FORT KENT (AP) – Local businessmen, civic leaders and political officials are baring themselves in various activities for a 2006 fund-raising calendar.

For the calendar, members of the Fort Kent Lions Club posed naked while golfing, cross-country skiing, fishing, hunting, snowmobiling, four-wheeling and logging. Certain body parts are covered by tree branches, a snowmobile helmet, a fish, a snowboard and other selected items.

The organization is aiming to raise $70,000 with the limited-edition calendar.

During the weekend, sales were brisk at signing events at local nightspots in Fort Kent and Sinclair.

The group is the latest in Maine to pose in the buff for calendars to raise money for medical research, elderly programs and other causes.

A group of elderly women from Rylestone, England, set off a flurry of interest in posing nude for calendars after making a calendar in 2000 of discreet nude photographs of themselves in various housewifely activities. The women ended up selling close to 100,000 calendars and raising more than $750,000 for leukemia research.

The Fort Kent group has printed 3,500 calendars that sell for $20 each. The proceeds will be shared by the Cardiac Fund and the Edgar J. Paradis Cancer Fund at Northern Maine Medical Center, the hot-top fund at the Senior Citizens Center, and youth projects in town.

Paul Berube, the Lions Club calendar chairman, said club members were nervous about the project at first.

“We wondered who we would ask to take part, and then we had more candidates than we needed,” he said.

Among the participants were Police Chief Kenneth Michaud, shown wearing nothing but black police boots and his .40-caliber Smith and Wesson revolver, and logging contractor Mike Daigle, who is shown holding an antique chain saw.

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