Higgins Beach was the subject of the Scarborough Historical Society’s March meeting. The speaker was Rodney Laughten, who is owner of the Breakers as well as president of the Society.

Rodney is an amateur historian and a collector of all things relating to the history of his hometown, and he has a wonderful selection of slides, many of them depicting old postcards. He shared his heartfelt memories of growing up at the beach.

His parents bought the Breakers in 1956 for $9,000, maintaining the practice of accommodating summer visitors that had begun in the early 1930s and which continues to this day under Rodney’s ownership. He talked of many happy days spent playing on the beach from Thunder Cove to the Spurwink River, and how all the boys knew that when the street lights came on, it was time to end their games and go home. He spoke of watching the remains of the coastal schooner “Howard W. Middleton” appear and disappear in the moving sands. I particularly loved his old postcard of the Conora, the tiny restaurant on Ocean Avenue that used to serve some of the best fried clams I have ever tasted.

Flowers and bugs

Members of the Scarborough Garden Club recently enjoyed two informative programs at their meeting place in St. Nicholas Church. In February, Nancy Atwell, National Garden Club Flower Show judge, presented “Basic Flower Arranging.” Attired in a gorgeous black apron adorned with red radishes, orange carrots, red tomatoes and a lime green turtle, she first described what it takes to become a judge in Maine, a regimen that includes three days of lectures and tests. She then amazed us with four enchanting flower arrangements, using carnations, lilies, asters, daisies, cana leaves and magnolia branches, all the while giving us useful tips on how to preserve cut flowers, choose the correct vase and other aspects of the trade.

In March, Dr. James Dill, pest management specialist for the University of Maine Cooperative Extension, drove down from Orono to tell us all about the various pests we are apt to find in our gardens. We learned about cutworms, aphids, squash bugs, cucumber beetles, tent caterpillars, gypsy moths, white pine weevils, white grubs, cinch bugs, Japanese beetles and many more pests just waiting to eat your vegetables, your flowers, trees and lawns. Excellent slides showed us what they all looked like and what kind of damage to expect. At the end of his fascinating and humorous lecture, Dr. Dill passed around a handout suggesting where to go to find solutions to all of our pest problems: PRONewEngland.org on your computer (PRO stands for Pest Resources Online).

A trip to colorful

Scarborough’s Senior WOW (WithOutWalls) provided transportation to the Portland Flower Show for a group of delighted seniors. Kudos to Portland for undertaking the show despite hard economic times – Boston and Bangor both declined to go ahead with their usual productions. It was a spectacular show with 16 beautiful exhibits and well over 100 vendors.

“My Marshview Garden” was a gorgeous medley of spring blooms – bright red and yellow tulips, purple lilacs, yellow daffodils, pink coral bells, blue hyacinths and white roses. I appreciated the neat little metal signs that identified all the plants in black easy-to-read letters.

“The Cozy Cottage” depicted a front-yard garden behind a white picket fence. On the porch were four Adirondack chairs, green and blue chairs to the left of the old-fashioned wooden screen door, yellow and orange to the right. A green canoe paddle stood on one side of the door, and an orange and red lobster buoy on the other. The garden mimicked these colors, moving from serene purple, blue and green flowers on one side of the seashell path, to bright yellow, orange and red blooms.

“Maine Mountain Retreat” featured an enormous, free-form stone picnic table that could easily seat eight people on its stone benches. China place settings with a floral pattern, gleaming glass goblets, and a bottle of dry mead suggested that a glamorous party was about to begin. A sun sculpture and a pyramid-shaped fountain completed the picture.

“Color ME” encouraged visitors to walk through a forest of plants and trees, including azaleas of many colors, cornelian cherry dogwoods and white lilacs. Hidden in the background was a red tent set up for the night and a nearby firepit held the remains of a feast of s’mores – chocolate bar wrappers, an empty graham cracker box and a torn marshmallow bag. Small stone birds and piled stone sculptures decorated the sides of the path.

I have mentioned only four of the exhibits – the rest were just as intriguing – and our group all marveled at the imagination and creativity displayed by our local nurseries, greenhouses and landscapers.

Spotlight on mystery

Every year, between the winter and spring semesters, Osher Lifelong Learning Institute, or OLLI, sponsors a “One Book-One Community” program.

This year, to my delight, a mystery was the book of choice – “A Fountain Filled With Blood,” by Julia Spencer-Fleming – and the author herself was the articulate, funny and completely charming keynote speaker.

Spencer-Fleming admitted to first being a lawyer and then the mother of two children who were born in quick succession. It was when one was in preschool and the other in kindergarten that she finally settled down to write mysteries. She knew she wanted to set her stories in a small town (Millers Kill in the Adirondacks) and that her heroine would be someone unique (Claire Fergusson, Episcopal minister and former army helicopter pilot). The chief of police (Russ Van Alstyne) provides the romance angle even though he is happily married!

Each of her books, and there are now six of them, tackles some kind of social question such as pollution, gay-bashing, or civil disobedience, and, of course, in each of them there is a murder, or two or three. Claire solves them all, working with Russ, and the author does a superb job of making sure that the plots are logical and the murderers obvious, providing you spot every clue. If you decide to indulge in one of these enthralling mysteries, my advice is to start out with No. 1, “In the Bleak Midwinter” – and settle back for a great read.