Watchic Pond 1964

Before the coming of the White Race the land around Watchic Pond belonged to Sokokis Tribe of the Abenaki Indians. The occupiers bulit a fort atop the highest hill and disposed the original inhabitants from their farms. In 1844 the settlers dammed Stout Creek to expand the pond to its present size. I had been told in my early youth that my grandfather and his friends had dammed a Stout Stream creating the lake. Obviously my story seems to have a hole in it, but rather that than a hole in the dam loosing the tannin tea waters from the barrier. I have never seen an Abenaki in the town, but have felt their ghosts in the woods even though the forests are not ancient like the ghosts, bith Abenaki, Yankee or Canadian. My grandmother and grandfather on my father's side are buried on a bluff overlooking our old camp. my suster and brother-in-law have a camp a short distance from the dam. Most recently the Lake association approved funds to restore the dam's integrity. The photo is of my brothers and sisters reenacting the Titanic sinking in 1964 off the camp, which belong to my Aunt Sally and Russ. Every summer our family came up from Boston to stay a weekend, sleeping in bunkheads. Five of us ruled the pond. My youngest brother Michael Charles was too young to swim. The rowboat was unsinkable and providing hours of fun for us.