Preserving the experience for future generations
by Art Wheaton
Alvah Harriman was born in Woodland, Maine, in October of 1946. The town is 10 miles from Calais, on the St. Croix River. This part of Washington County is one of many lakes, and Grand Falls Lake, off the St. Croix River, is the largest. On the other side of the river, is New Brunswick, Canada. In high school, many of Alvah’s friends were the sons and daughters of Grand Lake Guides. A boy growing up in this part of Maine lives a life of hunting and fishing. Alvah’s dream, as a youth, was to become a Grand Lake Guide when he was an adult.
He was a buck sergeant in an unpopular conflict, Vietnam. He was drafted before he could fulfill his wish, and served in an engineer battalion located at Marble Mountain, south of Da Nang. His mission was to rebuild dozers, cranes and other heavy equipment damaged during combat. There was a POW camp across from his living quarters. Most of his buddies were infected with the Agent Orange defoliant and eventually died from different forms of cancer. Alvah was lucky to not become infected. He survived to stay in the Army for twenty years. After service in Germany, he mustered out in 1985 with an E-7 rank.
He and his wife, Robin, bought a camp on Grand Lake, and Alvah added five bedrooms for his kids. That next year, his dream turned into a reality when he became a Registered Maine Guide. In the tradition of other guides, he’s always called his sportsmen clients, ‘sports,’ and felt that if they were satisfied with his efforts to make them happy, they would return to him every year. He remembers a cadre of older guides like Ollie White, Val and Pop Moore, Warren Berry, Earl Bonness, Hazen Bagley, Kenny Wheaton, Les Brown and others. They sat around the ‘liar’s bench’ at Weatherbys, and he listened and learned from them when he was growing up.
He told me during our interview, “I was just a kid, but I looked up to these old-timers because they were the epitome of what a Grand Lake Guide should be. They taught me what to do based on their experiences. When I went to help out on some of their trips, I took too much fishing equipment with me and tried to do more than my share in setting up a camp. I learned from those mistakes. With these old-timers, there was no wasted motion. They got right to the business at hand and put it all together like an artist’s picture. Some of them had a caustic tongue. I remember once a ‘sport’ asked a guide who was cooking, if he could have some fried potatoes, and the old-timer handed him a spatula and said the ‘sport’ could ‘make ‘em any way you want.’ While it was funny to me as a kid, now I want my clients to come back, and so I treat them with better customer service.”
Alvah loved his grandfather’s old, blue Bacon canoe, which had a 5hp Johnson pull start. He spent many evenings on Meddybemps Lake fishing for bass and spooning for lovely local ladies. His father had a ‘Pop’ Moore canoe and all through high school until he was drafted, Alvah couldn’t get enough fishing in the Grand Laker. When he started as a Guide, he acquired a canoe built by Sonny Sprague which was a bit larger than the normal pattern, and he used it for 16 years. Then, he graduated to a new design by Lance Wheaton which was larger, with casting platforms in the front and rear. It was crafted for a 15hp, 2 cycle motor, and the guide seat was padded. Its mahogany trim made it a craft of beauty perfect for his clients’ comfort.
Alvah then had his Masters license and an $80.00 a day wage. One night another surprise happened to enrich his life. He was asked to consider becoming President of the Grand Lake Stream Guides Association by a number of its members. The small village of Grand Lake Stream had an association which was mainly a social club for its members. Alvah had much respect from others in his occupation in the area because of his passion for fishing and the sporting tradition. He was elected to lead the group, and for 14 years he dedicated time and effort to sustain the future of the area. The group provided financial support to many worthy causes like the loon nesting study, the pro bear baiting effort, and The Downeast Lakes Land Trust, to name a few.
I asked him about the future of the guide in Maine. He said that it can be bright but the guides must pay attention to bringing customers back, and not killing fish needlessly. He said, “Many clients get a chance to hook a fish, watch it jump, maybe even lose it, but once it hits the frying pan, that opportunity no longer exists. Some younger guides don’t see the handwriting on the wall. I’d like the Association to address the fragile nature of our fishery and guard the resource more aggressively. Sportsmen come to this area because of the canoe and the quality of the fishing experience, and we must sustain it at all costs. We must yield to ‘catch and release,’ to provide that sport for others to enjoy.”
He said that in recent years less bass spawn and it’s important to stop that trend. Some visitors want a fish for lunch and that’s the place for pan fish like the perch, he continued.
Talking about his‘Grand Laker,’ Alvah said, “It gets banged up and I turn it over, repair it and paint it and it looks as good as new each year. This is the country where the canoe craftsman excels. You become intimate with the species and are part of the environment. Fishing the shoreline from my craft is a captivating adventure. There’s an adrenaline rush as a smallmouth bass climbs aboard a popper from some dark lair beneath the surface. This is wood-constructed canoe country and the tradition, the history of fishing from these boats, is a memorable, quality experience. That’s what propels it past aluminum, fiberglass or a composite, as the first, number one choice of our guides. It’s an important ingredient, not a noisy, impersonal partner. Our customers bring high quality memories home and cannot wait for the next season to do it over again.”
About the future, Alvah feels that he and other advocates for the economic stability of the region must be ever vigilant. There are many problems, and he talked about them with me. “The fragility of our precious resource should not be underestimated. We may have to give up some of our 100-year-old traditions to protect others such as the shore lunch fish fry, the law book limit, and a move to voluntary ‘catch and release.’ We must look beyond local customs of a basket of trout, bass, or even perch for dinner and come together, saving for our children and grandchildren. There are a host of ideas like substituting beef filets rather than fish filets, slot limits and trophy lake opportunities, which will let future generations enjoy this sport of kings.”
Alvah’s activism on the imposed slot limits on Big Lake, in the face of considerable opposition, and without scientific or biological support, has proven a key ingredient to keeping the lake a viable angler’s destination. He also feels the alewife issue of the 1990s, which is still being advanced by those fostering Atlantic salmon in both branches of the St. Croix River, is still a threat. They feel the alewife is necessary as a forage fish, while they have no compassion for landlocked salmon and smallmouth bass as the economic roots of the region.
Alvah said, “The solutions to fill our lodges with ‘sports from away,’ give our guides the jobs they need at rates where they can repair their equipment, feed their families, and have some level of a good life, must come from the collective wisdom of guides, lodge owners, historical society folks, village stakeholders and land trust representatives. We’re in this together and we have a stake in the future, and have to move to a path to preserve it for other generations.” Alvah Harriman’s passion for his world is infectious and his vision for the longevity of the guiding fraternity, its traditions, beliefs, and culture are a credit to the man and his lifelong work.
