Anyone who heard the sound felt a jolt of fear. It was a “weird howling” such as to make their hair stand on end, the newspaper reported.

In 1899, residents in the New Vineyard Mountains feared the return of the wolf. They had been prevalent in western Maine until settlement by farmers who wiped out the animals as quickly as possible.

Legend has it that the last wolf was slaughtered near Norton Mountain some time in the late 1800s. Residents of the area were alarmed to hear the howling of a wolf in the winter of 1899. The correspondent to the Lewiston Evening Journal called the wolf “the most cruel and treacherous of all North American beasts” and boasted that “if much more of this night howling is heard there will be a battle in the woods some fine day.”

Wolves were a threat to one of rural Maine’s most important sources of meat. “The residents of that section are pretty good deer hunters and don’t want to see their favorite animal driven away,” observed the correspondent.

But the fear and hatred that wolves aroused went even deeper than that. Maine wildlife biologist Debi Davidson observed that historically, the “blood curdling” howl itself has been enough to strike fear in people’s hearts. And then there are the children’s stories: “Little Red Riding Hood,” “The Three Pigs,” “Peter and the Wolf.” In all of them, the wolf is a beast to be feared.

In reality, wolves are no more aggressive than other animals in the wild.

“Most of the time they run from you,” said Davidson. “You don’t see a wolf in the woods because they are gone. They see you first.” In fact, she said, in the lower 48 states there has never been a fatal attack on a human by a wolf.

“Wolves don’t run the deer population down,” Davidson added. Instead, they thin out the weak and sick ones.

Davidson worked on wolf recovery for 10 years. She is president of the Maine chapter of the Izaak Walton League, which promotes sustainable use of America’s natural resources. Wolf populations are recovering in some parts of the country, she said. To the north, wolves are now on this side of the St. Lawrence River and some have been spotted within 20 miles of the Maine border.

Luann Yetter teaches writing at the University of Maine at Farmington. Additional research for this column by UMF student David Farady.

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