Confessions of a Mainer on Old Orchard Beach

Joan & Eugene Plourd sport their Easter outfits, Old Orchard Beach c. 1938

Confession of a Mainer: we've been known to gloat at our tourist attractions prior to the start of tourist season. Of course, I'm proud that hundreds of thousands of tourists flock to my home state because they're excited to see our pointed firs, tea-dark lakes, and frothy seashores. I'm also glad visitors can't wait to snarf down our increasingly famous Maine food. But yesterday, smitten with a summer-like April day, I  congratulated myself on living here. And like other well-trained Yankees who seize good weather at first sight, I dashed down to one of Maine's most-famous attractions - Old Orchard Beach.

Old Orchard Beach. Courtesy Seashore Trolley Museum

Much of the downtown area appears nearly like it did over a century ago, at least if you squint hard when you look at a vintage postcard. Amtrak hugs the shoreline, burrowing through the crowd of amusement park and retail buildings. If you look closely at this historic postcard image (left), you'll see a locomotive pulling up to the depot in Old Orchard Beach. Passengers could then step over onto electric trolleys, also visible here.

It's hard to imagine life without cars, but Maine's track record (pun intended) with tourism predates automobiles by decades. Steamship, railroad, and electric trolley routes and terminals encouraged restaurants, hotels, and entertainment to cluster in places of natural beauty like Old Orchard. Often trolley or steamship companies built up the destinations, creating both the means to get there and the services tourists patronized once they arrived.

Under the pier at Old Orchard Beach. Erikson photo.

Once I walked down to the beach, I couldn't resist photographing the gangly pier. It still totters above the waves, propping up numerous eateries and shops, although it doesn't jut out over 1800 feet from shore as it once did. Sipping an ice-cold drink while looking down over surf and crowded beach is still a summer rite of passage for me, but that wasn't my mission yesterday. I took advantage of the low tide and ran the two miles from the pier down the flat, honeyed sand to Pine Point and back. The string of modest motels and hotels trailed off when I reached the Scarborough line.

Grand hotels at Old Orchard Beach. Courtesy Seashore Trolley Museum

The stately Old Orchard Beach hotels are gone, sadly. It's their beauty, more than anything, that this time traveler misses. They were destroyed, along with more than 100 other buildings, during a 1907 fire. Their wooden construction and close proximity helped the fire to rage out of control when a young girl reportedly knocked over a gas lamp.

With pasty skin crisped by the sun and leg muscles thrashed by running on the malleable, sandy surface, I had exercised my rights as a year-round Mainer; it's likely I'll be suffering from the experience, as well as inspired by it, for days to come.