The Edgecomb Historical Society will host Jack Sarmanian, collector and dealer of old hand tools, at the Edgecomb Town Hall, 7 p.m. on Thursday, October 25! You are all invited to hear and see Jack as he explains a sequence of hand tools from our forefathers' days, how they were used, how they evolved from simple equipment into sometimes quite intricate pieces of equipment! Note well: There will be no usual EHS meeting at the Edgecomb Eddy School at 2 p.m. that day. Instead, we will hold a brief business meeting before Jack begins his talk.

The last Damariscotta Farmer's Market for the summer of 2007 will be Friday, October 26, 9 a.m. to noon, on the Damariscotta River Association grounds. Help clear out their produce for your fall and winter dining!

Don't forget to pick up your pre-ordered Soup Group take-out supper before 5 p.m. at the Edgecomb Congregational Church on Sunday, Oct. 21.

On the afternoon of Sunday, Oct. 28, the Center for Teaching and Learning at 119 Cross Point Road will hold its annual open house, from 4 to 5:30 p.m. The public is welcome to tour the school, meet the faculty, and ask questions about the innovative, award-winning educational program. Please call the school at 882-9706 for more details, and be sure to drop by that Sunday afternoon!

Mrs. Kosky, who teaches music at the Edgecomb Eddy School, still needs some six-string guitars, electric or acoustic, for her grades five and six music class. Call the school at 882-5515 for details. Thanks in advance!

Busy week for Edgecomb. A Grand Salute to the Lobstering industry was enacted during the afternoon of Thursday, October 11, with 38 boats in nearly precision formation swirling the outlines of a typical coal barge, while protesters at the Wiscasset Town Wharf looked on.

This event heralded the regional meeting hosted by the Edgecomb Selectmen for municipal officers representing ten towns with a stake in the health, both environmental and economic, of the Sheepscot/Back River delta and Bay, with attendance from numerous concerned citizens' organizations. Steve Hinchman of the Conservation Law Foundation presented both facts and strategies for regions to protect themselves from potentially harmful industrial projects.

Stott Carleton emphasized the threats to the lobster and fishing industry posed by such projects.

Our great thanks to them both, to State Representative Bruce MacDonald for pending legislation to prevent or mitigate such threats, and to Roger Bintliff for extending us the use of his upper story dining room for the meeting. This is a vitally important issue. There is bound to be more in the newspapers, and probably in this column, as plans evolve.

I can report a happy morning at Fort Edgecomb, sweeping the floors, ceilings and walls of the blockhouse in the company of Andy Abello, Becky Benton, Sue Carlson, Jim McQuaide, Joe McSwain and my sister Anni Colby Black. Don't see her in a couple years, first minute she's here from California, I give her a broom! Such a homecoming!

And as we swept and probed damp places and consulted with Tom Desjardin, the State's Historic Site Specialist, who was on hand to spray the underpinnings for powder post beetles, we agreed to push forward on several projects aimed at but not limited to the Fort's Bicentennial this coming summer! Gosh! It's upon us already!

Plans underway include a Small Ship Event, a series of historical lectures on the Fort and the Edgecomb surrounds from the Post-Revolutionary and Federal Eras through the Civil War. The Bicentennial Day itself will be Flag Day, June 14, the whole day (if not the weekend) at the Fort grounds, to be dedicated in large part to our armed forces, both currently active, on reserve, and from the past.

Anyone with a serious interest in helping out with fund-raisers of several sorts, or with any of the above mentioned projects, do please let us know. I've named the 'core' names above, and you always know where to find me!

Meanwhile, Anni and I went on to sundry pleasant visits with old friends, old haunts, enjoyed our private fall foliage tour, and talked far into the night, or at least until we both fell asleep!

Reuniting at 234 River Road, 633-2978, jocam@midcoast.com .

This column appears in the Boothbay Register, The Lincoln County News, the Wiscasset News-paper, and at www.Edgecomb.org.