WHITING (AP) – More than 70 years have passed since a dozen schoolchildren perished in a boating accident on an eastern Maine lake, but memories of the tragedy remain as vivid as ever for its last living survivor.
“I remember that as though it happened yesterday. I was 9 years old, and I am 83 now,” Miriam “Mimi” Kelley-Doherty told the Bangor Daily News.
Doherty was one of 15 children on board a 13-foot dinghy that capsized on June 9, 1936, during an outing on Gardner Lake that marked the end of the school year in Lubec. Three children and the operator of what came to be known as the “death boat” survived.
Accounts at the time indicate that sudden swells churned the nearly 4,000-acre lake, overpowering the outboard-powered vessel and causing it to either flip or simply sink. The victims ranged in age from 8 to 17. Six were from Doherty’s school.
The boat’s operator, Callie London, 55, gave trips to three groups of eager youngsters before setting out on the fourth and final run. Personal flotation devices were not required back then, and safety didn’t seem to be an issue since the boat stayed so close to shore. Most estimates say London was about 200 feet from shore.
“He (London) either went to turn the boat because there were too many in it … and go back to shore or the waves came in over it and flipped it right upside-down,” Doherty recalled. “Everybody was dumped out all at once. You didn’t have time to feel anything, you were in the water.”
Doherty couldn’t swim and struggled to stay afloat. Wayne Ramsdell, a Boy Scout who was onshore, swam to Doherty, grabbed her by the hair and pulled her up. Hearing screams as he was returning to the beach, her father removed a panel from a truck, floated it to his daughter and used it to bring her to shore.
Investigators concluded that London had displayed poor judgment but was not criminally negligent.
Doherty said it was 27 years before she returned to Pearl Beach, when she took her son Allen there to go swimming.
“I didn’t know if I would have strength enough to walk down from where I had to leave the car to Pearl Beach,” she said.
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Information from: Bangor Daily News, http://www.bangornews.com
AP-ES-12-02-08 1326EST
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