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Home > Archive > Apr 10, 2008

Incident at Songo Locks
By Al Cooper
Back in the nineteenth century, when road travel was limited at best, getting Maine's timber out of the woods and into the markets which so desperately hungered for it most often depended on river travel. Legendary waterways like the Kennebec, the Androscoggin, the Allagash and the Saco became avenues of commerce with their storied log drives, connecting ports and commercial hubs with the Pinetree State's forested interior.
Sometime around 1847, it became important to connect the great waters of Lake Sebago in southwestern Maine, with the Songo river and the maze of rivers, lakes and ponds which flowed into it north of the town of Naples. To make the river more navigable for boat and barge traffic, a dam was built in order to fill the shallows below Brandy pond.  To make the step between the levels, a set of locks had to be build and operated along a lonely stretch of the river, and so the Songo Locks were born.
Little has changed over the years except that today's river travelers are mostly recreational boaters, seeking the adventure of slow scenic meandering through some of Maine's most beautiful countryside. The locks are still operated by hand, raising  and lowering the coming and going river traffic, one fifteen-minute lockful at a time. The whole procedure is complicated by the fact that a low bridge crosses the Songo just above the lock station, and if occasional road traffic happens to coincide with boat traffic, the old bridge – a swing bridge -  must be opened and closed accordingly. The bridge is also hand-operated.
The tour group of Utahns I was leading one lovely October day, were listening eagerly as the friendly lock master was explaining all of this to us in the parking lot adjacent to his tiny lock-side shack. So intent were we all, that the rather excited warning whistle of an approaching pleasure boat took us all by surprise.
“Can you folks help me,” he asked, with some exasperation. “I am all alone today!”
Four of us happened to be of the “guy” persuasion, and so we were quickly dispatched with precise instructions: Duane and Ian helped open and close the lock gates, while Darryl and I ran to operate the swing bridge out from over the waterway just in time to accommodate the approaching water craft.
It all went well, and we were still laughing about our unplanned interlude when we arrived, a half hour later, in North Conway, New Hampshire – a REAL tourist mecca, with five miles of “Factory Outlet” temptations. A world famous steam-powered railway also operates from Conway, and I chose to park our rental van in its expansive parking lot. From long experience as a tour guide, I issued specific orders as our group deployed to various destinations, setting an absolute deadline for departure. (I know all about the town's frenetic grip on shoppers.) As departure time arrived, everyone was back and ready to go; except Darryl. He was nowhere in sight. This was so uncharacteristic of Darryl's built-in sense of duty and timing, that we began to worry.
A long tourist train was slowly chugging its way out the the depot, and as the caboose passed by, there stood our missing traveler, crossing the nest of intermingling tracks in the switching yard.
“Where have you been?” we all asked at once.
“Well,” the unrepentant Darryl explained, “I was just standing here when this train conductor came running up and asked me if I had ever operated a train switch before. When I told him no, he said 'Well you're going to learn real fast; follow me.' The next thing I know, I have the job of switching that train that just passed, from one set of tracks to another. Sorry to be late!”
And so... in a single morning, we had operated the Songo locks, hand powered a swing-bridge, and manually switched a passenger train.
Guests who have been with me on subsequent tours no doubt wonder why I break into gales of solo laughter when we pass by a roadside sign pointing to “SONGO LOCKS.”
When not routing boats and trains, Al Cooper teaches preparedness classes and seminars for the Utah Department of Public Safety. His radio program, “Provident Living – Home & Country,” airs at 4 p.m. each Monday on KSUB 590 AM from Cedar City. He can be reached by e-mail at acooper@utah.gov.

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