Granite, Fire, and Fog: The Natural and Cultural History of Acadia

186 Pages·2017·9.55 MB·English

by  Tom Wessels

Granite,
Fire, &
Fog
TO M W E S S E L S
THE NATURAL AND
CULTURAL HISTORY OF
A C A D I A
Granite, Fire, & Fog
T h e N aT u r a l
a N d C u lT u r a l
h i sT o r y o f
a C a d i a
• • •
uNiversiTy
Press of
New eNglaNd
haNover &
loNdoN
T o m W e s s e l s
Granite,
Fire, & Fog
University Press of New England
www.upne.com
© 2017 University Press of New England
All rights reserved
For permission to reproduce any of the material in this book,
contact Permissions, University Press of New England,
One Court Street, Suite 250, Lebanon NH 03766;
or visit www.upne.com
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
names: Wessels, Tom, 1951– , author.
title: Granite, fire, and fog: the natural and cultural history
of Acadia / Tom Wessels.
description: Hanover: University Press of New England,
2017. | Includes bibliographical references and index.
identifiers: lccn 2016038459 (print) | lccn 2016043914
(ebook) | isbn 9781512600087 (pbk.: alk. paper) | isbn
9781512600452 (epub, mobi & pdf) Subjects: lcsh: Natural
history —Maine —Acadia National Park. | Natural history —
Maine —Mount Desert Island. | Acadia National Park (Me.) —
History. | Mount Desert Island (Me.) —History.
classification: lcc qh105.m2 w47 2017 (print) |
lcc qh105. m2 (ebook) | ddc 508.741/45 —dc23
lc record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016038459
dedicated to
friends of acadia and
all its volunteers who work
for the well-being
of the park
c o n t e n t s
List of Illustrations viii
Acknowledgments xi
Introduction 1
1 • The Rock of Ages 5
2 • Life Returns 25
3 • The Dawn Land 49
4 • Fire and Fog 59
5 • Pathmakers 74
6 • The 1947 Fire 99
7 • A Look to the Future 110
8 • Let’s Take a Hike 127
appendix a • List of Species 149
appendix b • Glossary 153
Notes 159
Index 161

i l l u s t r at i o n s
10 The Bubbles, classic granite domes
15 Glacial polish on the North Ridge Trail of Champlain
Mountain
16 Glacial striations along the Shore Path in Bar Harbor
17 Two crescentic gouges, where the glacial ice advanced
from left to right
18 The Beehive
19 A small roche moutonnée with its quarried side on
the right
20 A small glacial notch between the summits of Dorr and
Cadillac Mountains
22 Balance Rock, a glacial erratic along the Shore Path in
Bar Harbor
32 Green map lichen on both sides of a drainage on the north
slope of Dorr Mountain
33 Cinder lichen on a diabase dike
34 Black-on-black lichen on the wind-exposed north side of
Champlain Mountain
35 Target lichen on the right-hand side of the step
36 Toad skin lichen and plated rock tripe
37 The pincushion-shaped sea foam lichen growing on granite
38 Alpine, green, and common reindeer lichen
40 A crevice community composed of moss, reindeer lichen,
and sedges
42 A wind-blasted crevice community composed solely of
three-toothed cinquefoil
43 A well-developed lichen outcrop community
57 The Rodick House and formal lawn
61 Advection fog rising over the Beehive and
Gorham Mountain
62 Old man’s beard lichen
63 Lungwort lichen on an unusual substrate —granite
64 A flagged red spruce
68 Serotinous cones on a jack pine
69 Jack pine and pitch pine
75 The Eyrie
79 Bates cairns
80 George Bucknam Dorr
81 Sieur de Monts Spring in 1916
83 A section of the granite-slab “sidewalk” on the
Beechcroft Path
84 A stairway on the Homans Path
86 The 1916 boundary of Sieur de Monts National Monument
89 John D. Rockefeller Jr.
91 Hemlock Bridge, one of the seventeen carriage
road bridges
93 A section of the carriage road built across the talus slope
on the northwest side of Jordan Pond
94 Acquisitions making up Acadia National Park between
1916 and 1941
97 Wabanaki summer encampment near Cromwell Brook
102 The De Gregoire Hotel prior to the 1947 fire
103 After the fire: The site where the De Gregoire Hotel
once stood