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History: Guides of Yarmouth: Spencer Harris
Spencer Harris
Spencer Harris now lives in Bloomingdale, N.J. and he owned Birchdale in 1960, buying the property from a group of businessmen. Mr. Harris is an engineer. In the rear of the main lodge was a room called the liars room in which the guides related their stories of the day. On the wall was a sign stating this to be the liars room.
At Mr. Harris' time of ownership there was a tame bear and at the rear of the main lodge was a small dump which the bear dug apart. A small line was tossed over a maple tree and attached to the line was a carcass of a turkey. This line was hauled up and down and the bear swung at it as if he were boxing. After a while the bear climbed the tree and got the carcass.
This story concerns a squirrel which got drunk on a crouton full of whiskey placed on a bird feeder, he swirled back and forth. One of the people there took a picture of the squirrel and as the light from the flash erupted, the squirrel turned head over heels and scrambled off into the woods.
One man, while bird hunting, saw his dog point and the bird flew and was shot, then the dog brought the bird to the man and he placed the bird in his pocket. Upon meeting with his friends they asked him what he shot and he pulled the bird from his pocket and placed it in his hand whereupon the bird stood up and let go his excrement and flew away.
Another time a man and his wife came to Birchdale to hunt. He complained that at all the other hunting camps the food was lousy and the guides drunk. This gentleman and his wife wished to go in a canoe so Mr. Harris said that was fine except they should be back for lunch at 1:00 p.m.. Well 1:00 p.m. came and no couple showed so Mr. Harris got in his motor boat and went to the end of Carrying Road lakes and found the canoe upset and the paddles floating in the lake. Well nobody was around and they went back to camp and figured on calling the R.C.M.P. and coming in view of the camp saw the couple who had walked through the woods to the camp. The man killed a big buck and the next day killed another deer bigger than the other.
Some of the people who visited Bichdale were:
F. Van Wyck Mason - author
Spryros Skouras - President of a Steamship Co. called American Export
Kendall - P
resident of Pepsi Cola and a group of Wall Street Brokers
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