The American Legion Riders from Post 40 in Winthrop, Maine held their first ever Veterans Memorial Ride & Scavenger Hunt on Sunday, 20 September and if the many positive comments heard are any indication, it won't be their last.

The Riders of Post 40 came up with a novel idea.  A new and interesting twist on planning a fund raising ride.  Why not have the participants ride to various towns nearby, locate historic landmarks and monuments, record bits of information and return with their findings?  The rider with the highest score, wins!  Not only do you get to spend a sunny afternoon riding around the beautiful countryside of Maine with your friends, you get to exercise your collective investigative skills locating historic landmarks and monuments.  Not a difficult process given that you are provided with a map and very good directions to each point of interest.  It's a win/win!

The day was indeed perfect for a motorcycle ride in the country and our ride began at the American Legion Post 40 in Winthrop.  We gathered with our fellow riders, registered for the ride, received our map and directions and made our donations to the "Movies For Soldiers" program.  Can't remember the total number of movies donated on this particular day, but there were quite a few.

Small groups began forming for the ride and each rider's departure time recorded.  We would be meeting up with these other groups throughout the day coming and going from the various points of interest we were to visit.  It was like meeting your old friends over and over and....well, you get the idea.  It was great fun!

The first stop, the ride instructions led us to, was a small cemetery not too far from Legion Post 40.  There was something very special and unique about the monument we were to locate here.  Something many, myself included, never knew existed in the State of Maine. But so appropriate as we would soon discover. There in the front of the cemetery, standing along side Old Glory was the flag of France.  Not something one would expect to see in a rural cemetery in Maine. But there she was.  Swaying in the breeze along side our nation's colors.  There must be a reason for this display and indeed there is.  Beneath these two banners-of-freedom rests a small bronze casket.  Inside that special container is the soil taken from the graves of our soldiers buried at the cemetery at Belleau Woods.  Soil from this cemetery in Winthrop was taken to the cemetery at Belleau Woods and placed there in the same manner.

Honored to have been given the opportunity to visit such a special place, we gathered the information we needed, hopped on our motorcycles and eagerly headed to our second destination.

The day was warming and the thought of removing a layer of riding gear popped into our minds. The world and the road was ours.  Well, the road in any event. Here and there we spotted trees whose leaves were beginning to turn vibrant colors.  Indication that we soon would be planning our fall foliage rides and sharing those plans with our fellow riders.  Our next route took us to the town of Readfield and the next monument on our list.

Christine, Walter & Trina

From one monument to another.  One historic landmark to another we travelled.  Stopping long enough to record the required information, savor the moment and perhaps whisper a quiet prayer.  That excited feeling of discovery had us all in it's grasp.  Seeing something you had never noticed before, right there in our own backyards!
Trina Lloyd, taking a rubbing from a plaque honoring the sons from Mt. Vernon who sacrificed all. We discovered that a local pond we had passed had been named after one of the persons named on the plaque. That was a tough one.








After Mt. Vernon, we headed to Vienna, then onto Farmington.  We rode past the American Legion Post on our way to the park in the center of town.  There were a number of monuments in this park, including this one.  It wasn't on our list of "must visits" but I thought I should take a photo of it nonetheless......so I did.  No truer words were ever inscribed on granite.  FREEDOM IS NOT FREE.







After stops in Wilton, Jay, Livermore Falls and Wayne, we headed our motorcycles back towards Winthrop and the parking lot where we had started this ride earlier in the day.  There were burgers and hotdogs on the grill and cold drinks in the cooler.  There were also a good number of items that had been donated to be raffled off.

It was a great day, a great ride and a wonderful idea!  One simply never knows the amount of history that is in our backyards.  Not until we take the time to explore, investigate, inquire and discover.  Let's do this again next year Post 40!

Civil War canon in Livermore Falls



Registration                                             Post 40







Thank you Janie and Hawkeye for the collage of photos.