236 Cumberland Ave. Portland, Maine: Strange Happenings in our Young Lives

By Cheryl Blanchard

I would like to dedicate this book to my kids and all of their cousins.

Many of these stories are based on facts and experiences with several family members. Some are true, and some could not be true.

I would like to thank The Maine Historian for inspiring me to write about the house I lived in as a child and the whole neighborhood block.

Thank you for all your support on writing my childhood story, allowing me to share a lot of memories in a little girl's mind.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Newman Springs Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Dec 5, 2022
• ISBN: 9798887631196

Book preview

236

Cumberland Ave. Portland, Maine

Strange Happenings in our Young Lives

CHERYL BLANCHARD

Copyright © 2022 Cheryl Blanchard

All rights reserved

First Edition

NEWMAN SPRINGS PUBLISHING

320 Broad Street

Red Bank, NJ 07701

First originally published by Newman Springs Publishing 2022

Front and Back Cover Photo

By Moe Blanchard

ISBN 979-8-88763-118-9 (Paperback)

ISBN 979-8-88763-119-6 (Digital)

Printed in the United States of America

I would like to dedicate this book to my kids and all of their cousins. Many of these stories are based on facts and experiences with several family members. Some are true; some could not be true.

CONTENTS

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Chapter 1

The Block

Blueprint

Station Wagon

Airtight

Chapter 2

Satin Dress

The Sound

The Black Car

Fur Coats

Fire Escape

Chapter 3

The Chair

The Necklace

The Look

Tunnels

The Scream

Chapter 4

Silhouette

The Man

Red Eyes

Footsteps

The Spell

Chapter 5

The Protector

What’s That?

Blacky

Barrel Ass Out

Drums

Tippy Toes

Chapter 6

The Frame

The Blessings

The Door

Chapter 7

The Giving

Woodpile

Talent Seeker

In the Year 2525

Daddy’s New Job

Chapter 8

Hidden Talent

Pageant

Cleaning

The Gathering

Echoes

Chapter 9

Tambourine

Nonnie Nonnie New

Steel Guitar

Chapter 10

Lipstick

Swimming Pool

Balsam Tree

Dough Floggers

Wooden Box

Lilac Bush

36–24–36

The Boat

Nightmares

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I would like to thank the Maine historian for inspiring me to write about the house I lived in as a child and the whole neighborhood block. Thank you for all your support on me writing my childhood story, allowing me to share a lot of the memories in a little girl’s mind.

INTRODUCTION

There are such a lot of memories for a small child at the age of six along with five brothers and five sisters who were also very young. All of those memories are still living in the minds of all of us. We haven’t talked about them in over fifty years. I would like to thank the Maine historian for asking me about the house up over Botto’s Market that I lived in as a child.

He also asked me about the whole block as it is all demolished now. I looked at him and said, Are you sure?

And he said yes. I didn’t give him a direct answer. A year later, he asked me again. So I agreed to go home and write down everything I could remember back in that little girl’s memory.

As memories came rushing to my mind, all those emotionally traumatizing times in our young life, I had to set it all aside. I realized how overwhelmed my family and I had been.

I needed to take a break from all of the feelings that the memories brought back to me. I contacted all of my brothers and sisters and let them know that I was going to be writing this all out for the Maine historian.

They were all very happy. There have been a lot of tears from those memories. We haven’t spoken of any of this in over fifty years. It had seemed like a natural everyday life of happenings in our young lives.

As I was drawing out a map of the neighborhood, I just started typing out a lot of those childhood memories. I’ve decided it needs to go into a book. This is true family life, true facts of my family when we first moved into our great big apartment up over the Market.

At 236 Cumberland Avenue in Portland, Maine

236 Cumberland Avenue

Portland, Maine

Living up over Botto’s

Mark 1964 until 1971

Unexplained strange happenings in our young life

CHAPTER 1

The Block

There were a lot of old Victorian-style apartment buildings on that one block. There were seven very large apartment buildings and a sandwich shop called Victory’s Market. There was also the Botto’s Market, the Volunteers of America, and the First Baptist Church. They have all been demolished. It is all a great big parking lot now.

Across the First Baptist Church on Congress Street, there was a very large part of Lincoln Park where I spent a lot of my young life