When Nancy Moody Genthner spent the night in a Massachusetts motel to attend a family wedding, she was shocked at the bill. “More than $100, just to sleep there for one night? I am too Dutch to spend that much,” she said.

Since 1927, Genthner’s family has been running Moody’s Motel in Waldoboro, where prices last year were increased $1 to $28 a night for a single and $34 for a double. “That’s because we put in cable television,” she explained.

Cable service was a big step for a motel which was built more than 70 years ago and prided itself on no-frills service with low prices. The combination proved popular among families along the East Coast, with several generations staying at the Waldoboro institution, just a ride up the hill from the “other” family institution, Moody’s Diner.

As the Moody family members get older and the next generation looks for greener pastures, both businesses face an uncertain future.

In 1927, Bertha and P.J. Moody built three small cabins on the old Route 1 in Waldoboro. They were one-room cabins with screened porches and a dry toilet out back. There was no running water, but a local firm took a jug of water to each new tenant, all for the cost of $1 a night, no sales tax. Central heat was a rarity in those days, so each cabin got its own wood stove. The Moody boys would take the wood around in a wheelbarrow.

Business was so good that the Moodys added two two-room cabins and two one- room cabins the next year. The price zoomed to $3 a night, which generated enough capital to add a drilled well, then a common shower and bathroom building. Eventually the number of cabins grew to 18.

There was no restaurant nearby, so the hungry clientele was sent to Brown’s Restaurant, under the Star Theater. By 1930, the Moody family figured out that they could feed the tourists as well as Brown’s could, so they bought a small house near the motel entrance and started serving breakfast and dinner. When the road was moved to the new Route 1 in 1934, the motel stayed put and the diner was moved to the newer, busier road, where it grew into a national institution.

The motel caught on from the beginning, offering a safe, country atmosphere. One customer described it as “going to grandmother’s farm.” One early advertisement bragged that “ice can be furnished.”

From the beginning, it was a family affair. “All the kids worked here. We kept cows and pigs and we had milk and eggs for the customers,” Genthner said. The worst times, said Genthner, were the World War II years when gas rationing killed any notions of leisurely drives in the country, or stays in country motels.

Debby Moody Bellows, Genthner’s sister, is running the motel these days. She remembers carefree summers when the same families would come year after year. She watched their children grow into new families and new customers.

“Some families would take the whole place for a weekend or a family reunion. The families came from all over the East Coast, New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania. One family made the trip from Austin, Texas, each summer. Customers would recommend the place to friends. Many times before families left, they would make reservations for the same cabin, for the next year,” Bellows said.

During July and August the basic cabins are full virtually every night. The motel is open from mid-May to mid-October.

“Families always liked it. There was a lot of room and the kids could play right outside the cabins. There are picnic tables and it’s quiet and safe,” Genthner said.

Moody’s is clearly not for everyone. There is no pool, no bar and no air conditioning. Despite the unusually hot weather this summer, there were few complaints from customers.

“It’s always breezy up here,” Genthner said.

The best part of the summers at the motel was meeting the out-of-staters, Genthner said. The same families came back year after year and the proprietors got to see their children grow up. But the worst part was being tied to the place 24 hours a day. If someone had a problem at 1 a.m., it had to be dealt with.

Some families called the country motel “the best-kept secret on the Maine coast,” Genthner said.

Pat and Dick Leyh of Spring Lake, N.J., were in on the secret. They started coming to the Waldoboro motel 25 or 30 years ago, after hearing about it from friends who had been making the pilgrimage since the 1950s.

“Every time they raised the rates a dollar or two, they would apologize. We would tell them that another dollar a night would not keep us from coming back. It’s so safe and reasonable. We take the whole family,” Pat Leyh said. “In mid-July we had three generations meet there. Six out of seven children and all of our 19 grandchildren were there. We sort of took over the camp with 34 people. We bring toys and games, play on the grass, then have a family picnic. It’s a great family atmosphere and it’s perfectly safe for the kids. I certainly hope it doesn’t fall by the wayside.”

No one knows what will happen to the diner and motel now that the original Moody family members are aging. The younger generation is more interested in education and higher paying jobs than the motel can offer, the sisters said. Despite the strong summer business, there is no plan for expansion or remodeling. “We are getting too old to put any more into it. Every year there is so much maintenance after the winter. We had to work on the pipes this year,” said Bellows.

It has come to the point that the family is thinking the unthinkable. “Every year for the past 10 we have thought about closing. I don’t know who will run it next year,” Bellows said.

Even the famous diner, with its overhead, insurance and Workers’ Compensation expenses is becoming a heavy load for the family. The next generation is just not interested.

Midcoast residents and summer visitors alike would find it hard to imagine Route 1 in Waldoboro without a Moody business — or two.