Building (and Returning to) Home in Quabacook / Chisapeak / Kinapekw / Merrymeeting Bay
Merrymeeting Bay is one of only a few inland, tidal, freshwater deltas in the world. It joins six rivers—the Kennebec, Androscoggin, Eastern, Abagadasset, Cathance, and Muddy Rivers—which drain 38% of the State of Maine. Its unique environment of wetlands and rivers has supported a number of human and non-human communities for millennia. At least 8,000 years ago, Native people fished for salmon and other species that were returning upstream to spawn in the spring. As sea levels rose and the bay formed, Wabanaki began hunting waterfowl that stopped in the wetlands on their migrations. Wabanaki may have also gathered wild rice that grew abundantly along the shores of the bay.
It might be possible to describe these millennia of changing relationships as part of Wabanaki “sustenance” practices, but this word does not capture well how Wabanaki understand their relationships.
Colonization challenged but did not erase these relationships and responsibilities. Colonists forced Wabanaki to abandon their homes near the bay. They built dams that stopped fish migrations, and they later built factories that polluted the waters and made fish and wild rice dangerous to eat.
“The term sustenance seems to speak to someone getting enough to sustain life. Wabanaki people don’t usually describe things that we need or want, we usually have words that describe our responsibility to others in creation.”
Amid these changes, Wabanaki continue to live in the region, and they continue to be in relation with its waters and lands. Pejepscot/Brunswick remains an important gathering place, where local Wabanaki gather with friends and kin from nearby communities such as Bath, Freeport, and New Gloucester.
Unfortunately, they have no space of their own to hold community meetings and celebrations here. Can someone here help them find a place in Brunswick where they can gather regularly—a place they can call home?
This research was compiled as part of the Pejepscot Portage Walk, which took place in Brunswick on October 6, 2024. For more information about this walk, click here.
For more research related to this area, click on the tags below. To download a hi-res version of the posters below for educational use, please contact where@atlanticblackbox.com.
This walk was a collaboration between the Pejepscot Portage Mapping Project and Atlantic Black Box.
