomologists who sought immortality via the apple variety they created in their orchards. Foster's Russet, Holman Russet, Cole Quince, Governor King's Apple, Harry Kaump (who?), Jonathan of the North, and just plain Judy. Is your name among the 1200? Think of the satisfaction of finding "your" apple among the heirloom varieties that may still be out there. You might even be able to graft or plant a cutting and be thus assured of your immortality.
For this is a book of many unexpected dimensions, Mr. Stilphen's introductory essay being one of the most rewarding. Quick to credit a thesis by Charles Bradford submitted in 1911 to the University of Maine at Orono as the genesis of his work, the author prefaces his listings with an illuminating discourse on the importance of apples to 18th and 19th century Maine. "The greatest quantities of Maine apples," he writes, "have always grown in and east-west band of limey soils running from Waldo County, through Kennebec and Amdroscoggin and into Oxford County...Poor indeed was the rough homestead that could not boast several dozen trees. Why so many? Well, cider (and the term here refers only to the alcoholic beverage) was the national drink. In those halcyon, pre-preservative days when everything was as natural as could be, alcohol producing bacteria had a field day....Cider 'hard' as the strongest wine, was served at every meal and on every possible social occasion. Brawny men sweating in fields were refreshed, and fretful babies calmed by its frequent application...Cider mills could be found at every other country crossroad." It is a gentle irony that so many of the heirloom-variety apples sought by today's organic pomologists were originally cultivated because they could be counted on to contribute copious amounts of cider to the family cellars. However, Mr. Stilphen's research does not discriminate. Whatever an apple's purpose more than a century ago, if indeed it had a purpose, that reason for being is duly noted in this book's listings. The Champion, for example, was mentioned by a grower in Penobscot County as "all right; a long keeper and splendid apple late in the season." The Holman Russet was, "...small, russet, tough, juicy; flesh yellow, medium, sub-acid; very good to best, dessert, late, resembles Pomme Gris."
You will, I believe, find yourselves captivated by this book you surely never imagined. It's a fine surprise. Well, on the other hand, if you think about it, perhaps not. For the apple, as poet Robert Peter Tristram Coffin writes, deserves our wonder.
Maine Apples
by Robert Peter Tristram Coffin
These things make Maine apples sharp
As sweet notes running up a harp:
Our winters close to flowers and fruits,
Enamel luster of our skies,
The sorrow in our frostflowers' eyes,
Brevity of our sudden summers,
Thunder drumming like bass-drummers
Below white Andes in the west.
Our hard soil gives our apples zest,
The spark-eyed chickadees' fast tune,
Wild sadness of the lonely loon,
The salt that blows in from the sea,
The bayberry, the rosemary,
Needles and knives of fir and pine,
Granite in the Maine State spine,
The wind that's never far away
Around the corner of a day,
The dance of secret polar light,
The quick beams of our sun at night.
In this apple in your fingers
The splendor of the Maine year lingers,
This globe arching your hand apart
Is Maine's cool and beautiful heart.
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