Poor memory works back through 2006’s main events

As Alice in Wonderland’s queen was fond of saying, “It’s a poor sort of memory that only works backwards.” Alas, that’s where I am as I attempt to recall the notable events of the year scheduled to come to a screeching halt at midnight tomorrow.

An Augusta convenience store was robbed by a poor planner wearing a football jersey sporting the number 89 in two-foot numerals for benefit of the store’s security camera. Although the man hadn’t also had the foresight to have his name sewn above the number on the jersey, the cops tracked him down anyway. They did not say whether the suspect was in training for a career in professional football, but judging from the sports news these days the stickup would seem to be a start in the right direction.

Engineers building a new bridge across the Penobscot River at Prospect-Verona Island worked from both shores simultaneously, hoping to meet squarely in the middle without having to apply copious amounts of duct tape at the last minute to make things right. That they succeeded spectacularly will be confirmed at today’s bridge dedication ceremony and public perp walk across the gleaming new structure before it is opened to vehicular traffic.

Too many people whose profession involves talking on radio and television continued to drive listeners nuts in their fracturing of the language: “Ek-cetra” for “et cetera,” and “I could care less” for “I could not care less,” and the like. Seemingly, no reporter in print or broadcast had yet met the fire that he or she couldn’t call a “blaze,” sometimes managing the feat in all five paragraphs of a five-paragraph news story. None had progressed to logically calling the apparatus that responded to each blaze a “blaze truck,” but there is always tomorrow.

The Bangor Auditorium celebrated its 50th year of hosting high school basketball tournaments, a tradition that began on Feb. 23, 1956, when Mount Desert Island defeated East Corinth, 72-44. “They waxed us pretty good,” recalled Ken Tate of East Corinth, who played in the game. No one argued the point. Still, Tate was happy to have been there.

Two University of Maine professors found that college hazing is common on college campuses, although many students don’t even know when they are being hazed. The researchers did not say whether clueless students may have been victims of mean-spirited sessions of dodge ball or tag in their formative years, or whether they simply became jaded from being subjected to too many politically incorrect fairy tales. But not to worry. Another study concluded that the kids don’t know a whole lot about geography, either, so things apparently are running about normal, after all.

Meanwhile, the excellence epitomized by a clued-in University of Maine Black Bear hockey team continued to make the state proud. The two-time national champion Black Bears made it to the Frozen Four national championship series again, where they lost to the Wisconsin Badgers in the semifinal round – sufficient incentive, the current team’s loyal fans hope, for another trip to the Final Four and a different result come April.

Bangor city fathers were obliged to consider drafting an ordinance regulating when kids can play basketball on neighborhood streets after a citizen complained that the present ordinance, which basically came down to cops looking the other way, didn’t seem to be working worth a damn. Nor, for that matter, did the practice of selling Maine lobster without tagging it as The Real Thing. Which is why the industry encouraged fishermen to affix a plastic tag to their product, identifying their catches as “certified Maine lobster” to distinguish them from the inferior stuff from waters beyond Kittery and east of Lubec.

Despite vows to smarten up, the national news media continued its over-reliance on anonymous sources; political campaigns bought more heavily than usual into negative advertising because it paid off handsomely; and everything that went wrong with the country continued to be laid to President Bush.

On a more somber note, death took its toll of outstanding citizens in the year about to exit, stage left. Outstanding among the outstanding in Maine was World War II Medal of Honor recipient Ed Dahlgren of Blaine. On the national level it was former President Gerald Ford, who had visited Maine a number of times before and during his presidency.

The grass-roots consensus, long before their deaths, was that humility was a prime attribute that made each an admired man of the people. It was a quality that enabled both to serve their country well while debunking the popular misconception that nice guys are destined to finish last in the attempt.

BDN columnist Kent Ward lives in Limestone. His e-mail address is olddawg@bangordailynews.net.