FARMINGTON – “Look at these,” Kenny Wing said, pulling a handful of jewel-toned arrowheads from his pocket and dropping them on a table inside downtown’s Soup for You.
Then, with a smile, he began describing how he made the points and where he finds or buys the multicolored rocks. He also talked about why he enjoys immersing himself in the craft of flint knapping. In this ancient craft of making stone tools, he tries to finish an arrowhead in as little time as possible.
If an Indian took a half-hour to make just one arrowhead, he explained, nothing but flint knapping would get done.
Wing, a 28-year Forest Service veteran, retired as district forest ranger for the Rangeley District in November after more than 10 years managing Forest Service efforts in the region and a lifetime of fighting fires. While he said he’ll miss both the job and his co-workers, he speaks almost effervescently about his plans.
“The job of anyone in emergency services has a certain stress to it,” Wing said Monday. “I was living next to the phone and that’s why a lot of emergency services people” retire early, he explained. “I want to do something else, travel and dabble in archaeology.”
Wing is certainly familiar with this life. He grew up in Eustis as the son of a district ranger, living in the Eustis ranger’s storehouse.
“Since I was old enough to grab a shovel, I’ve been fighting fire. I’ve been fighting fire since I was 10 years old,” he said.
Wing, who has had a passion for archaeology since his youth, wanted to go to school to study that subject. “But I had an adviser that wasn’t real keen on the deal,” he said. “It wasn’t one of those career moves, like it is today.”
So Wing decided to pursue a career in the Forest Service. “I always had this firefighting in my blood,” he said. “I said to myself, Before I do anything else, I’m going to try to be a ranger.’ It stuck. It was a good career.” He started manning a fire tower in Canaan, then worked as a ranger in both Norridgewock and Greenville.
“And then in 1989 I got my lifelong wish of moving home and being district ranger where my dad was,” in Eustis.
Wing said the Forest Service work has changed dramatically during his 28-year tenure, although the basic process of fighting fires and protecting Maine forests has not.
The acreage each district covers is about three times as big as in the past, Wing said. “When I got to be a district ranger, I had a district with about twice as much acreage as my dad.” By the time he retired, it was about three times what his dad had. His former district covers approximately 3 million acres.
Wing’s tenure saw technological changes ranging from the replacement of fire towers with surveillance plane flights to aid in the detection of forest fires to cell phone and radio communication.
“The better the communication, the safer your men are in the fire,” he said.
Ranger training is “drastically different” now, Wing said. Forest Service employees currently have “duties my father didn’t do,” the most time-consuming of which is “environmental law enforcement.”
For example, timber theft “has become one of the biggest crimes in the state of Maine.” To do their job safely and effectively, rangers must now learn about “law enforcement, forensics, court systems and then (educators) teach them how to defend themselves when some irate criminal tries to kill them,” Wing said.
Wing is looking forward to his retirement and has plans to travel the country on his motorcycle visiting archaeological and historical sights. He said he’ll miss his co-workers, though.
“I miss my rangers already,” he said. “This state is so lucky. They’re professionals, they’re dedicated, and they work for practically no money under adverse conditions to help the environment and save trees from burning.”
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