Fendler to speak at Bangor museum

BANGOR – People still want to meet the boy who was “Lost on a Mountain in Maine.”

The subject of that book isn’t 12 anymore, he’s 81. Donn Fendler will speak, meet the public and sign books 10 a.m.-noon Saturday, Sept. 29, at the Cole Land Transportation Museum, 405 Perry Road. Books will be available for purchase.

Fendler, who lives in Tennessee, still returns to Maine each summer and often gives talks to school classes, his way of “giving back” to the state that rallied to support his family and help look for him during those nine days in 1939 when he was lost on Mount Katahdin.

With his Boy Scout training and a lot of faith, young Fendler eventually wandered out of the woods near a cabin in Patten. He never made a penny off the book he co-authored, but Maine teachers have kept it in print, using it in their reading classes ever since.

Fendler went on to marry, raise a family and become a paratrooper in the U.S. Army, retiring as a lieutenant colonel.

Last year, Fendler flew by helicopter over the area where he was lost, accompanied by Conservation Commissioner Patrick McGowan and Cole museum founder Galen Cole.

The 10-minute video made from footage McGowan shot on that trip will be shown at 9:45 a.m. Saturday before Fendler’s talk.

“It’s just a great story of will and determination,” McGowan said last year before the film’s first showing. “Donn said, ‘I remember that place, Wassataquoik Stream,'” as the trio flew over the terrain. “He just had unbelievable recall.”

“Such an inspiring tale he tells for young and old alike,” Cole said.