| Special for Seacoastonline
As it began, so shall it end. For the most part.
The inaugural Taste of Kittery, held in the town’s Post Office Square last October, marked the official start of Kittery’s 375th Year Celebration. This Saturday’s Taste of Kittery The event will serve as a punctuation mark for festivities honoring Maine’s oldest town over the past 12 months.
The weekend will first feature a children’s program Birthday party Friday afternoon on the Kittery Community Center lawn. The party will be complete with carnival games, bounce houses, an obstacle course, dessert ride, shaved ice truck, pony rides, Kittery 375th T-shirts, a fortune teller, live music by Traip Academy students, food and three tents with hands-on activities run by Portsmouth Naval Shipyard.
Kittery teachers and administrators are helping out as volunteers, and students from the Traip boat building class and the school’s soccer team will also be there.
“You only do 375 once” is the apparent theme of the party, according to the Kittery 375 Celebration Committee website.
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There will also be a bike parade at the birthday party, where kids can decorate their bikes in honor of the community and its history. Cyclists are asked to line up outside the KCC at 4.50pm for the parade to start at 5pm. There will be prizes for all participants, as well as prizes for first, second and third place.
Riders can email Jane Durgin of the Kittery School Department at jdurgin@kitteryschools.com. The department is organizing the event in partnership with the 375 committee and Kennebunk Savings Bank is sponsoring the children’s party. The celebration will take place from 16.30 to 18.30 h
“It’s going to be a great event for everyone and a wonderful way to say Happy Birthday Kittery,” Durgin said this week.
While admission is free, refreshments and game tickets will be available for purchase. A portion of the proceeds from ticket sales will go to the Kittery PTA and the Pam Hoyt Sanborn Scholarship Fund.
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In addition, Seacoast Fridge will have collection containers on site for residents to drop off food and household items. The most in demand are school snacks like pretzels, jerky and trail mix; cleaning products such as soap, detergent and sponges; and personal care items such as shampoo, brushes and feminine hygiene products.
And, of course, fruits and vegetables.
Then a more adult-oriented soiree is scheduled for the following afternoon, a few blocks down the road at the Post Office Square from 1-4pm Taste of Kittery offers a unique opportunity so that residents can sample the offerings of local restaurants and the growth of the city. presence of the brewery, all in one place.
Tasting participants scheduled so far include Aroma Joe’s Coffee, Beach Pea Baking Company, Black Birch Restaurant, Buoy Shack Lobster & Drinks, Definitive Brewing Company, Kasha’s Kitchen, Lil’s Cafe, Loco Cocos Tacos, Maine Beer Cafe, NOBL Beverages, Ore Nell’s Barbecue, Rose’s Spring Rolls, Rudders Public House, The Black Birch, Tributary Brewing Company, Tulsi Restaurant, Urban Farm Fermentory & Gruit Brewing Co. and Woodland Farms Brewery.
Tickets for the Taste of Kittery can be purchased at portsmouthnhtickets.com or at the community center. Pre-event tickets are available at $35 each for standard admission, which includes entry and tastings for all non-alcoholic attendees, and $40 upgraded to also include up to five beer vendor pours . On the day of the event, tickets will be $45 and $50, respectively.
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Live music will also be included, with performances by Soulcolor, Elroy and Jake Davis and the Whiskey Stones.
“It’s been great to see how the town celebrates over the last year. The diversity of the community has been highlighted throughout the year,” KCC Executive Director Jeremy Paul said recently. “It’s a proud town and the response to the year-round celebration showed that.”
In the months between last year’s Taste of Kittery gathering and Saturday’s celebration, a wide variety of events were held throughout the city to commemorate Kittery’s landmark anniversary. There were free historical lectures, a tour of the Seaside Gardens and tours of the summer home of the late literary giant William Dean Howells.
A month-long summer Kittery Arts Festival allowed attendees to recognize some of the town’s local artists and performers. Rice Public Library partnered with the Maine State Library to commemorate the anniversary through an ongoing program called Read ME, in which participants engage in a shared experience reading books by Maine authors. Earlier this month, the library hosted a performance by sea shanty singer David Coffin.
Last week, local documentary filmmaker Jim White premiered his film about “The Many Lives of Fort McClary” (also free) at the KCC. Last month, the Wood Island Life Saving Station Association sponsored a fireworks display over the Piscataqua River to salute both Kittery’s 375th and 232nd birthdays of the U.S. Coast Guard, which has a long history with the town.
One of the big highlights of last year was the release of a unique cookbook by Betsy Page Wish, resident and member of the 375th Celebration Committee. Compiled from countless interviews during the pandemic, “Kittery’s Maine Ingredients” includes not only recipes dating back to the 1600s, but also many photos, historical anecdotes and family stories from generations of local people.
The book will be a Kittery treasure for years to come, and proceeds from sales will be donated to local nonprofits that address food insecurity.
Some occasions were not specifically planned to commemorate Kittery’s 375th, but nevertheless happened to enhance the celebration. For example, Maine Gov. Janet Mills appeared at the city’s annual Independence Day ceremony in June, which each year features a reading of the Declaration of Independence by the hometown boy, the general William Whipple, who signed the document in 1776. .
This year also saw the long-awaited reopening of the Arròs Public Library, the jewel in the city’s crown, after an important renovation and expansion project. The official ribbon-cutting ceremony for the building, originally built in 1888, was held earlier this month. And a restored 1930s surf boat is docked at Wood Island for another ceremony next week.
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While this weekend’s festivities will be the last public gathering of the entire town to cap off the year-long anniversary celebration, there will still be other milestone moments for this historic town. Another documentary by Jim White, this one titled “The Unvarnished Truth,” about 18th-century Kittery icon Sir William Pepperrell will open Dec. 8 at KCC’s Star Theater.
Seacoast Media Group has also been kind enough to publish a monthly series of historical articles about Maine’s oldest town over the past year.
Kittery’s tradition has been long since the town was incorporated on October 20, 1647, the first town in Maine to do so. However, no original documentation confirming this date has been submitted to date. Some historians maintain that the actual birth date is October 1649, and others offer 1652, which is when Kittery agreed to become part of Massachusetts.
My own opinion is that when Sir Ferdinando Gorges, who essentially established Maine as his personal fiefdom, died in 1647, the people of Kittery chose this opportunity to assert their independence. As such, the 375th milestone is not far off the mark.
In any case, it’s been quite a ride over the last 375 years, and especially over the last 12 months.
D. Allan Kerr is a Kittery resident and frequent contributor.
