(Editor’s note: Looking Back is a new weekly column including news items reported 10 years ago in The Current, which is celebrating its 10th anniversary this year.)

Issue of Dec. 13, 2001

The Scarborough Police Department is warning people to look out for speeding trains in town, as the Amtrak service between Boston and Portland begins Saturday.

It means that some trains passing through Scarborough will not be going 30 mph, as freight trains do, but possibly up to 79 mph.

The only road-rail crossing in town will be on Winnocks Neck Road, but police Chief Robert Moulton said he is more concerned about people walking on the tracks elsewhere in town.

People often fish from the trestles or walk along the railroad bed, he said. Some parents encourage their children to walk along the tracks rather than use busy roads.

The increased train speed means people along the tracks will have less time to get out of the way of an oncoming train, but Moulton also warned of another danger: suction.

The train could be moving fast enough, Moulton said, that a 200-pound adult ten feet from the tracks could be sucked in and under the passing train.

The Scarborough woman who wants hunting banned in town says she will work to put it on the ballot next November. Sharman Kivatisky plans to collect the approximately 1,500 signatures necessary to get a referendum before voters.

On Christmas Day Richard Lindsey will get an extra gift: freedom. The 60-year-old sergeant on the Cape Elizabeth police force has served 30 years, literally half his life, with the department. His last two shifts will be Christmas Eve and Christmas night.

He has served four police chiefs under four town managers, in four different police stations around Cape Elizabeth. “It goes by quick,” Lindsey said.

And he has seen a lot of change in town. “This was all farmland,” Lindsey said, gesturing to the area southeast of the town center. He remembers when Wainwright Circle was a big potato farm.

After a lengthy discussion and several proposals by audience members, the Scarborough Shellfish Management Commission voted 6-0 to open the Jones Creek clamming flats every Saturday between Jan. 5 and Feb. 23. A public hearing would then be set for the commission’s May meeting on whether and when to open Jones Creek during the summer months.

The commission agreed to open the Jones Creek flats this winter because, according to a recent survey of the area, there were two and a half legal clams to every unharvestable clam. Not only were there many legal clams, the clams were also of good size, between two and three-and-a-half inches long. The survey consisted of checking 25 plots in and around the creek, said John Lyon, commission chairman.

“Books are Magic” was the theme for Wentworth Intermediate School’s library book fair. Everyday, classrooms visiting the book fair were asked to guess how many “magic” (jelly) beans filled the huge jar. A winner from each grade level was announced. Vanessa Matthews was the lucky person to take home the magic bean jar at the end of the week.

The library staff at Wentworth would like to thank the parents and others who purchased items. This was Wentworth’s most successful book fair. A big thanks also goes to the area merchants who donated prizes. These merchants were: Hannaford, Shaw’s, Wal-Mart, Burger King, McDonalds’s, Foodzy.com, Lois Natural Marketplace, the Dollar Store and Shirley’s Hallmark Shop. Gratitude also is extended to the following storytellers: Anne-Mayre Dexter, Bruce Spang, Supt. William Michaud, Marilyn Taylor and Jerry Peridy. Magic bean winners were: Katie Brett, Zachary Brown, Carla Burke, Max Erwin, Jenny Green, Emily Keenan, Trevor Kendall, Tom Makisso, Jessica Mitchell, Derek Moody, Stuart Roelke, Sophie Stewart, Laura Valentine, Sonya Walker and Joseph Whitten.

Door prize winners were: Margaret Van Note, James Publicover, Dana Dennett, Jennifer Ng, Carol Biheau, Jenny Snyder, Carolyn Bragg, Tressa Brown, Tracy Najarian and Stephen Wells.