MACHIAS — The Select Board presented the inaugural “Make Here Better” award Wednesday to the 50‑year‑old Machias Wild Blueberry Festival, with Festival Director Ellen Farnsworth accepting the honor.
The award was the brainchild of former Town Manager Bill Kitchen, who died unexpectedly in September 2024, and it was created in his memory.
“Before Bill passed away, he was working on an award to recognize good things around town,” Town Manager Sarah Craighead Dedmon said.
She read the award’s inscription: “Awarded on Aug. 26, 2026, in memory of Bill Kitchen and in celebration of 50 years of making Machias a better place to live, a better place to visit, and a better place to play.”
The festival’s website recounts the event’s history this way: “The Machias Wild Blueberry Festival began 50 years ago with an idea from then‑19‑year‑old Dwight Whitney Jr. He thought it would be fun to have a festival to celebrate the harvest of the blueberry crop. That first year saw a few vendors, some blueberry pies, and a few other events.”
That tradition continues to resonate today.
“It’s our flagship event and the crescendo of our summer, in my opinion,” Craighead Dedmon said. “Just that we have a musical every single year that’s written all about clams and blueberries is, I think, significant.”
Another board member shared a similar sentiment.
“The blueberry festival has been a part of my life every single year,” Select Board Vice Chair Ben Edwards said. “I like that we have this award to give.”
Machias residents will also soon see eight new “Discovery Tour” informational signs popping up at significant locations in town.
Claire Bailey, community engagement specialist at the Downeast Salmon Federation, presented the sign renderings and discussed the grant‑funded signs’ content with the Select Board.
The signs are “standard interpretative signage size,” at 3 feet wide by 2 feet tall, based on National Park Service standards, and their content will focus on community history, culture, climate adaptation and local ecology, Bailey said.
Three of the eight signs will be on town property — one at Bad Little Falls Park and two at Norm Nelson Park. One sign will highlight the 2024 flooding, and another will be a biographical panel about Norm Nelson, a community icon and veteran who served as a Machias Select Board member, in the Maine House of Representatives and as a Washington County commissioner.
“He was a regular part of the school,” Edwards said.
The park is next to the Machias River along Route 1/Main Street, between Bar Harbor Bank & Trust and Irving Oil, according to Craighead Dedmon.
The signs were also a collaboration with Washington Academy students, who conducted research and interviewed local business owners. Washington Academy junior and artist Acadia Thimlar painted images for the signs.
“It gives you a sense of a lot of important things,” Craighead Dedmon said of the signs’ content.
Edwards also applauded the effort.
“It’s great you guys are doing this,” he said.
The Select Board also conditionally accepted two metal roofing replacement bids from Williams Construction and Roofing Co. of Brewer — one for a new roof on the Public Works building and another for a roof on the 1898 Station, the historic train station.
The Public Works roof was bid at $10,630, and the 1898 Station roof is expected to cost $16,630. Both were the low bids.
The bids were conditionally approved based on confirming that funds are available and on Public Works Director and Road Commissioner Mike Schoppee’s list of proposed projects.
The Select Board also awarded a paving bid for a 900‑foot portion of Water Street in the amount of $27,000 to County Concrete & Asphalt of Columbia Falls.
The next meeting of the Machias Select Board is scheduled for 5 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 9.
